Hello, it’s Bill from Go Media again with our 30 Day Design Firm Makeover Course. I am really excited for today’s lesson!
In case you missed it, here is Lesson One.
Lesson 2: Your Services
When was the last time you questioned the services you are providing for your clients? Chances are you are pretty good at design and you are offering that to anyone willing to pay you. For example, a small business needs a logo, so you step up and use your skills to design them a logo. A cupcake shop needs a website, so you build them one. Easy.
But let’s take a step back for a minute.
What do you do?
Are you selling yourself as designer (or firm) for hire? Is your differentiator that your design or creativity is better? Selling “high quality design” just isn’t enough anymore. It’s getting harder to stay competitive and charge a profitable rate for your work when that seems to be what every other designer is offering. So what should you do?
Stop focusing on YOU
Many designers start out by developing their creative skills. They practice really hard and get really good at their craft. Then when it comes time to find clients, they advertise themselves as a great designer. That’s selling yourself, not a solution to your customer.
That’s starting with the assumption there are clients who already know the solution they need and are just looking for a talented designer to execute them. But there are SO many talented designers these days all saying the same thing – Hire me, I’m a good designer.
Designers wish their clients took their advice more. They say, “If they only listened to me, I know so much about branding and good design, but they always pick the worst concept.” They often criticize their clients for not appreciating good design or knowing it when they see it. This might be because they see you as a tool. A Photoshop lackey who makes things look nice. They see you as a person who can put colors, strokes, drop shadows, textures, and shiny things on a screen in the way they want it. But design is so much more than that and you know it.
Focus on your client
You can change this right now by tweaking your services. Change the way you talk about them. Try thinking of your clients’ deep desires and needs and start selling solutions instead of technical know-how or style. How can you use your creative and technical abilities to make your clients dreams come true? You need to get to know your clients and understand their hopes, dreams, and struggles first.
Take a minute and think about the problems your clients have. Is their biggest problem that they need a poster or brochure? Or they need a website that’s modern and trendy? Not directly. What they deeply want is more revenue, more freedom, less work, more customers, better customers, more clarity, more focus, etc. They likely have a vision or idea they are trying to communicate with their audience that they are struggling with.
That’s where you come in!
Sell solutions, not style
Instead of selling them your HTML skills, try selling them on the fact that you build websites that make it easy for them to create great content that will grow their audience. Or you will build them a website that makes it dead-simple to add products and sell them. Or the landing page you design for them will convert a lot of users. They’re going to save so much time and actually have fun with their site thanks to you. They’re going to have more freedom to focus on what matters to them and their website is going to work FOR them.
In summary, identify your client’s deep desires and needs. Create solutions for those needs based around your best creative and technical abilities. Figure out how to describe it in words your customers want to hear.
Example: “We are the people you call when stuff is hard to use.” Or “We build beautiful websites for startups.” Know what I mean?
Once you have that, you need to promote it, but that’s another lesson!
See you next time!
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