Have you ever wondered what it’s like to experience your own service from your client’s perspective?
Every interaction you have with your client, whether that is through your marketing, your website, an email, document or a zoom call is an opportunity to create an experience for your client. And by not having awareness around the experience you are creating you could be unintentionally creating confusion or missing an opportunity to build trust and connection.
When I mention client experience to potential clients, they generally want to skip to two things:
- Their client gifting strategy
- And how they can underpromise and over deliver
And here is why I think that is the wrong place to start when it comes to creating a signature experience for your brand.
While gifting is really lovely, and will certainly make your clients feel special in the short term, it’s not what they are going to remember. What they are going to remember is how you made them feel during every interaction with you, which is why you have to ensure you build a solid foundation (through your systems and processes) to help them feel seen, understood and guided throughout their time working with you.
And honestly I get it, all of my clients are incredibly talented humans, but they are also busier than ever – juggling work, life, being a human in this crazy noisy world. They are multi-tasking and wearing 100 different hats in their business, it’s no wonder things fall through the cracks, and they can’t seem to deliver a consistent experience to each client they work with.
They are so busy “getting the work done”, that they forget to gently guide and nurture their clients, they miss opportunities to work with them again and get trapped in a cycle of over-promising and under-delivering. And although their client might not notice it, they feel it and know they want to do better.
I also don’t believe in designing your client experience with the mentality of under-promising and over delivering, as this doesn’t serve you well in the long term and could leave you feeling really burnt out and overwhelmed. I do think that the statement of under promising and over delivering has value – in that you give your clients a better experience than they expected BUT at what point do you stop over delivering?
And do you actually have any systems and processes to help you over-deliver, or will you just keep trying your best, feeling the need to please people and “make your clients happy” even if that comes at your own expense or personal health?
I think it’s at this intersection that you have the opportunity to create an incredible experience for your clients. One that supports you as the small business owner AND YOUR CLIENT! It should never come at a cost to either of you!
To me it’s all about taking your client on a journey, lighting up the path, extending a hand, and gently guiding your clients towards the transformation or destination that your service can provide. While also taking into account your own needs, how you experience being in your business. Creating rituals and boundaries that support you in running a profitable, sustainable and most importantly an enjoyable business!
And the way you create this is by mapping out your client journey! And considering everything from your perspective and your client’s perspective.
How can you create an experience that supports both of you from the time a potential client gets in touch, all the way till you wrap up your service (and even beyond!)
I believe that by creating systems and processes that support and nurture the relationship between you and your clients, you can create a signature brand experience that will get people talking about your work. And most importantly will leave you feeling good about the work you do, and the impact you have made in your clients life!
An intentional client experience will help you:
- To feel more confident in the service you deliver to your clients
- Build trust with future, current and past clients
- Create an impact through the work you do
- Get more referrals, and not have so much pressure to market your business online
- Feel confident in your prices, because you know you deliver a high touch experience to every single person you work with
Now that you can see the importance and value of improving your client experience, you might be wondering where to start? The most important thing to know that a good experience is built on good systems, which is why through my signature Dubsado experience we’ll look at the way you currently deliver to find ways you can build trust, increase the value of your service AND give you the systems and processes to execute this strategy for every client (regardless of how busy you are or your energy levels).
If this really resonates with you and you want to find out more – head on over to see how we can work together. Or sign up to my newsletter where I share more tips on how I run a thoughtful & intentional business rooted in slow business values & principles.
