How to pitch your service to potential clients without sounding overly sale-ish

As a service provider, pitching your services to potential client is how we get more sales. Be it through your website, email campaigns or direct marketing, one way or another you pitch your services to new customers. Sometimes you get the gig, sometimes you don't. When there has been quite the number of inconsistencies with your winning streaks, or none at all, it is that time you determine what your winning factors are.

As an #Upworker, I believe no other line of business sends more pitches than we do. Just recently, I heard a guy confessing how unafraid he was to burn his #Upwork connects. He basically shoots till he hits a target. This is the kind of trial by error the lot of us are engaged in today and its why we work so hard for little reward. We have no strategy, no definition of our ideal clients and certainly no idea what clients are looking out for in a pitch/proposal. If you have been in this table for as long as I have and would like a change, then read along.

Here are what you are probably doing wrong and the corrections you should make;

1. Have your proposal resonate with you

This is the first and most important rule in turning your mediocre proposals into job-winning proposals. Putting up a great proposal isn't as difficult as myself or anyone else must have made you imagine. After writing your #salespitch, try to see from the eyes of your client and see if you would love to hire yourself if the tables were turned. Since you wrote the #proposal, you might be thinking "Why wouldn't it, I wrote it after all". well, you might need to get off your head and act like you trying to actually hire someone for the role you are applying for.

2. Don't be you-centric

Hello,


My name is Jamal Jackson and I am a 20 year old designer, developer, blogger, and best-selling author based in Atlanta, Ga. Through my four years of professional experience, I have gained a good reputation for my exceptional design and usability skills, in addition to my semantically clean coding practices.


I have also written on web industry blogs such as SpeckyBoy Design Blog, Onextrapixel, UX Mag, and 1stwebdesigner where I also wrote a best-selling eBook on Responsive Web Design.


Through my years as a web professional, I have gained a good reputation for my attention to detail on the usability aspects of websites, my creative problem solving skills, and warm, and refreshing approach to my projects. As a front-end developer, I stand out because I am also a designer for one. So I understand both design principles and coding, which pushes me to strive in making my coding always come out semantically, practical, and in the most efficient way possible.


I have worked on such clients as AT&T, Realtree, Compassion International, Delta TechOps, Childrens Healthcare, and March of Dimes. In addition, I’ve been able to work on video conferencing apps whose parent company’s client list includes 75% of the fortune 100.


If you are interested in working with me then you can further learn more about my capabilities from my portfolio site, https://www.5alarmint.com, and you can hear what is being said of myself and work in the Testimonials section, https://5alarmint.com/testimonials.


Thank you for taking the time to read this and consider me for this position, and have a nice day!

Take a look at the above proposal. If there is anything consistent in it, it is the "you-centric". If you arent aware, the you-centric is simply when a pitch addresses you more than the needs of your client. Jamal talked about his age, experiences, skills, reputation and gave his port-folio. While the later is great, no client wants to hear about how according to you, you have a shining reputation or lengthy experiences. If you have experience, show it by resonating with the client's needs, asking questions that intrigue them and offer free advice on something they might need but aren't aware of.

In a nutshell, talk about a client's needs and not about your over qualifications, skills or experiences.

3. Keep it short

How much do you enjoy reading long sales pitch? you might, but then you'd be among the less than 5% of people who have the patience to read long proposals. The average man and your typical everyday client will skip your pitch at the sight of its length regardless of your most thoughtful ideas. Keep your proposals short and straight to the point. Avoid squeezing in unnecessary pieces of information such as your mother's maidens name, your date of birth, what some other client said about you, your years of experiences and others. Frankly, your clients do not care, at least not at that point in time. You will get the chance to tell him/her about your family tree when you hit their needs well enough on your pitch.

4. Display the right port-folio

Sending your entire port-folio directory might be good when you are not sure what your clients need, but it is awful when you are bidding for a project with specific needs. You are 40-50% in when you have successfully completed a similar job a client is looking to hire for. I mean why wouldn't he want to hire you. You seem to haven't just done it before but did it right in the past. However, your client might never get to this point if you do not follow the above steps.

5. Define your Ideal Clients

Well, this is should be the first thing to do before starting your journey on client pitching. When you do not have an ideal client list defined, no matter your skillsets, pitch, or experiences, you will end up frustrated in the long run. So, before anything else, define your ideal clients.

6. Sell your client on a phone call to discuss their project

Selling a potential client on a phone call to discuss more about their project increases your chance of winning significantly. Believe it or not, most jobs aren't won on the first pitch. Just like applying for office jobs and getting invited for an interview and still not getting the job, it's the same with pitching your service(s). After crafting a great proposal, you want to give a client the opportunity for an interview. However, instead of having a typical interview, this is where you tell your client more about what you can offer.

ACCORDING TO THE CRM BENCHMARK REPORT BY COPPER + QUALTRICS RESEARCH, PHONE CALLS ARE THE MOST COMMON CHANNEL USED IN MANAGING SALES RELATIONSHIPS.

More and more service providers today are utilizing phone calls in pitching to clients. It's a working method and one you should also utilize.

If you like this article, do like, share and leave your thoughts on the comment section so more can see it.