How to create high-value offers your customers will scramble over
Are you a sucker for free samples?
I know I am.
I love the grocery store on free sample day. It’s like an extra treat to power me through the food shopping trip.
There’s just one problem…
I end up buying almost everything I taste.
I walk into the grocery store not knowing how lacking my life is without Baja Fiesta Doritos. But after one bite of the sample, I know I’ll never host another party without these crunchy bites of spicy heaven.
Marketers keep using free samples because they WORK.
Giving people a risk-free way to try a product is a fantastic way to get them to buy.
What if you could include this free sample strategy in your business? To give people a “taste” of working with you and encourage them to pull out their wallet?
There are actually two ways to do this that, when used correctly, are incredibly effective at generating leads and closing sales.
Taste test = high-value offer
In the marketing world, we use the phrase “high-value offer” to describe a taste test.
A high-value offer is something that’s so chock full of value, it’s almost impossible for a person to say “no” to.
It’s like walking around the grocery store and your absolute favourite type of food is being given away for free. “Would you like a free sample of this wood-fired pesto pizza with extra olives, Mr. Krauksts?” I wouldn’t be able to say “yes” fast enough!
The key to creating high-value offers is knowing your customer inside and out. You need to understand two main things:
- what your customers are struggling with
- what they want more than anything
Those two ingredients will help you design irresistible high-value offers, which makes it easy for people to say “yes” to the taste test.
Creating your high-value lead magnet
Your lead magnet is the second piece inside your sales funnel. It’s something valuable that a new lead can access for free by “paying” with his/her email address.
If a stranger doesn’t sign up for your lead magnet, you’ll lose the chance to warm them up and turn them into a friend (customer!) with your sales funnel. So this free sample needs to be a really enticing one!
The secret to getting people to opt in for your lead magnet is choosing the right topic.
Lead magnets that convert the best (meaning they get the most people to “trade” their email address to get the free report) are ones that solve a problem.
…And not just any problem. They solve a big, juicy, incredibly painful problem.
Let’s pretend a real estate agent wants to attract first-time home buyers. She knows that first-time buyers really hate the home-searching process. They’re busy and think it’s an annoying waste of time to scroll through new listings every week.
How can we solve that pain for them?
Let’s use my All Gain, No Pain lead magnet formula.
You’ll create a lead magnet that helps readers achieve a meaningful goal without something they dislike. It’s a double-whammy.
Just fill in the blanks to come up with your irresistible lead magnet title:
How to [[Benefit]] Without [[Pain]]
A great lead magnet could be: “How to Find Your First Dream Home Without Spending All Day Searching Through Online Listings.”
Boom! Busy first-time buyers would jump at the chance to read that free report, right?
Now that we’ve got your title, what goes inside your lead magnet?
The main thing is to keep your teaching simple. Don’t overcomplicate it. All you need to do is give your reader 3-5 tips to help solve their problem.
For each tip, share 2-3 paragraphs explaining the general nature of your teaching point. The reader may not have any experience with your industry so go back to basics and make this as easy for them as possible.
You want to write like you’d talk to a mate. Use a conversational tone and avoid industry jargon, acronyms, etc. to make it easy for a layperson to understand.
Imagine you have only 30 seconds to explain this tip to someone. What would you say? That’s what you should write in each section of your lead magnet.
And when it comes to your tips, don’t hold back! You want to share some of your best advice in this guide. The goal is for people to think, “If this is what they give away for free, imagine how great it will be to work with them!”
Type your teaching points into a simple PDF, designed with your brand colours. Add a few brand images or download royalty-free graphics from sites like Pixabay or Unsplash. And you’ve got your lead magnet!
Creating your high-value free call
After people sign up for your first “free sample” in the lead magnet, you’re going to take them on a journey using your email nurture sequence.
You’ll strategically share value, show your expertise, overcome objections, and then invite them to take the second taste test…
Your high-value free call.
At this point in the funnel, it’s time to take the conversation out of the inbox and onto the phone. We connect on a deeper level when we can hear someone’s voice and engage in real-time. So once you’ve given lots of value with your email sequence, it’s time for people to take the next step and hop on the phone with you.
Here’s the important part…
A high-value call is NOT a sales call.
A high-value call actually gives something away (tips, advice, or other information that will help your potential customer) before talking about how you can work together.
There are 3 reasons that high-value calls work SO much better:
- Everybody in the marketplace is offering free calls. “Free consult!” “Free quote!” “Free sales call!” But nobody likes being on the phone where they know they’re going to be sold to. Dressing up your call as an opportunity for people to get something of value will get more people on the phone with you.
- There’s no more powerful sales tool than sharing value and showing your expertise. Generosity is the best and most overlooked sales strategy. It’s much easier to close a sale when you’ve given something first.
- We don’t want to fill your business with just any customers…but the right customers. A high-value call gives you a chance to see if your lead is the right fit for YOU, too.
So, how do you create your high-value call?
First, you need to decide what you’ll give away. You want to share information to make a lead’s life easier, solve a problem, or help them take the next step towards achieving their goals.
What’s keeping your lead stuck? What’s stopping them from solving their problem on their own? What stresses them out or keeps them up at night? Address that with your free call.
You also want to be strategic and choose a topic that leads to a natural conversation about working together.
To help you understand this better, I’ll let you peek behind the curtain at Smart Marketing Success…
We talk about your business, your goals, and your ideal customer on the phone…and you'll walk away with your very own 12 month marketing & sales plan based on your business and goals. I’ll tell you exactly what you need at each step of the process to turn strangers into friends into customers.
Really valuable, right? Can you see how having your own Marketing & Sales Action Plan would make your life so much easier? You’d just need to follow the bouncing ball to create your funnel and start turning strangers into friends.
(Want to book in your free Marketing & Sales Strategy Call? Just click here.)
But this is where the strategy comes in…
When I deliver the customMarketing & Sales Action Plan, I also lay out the options for how Smart Marketing Success can help create the funnel. It’s a natural next step because most of our clients are too busy to do the work themselves. They tell us it’s actually really helpful to learn about our services — we never get complaints for being salesy at this point!
If it feels like a good fit to work with us, that great! If not, leads still walk away with a plan they can implement themselves.
These free calls are a way for us to do the right thing and give something of value. They’re not about being salesy or aggressive in getting a customer.
They’re designed so that regardless of what happens, someone walks away feeling happy, capable, and with a good feeling about Smart Marketing Success.
Because we’ve given a tremendous amount of value, people usually come back to us when they are ready to work together — so we know it’s a long-term win!
You want your high-value call to do the same.
Aim to keep your calls to around 30 minutes. You can really deliver a lot of value in a short window, when you plan it out.
And make sure you don’t forget to tie it back to your services at the end. Sharing value is great. But at this point in the funnel, you’ve already given so much away for free. You’ve earned the right to talk about your services and educate a lead about how you could work together.
The secret sauce underneath an irresistible lead magnet and free call? Knowing your customer.
If you understand what keeps him/her up at night, you can design high-value offers that are tastier than Baja Fiesta Doritos. (And that’s saying something.)
And if you want to see a high-value call in action…