How To Show Authenticity & Sell To Anyone!

As seen in the APeeling Magazine September 2019

I’ve always been told, “you make selling seem so easy! How do you do it?” The truth is, I never took a sales workshop or tried to be the typical used car salesman/woman, in fact I hate salespeople who act like that. I’m going to give you the golden key to connecting with potential clients and how to create the connection with them that will open to a sale.

I’ve worked in sales for several years and have seen and heard it all. Good pitches, bad pitches and absolutely horrible pitches. I learned from the mistakes of others and kept refining how I talked to clients, how I created a bond with them from the moment I introduced myself to them, and how I asked for the sale and created a really good connection with the clients, creating a “customer for life”. Ready to learn my secrets and how to start using them today?

BE THE EXPERT & ESTABLISH YOUR AUTHORITY FROM THE START.

The first step is to establish you are the expert in what you are selling, and your authority is valuable. Most people will think they need to have the “BIG client” to get any attention, but this isn’t always the case. If you’re a graphic designer, say who you have worked for in the past, what the goals were and how you achieved the client’s goals.

The point is the pitch needs to be real and have meaning to you, if you’re talking about someone you worked with, you will have positive emotions and you will light up while you are talking about the projects. This will create the connection with the customer and show you are authentic and know what you are talking about.

BUILD YOUR BEST WORKS THAT YOU ARE PROUD OF.

Here’s the fun part, find your best works you’ve completed. STOP being over critical (we are all guilty of this) that doesn’t help. It doesn’t matter if it was while you were in school, if you are proud of it use it. To add the special touches, find work that will relate to the type of work the client is looking for. If you don’t have any, create some, venture out to businesses in the local area and offer to do free design work to build up your portfolio, you never know these clients may turn into paying clients. If your new potential client is looking for business card design concepts, link in several images of business cards you’ve created. If they are looking for full marketing packages then put together examples of marketing packages you’ve done, create one image of all the marketing pieces you’ve designed with an eye-catching background that will tie all the elements together. To be clear, you must make it very easy for your potential client to see your work. Use the actual direct links to your work, if they have to jump through hoops, you’ll lose them.

K.I.S.S!

Keep It Simple Stupid! Everyone is super busy and has very short attention spans, you have about 3-5 seconds to catch their attention. If they are asking for a short summary keep it short if they are asking for detailed information go into a reasonable amount of detail, remember they are probably looking at this on their phone and endless scrolling is exhausting. My pitch is usually one or two short paragraphs with links. That’s it.

IDEAS ARE GREAT! DO YOU HAVE SOME? SHARE THEM!

I’ve heard from many people they were too afraid to share ideas in the worries that someone would steal them. Ever feel that way? I’m sure you have; it seems to be common among creative types like you and me.

Can I tell you a secret?

I’ve sent ground breaking ideas to potential clients, ideas I originally would have thought everyone else must have thought about or it isn’t good enough or I am going to sound stupid by suggesting this – who am I anyways?

Once I was able to bite the bullet and say to hell with it, I’m going to give this a shot, who knows maybe it will make me stand out and get me the gig? You know what? It did, time and time again. Think of it like this, would you buy something you haven’t tried on before, touched, felt? Give the client the chance to “try you on for size” give them the bone to chew on and send the idea you have, what’s the worst that can happen?

FINAL THOUGHTS.

The perfect client pitch doesn’t have to be long and it is not a test, it is the opportunity for you to shine in what you know best and give you the mic to talk about it. Just keep it short and sweet and to the point.

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Hannah Cohen is the Creative Director at FoxiPrint, where you can get high-end metal business cards and anything else you need printed.

www.FoxiPrint.com