Don’t Overwhelm Your Prospects

I remember when I was first starting my career as a VA 10 years ago – I would routinely overwhelm my prospects on our 30-minute free consultation calls. I didn’t do it on purpose, but over and over I could hear when I had crossed the line and felt their strong desire to get off the phone – quickly!

The problem was my fear that if I didn’t say the exact, right thing to get hired, they wouldn’t be interested in working with me. So every time they asked me a question, I just kept talking, and talking, giving example after example of my work to convince them that hiring me was a good idea.

What I didn’t realize was that it was working against me, many potential clients were heading for the hills.

Here’s how to avoid this problem:

1. Practice talking about your work. Write a script beforehand. Keep it short and simple, one to two sentences. And when you’re finished saying them, stop talking. Give the listener a chance to catch up with what you just said.
2. Keep your answers short. When your prospect, or a client for that matter, asks if you know how to do something, answer yes or no whenever possible. If they’re asking you to manage their calendar, they don’t need to hear stories about the last time you did this task. A simple, “yes, I’ve done that for clients before and enjoy it” is a good place to start. They might have additional questions about your technique, but let them guide the amount of information they want.
3. Don’t think out loud. When you’re in a consultation call with a prospect, even though it’s a natural impulse, don’t wing it. It’s better to say – let me think about that for a minute and then answer their question vs. talking off the top of your head. This is when the rambling usually occurs and the overwhelm.

It takes a while to get really good at 30-minute consultations with potential clients, but with practice, you’ll nail them. Remember, the goal is to make sure they’re a good fit, and not to talk them into working with you. By creating space for the conversation to happen, you’ll find yourself with clients better suited for you.

I could say a lot more about this topic, but I should probably stop here!

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A business workflow and productivity expert with 25 years of experience, RocketGirl Solutions Founder Belinda Wasser is hired by small businesses on a contract basis to act as their part-time, “business manager.”

In addition, she is the Founder of the VA Connection, a professional online community with the goal of educating and connecting independent virtual assistants around the world. Join her free online classroom here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/thevaconnection/