How to Craft Services a Client Can’t Refuse
The reality of freelancing: you will offer similar services as other freelancers do. So how do you make yours stand out? How do you make your client keen on hiring you?
It is easy to think that you are selling your service as a freelancer. But what if we were to tell you, that is not the case? In reality, you are selling the solutions you can offer. A fun example of this is imagining purchasing food through a food ordering company (ex: Uber Eats). While sometimes you have all the ingredients at home, you are purchasing the food ordering service because you want to spend less energy and have more time. Often, we think about how we will feel when we have extra help — the feeling and the presented outcome are what hooks us in. You essentially want your client to feel the same. Here’s how we can do it!
How do you craft your services?
At the baseline, your services should be solutions to common problems for your target clients. If you have had clients in the past, what issues did they present? If you haven’t had clients, you can research clients online who are looking to hire freelancers with your specialties. You can craft a very basic list of services that would present solutions to general types of issues! Of course, these solutions all have to be feasible with your skillset. You never want to offer services that you cannot perform! You must remember, that they are hiring you (or your agency)— you must help them see the ROI of working with you (or your team), specifically.
What happens before and after your services?
One of the most commonly missed out opportunities, is looking at the services that would come before and after the services you currently offer. A good example of this is a social media strategist. Their work focuses on building the strategy, creating content, and posting on social media platforms. Before they do their work, they need to understand the brand's tone of voice and have clear copy/taglines to work with. They may also need a designer, to help build out any static (non-video) posts. The question to ask yourself is: could I offer these services? Sometimes the answer is yes — and sometimes you just don’t have the skills (yet!). An example of a service that could come after execution, could be along the lines of SEO strategies. For the content to be seen by more people, there needs to be someone on the back end helping with keyword research. Again, these are natural services that could be added to your service offerings.
Growing and changing your services
It is only natural that your services should change over time. The more you work with target clients (or even clients outside of your target industry), the more you can expand the services you offer. If a client approaches you in need of help, but you don’t offer that specific service, you should consider expanding a bit out of your current reach. You never know what will make you light up and interested in more. Over time, your services can be expanded by markets changing, specific client needs, and adding services that naturally work well with your current services.
The importance of having an offer
Part of closing the sale is having a strong offer! An offer gives the potential client a clear understanding of the end game of your work together. You must clearly understand your potential client's goals and concerns to have a strong offer. Your offer must speak to both of these elements! Maybe your client needs fast work (ex: work done within 1 week), or maybe they have a tight budget (ex: under $1,000). Since offers are dependent on these unique elements, this means they will change depending on the client you are pitching to. In this part of closing the deal, it is important to emphasize that you understand their goals, your plan to mitigate their concerns, and how you are a strategic partner in getting them to their goals. A tangible way to do this, is to create a case study (if applicable), to showcase how you can help them. The more a client can see, hear, or understand how you specifically will help, the higher the chance of closing the deal is!
Parting Thought
If you take anything away from this blog, it is that you are a strategic partner and that you are selling a solution. Your services need to be practical and based on the needs of your industry! Your services will naturally grow and change over time — so don’t worry, nothing is set in stone. You just need a place to start.
Make sure to check out our worksheet on building services. It will give you more tangible steps and things to consider (such as perceived value, time, money, etc.)!
