Your prospect wants a clear solution — it will make them happy to give you money…

In selling, there’s practically nothing more powerful than clarity.  Clarity that your product or service will solve your prospect’s problem.

With clarity, it makes it easy for them to buy.

With clarity, it makes it easy for you to sell.

With clarity, it makes them happy to give you money.

If you have a clear solution to their problem…  Even better, a clearly-superior solution…  And can share the clarity and your confidence…  They will readily buy and be happy to do so.

True story…

In the middle of this whole coronavirus outbreak, our garage door spring broke.

Now, I’m reasonably confident at DIY home repairs.

I sometimes do them.

Sometimes we pay people.

I’m not of the school where I refuse to get my hands dirty.  It’s just not how we roll in our family.

So I was trying to figure out what to do.

This was a new repair for me — and a new challenge.

I’ve never replaced a garage door spring before.

And it turned out it was a bigger challenge than expected.

You see, you can buy new garage door springs.  And you can do 4 separate measurements to figure out what your replacement spring needs to be.

But I ran into a problem.

Even when I researched what the correct spring would be, it looked wrong.

The replacement springs all have a very specific bracket on one end.

Ours had a very different bracket.

In fact, our whole garage door mechanism is super-retro.

Our house was built in the early 1960s.  It’s mid-century modern, and we like it a lot.  In fact, our whole neighborhood has some special designation based on the architecture and design of the homes.

But with all that, sometimes you end up with strange building problems.

Like a retro garage door spring mechanism, that doesn’t fit modern hardware.

I tried to find a solution myself.

But the more I looked, the more I realized I’d have to hack together something.  And the less confident I became that I would be able to fix this in any reasonable length of time.

I called a local company to ask for help.

I talked to them about what was going on.

I asked for advice.

They told me what they would do, and gave me a rough estimate for them to do it.

I wanted to run it by my wife, so I did.

I thought maybe if I had the right parts, I could do it myself for about half as much.  But I honestly didn’t know what I was getting into, or if I’d end up with the right parts, or if I’d do it right.

And the last thing I wanted was to totally screw up our garage door.  Or, worse, not do it quite right and have the 150-pound wooden door come slamming down on one of the kids.

So I called them back and booked the appointment.

The guy came out today.

I talk to him about what his coworker said on the phone the day before.

He says, “Yeah, without seeing it, I’d say that’s what we need to do, too.  But it’s actually much simpler.  And it will cost less, too.”

I tell him to go for it.

40 minutes later, he’s done.

Rather than replace the whole get-up, he adds a bracket in the middle, to mount the new spring.

Way less hardware.

Way less work.

Way less expense.

A crystal-clear solution.

All it took was a tiny bit more experience to create a clearly-superior solution.

Frankly, I could’ve done the work — once I knew the solution.

But what created a TON of perceived value for me in this situation was how quickly and easily he came up with his clear solution.

This is what your prospect wants most…

Frankly, piling on a thousand bonuses or all the other ways marketers “add value” pale in comparison to this.

Can you save your prospect time, effort, or money?

Can you give them clarity where there is confusion?

Can you show them the missing piece that, if they understood it, would reveal the clear and simple solution to their problem?

There’s an old story, often repeated in teaching about the value of consulting…

A factory’s manufacturing line comes to a grinding halt.  One of the machines is not working.  They cannot figure out what is going on.  So they call in the expert engineer.

The engineer spends about 5 minutes inspecting the machinery.  He pokes, prods, and peeks.

Then, he pulls out a hammer.  He taps the side of one machine.  Suddenly the whole assembly line roars to life again.

He pulls out his pocket invoice book, and writes an invoice for $10,000.

The factory owner flips out, “$10,000 for 5 minutes and a smack to the side of a machine with a hammer?!  Anybody on the line could’ve done that, for much, much less!”

The engineer waits a moment for the owner to calm down, and says, “The 5 minutes and hitting it with the hammer was only $10 of the fee.  The other $9,990 was knowing what and where to hit.”

That value is hard to argue with…

What machines would’ve been replaced?  How many hours of labor would’ve been invested?  And how many hours of productivity lost?

All for lack of the clear solution.

The expert’s value is in CLARITY…

I’ve just finished up the content for Milestone 1 of The Client-Getting Blueprint.

I will have it recorded and posted to the BTMSinsiders website by Thursday at the latest.  (Having a house full of kids and splitting my time to play teacher adds scheduling complexity for dedicated recording time.)

One HUGE value that I’m adding in that program is clarity.

While there’s a lot of bulk in trying to cover all the stages of building and growing a client business, my goal is be as clear with action steps to get through every single milestone.

For one, the entire course is structured around the 14 milestones you’ll pass in building a thriving client business — as I shared in this free video.

Although 14 steps or milestones may feel like a big number, having the path creates clarity.

If you’re using Google Maps, and you ask for directions to an address, every turn is important.  You don’t care if there’s 3 turns, or 14, or 41.  You just want to get to your destination.  And you know you need to make every turn.

But even within each milestone, there’s opportunity for clarity.

For example, Milestone 1 is built around defining your minimum viable offer.  That’s the very basic understanding of what you’re offering that you need to lay out before you can start having conversations with clients.

And I’ve actually broken this down into 4 key steps.

— Define your MARKET

— Define the PROBLEM

— Define the SOLUTION

— Identify the CLIENT

They’re in this order for a reason.  While most client service providers will have some level of understanding on all of these already, going through in this order and covering the details gives clarity.

Follow the directions to make sure you’ve chosen the right market.  Then, make sure you’re working with a problem the prospect wants to pay to have solved.  Then, nail down what solution you uniquely can provide.  Then narrow in on the clients in that market that have the problem and are ready for a solution.

Consider this on two levels.  One, my training is meant to give you clarity on these steps.  But two, this is the kind of clarity you need to be giving to your clients, when they hire you.

And it doesn’t matter if you’re fixing garage doors, or working with them on health and fitness offers, or helping them with financial plans, or helping them build their business, or one of the thousands of other industries that can offer opportunities for client businesses.

It’s the same process on the back end, to build your business to get and serve clients.

And on the front end, it’s the same fundamental sales pitch that works: I can give you clarity on how to solve this problem.

Learn more and get access to The Client-Getting Blueprint here.

Yours for bigger breakthroughs,

Roy Furr

PS: In the middle of all this coronavirus chaos, it’s worth noting that there are businesses that are still doing REALLY well.

One of my past copy coaching students was just getting wild praise in a Facebook copywriting group for a promo that’s doing over 500 sales per day this week.

Another copywriter/client combo that I hooked up and then did a copy review to help bring the VSL over the finish line just launched to some of the best conversion rates and earnings-per-clicks the company has ever seen on a new product.

And NEITHER are doom-and-gloom financial promos.

Some products, offers, and businesses are struggling, and will continue to struggle as long as we’re physically isolating ourselves.  I don’t want to downplay that or the health risks.

And yet, others are doing incredibly well.  People want service, leadership, hope, health, income, entertainment, distraction, safety, and basic necessities.  If you can shift your offer toward providing these, it will resonate.

Despite what you’ll hear on the 24/7 channels, Fear News and Crisis News Network, there is reason to hope.

The macroeconomic news will be bad.  But your microeconomic news — your finances and income — don’t have to stick to that narrative.

Not only that, the countries that are taking draconian measure like shutting down completely are “flattening the curve,” nearly eliminating new infections, and stopping the spread of disease.

I’ve even heard many reports from China, Singapore, and elsewhere of how the panic buying is long gone, people are coming out again, businesses are opening, and life is starting to return to normal.

Believe it or not, the best is yet to come.