How to Nail Your Offer Introduction

Colie: Hey y’all. Welcome back to another episode of Business First Creatives. Today we’re going to unpack one of the most important moments in your client experience, and that’s the offer introduction. Now, last week we discussed why some of your best fit leads might be disappearing on you, whether it’s delayed replies, overwhelming information, unclear next steps.

Sometimes you get a lead that seems totally awesome and they don’t follow through and say yes to your offer. But what if the way that you’re introducing your offer is actually the problem? Now there are a multitude of ways that you can introduce your offers and I’m talking about what happens after they contact you, because of course, people could have seen your offer on Instagram or your website, or if they’re a referral, they could have heard about how you work from their friends.

But regardless of how someone first sees your business. And gets an idea of what you offer. You still always have the opportunity to walk them through your offer and give them clarity and confidence. A different medium. And so whether you hop on Zoom and do a live sales call, or you record a walkthrough video, which replaces a sales call, which gives them all of the information about your offer and how you work, or if you use video, ask Chat to create a guided experience.

All of these are opportunities for you to connect with your lead at the same time that you are introducing the offer. And so today I wanna talk about how to prepare for this moment. Regardless of how you introduce the offer, what to say, and how to get a confident yes or no if your offer is not a good fit for them.

So the one thing that I wanna be clear on is that your offer introduction is more than a pitch. It’s the moment when someone decides to trust you with their time, their money, their family, their business, their memory. When done right, the offer introduction builds confidence and connection and can help you get them to say yes, but when it’s done wrong, it can derail even the warmest lead, which is what we talked about in last week’s episode.

Just a friendly reminder. This is not about convincing someone to work with you. It’s about creating a moment where your lead feels seen, informed, and supported so that they can make the best decision for themselves. The format in which you introduce your offer doesn’t matter as much as what’s included, so.

Before you hit record or hop on a call, I want all of you to take five to 10 minutes to do this. In order to prepare for your offer introduction. First, I want you to review their inquiry, their contact form, their text message, their Instagram dm, and pull out what matters most to them and identify what offer they’re inquiring about and what offer you feel like is the best fit.

’cause those are not always the same. The second thing that I want you to do is jot down a few examples or past client stories that align with what they need. And then I want you to think about how the conversation will go.

Now, we can have an entire podcast episode on whether or not you should be creating a sales script. I say no. I feel like most people cannot handle a sales script because if someone gives you an objection. That you weren’t prepared for. If the conversation goes even a little bit out of order, you get flustered and don’t know how to move the conversation forward.

So I really do want it to be like a list of bullet points that you wanna make sure that you hit. You wanna make sure that you’re answering their questions, that you’re talking about the investment, and that you always give them the next steps to book. You don’t need a script. You just need a path, whether it’s live or it’s asynchronous.

Okay, so if you are doing a live sales call, I want you to start it with a client led prompt, and that is what made you reach out now, or what are you hoping to get out of this experience. You always want them to start the conversation because that allows you to listen to their needs and figure out if you’re a good fit for them.

I say, people always have a better chance of telling you what they need if they talk about it rather than writing it. So even if you’ve asked them this on their inquiry contact form, chances are they’re gonna say it differently than they wrote it, and you are going to be able to identify different pieces that you can discuss and inform them about during this call.

Now even in video, ask if you are going to use video ask. First of all, if you don’t know what video ask is, go to my website and on all the main pages and all the shop pages and my course page, there’s a little circle in the bottom right hand corner that’s a picture of me. And when you open it, you can watch a quick 32nd video of me telling you who I am and asking you what questions you have, and then to respond to me, you can either make a video yourself.

Record an audio message or send me a text message. Now I am starting to get more and more people that are using video ask to get their questions answered rather than scheduling a sales call. And I’m okay with that. If you are getting your answers in an asynchronous manner and that is pushing you along and it’s getting me to the point to where I can introduce my offer to you, I’m good with that.

So whichever one you do, you know, do it well. So the second thing that I want you to do is that I want you to share your process simply this is not when you are supposed to go into every single detail of your offer, especially if you’re like a wedding photographer or you’re designing someone’s website.

You don’t need to give them the nitty gritty about exactly how you’re gonna do the timeline, how you choose where to put what, you know, how many different forms you’re gonna have them fill out. You wanna give them the broad stroke. What you are going to give them at the end of the experience is mostly what you wanna talk about.

The process to get there should just be an overview. The third thing that I want you to do, no matter how you are introducing your offer, is I want you to state your investment with confidence. Now, sales call, video ask.

Those are when you’re actually going to be saying it out loud, but you will find that some people are going to skip that personal interaction altogether and just send a proposal. And there are still tons of ways that you can do that on your proposal. Like make sure that you are giving them the information in a warm way.

Don’t just state the price and then ask them to sign on the dotted line. You have to give them information no matter how you are introducing the offer. The last thing that I want you to do is give them the next steps to book. The number one mistake that I hear people make related to a sales call is they say, and then I ask them if they want the proposal, and I’m like, wait, full stop. You are the one that is guiding this conversation, so you don’t need to ask them if they would like for you to send a proposal.

