What is an ‘Item of Value’ and how can you use on to grow your business?
Let’s take a look, although you may already have seen one or two on this and other pages of my website…
Why Do You Need An Item Of Value
First, let’s look at what an item of value actually is and why you need one to grow your business….
If you are a consultant, mentor, coach or other expert, like me, the chances are that no one ever wakes up in the morning and says that they are going to buy the services that you provide.
Why?
It is simply not how the world works.
“Right, off to buy myself a mentor”, your prospect says.
“Mentor, can I pay you to mentor me, please?”
“Yes, of course, that will be £1,000 a month please.”
“Excellent, here you go then, let’s get started!”
Sadly, that will rarely, if ever happen to you.
What will happen is that your ideal prospects will go looking for solutions to the problems that you solve.
For example, for my business growth consultancy, someone might head to their favourite search engine and type in “How to attract clients fast”.
What they are asking for is not me or the service that I provide but for help finding out how to get their next clients.
If they arrive at my website because I have written a guide about the very topic that they are looking for, they want the solution, not to instruct me as their business growth consultant just yet.
This means that if I do not offer them a solution to their problem, they leave my website and will never come back again.
That is not much fun for me or them!
They want help knowing how to find clients fast, and I KNOW that I can solve that problem for them, so how can I ensure that they do not leave empty handed?
I offer them an ‘Item of Value’ in exchange for their email address (their value in this transaction – giving up their email), so that they receive my Get Clients Fast guide instantly, and I then have the ability to keep in touch with them, continually offering more value about how to get clients fast, until they decide to book a ‘More Clients Now’ call with me and discover more about my services.
Seriously, if I had no downloads on my website, at best I estimate that my business would be 1/5th of the size that it currently is. At best!
My Software
I am always asked which software I use for collecting email addresses and how I manage to grow my email list more quickly than others.
This is what I use:
Click here to download my set up guide for both Aweber & Optinmonster:>>
I speak with dozens of coaches, consultants, mentors and experts every year (all of whom have gone through the exact process I outlined above – found my blog, downloaded my ‘Item of Value’, received my follow up emails and booked a ‘More Clients Now’ call) and the reason they are calling me and looking for new clients is because they have not gone through this process.
They have no ‘Item of Value’, no email marketing follow up and simply not enough clients.
If you are serious about mastering my Easy Life Client Attraction methods of getting clients coming to you, rather than you hunting them down, you must have at least one ‘Item of Value’ on your website.
And in case you are wondering, No, ‘Sign Up For My Newsletter’ does not count. That is all about you and not all about solving your prospects problems.
So, what does count?
Types Of Items Of Value
Here are some examples for different coaches/mentors/experts:
- Life coach – “How to master procrastination! Get more done in a day than you usually do in a week”
- Weight Loss Mentor – “Lose Weight Fast And Permanently. What they don’t tell you about cracking permanent weight loss.”
- Financial consultant – “How to save £10,000 per annum. Simple ways to save money in your business every month.”
- Business Mentor – “How to plan the perfect business exit for the best possible price.”
Your ‘Item of Value’ should solve the biggest problem faced by your clients.
Think about all of your clients now.
How did they find you and what was the biggest, common challenge that they all faced when they came to you?
Once you know that, what format should it take?
What Format Can Your Item Of Value Take?
- A PDF book
- A shourt video training course
- Access to the recording of a webinar that you have created.
- A simple checklist (people love checklists)
- A calculator – ie they input information and you output the results – e.g. personality type/profitability/amount of compensation etc.
The format is almost irrelevant, but you must make sure you offer them SOMETHING OF VALUE, or they will leave your website and never come back.
Once they have downloaded your ‘Item of Value’, what happens next?
Email Follow Up
Next, you put in place a series of 3/4/10 email follow up emails to keep adding value around your topic of expertise, each one offering a call with you at the end of it to provide them with some bespoke help.
That call is all about Serving Not Selling!
At the end of it, if there is an opportunity to work together, and you think they are a good fit for you, you outline their options.
No hard sell, just Easy Life Client Attraction!
Does Email Marketing Still Work
I hear this question so much, and if it is one of my competitors on a forum somewhere, I smile deeply!
It works like a charm, and as I say above, without it I would be lucky if my business was 1/5th of its current size.
Yes, some people will unsubscribe.
Yes, some people might email you and ask you to stop emailing them (because they can’t be bothered to click the ‘unsubscribe’ button themselves.
But those are an absolute minority.
The rest are your future ideal clients who will ask how they can find out more about working with you in the days, weeks and months to come.
Want To See This All In Action?
Hit the button below and see my entire process in operation:
Nick is totally practical and has a laser-like focus on getting his clients more clients of their own.
As someone with no marketing experience at all, his user-friendly approach made it so much quicker and easier to get started on getting work than if I had tried to do this on my own. I strongly recommend both the More Clients Academy and also Nick’s book, The Law Firm Growth Formula. I’m not a lawyer, but the ideas apply to virtually any professional business. Well worth your time and money!
– Ciaran McGee, Chartered Tax Adviser
