
While owning a solo business can be overwhelming, it is important to ensure you are not passing that overwhelm onto your leads and clients. Your days are filled with the constant hustle and shuffle which can lead to quick, off-the-cuff communications with clients or leads. While those communications might feel like you are helping, they might actually be overwhelming to your clients.
Signs of Overwhelming Communication
Reading your client’s microexpressions is a learned skill and something that comes with time. From confused facial expressions to awkward expressions, seeing the overwhelm in gestures is quite easy to pick up on. However, over the phone or email, it might be a little more subtle.
Here are a few clues your clients may be overwhelmed …
- They flat out say it: Many times clients will say, “Wow, that’s overwhelming, but I’m excited!” The overwhelm is passed off as being ok because they are excited, but ideally, it is not there at all.
- They hesitate: “I need to think about that.” Or, “Let me talk to my spouse.” Many times that really means, “I need more clarity or need to process it with someone.”
- Back-and-forth emails with lots of questions: If clients need more information from you, then they are trying to work out the hows, whens, and whys in their heads. It’s a frustrating experience for them, and for you.
- Decision fatigue: If clients are not able to make a decision, it’s because there is too much to think about.
- Stop engaging: This happens the most with leads. If you give them too much information upfront, they just stop responding.
Why You Need to Remove the Overwhelm
Removing the overwhelm in client communication is vital for a small business.
First, it is difficult to cultivate raving fans as the overwhelm will always be the ‘but’ in the final review.
- “The service was amazing, but it was kinda stressful.”
- “The end result was great, but it was all a little overwhelming.”
Cultivating raving fans is the best marketing strategy a small business can have, so removing the “but” is important to increase your referrals and therefore your business growth.
Next, overwhelm typically means you are flying by the seat of your pants instead of creating a curated experience for your clients to enjoy. The method of “handle-it-as-it-comes” style of business management will only get you so far and will eventually lead you down the wrong path.
Lastly, at least for this blog post, overwhelm stifles clients from booking and purchasing. Think of shopping … When you’re overwhelmed while shopping, you go with the option you are most comfortable with. You get in and get out. There is no brain power to even explore the higher prices options or other products. If you want to convert more and sell more, you must simplify, streamline and communicate in a more effective way.
How to Reduce the Overwhelm
Now that we know the whys, let’s dive into the how. To reduce the overwhelm it is important to think about the client experience you are providing.
Just as you would go through a haunted house 👻 (fall is just right around the corner) each scream and fright is created due to a meticulous plan all created to provide the most thrilling experience. Your experience is the same … yet replace thrilling with pleasing (or whatever positive word you want your clients to experience).
First, you want to take some time to uncover what type of experience you want to provide. Think of restaurant experiences – fine dining, fast food, grab-and-go, casual dining, gourmet, cafeteria style. They all sell food; however, the quality, atmosphere, accessibility, and customer services are all different and directly related to price.
Next, think about your communications compared to the experience you wish to provide. Are you fast food, saying “Hello” and “Have a great day!” all while throwing your experience out a window? Or, do you need more touch points (communications) as your experience is determined to be of higher value?
With more touch points, I suggest keeping in mind three words when it comes to communicating: Timely, Relevant, Bite-Sized.
Timely, Relevant, and Bite-Sized
Is what you are saying something they need to know now and relevant to what is happening now?
Many businesses give so much information up front and expect their client to remember it all. But, it doesn’t work like that.
The human brain can only take in/process/remember about 20% of what is said or read. So knowing that statistic, you can see why frontloading someone with information can be very overwhelming.
Create a communication cadence that delivers information in a timely and relevant way, removes the overwhelm, and guides your clients through your experience. With this style of proactive communication, you will not only eliminate the overwhelm but you’ll create an experience in which your clients will respect you as the professional, trust you and your business, and be thankful for your guidance. This trio of respect, trust, and thankfulness is what creates raving fans.
Here are some negatives your clients will experience if your communication is not timely and relevant:
Relevant: If you ask questions that they don’t have the answer to yet
This happens a lot when talking to leads or on lead capture forms. If you ask questions they don’t know the answer to yet on a lead capture form, they will automatically feel insecure … “Should I know the answer to that? Why don’t I know?”
Timely: Giving information too early
By giving information too early, clients tend to forget and then say, “I didn’t know”. Your under-the-breath response is, “Well I told you.” Or, “I sent it in an email.” While we can blame our clients for not reading our emails, the real reason is because we are overwhelming them with too much information in the email.
Timely: Giving information too late
It’s a balancing act. Too early, the information does not register, too late they don’t have time to prepare. Not allowing enough time to prepare, creates frustration and overwhelm with your clients too.
Let’s take an example. If you need a client to send you a guest list for their party.
- 4 months out: I will need a guest list of names and mailing addresses for each guest 60 days prior to the party. Over the next two weeks can you send me the VIPs of the party. This includes relatives and friends that are 100% invited.
- Two weeks later: Now that’s complete, can you please extend the guest list with community members and neighborhood friends?
- Two weeks later: Great, how about work friends?
By guiding the process of creating a guest list, helping break down this overwhelming task into actionable chunks all the while ensuring that each step is well thought out, setting yourself and your client up for success.
Bite-sized communication is another key to success. Keeping communication to 1 to 3 points (bite-sized) on top of being timely and relevant, allow clients to be able to process what is said quicker and easier. Bite-sized and actionable content delivers the most value.
Create the Communication Workflow
Conquering the overwhelm is a big step for you and your business. While there are so many benefits to your clients, there are many benefits to you as well.
By creating these email cadences with the use of 17hats Workflows, you can automate the process ensuring a rave-worthy client experience without the extra work. Workflows can be set up for leads as well as your onboarding process to ensure emails and questionnaires are sent throughout the experience. By automating these emails your clients will receive them in a timely way.
As you continue to grow your business, you will find more and more ways to work more effectively and efficiently. And, it is important not to overwhelm yourself. There is always too much to do and not enough time, so if you are looking to make changes in your business process and management, I recommend blocking off a day in the near future to dive in.
Especially as summer comes to an end and the busy fall season is approaching, now is the time to invest in your business. Just one day of working on your business communications and client experience can save you hours of work later.