3 Steps to Turning Freebie Seekers into Paying Clients
As you’re growing your email list and social media followers with your free content, one of your main goals is to turn some of your subscribers into paying clients.
You may be wondering how to move people from being just a freebie seeker to becoming someone who invests in your coaching programs or other offers.
On this episode, we are covering 3 specific steps to put into place to enroll more people into your paid programs, and we’re sharing examples of each one.
STEP #1. Find out what your ideal clients want and find out what to do with the information you gather once you have it.
STEP #2. Invite people to work with you or join your group program (discover one effective ‘non salesy’ way to do this with ease).
STEP #3. Map out a customer journey that leads potential client down the path towards becoming a client.
If you want to turn more of your followers and subscribers into clients, be sure to tune in.
Let’s dive in!
It’s important to know some stats up front, so you can set some realistic goals. I believe it was Instagram expert, Jasmine Star, who said something like 95% of your audience will only consume your free content and that’s okay. Keep showing up and be there for the people who want to hear from you because you never know when they will be ready to work with you and you also never know when someone will refer you to a friend, even if they never work with themselves.
We find this to be very true in our businesses too – most people will only consume our free content, but when you know how to drive people to your paid programs, you’ll have more of them becoming clients or enrolling in your online programs.
This exact question was posted in my Health Coach Biz Support Facebook group for my live office hours, so I gave a very detailed answer that you can watch if you are in my group. Just go to the videos tab and you’ll see the replay from the Live office hours replay I did in April.
Here was the question:
How do you move people from “freebie seekers” to paid clients? I have both a group and a list that all came from opting into my free lead magnet. They come out in full force for free trainings, free downloads, etc. – but paid offers (even as low as the $18 offer I put out Monday) are literally crickets.
I loved this question because it gave me some good information. Her freebies are resonating with her audience since they are signing up for them so that’s great. Since the price of her offer was only $18, we can feel pretty confident that price is not the objection, so it’s something else. It’s usually a disconnect in how the offer is worded – meaning it isn’t clear HOW it will benefit them or how it will help them get from where they are now to where they want to go – the outcome or result. If people are confused or unsure of how something will help them, they aren’t going to dig around to figure it out, so they pass on it.
It could also be that the freebie topic and title was enticing but there was somehow not a direct logical connection about how the freebie topic relates to her paid program.
This is common because we don’t come out of school knowing how to write sales copy – it’s a process and it takes time to figure out what our audience really wants and what will resonate with them enough to take action.
When people understand the benefits and it’s a solution they WANT, money becomes much less of an issue. Saying “I can’t afford it” oftentimes means I don’t see the value, I don’t need that, or it’s not a top priority right now. People find a way to pay for things they really want.
Let’s look at 3 steps to turning freebie seekers into paying clients.
STEP #1 – Know what your ideal clients want (their desired goal, what problem they want fixed).
This is why it’s so important to do some research to find out what specific problem people have when it comes to your niche. You want to make sure your offer directly addresses the problem, and you are using words they use to describe the problem and the solution.
When you think about your ideal client, can you make a list of 3-5 very concrete and specific challenges, issues or struggles they have that are related to your niche? What are they saying to themselves or what are they telling their best friend? What words and phrases are they using? Go ahead and write them down. If you really aren’t sure, you can start out by looking at other social media accounts of similar niches to get some ideas. Look at the posts and questions you see to get some insights. Ideally, speaking to people one-on-one will give you the best information but start where you can.
If your niche is about balancing women’s hormones, your ideal clients may not be saying to themselves “I sure wish I could balance my hormones” but they might be thinking things like “These hot flashes are driving me crazy because I can’t sleep, and I can’t lose weight no matter what I try.” Your niche could be about balancing hormones in the big picture, but make sure the wording you use is what your ideal clients are actually expressing, so they understand how you might be able to help them solve the problem.
Here is where the wording comes into play:
- The name of the program or paid offer (is it specific and clear who it’s for)
- The benefit people will receive from it – what is the promise or expected outcome they will get if they go through your program? This will be communicated on place like your sales page, social media posts and videos.
STEP #2. Invite people to work with you.
If you have a freebie that is growing your email list, are you inviting your new subscribers to take the next step with you?
The next step could be to book a discovery call, enroll in a program or purchase a low-priced offer such as a high-value guide, recipe bundle or something else (priced under $30). Oftentimes, coaches aren’t presenting offers often enough and that’s a big reason for not getting clients.
One easy way to do this is to add an invitation in the P.S. of the first email in the nurture email sequence, and then sprinkle in client success stories in some of the other nurture sequence emails.
Back on episode 155, we covered The Missing Link to Turning Your Email Subscribers into Clients, and we highly recommend listening to that since we go into how to align your free offer with your paid programs, so you have more people signing up to work with you.
STEP #3. Map out a customer journey.
A customer journey is simply how people go from finding out about you to becoming a client, so there are going to be steps for that along the way.
This is a big one. When you share content on social media, do some of your posts lead clients to the next step in the customer journey? Before someone becomes a client, they will need to have several touchpoints with you.
Here’s just one example:
#1. They follow you on IG.
#2. They check out your bio and some of your posts.
#3. They join your FB group.
#4. They subscribe to your podcast or YouTube channel.
#5. They get on your email list.
This example was 5 steps but one of your customer journeys may be 3 or 4, and you will likely have more than one customer journey in place.
The chances of someone booking a call or joining your program from just one post, one video or one email is incredibly small, but when people get to know you more and see you and your content in multiple formats, it’s builds trust and familiarity which is critical in the customer journey.
We did a very in-depth episode all about the customer journey on Episode 132: Planning Your Customer Journey for Improved Client Attraction, and we’ll link to that in the show notes at wbpodcast.com/132
Let’s recap the 3 steps to turning freebie seekers into paying clients:
STEP #1. Know what your ideal clients want, so you can communicate that you have the solution.
STEP #2. Invite people to work with you or join your group program. Don’t be shy about it.
STEP #3. Map out a customer journey, and keep in mind that it takes time and multiple touchpoints with you before people invest.
Remember to be patient with yourself with all of this. It takes learning a bit about marketing and then you test, tweak and fine tune as you go to see what works. We are still testing things all the time.
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