1. I made it about me. There’s a difference between telling your brand story (thumbs up) and navel-gazing (thumbs down). Your ideal clients need to feel seen and heard before they’ll hire you. Talking exclusively about the benefits of your work while ignoring your ideal client’s worldview means you’ve lost them. If you don’t know how to speak to your ideal client, you are not alone. No one does initially.
2. I thought my program was for everyone. I thought my Brand Strategy Program was perfect for all entrepreneurs. This led to 30-minute consultations that ultimately wasted the time of busy business owners. That’s not cool. I apologize if that was you. Now I understand my program is for folks who are GREAT at what they do (they have an offer and they make their clients happy with that offer) but they’re not-so-great (yet) at talking about what they do. I figured this out by conducting 30-minute ideal client interviews with past, current and dream clients.
3. I thought I had to pretend to be something I’m not, DIRECTLY IGNORING WHAT science tells us about how human attention works: Different gets attention. Unique gets attention. Real gets attention. Be you!
4. I wasn’t clear about my values. As a result, potential clients didn’t know WHY they should hire me or WHAT they would get if they did. Increasingly, folks want to know there’s some overlap in a company’s values with THEIRS prior to engagement (another reason to do the work to understand your ideal client!)