As we drive along the Rio Grande (for hours!) to my daughters graduation, I have time to reflect on recent conversations I’ve had with my coaching clients. One that stuck in my mind was on the topic of fear.
Let me share my aha with you.
My daughter is graduating from therapeutic boarding school and getting ready to attend a two year college in Idaho.
She is taking big leaps(!) and is afraid of relapsing and falling into old habits.
It’s a justified fear.
Many people in the landscape world however have unjustified fears holding them back, especially around price and making profits.
Here are some of the unjustified concerns I hear:
- We are gouging the client.
- We are the highest price in our market.
- We are charging more than industry standard.
- Our clients and prospects will bad mouth us and ruin our reputation due to our price.
These fears have no basis in fact.
Perhaps you tried to sell a bad prospect and they said your price was too high, and now that’s stuck in your head. Or you hang out with peers who have a poverty mentality, and they are sharing their guilt and fear with you.
Stay away from them both!
Your job is to educate your employees and sales people on the true value you offer. If they don’t buy it, neither will your clients.
Your Challenge: Hire sales people who love the challenge of selling, don’t just promote your technical people to sales because “they know a lot”.
Remember, your clients will often recognize your value before your people will. Your job as leader is to close that gap.
