“How do you make more money? You have really got to build business with your existing clients.”
Show Segments:
Keep Them Coming Back For More
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Summary
Some say it is obvious - you can’t build a business on new clients alone. Doing new projects for previous clients is essential to steady growth—here’s how you do it.
Transcript
Renee: How do you make more money? That’s one of the toughest parts of being in business. You can’t do it just by calling on new client after new client after new client. You have really got to build business with your existing clients.
Betsy: That’s the secret. Repeat business. The key is to build trust with that client.
Renee: They have to believe that there is a quality product they are going to get from you and it is going to be done on time.
Betsy: You have to call clients, email clients, stay in touch with them with updated questions… simply asking how business is in order to hear what their current challenges are.
Renee: Some of the things I do are invite potential prospects or current clients to lunches, to speaking engagements, things that I know that might be related to their business or related to their personal interests so that I can engage them in conversation.
Betsy: Another good reason to call a previous client is to ask his or her council about how to constantly improve the quality of your service.
Renee: When you do that though you have got to be prepared to answer if you have made a mistake. You have got to be willing to take the criticism, turn it around into a positive and make it constructive about how you will handle the next project.
Betsy: Time is everything so you need to sell business to previous clients in order to save yourself time.
Renee: Anytime you take up a new client there is that long learning curve for them and for you. When you work with a client the second, third, and fourth time, it is more profitable.