YouTube video (speaker: Katie McManus) advising business owners—particularly those with ADHD—about which potential clients to prioritize. McManus argues that prospects who appear to 'need' you most are often poor targets because they either don't recognize the problem or have chosen not to prioritize fixing it; instead, pursue clients who already acknowledge the issue and have taken some steps toward solving it (the "low-hanging fruit"), as they'll convert faster and help your business grow sooner.
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Your ideal client is actually not the one who needs you the most. I know, I know. And before you jump down my throat, let me explain why. And hi. I help ADHD business owners make more money in less time with fewer distractions. I'm Katie McManus, business strategist and money mindset coach. The new business owners who've done the correct work to figure out their niche deeply understand the problems that they solve. And because they deeply understand the problems that they solve, they're able to identify and the clients or the companies that they are perfectly set up to help. And it's really tempting when you identify a person or company that you can help solve all their problems to want to sell to them, right? Especially if they desperately need you. But here's the thing about a potential client who needs you that badly. They've gone all this time without fixing this problem, which means one of two things. Either one, they are not aware that they even have a problem, in which case, your job becomes a lot harder because you're going to have to educate them that, hey, you have a problem, and here's the problem, and here's why you should hire me, and the fact that you're going to educate them and then try to sell to them. They're actually not even going to trust you with the education bit because you're just trying to sell them something. Or two, they're aware that they have a problem, but they don't give a fuck, okay? They've existed this long without fixing it. It is obviously not a priority to them. In which case, you trying to sell to them, like, they're never going to bite. They're never going to book a call with you. If they do book a call with you, they're never going to follow up. It is not a priority for them to fix this problem. So who should you go for instead? Let me explain this with a metaphor. Okay? So imagine you want to make an apple pie, and you have this apple tree in your backyard, and you go out and you're gonna pick apples, and you see the most perfect, luscious, gorgeous apples. And they're way up in the tree and they're way out of reach, okay? And you're eyeing them and you're thinking, oh, my God, like, I would love to make a pie out of those apples, right? So you're gonna spend a whole lot of time trying to get up into the tree, trying to get to these apples. It's going to be a lot harder for you, and you're gonna take a lot more time to actually make this apple pie versus if you were to go for that low hanging fruit that's really easy to pick. Remember, you're making a pie here, okay? So it doesn't have to be perfect. They're gonna be chopped up, they're gonna be baked mixed with sugar and cinnamon. There's gonna be a whole lot of stuff that can cover up any imperfections. You want to do the same thing in your business. You wanna go for the clients who are aware that they have a problem, who've already tried a few things to solve that problem. Maybe they've progress, they're 50% of the way there and yet they could still use some help. They're going to be your ideal client. And because they've already committed to fixing this, A, you're not going to have to teach them that they have a problem and B, this is a priority for them, okay? They've already proven that they're willing to spend money on it. They are going to be far more willing to spend money with you than the client who absolutely needs you, but has never prioritized fixing this problem before. And just like baking a pie with low hanging fruit, it's going to help you grow your business a heck of a lot faster, all right? Because you're not going to have to struggle as hard to get that high hanging fruit and you can get to baking a hell of a lot faster, which the metaphor means that you'll make more money faster. I hope you got that also. Now I want pieces.
