How Far Are You Willing to Go to Land a Sale?

Scotty Stevens asked me an impor­tant ques­tion. So impor­tant that I’ve decided to reprint it here, with his permission:

“How far would you travel to meet a poten­tial client, if they had the deposit ready for your ser­vices? My girl­friend thinks the cus­tomer is pulling the strings if they don’t at least meet me halfway. Before, I’ve always trav­eled as far as it takes, even if it meant dri­ving all the way to the cus­tomer, but is that set­ting a weak precedent?”

Good ques­tion, but it’s the wrong one.

“How far would you travel” is irrel­e­vant. A bet­ter ques­tion is, do they value your time? Do they respect it enough that they are will­ing to pay for it? In other words, are they will­ing to cover your travel expenses and pay for you to go out of your way for them?

If so, then I’d be will­ing to travel anywhere.

I would always con­sider trav­el­ling to meet a prospect if the project was large enough, and pro­vided they paid for what is com­monly referred to in this indus­try as “TMI” (i.e., travel, meals, and inci­den­tals). And in some cases, for my time, too.

(By the way, travel includes lodg­ing, and inci­den­tals include pho­to­copy­ing, long-​​distance calls, Inter­net con­nec­tion in the hotel room, car rental, etc.)

Plus, I would ask them for an advance so I can take care of my own expenses. I would avoid get­ting them to han­dle my trip on their end. I would want to have full con­trol over the choice of air­line, hotel, restau­rants, etc.

If you were dri­ving to meet them, then the client — or, in this case, the prospect — should pay for your gas, nor­mal wear-​​and-​​tear on your car (such as $[X] per mile), your meals, and any inci­den­tals. And lodg­ing too, if you were stay­ing overnight.

There’s a very good rea­son for this.

My clients are respon­si­ble for any direct, out-​​of-​​pocket expenses — whether they’ve hired me yet or not. It’s included in all my agree­ments and quotes. For exam­ple, I’ve had many clients fly me to meet with them before they’ve hired me.

Whether you’re a copy­writer, a web designer, or a graphic artist, you’re still a free­lancer. You are not only a mar­keter sell­ing your ser­vices but also the provider of those services.

You’re not a sales­per­son work­ing on com­mis­sion where your only job is to close deals — and there­fore, you don’t have the lux­ury of expense accounts or the abil­ity to write the trip off as a busi­ness expense against sales commissions.

As a free­lancer, your time is immensely valuable.

As the per­son pro­vid­ing the ser­vice they are buy­ing, by mak­ing your­self avail­able to them also forces you to be unavail­able to work with other clients, let alone to mar­ket your­self to find other clients. So the cost is a lot greater than just the trip itself.

That’s why, if the trip would be a con­sid­er­able dis­tance away or if it were to take longer than a one day, I would even want my prospect to pay for my time. And that would be $3,000 a day. Min­i­mum. For sev­eral reasons.

For one, they are pay­ing me to con­sult them. Even if it’s an attempt to hire me. Call it an “assess­ment” or a “needs analy­sis,” if you will. It’s still a consultation.

Believe me, a lot of clients try to get you to con­sult them for free, dis­guised as a “trial” or in an effort to see what you can do for them first. To me, it’s a dan­gling, elu­sive car­rot. Too often, these pre-​​sale con­sul­ta­tions are eas­ily abused.

A con­sul­ta­tion is a con­sul­ta­tion. Period.

I even go as far as to add a dol­lar value to my “free quotes.” Why? Because it not only adds value to my esti­mate and there­fore my time, but also pre­qual­i­fies them to a degree.

If you offer a “free esti­mate” and leave it at that, you are also com­mu­ni­cat­ing that tak­ing the time to ana­lyze their needs and pro­vide the esti­mate is noth­ing to you. There­fore, they’re left won­der­ing what else can you do for free. After all, “it was noth­ing,” is it not?

Don’t devalue your­self or the item you’re giv­ing away for free.

Some­thing that’s free is not really “free” if it’s not worth some­thing or oth­er­wise sold. It just is. But an esti­mate is not just free. It’s a gift, a con­ces­sion, an expense on your part. Rather than a free esti­mate, it’s a $[X] esti­mate you’re giv­ing them for free.

Big dif­fer­ence.

The lan­guage might seem a bit of a play on seman­tics, but it’s crit­i­cally impor­tant. In fact, if your cus­tomer is look­ing for a “great deal,” make sure they know it really is.

If you give some­thing away for free that’s always free and expected, then it’s worth­less. But if you give some­thing valu­able away for free, then it’s indeed a great deal.

Ulti­mately, I would never, ever, meet with a client until and unless they pay for my expenses. After all, if they’re not will­ing to at least pay for my expenses, then…

• They are unqualified;
• They are going to haggle;
• They will nit­pick my work;
• They will demand more, likely for free;
• And they’ll avoid pay­ing for reg­u­lar, project expenses, too.

Even if they don’t seem like they will be a has­sle at first, you want to stand firm. First impres­sions can often be deceiv­ing. Keep in mind, just as you’re try­ing to get them to hire you, the prospect is try­ing to sell you on them, too.