You need to tell them that is what you are going to do when the call ends. I like to say, okay, and I know that this was a lot of information, but within the next hour I’m gonna go ahead and send over the proposal and it is going to have all of the information that we discussed on this phone call and the next steps to book and confirm.

Your session, your offer, whatever. It’s, but don’t leave it ambiguous. And if you are sending them the proposal and the next step is to confirm services, sign the contract and pay the invoice. Tell them that on the call. Let them know that that’s the expectation. If you are someone that puts a soft hold on a date for someone for like, let’s say 72 hours.

Tell them that at the end of the call, you always wanna be clear but supportive. You want them to be informed and be able to make a decision with all of the information, but at the end of the day, you are in control. This is your business. And so I don’t ask anyone if they would like to take the next step.

I tell them what the next step is and then I send it. Okay, so this does beg the question ’cause I just made a big point of emphasizing that I don’t tell people at the end of the call, do they want a proposal? I tell them that I’m sending it. But when should you actually send the proposal? Because sometimes people ask, well, Coley, would it be more helpful if I sent it before the call and here’s my opinion on that.

If you send it before the call, there’s nothing wrong with that. If you send it after the call, there’s nothing wrong with that. If you decide that you want to only send a proposal and not do a sales call there is nothing wrong with that. I just ask that however you have your first conversation with them and introduce the offer, that you are clear about what the offer is and what the next steps are.

So if you send the proposal after, you will have the opportunity to tailor the details inside, depending on what you discussed on the phone. So a good example of that for me is let’s say that you were inquiring with me about. System set up and my proposal has testimonials from photographers.

Well, if I’m discussing it with you and you’re a website designer, I’m gonna go back in my little testimonial bank and I’m gonna make sure that before I send you that proposal, it has examples for other website designers that I have set their systems up. I wanna make sure that when you review the proposal, that it has information that is of importance to you and that you can see yourself in.

If you’re a website designer and all you’ve seen me do is talk about photographers, if I have set up anybody else’s website design process in Dato or HoneyBook, you probably wanna know that. That would make you feel more confident that I can create the systems that you are looking for. Now, if you wanna send the proposal before the call, that will actually give them time to review your process, review your pricing, and make a list of questions to ask you.

Neither is wrong, and if you are not sure which one you should do, I honestly say flip a coin. The next lead that you get, send it after the one. After that, send it before. Do it a couple of different ways until you figure out what feels best for you. Okay, now coming back to video Ask as a sales call alternative, I wanna tell you that I have been getting more and more inquiries that have started there and my conversion rate off of video ask is incredibly high.

Now, some people are inquiring about templates in my shop. Somebody is asking about the course and then other people are asking about the one-to-one services. I will say if someone is trying to hire me to do a full setup, it’s usually not starting on video ask. They are usually immediately booking a sales call, but for the others, maybe they don’t feel like they want to take a 15 minute sales call in order to ask me the questions that they need.

And so I think that video ask is really great. I just wanna give you a few pointers. Number one, I want you to start by asking thoughtful and open-ended questions. Let them know that there is no question that is too dumb. Let them know that you know, if they ask questions, that you are gonna send them back the information that they need in order to make a decision.

When you respond to them, I really want you to make it a video so that you are in fact taking the opportunity to make a human connection with them so that they can see your face and hear your voice while you are talking about your offers. And just because it’s on video ask doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t give them the next path to book.

Now, I will say I don’t automatically send somebody a proposal that has inquired on video ask. Um. That might be the one time where I actually say, and if you’re interested in taking the next step or if you don’t have any additional questions, I would love to send you a proposal. I do think that there’s a little bit of a disconnect if you’re talking to them in that asynchronous manner and you just show up in their inbox with a proposal.

Now, it could be that after you’ve gone back three and four times, if they are asking you questions that you know that you cover in your proposal, I might be more inclined to say, Hey, I just wanted to let you know. Check your inbox. I have sent you over the proposal that completely lays out my offer. If you have any additional questions, please come back to this chat and ask them.

I wouldn’t immediately respond to someone’s video ask with a proposal, but I love video ask because it is flexible. It is client led, and it still makes you feel like you, but you are answering their questions on their timeline. Okay, so the next time that you wonder why a lead didn’t book, I want you to ask yourself, did I truly introduce the offer or did I just send a link to pay an invoice?

And whether you choose to do a live sales call, a sales call replacement video, or a video ask Chat. Your offer introduction needs to feel personal, grounded, and easy to say yes to. Now, if you want help, fine tuning this process. That is exactly what my strategy calls are for. This is an opportunity for us to get on a call, look at your proposal, discuss what you’re currently doing in your offer introduction, and make the changes that we need so that when you introduce your offers to your next lead, you feel more confident in doing so.

So if you would like additional information on my strategy calls, there is a link in the show notes. Alright, I hope that you have found this episode helpful to think about how you are introducing your offer to the people who are inquiring in your business.

But that’s it for this episode. See you next time.