The Magnificent Seven - Reasons Clients Called

I wanted to understand the main reasons for clients hiring me so I looked through every documented client interaction throughout my career (what a fun weekend that was).

I expected to have a small list of maybe 2 or 3 reasons but what I quickly found was clients, when asked, had seemingly different reasons for hiring me. Many of their answers were long-winded ramblings that began for one reason and ended with something else entirely. After building a spreadsheet to organize client responses, I was able to identify a pattern; they all reached out for different reasons initially but when it boiled down to, “why me and not another consultant”, clients only had 7 variations:

1. Clients are experts (hopefully) at whatever the heck it is they do…the last thing they want is to become a marketing or advertising expert. They just want to hire an expert to help them get results so they can focus on their expertise.

2. Have you heard the expression, “I feel like I am working on an island”? It is natural to have a bit of fear when we are “going for it” so to speak and that fear is magnified when we are going for it all alone. Often, guidance and even some hand-holding are really what clients are looking for when they need help growing their business.

3. A little kick in the pants…no book, video, app or website is able to keep them accountable and help to motivate when they don’t feel like doing the work. But I sure am.

4. Everyone needs a cheerleader to lift them up and inspire them and my clients are no different.

5. Frozen in my tracks. I have personally been so lost when hiking that I froze. Not because I was cold or even scared. I just didn’t know where I was, where I was going, and how I was going to get there. I lacked clarity and I found business owners, when lacking clarity, just stop. “Facebook doesn’t work for us…I tried”. That is a lack of clarity issue….not a broken Facebook issue (I promise you, it’s NOT broken and I have yet to find a business Facebook can’t help when done correctly).

6. Ease of use put Apple, the iPod, iPhone, etc. in the position it is today…we don’t have the time to figure things out (at least that’s what we tell ourselves); business owners often time value time more than money and when advertising & marketing is easy (handled for them) and effective, they are happy as a pig in….well you know the rest.

7. Speed. Business owners know they will get the results a lot faster with my help.