The secret to making a decent profit? Upselling
Every client you get costs money through marketing and getting them on board. Every freelancer knows that not all leads work out, even when we put a lot of effort behind them.
That’s why it’s super important to make sure you get your money’s worth out of the clients you do get. The best way to do this is through upselling.
Upselling involves a couple of key points.
1)Changing your mindset
The first part of being successful in upselling is to offer more than what the client wants. They may come to you for 3 articles or for a website, but you need to look at the gaps in their business and suggest more than what they may need.
Give what the client wants, but also makes suggestions on how they can grow the business. Present the idea you can offer more.
2)Pricing to engage
Last time, we talked about ensuring you had your costs covered. What you didn’t see me advocating was charging big fat prices for the projects. Many freelancers fall into short term thinking when it comes to pricing, like charging too much for a project or not thinking about the future.
Price to cover your time spent, but aim to be ‘perfectly priced’ rather than expensive.
3)Tailor the offer
Upselling isn’t the stock standard sales promotion patter. It’s a lot like lead generation. You need to notice what the client most needs and fill that need.
This is about relationship building.
Beyond the soft sell points, here are some of the ways you can upsell effectively
Writers
Offer a content plan (blogging plan) with websites
Push for retainers for blogs after successful one off projects
Suggest areas of improvement on a website when asked to write brochures that match the new brochure
Try newsletter and eNews writing as a regular add on post a web writing project
Offer an SEO review of a client or agency’s website to get future web writing work after smaller writing projects
Package up social media writing as a custom kit for newly launched blogs
Suggest grant and funding application writing to startups, NGOs and NFPs
For journal, online or print magazine articles, offer regular contributions and columns
Take health and technical writing from blogs through to producing pamphlets, newsletters, article series and so on
Case study writing can often be pitched successfully into a whitepaper, a print newsletter or larger grouped brochure or something for the end of year memorandum
Ghost writing can be pitched to PR
Blogging can be expanded to include writing what is needed for blogger outreach and doing the research of who to target
Writing social media content may become a social media plan
Writing marketing plans may also lead to strategy plans
How to upsell effectively
A couple of effective upsell techniques are:
Prior to the first meeting or brief, by assessing the clients current assets and suggesting further work during the call
Adding the additional suggestions in your proposals as optional quoted items and an explanation
Weaving in elements that may assist with helping the project that are out of scope within the body of work. For example, mentioning blogging and how it helps SEO in a copy deck or mentioning photography as part of a visual branding refresh
Taking note of the problems encountered during the project and offering solutions during the project life
An open door exit email after the project is finished that may suggest an element they’ll need
Making contact with the client at regular intervals to offer more updates
Making contact when significant events occur that may change the nature of their business such as a Google update, change to the law, new visual trend and on-trend change you may be able to navigate for the client
Keeping an eye on seasonal work and making the approach before the client books
Want more advice?
We can talk about this at your final call if you like. Just add it to the list!
Exercise:
Write down what you offer as a mainstay
Look for the cross over connections
What else out of what you currently offer could be used in an upselling situation?
How could you price the original offering and the upsold offering together?
What else could you offer to extend the job that little bit further?