Three Ways To Set Yourself Apart From Low-Budget Web Designers
What makes you different from a low-budget, garden-variety web designer?
If you want to charge more, what makes you better than the lower-cost alternatives?
As you’re answering these questions in your mind, are you coming up with answers your clients would understand or are you coming up with reasons only tech people like you and I would appreciate?
In the next few minutes, you’ll discover three ways to set yourself apart from the low-cost competition by underscoring your value without overwhelming your clients with technical buzz words.
The key is to help your client understand why they’ll get better results (not just a better website) because of you.
The Goal Is To Win High-Ticket Clients
The key to building your own 6-figure business is not to crank out more “affordable” websites because:
- Generating that many leads is too time-consuming and expensive
- Your marketing budget is too small because you’re competing with Wix, Squarespace, Upwork, Fiver, and everybody on Facebook
- Cheap clients are exhausting, nit-picky, and demanding
- Nobody gets results because you don’t have the time to do anything meaningful
- It’s a moral challenge because your client could get the same business outcome for much less
The solution, therefore, is not high-volume. The solution is to go high-value.
But how do you communicate your value to your client without overwhelming them with technical details?
Here are three ways to differentiate yourself from all the low-budget alternatives. You don't have to do all three. You can mix-and-match these techniques. You'll find more leads and command significantly higher rates even if you just choose one.
Target Market
Simply picking a target market will go a long way to differentiate your business and set you apart from all the garden-variety web designers. For example, you’ll get more clients by saying, “I build websites for real estate agents” as opposed to just saying, “I build websites.”
The reason you get more leads simply by specifying a target market is that you’re tapping into the relational part of people’s minds. Saying that you build websites does not help the person you’re speaking with make the association between you and the people they know that you could help. As soon as you add your target market of real estate agents you have activated the other person’s mind and they can’t help but think of all the real estate agents they know.
As soon as you say, “real estate agents” the other person is going to start thinking about who they could refer to you and you don’t even have to ask. It’s almost an involuntary response.
Personal Experience
What about you gives you the expertise and authority to help the clients you’re targeting? To make this work, first, you have to target a market. You’ll never be able to create authority in every market. Nobody will believe it if your claims are too broad.
For example, you could say that over the last five years you’ve been a professional real-estate agent and, therefore, you know exactly what real estate agents need both in terms of their tools and marketing to generate leads, take listings, and sell houses.
Common Problem
Picking a job title or an industry is not the only way to define your target market. You can define your target market by a common problem that is shared among a variety of different industries.
For example, think of Angie’s List. Angie’s List has a very broad target market that includes plumbers, roofers, electricians, landscapers, cleaning services, painters, home remodeling businesses, and more. As broad as their audience seems to be they are successful because they solve a common problem that all of those business owners share. They generate leads for local service professionals.
When defining your target market based on a common problem, the key to success is to avoid the temptation to slip into describing the service you provide rather than talking about the problem you solve.
Saying that you solve the problem of providing websites for people who need websites doesn’t count. This is just another way of saying, “I build websites.” The key is to talk about the problem you solve while making sure you specify who you solve the problem for even if your solution applies to multiple markets.
For example, if you are an accessibility expert, you could say you develop accessible websites for online stores that that understand the importance of serving colorblind and visually impaired clients.
Summary
The whole point behind all of this for you to communicate clearly and quickly what makes you different. Ultimately, the reason they should work with you and the reason you cost more is that you deliver measurable results that your clients count on you for. By choosing a target market, supporting your authority through your personal experiences, and specifying the problem(s) you solve you are repositioning yourself as a high-ticket consultant.
Ready To Raise Your Rates?
If this sounds like the direction you want to go and you want to talk about exactly how to apply all of this in the context of your specific skills, interests, and clients let's talk about it. We'll get on the phone for about 45 mins and put together a step-by-step plan to raise your rates and find high-ticket clients.
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