Not our timetable

- Hey everybody! Drew McLellan here from Agency Management Institute, this week coming to you from Orlando, Florida. You know, I just got off a live Q&A call with about 50 business owners and agency owners, and one of the questions was, "I need sales now. How do I get the buyers, the prospects to want to buy today?" And unfortunately, my answer to that person who asked the question is, "You don't." That we are not in control of the buying cycle. The buyer is. Until they have a need, until they absolutely are ready to take the risk, which is what any buying decision is, until they're ready to take that risk, we can't force them or cajole them into buying it. And so the best way is to start right now, if you haven't already started, to build a position of authority, to be a thought leader, to be incredibly helpful and useful to your prospect audience, to keep feeding them tools and tips and ideas that help them do their job better. So that on the day they're ready to hire an agency, now the sales cycle is super small, because they already know who you are, they already like you, and they already trust you because you have proven over and over and over again to be of value to them. Now the sales cycle can literally be an email or a phone call or a quick meeting, and they are ready to buy. But if you need to do that today and you haven't done any of that legwork, it's going to be tough. You're going to have to grossly discount your prices, you're going to have to chase aggressively, which means you're going to turn off a lot of the potential buyers. But if you don't offer them something so amazing, like a money-back guarantee or a 90-day trial period or a deeply discounted first project, none of which are ideal for you, you've got to let the buyer's buying cycle dictate when they purchase. So, start today if you haven't started. Begin to build a position of authority so you can shorten the buying cycle once they've decided they're ready to buy. All right? I'll talk to you next week.