Ah, summer. The season of weddings. And the time when stressed out guests scramble in search of appropriate celebration attire.
That was me about a year ago.
I had 3 – count ’em – 3 weddings to attend. And a closet full of ‘nothing to wear’. So, I went on an exhaustive search for the perfect dresses. And after 2 consecutive days of hunting, I found them.
About a week before the first wedding I realized I’d forgotten about the shoes. And, the thought of spending another 2 days anywhere near a mall was only nominally more pleasing than the thought of sticking my hand in a cauldron of boiling hot wax.
So, my friend told me to look up Zappos and a few other online shoe sites. Within about 1/2 hr, I’d narrowed it down to 2 different online stores and about 4 different shoes.
I sat, with mouse in hand, comparing these 2 stores. They both met the criteria I had – they could ship to me, they could do it fast, the shipping was pretty economical, blah, blah.
But, here’s the thing. I was kind of afraid. I’d never done this online shoe shopping thing before. What if I got the shoes and they were too small, or too strappy, or too tall? What if they made my feet hurt? Or, if I changed my mind and didn’t like the style after all?…
Then, I saw that Zappos offered something the other store didn’t…a pretty awesome return policy. If, for any reason, I didn’t like the shoes, I could return them – no questions asked – get my money back and return shipping was free!
“What have I got to lose?”, I said to myself.
And with that, I went back to my Zappos shoe search, found my favourite style and clicked “BUY”.
Zappos won the sale because they flipped the risk.
Let’s talk for a minute.
Come closer.
If I had a penny for every time I heard, “I don’t understand why we lost that project. We’re heads and tails above that other company”, I’d be on a very large boat right now…somewhere hot and far, far away.
In all likelihood, you lost because you didn’t solve your prospective client’s pain. As my son would say, you left their ouchie untouched and someone else figured out how to soothe it.
Your prospective customers all come with an array of fears: What if I look bad to my boss for choosing the wrong supplier? What if the supplier screws up? What if there’s someone just as good who does the same thing for less money? What if this company delivers something different from what they promised? Ugh – what if they’re horrible to work with?
Your job is to pacify that pain.
Sure, this can be done by being frickin awesome in the pitch, giving great ideas, showing that you’ve done this kind of work before, and all of that other jazz. Every time you drive home how capable you are, it’s like putting aloe vera on the wound.
But if you really want to take away the ouch…you can ALSO flip the risk.
Zappos did this by saying, “Hey, if you buy from us, you have nothing to worry about. If you don’t like the shoes, we’ll take ’em back and, heck, we’ll even pay for you to return them to us. Oh, and no worries, you have 365 days to change your mind. Ahem…and did we also mention that we have the most amazing customer service on the planet? Well, we do.”
They did this when all other companies said, “We have great shoes. But if you don’t like them, you have a week or two to make up your mind AND you have to go through hell on wheels to send them back to us…at your own cost.” The risk didn’t outweigh the reward.
It’s kind of like Zappos went through a list of everything that could prevent me from buying from them and removed the roadblocks.
I had NOTHING to lose by choosing them.
When your potential customer is sitting in front of 3 proposals deciding which supplier to select, whether they know it or not, they’re working through their list of pains. You need to know what those pains are and figure out how to pacify them.
Let me give you a few examples…
(Pain) I’m fearful of buying from this new supplier in case they can’t deliver / (Risk Pacifier) Money back guarantee
(Pain) How do I know I’m really getting the best price with this supplier? / (Risk Pacifier) Lowest price guarantee or Price match guarantee
(Pain) I’ve never worked with this company before and I’m not totally sure they ‘get us’ or can do the work / (Pain Pacifier) Complimentary initial assessment
(Pain) What if, after I’ve chosen to work with them, I’m not happy with their products or services? / (Risk Pacifier) 100% Satisfaction guarantee
(Pain) They’re more expensive than anyone else…but are they really worth it? / (Risk Pacifier) Forever guarantee
(Pain) …but what if something goes wrong? / (Pain Pacifier) Assurance guarantee (i.e. Lifelock’s $1M guarantee – “if you become a victim of identity theft, Lifelock will spend up to $1M to hire experts to help your recovery”)
Because working with a new supplier is a painful process.
When you take the pain away from the buyer and absorb it as the seller, you flip the risk and remove the roadblocks.
And that, my friends, may just buy you enough new clients to get on a big boat, somewhere hot and far, far away…