That kind of content, the kind that’s honest and transparent, takes me far longer to write and publish than anything else.

Why? Because it scares the crap out of me.

Scary thoughts run through my mind. Things like…

What if we never see any enquiries ever again?
What if we’re so honest that no one wants to work with us?
Isn’t it best to get people on a call first to convince them what we’re worth before we reveal our prices or processes?

But you know what? None of my worst fears have ever come true.

We’ve published blog posts like, Why Are We So Expensive, How Much Money Have We Made From Free Website Critiques?, Why We Don’t Do Ad-Hoc Amendments, Top 10 Best Web Design Companies in Manchester and Why You Shouldn’t Work With Us.

On the face of it, it looks like we’re majorly shooting ourselves in the foot, doesn’t it? But in fact, by being brutally honest through our content we’ve managed to attract MORE of our ideal clients.

Still not convinced? Here are some reasons why you need to bring some brutal honesty to your business.

1. You’ll get found on Google

I distinctly remember when Martin told me he was going to write an article about the top 10 web design agencies in Manchester…and not include us.

‘Are you feeling alright?’ was my first response. ‘You’ve got to be kidding,’ was my second. There was probably a swear word or two in there as well.

But Martin, being Martin, stubbornly went ahead and has been smug about it ever since.

Back then, we were getting a lot of enquiries from people who just weren’t the right fit for us. They weren’t bad potential clients, it’s just they didn’t have the right budget or they needed a much larger agency. In the interest of good customer service, Martin wrote a blog post about other web design agencies in Manchester who he thought were great and would be happy to recommend.

Essentially this blog post was all about saving us time when responding to enquiries and delivering good customer service. BUT, this one article actually had another, more profitable side-effect.

What Were Our Results?

We received (and still do receive!) a lot of traffic to this blog post. We are ranked on the first page of Google for ‘Best Web Design Manchester’/ ‘Best Web Designer Manchester’/‘Best Web Design Agencies in Manchester’ and all associated keywords.

In fact, four days after we published this post, we received a phone call from a completely cold lead. Someone asked us to design their website on the spot, and they’ve been a loyal client ever since. That’s about 6K from one blog post (that we can account for directly).

They found us from typing into Google ‘Best Web Design Agencies in Manchester’. And they wanted to work with us because they valued our honesty.

You can see why Martin was smug.

How Can You Do This?

Think about what your audience will type into Google about your products and services and answer that question.

It’s that simple.

Yes, it might make you squirm a little. Yes, it’s scary. But if you’re answering that question and delivering the best customer service, people will find you on Google and you’ll blow the competition out of the water.

Of course, there are things you can do to enhance your chances of getting found, check out this blog post on how to optimise your blog posts.

2. You won’t waste time with people who aren’t right for your business

Before 2017, we were spending A LOT of time talking to people who just weren’t right for our business. This ranged from people who wanted a cheap web designer for a few hundred quid to people who wanted a full-service agency with £50,000+ to spend.

But it’s not just about money. We also spoke to people who wanted a ‘yes-man’ to do exactly what they asked or people who wanted an agency to update their website daily without doing anything themselves.

Now, don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with these particular clients. At all. They’re just not the right clients for us. But we were spending hours and hours each week talking to these kinds of people. They booked calls with us and sometimes we’d even get to the proposal stage before it became clear we were the wrong company for them.

That’s why we write articles like ‘Why You Shouldn’t Work With Us’, that’s why we talk about our pricing and that’s why we joke that we’ll never, ever wear a suit. We’re just not that kind of agency.

At first, writing this kind of content is scary. You’re putting yourselves into a corner. You’re drawing a line in the sand – this is who I do work with, this is who I don’t work with.

What Were Our Results?

Now we attract our ideal clients, and by that, we mean people who are the right fit for us, but equally, we’re the right fit for them.

How Can You Do This?

Firstly, you need to think about who you’re ideal clients are and who your crappy clients are. And I’m not just talking about clients with the right budget, I’m talking about clients you want to work with.

For us, that’s people who are quite happy to get their hands dirty with updating their website themselves, and people who want to hire an agency for their expertise (they don’t just see us as designers to boss around).

You need to establish the type of people you want to work with then use your content and your web pages to make it clear who you’re suitable for and who you’re not.

3. You tackle people’s objections

You know those little niggles you have when you’re purchasing something…‘It seems a little expensive’, ‘will this deliver a ROI?’, ‘will this really help me to x,y,z?’

Every time a potential customer visits your website, they have these same ‘niggles’.

You can do one of three things to tackle this:

1. Completely ignore them in the hopes that the potential customer just decides to invest in you anyway
2. Invest in ‘soft’ strategies that help give you social proof, essentially proving to the potential customer you are reliable and trustworthy. You can do this by showing reviews and testimonials, case studies and awards etc.
3. Tackle the issues head on through your content.

A lot of business go with option one. Some do two. Very few go with option three.

And yes it’s scary. Why is it scary, I don’t know? Maybe it feels like we’re shining a light on the perceived downsides of our products and services?

