Are You Using an Up-Front Assessment to Bring in New Clients?

by Bill Zipp  |  May 24th, 2010
Marketing


 

 
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Last spring I took a trip to one of my favorite Oregon cities, Ashland. Ashland is home to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and all kinds of delightful–and sometimes odd–cultural activities. I caught a couple of plays with my kids, enjoyed colorful street performers, and ate (too much) at the array of wonderful restaurants the city has to offer.


On the way home, however, a huge semi-truck sped past me, spraying gravel on my windshield. A star-shaped chip appeared in my line of sight, and, by the time I got home, a crack stretched across the entire windshield.


This is what marketers call a trigger event: a series of activities that initiate a buying decision. For most businesses, trigger events aren’t as obvious as a crack in a windshield, but they exist nevertheless. Identifying them and talking about them on a regular basis is a key to marketing success.


One of the best ways I’ve seen this done is offering a free up-front assessment to potential clients. Here are some examples:


  • For a web designer, a free website evaluation
  • For a coach, a free personality profile
  • For a heating and cooling company, a free energy audit
  • For a painting contractor, a free exterior home inspection
  • For a marketing firm, an free ad impact audit
  • For an insurance agent, a free coverage review


All of these tools educate a prospective client about the crack in their windshield and initiate a buying decision. Even better, it focuses the sales process on helping a person solve a problem that could ultimately hurt them, rather than persuading a total stranger to spend a ton of money.


What could you offer for free that would help prospective clients clearly see their need to use your products and services?

Bill Zipp

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Reader comments (6)

 

This is one of the best things you helped us put in place, Bill. Visual People now does free 3-page website evaluations for potential clients and Facebook fans/likers and we’ve had great success with them. They help us to have a better conversation with potential clients that, as you say, educates about a “crack” and gives people ideas for improving their web presence. Great analogy and great advice!


Jennifer Gardner | May 24, 2010

Nice idea, Bill.

Not too long ago I was hired to evaluate a client’s website. It was a fairly in-depth shred session — the site was/is in very bad shape — and I spent about 4 hours total, including preparing a written evaluation and reviewing the findings with the client. I got paid and that was that, as they had an in-house team ready to implement my recommendations.

Jennifer, when you and Ryan do your free website evaluations do you focus just on usability, design, SEO, or something else specific? Or is it more of a general evaluation? I think it’s a great idea… I would just need to resist the temptation to spend too much time on it!


Jeff Jimerson | May 24, 2010

Jeff, you make a great point about the downside of this methodology. There is an art to using it. We must give away enough information to show a person their need for our services, but not too much as to actually fix the “crack” for free (and they drive away). Also, as with any marketing tool, this isn’t a magic bullet. Nothing works every time no matter what anyone tells you!


Bill Zipp | May 25, 2010

Just started rolling this idea out Bill. So far, I’ve put in a lot of work into it with no direct return. However, the insights and content I generated from that exercise is now much easier to duplicate and has spilled over into work I do for other clients. Plus, it has fueled some blog posts. Certainly not a waste of time.


Matt Riopelle | May 27, 2010

Matt, good job getting started. Check this out as a free web evaluation tool: http://websitegrader.com/ . Could you do something similar for social media?


Bill Zipp | May 27, 2010

Jeff, our evaluations are usually about three pages and touch on design and usability, technical issues, content and SEO. They are pretty general – as Bill says (and as he instructed us) don’t fix the “crack” for free. Our goal is to start a conversation about what the client needs and it’s often a lot easier with some sort of framework to go by.


Jennifer Gardner | May 27, 2010
 


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