Many of my stu­dents have told me: “But my prospect seems gen­uine! They are will­ing to pay hand­somely if I go ahead! They appear really inter­ested!” Remem­ber, if you give in now, chances are you will be giv­ing in (or expected to give in) later on.

Remem­ber, the mem­ber who asked me the ques­tion at the top of this post added this reveal­ing tibit: “They (have) the deposit ready for your services.”

That’s the prob­lem. They are dan­gling this car­rot in front of you, expect­ing you to fol­low. Sure, they prob­a­bly do have a deposit ready. But they’re going to expect you to work for it. For free, no doubt. And often­times, in lit­tle, insignif­i­cant, and sub­tle ways.

Ask­ing them to pay for your expenses also helps to stop the grind­ing away process.

Oth­er­wise, if you’re will­ing to bend over back­wards in try­ing to land the account, you’re edu­cat­ing them you are also will­ing to do so after you get hired — often, to your detri­ment. They will grind away at you. Because they expect it.

A prospect refus­ing to pay for your trip always sends up a big red flag.

In my expe­ri­ence, a client who is not will­ing to com­pen­sate for my travel is a client who may not be hir­ing me based on my exper­tise, expe­ri­ence, or mar­ket­ing — in which I’ve already invested a lot of time and money to get the client in the first place…

… But hir­ing me based on how amenable, cheap, and will­ing to be manip­u­lated I am.

Some peo­ple say that show­ing you are will­ing to do any­thing to get the project means you also are will­ing to do any­thing for your client — and there­fore, it’s a pos­i­tive thing.

Wrong. Because human nature invari­ably dictates.

It sends the wrong mes­sage that could, and often does, work against you. In fact, while it may or may not com­mu­ni­cate that you’re a hard worker will­ing to do any­thing for your client, it also com­mu­ni­cates five other dis­tinct yet neg­a­tive messages:

1. Your time is not valu­able. If they can’t respect your time now, they cer­tainly won’t respect your time after they’ve become clients. Guaranteed.
2. You look des­per­ate. There­fore, you’re not in demand. Maybe it’s because you’re not good enough. Maybe it’s because you’re hav­ing trou­ble get­ting work. True or not, you’re going to have to work twice as hard to con­vince them otherwise.
3. You appear deceit­ful. You are sub­tly com­mu­ni­cat­ing you’re will­ing to do or say any­thing to get the job. Like it or not, that doubt will linger in the back of their minds over the course of your rela­tion­ship with them, which may hurt you in other areas.
4. You’re too pli­able. You show that you can be eas­ily manip­u­lated, which opens your­self up for abuse. (Believe me, I know this all too inti­mately!) Plus, they often do this as a “test” to see how sub­servient you are.
5. You lack con­fi­dence. It com­mu­ni­cates that you’re weak and uncer­tain, and that you ques­tion your own skills, which can back­fire. If you’re will­ing to ques­tion your own abil­i­ties, chances are, they will too.

So yes, it does set a weak precedent.

Above all, they will won­der what else you’re will­ing to do for free and, exactly as you won­dered your­self, how far you’re will­ing to go. Not only are you allow­ing them to hag­gle, has­sle, and quib­ble, but also you are invit­ing it.

If, lucky for you, they do end up hir­ing you, chances are they will nit­pick your work, wran­gle over your invoices, ques­tion what you deliver, sab­o­tage your deliv­er­ables, bar­rage you with inces­sant demands, and become high maintenance.

I know what you’re going to say: “But Michel, isn’t that mar­ket­ing? Isn’t that show­ing how much of a hard worker you are? Surely, not all prospects are like that?”

True on all three counts.

But you can com­mu­ni­cate the same in more effec­tive ways.

If you get them to under­stand how valu­able your time is, how con­fi­dent you are in your work, and how much your work is worth, then you are com­mu­ni­cat­ing — although, to everyone’s ben­e­fit — that you are a hard worker will­ing to do what it takes.

A good, qual­i­fied prospect will see this. Even expect it.

Those who refuse to accept your posi­tion only means one of two things: they are fish­ing for a “great deal” (e.g., a naive, cheap, unques­tion­ing, slav­ish free­lancer), or they are just look­ing for some­one who can com­plete tasks rather than help them achieve results.

Re-​​read that last para­graph. It’s crazy important.

Check out Paddi Lund’s web­site. It’s all about posi­tion­ing. The less avail­able you are and the more hoops clients have to jump through to hire you, the more it com­mu­ni­cates you are valu­able, your time is valu­able, and your work is valuable.

Because, and keep this in mind, if they have a chance to get a great deal (and some, at your expense let alone your san­ity), they will. Left to their own devices, they will take advan­tage of you. Don’t take it per­son­ally, because it’s not you they are abus­ing. It’s your ser­vices. Your time. And your will­ing­ness to do what it takes.

Call it greed. Call it a sign of the cur­rent, slug­gish econ­omy. Call it what you will.

I pre­fer to call it human nature.

If you think I’m the only one, here’s a funny, albeit real­is­tic, video on how clients tend to view ven­dors, brought to me cour­tesy of “Copy­writ­ing Maven” Roberta Rosen­berg…

So, there you have it! I hope this post was help­ful to you.

About the Author

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