That’s what it felt like when we wrote the post ‘Why are We So Expensive?” Aren’t we just reaffirming a bad point to our potential customers???

Nope.

We knew our customers were asking themselves why we cost more than other web designers. It’s not as if by writing this content we were putting those thoughts in their heads. They were already there.

So, if those thoughts were already there, what did we have to lose by explaining why we charged more?

What Were Our Results?

When people question why we charge what we do, we simply send them that article. It essentially explains the difference between us and other agencies. And you know what? It does really well at converting those potential customers into paying customers! Just because we tackle their concerns head-on.

How Can You Do This?

Think about the main concerns people have about working with you. Think about…

1. What are your customer objections?
2. What are the reasons you’ve been turned down in the past?

Now, this can be difficult as often people don’t want to admit why they don’t want to work with you, either out of politeness or embarrassment (if they can’t afford it, for example).

This is where it’s good to ask your peers and other business owners what their objections might be for working with you. Once you have these objections, you can start writing content around that.

4. You’ll build trust and loyalty

This is possibly the biggest benefit we’ve seen in producing ‘scary’ content. Scary content is usually honest content. It’s saying something that others in your industry don’t talk about, or even hide from their customers.

Scary content is about delivering the best possible customer service, and in doing this, you will build trust and loyalty.

One of our scariest pieces of content was – Why new business owners shouldn’t spend thousands on a website.

This was based on our experience. We’d designed websites for excited new business owners only to find that a year or so later their business had changed direction. This meant they had to come back to us to tweak their website or even redesign it.

It occurred to us that this was a huge waste of time and money for new business owners. So we made the decision not to accept clients who were brand new business owners and recommend they invest their time building a website themselves first.

What Were Our Results?

Did we lose money? Yes.

BUT, this was only a short-term loss.

We’ve had several clients who originally took this advice and spent their time building their business and website only to come back to us when they were in a better position to invest.

Our advice meant that when they were ready, they came back to us at a better time for them to spend money. There was no chance they were going to go anywhere else.

How Can You Do This?

This is about taking the decision to be better.

We know so many wonderful web designers but we also know the industry is rife with money-grabbing, crap-bags too.

We constantly strive to be better and make the right recommendations to our audience. Sometimes, this is tough, as it can feel like you’re losing money. But in the long-term, it works out better for both the client and you.

5. You’ll get traffic

Do you know what happens when you’re the only one in your industry talking about something? You get traffic. And tons of it!

One thing that people hate talking about is money (I think it’s a British thing). But, we all have a secret interest in it, don’t we?

We decided to share how much we’d made from delivering free website critiques in our Facebook group. The point of this article was to show people how they can make actual money from giving away free content. We used us as an example because we could see a direct correlation between our free website critiques and our sales.

What Were Our Results

This blog post received a lot of traffic and was shared a lot across social media. Other people said they were going to do something similar, even other web designers!

How Can You Do This?

My biggest fear was that I was going to come across as braggy. I didn’t want that.

So, instead of just saying this is what we did, look at how much money we made and aren’t we just ace, we broke it down. We said how we did this and why it worked, and we talked about how our audience could do something similar.

Just come at it as if you’re sharing something that works, and you’re wanting to help your reader do the same.

6. You actually sell

We’ve made a commitment to being open and clear with our pricing, which is why we have a pricing page on our website.

But this year, Martin and I sat down at the kitchen table and made the decision to increase our prices. Now, we could’ve just edited our pricing page and had done with it, but we wanted to explain why we’re increasing our prices.

In an effort to be transparent, what actually happened was we outlined how we deliver value and a healthy return on investment for our clients.

What were our results?

As a result of that blog post, three people confirmed they wanted us to design their website for them, resulting in over £15,000 worth of sales.

How can you do the same?

If there are changes within your business – such as price increases, don’t shy away from telling people about them. Tell them, but explain why these changes are happening, what value you are giving and how it’s a benefit to your clients and customers.

But, even if your prices are going up from external factors outside of your control, such as the price of goods, explain why clearly. People get that costs go up and if you’re upfront about it, you will gain (most) people’s respect and understanding.

To Sum Up

Scary content is exactly that, scary. Of course, there are massive benefits to you, as I’ve listed above. But ultimately, this is about your audience and what will be hugely helpful to them. If you put them front and centre of everything you do, you can’t go wrong.

We didn’t think of this ourselves (I wish we did). This all comes from the teachings of Marcus Sheridan and Chris Marr from Content Marketing Academy. It’s all about producing content that helps your audience make a better buying decision.

Your thoughts?

Have you ever produced a piece of scary content? What was it? And what were your results? We’d love to know!

Lyndsay Cambridge

Owner at Jammy Digital, Digital Marketing Specialist and Writer of Young-Adult Fiction.

jammydigital.com

The post If Your Content Doesn’t Scare You It Won’t Work appeared first on Content Marketing & SEO Agency | Get More Sales From Your Website.