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Agencies and agency founders are super hungry for insights on how to really nail their pitches and proposals. So, I got together with Graham Todd, Co-Director of Spaghetti Agency, and Adam Hempenstall, CEO and Founder of Better Proposals, to pick their brains on the subject.
These are two people with tons of experience in this area, who worked with many different types of clients and agencies. Let’s get straight into it with the intros.
Todd: My name is Todd, from Spaghetti Agency. We’re a small agency, to give you some context there’s a team of 10 of us here. We’re a digital marketing agency predominantly content and some social media, which is why we love Planable. We do paid advertising as well. Our audience is fairly diverse and since COVID, since we found Better Proposals actually, we’ve completely changed our sales process and how we do stuff. I live on Zoom, most of my pictures are on Zoom and I never send a proposal without them seeing it first. That’s my top tip.
Adam: My name is Adam. I’m the founder and CEO of Better Proposals, which is an online proposal creation platform. It essentially replaces that laborious thing you have to do in Word – creating a proposal, typing it up, making it line up, and formatting it.
And it obviously replaces the concept of a PDF as well. You can get things signed online, and guide your clients through a really nice and smooth onboarding process. So really, it’s taking you from ‘do you want to work with us’ through to them actually being a fully onboarded client and everything in between.
We have 11,000 customers around the world. Most of them seem pretty happy and are seeing some really nice streamlined results.
I’ll give you my top tip as well: avoid PDFs. Get rid of PDFs. Do not use them. Definitely don’t send them to your clients when you’re asking for money.
Miruna: I’m Miruna, CMO here at Planable. I’ve been with the company for the past seven years now. Planable is a social media collaboration tool, very much geared toward agencies that do social media for their clients. It’s a space where you can create, collaborate, and approve your content – and of course, schedule it to go live.
My experience with pitches and proposals in agencies per se is not that vast. That’s why I’m moderating this conversation.
But working in a startup means wearing a lot of hats and one of those hats is selling to clients every now and then. So I’ve sent my fair share of proposals and pitches. I’ve had those sales conversations. I’ll be coming from that angle with some questions.
Miruna: I thought we could start from a place of positivity. So, what are some of the pitches you’ve made or seen that went really great and landed a major client? What do you think made them work? What would you say really did the trick to convince the client?
Todd: I think not selling has worked for our clients recently, especially since we’ve embedded Better Proposals.
I go up against other agencies that have their slide deck, their pitch, and all of the usual stuff. They have a predetermined thing to sell.
We don’t do that. We go into a first call saying, “This is just a conversation, we’ll book another meeting if we feel like we can work together”. And then we probably spend half an hour, 45 minutes across two calls listening to them.
We’re very picky in that first stage, but we’re polite about it. If we think it’s not a good fit, we’re very direct. What we find works really well is just asking them what they need.
Because I’m a bit of a talker, I’ve had to learn to actually shut up occasionally and listen. Ask a question, then shut up again. You gain so much insight from speaking to people and asking them questions with the intent to really listen to the answers. That’s definitely helped us in how we build proposals.
For example, most clients that come to us asking for social media, end up having Google advertising. And most clients that come to us wanting a new website, actually just need more copyrighting.
Miruna: I feel like you’d be tempted to give advice at this point. And there are two issues here. First of all, do you give advice at all on that first call? Secondly, how do you know how much to give for free?
Todd: In our marketing, I give everything away for free. All of our knowledge and advice are available in our short-form videos, blogs, or emails. I’d say give it all away for free. Quite frankly, you have Google, Chat GPT and you can find the information if you’re that way inclined. So my approach to it has always been – if you’re going to find the information, it might as well come from me. I always give information for free.
But in the proposals, in a pitch, or in that initial conversation, I don’t do that. I spend all the time gathering information. Because they may leave thinking they’ve got enough information to do it themselves. And that is often a disservice to them.
Also when you’re selling and you’re telling, you’re not listening. You’re not gathering the information.
So, I think you should give your information away for free. But not in that sales pitch. You should listen and work out where they are and where they want to get to. Then, the question is: can you help them get there?
Adam: I’d agree with that a lot.
One of the things I’ve always found, doing a lot of proposal reviews over the years, is the amount of generic information that’s always in proposals.
But when you ask good questions in the meeting and you do that discovery, that’s usually where the gold is.
It’s uncomfortable for you to stay silent and it may be uncomfortable for them to talk about it. But if you can get to that point with them, that’s game over. Then really it’s just about communicating to them and not barraging them with a load of nonsense.
Just keep it simple.
Miruna: How should the insights that you get from those moments of silence translate into personalization in the actual proposals? How personalized should you get? And what should you personalize in general besides the price of course and the services and all of that?
Adam: I think that if you over-personalize, you’ll end up spending too much time on a proposal. Then it’s not worth it.
It’s essentially a game of picking your battles. If you’ve got your stuff organized, then obviously this becomes a hell of a lot easier. You always want to personalize your introduction. That could be your executive summary or whatever you want to call it. That’s the first meaningful bit of text that they read. They click through your cover and it’s always the bit that gets the most mental traction.
So if you can summarize everything in that section, you’re a winner. It’s well worth personalizing that part.
Obviously, there’s the pricing. I would try to personalize it in chunks after that.
Say you had a bank of eight or nine case studies. You’re not going to write a new one each time. You might personalize which one you choose. So yes, there’s a bit of an upfront effort to get that in there. But it’s two seconds to choose which one. You’re personalizing in chunks rather than in words, if that makes any sense.
Todd: I agree. We gather information and we use their exact language – their words, phrases, metaphors, analogies, and so on. They recognize themselves in the proposal and it’s not some marketing trick. It just means you listened and cared.
Just like Adam said, in Better Proposals, we’ve got all the templates in the Content Library. So, if they want Google ads and social media, we’ll click those two things and drop them in. We have a couple of things in there in huge, horrendous capitals, saying ‘Please replace this text with something relevant’.
We just replace those tiny bits and obviously the price. Usually, it’s the same sort of price anyway.
I’m obsessed with the analytics in Better Proposals, as I am in Planable. I’m always fascinated by the different types of people and how long they linger on different bits in Better Proposals.
That introduction gets a lot of traction. Then, larger companies spend hours on the terms and conditions. But you can actually see their interest in that introduction.
Adam: You’d be surprised how little time people spend reading the terms and conditions. What’s usually interesting is when you get a notification that somebody’s reading the proposal and they go straight to the T&Cs four months after you’ve started working with them.
That’s not a great sign, but it’s good to know. At least you can get your stuff together.
Miruna: I bet that kind of insight can really help with retention.
And even if it won’t prevent the client from leaving, it might prompt you to intervene before they share their grievances.
Adam: Let’s just say you built a website for a client and you’re in the final stages. You’re snagging or they’re snagging it. You’re doing the work and there’s some weird little tension point you think isn’t included. But oh well! You think ‘I want to keep the good relationship’.
Then you get a notification that they’re opening the proposal, looking at all the specifications and the details of exactly what you agreed to provide.
Interesting. Okay, they’re trying to see what their options are.
So it can give you a bit of a heads up about where they might be at mentally.
Miruna: Now let’s move on to the not-so-positive part of the process – the objections and the fears. What are the things that make people hesitate or say no? First of all, what are the most common objections? And how do you handle them?
Todd: From an agency perspective, one of the most common objections is the price.
We talk about it on our first call. We check the budget straight away because there’s no point in having three or four conversations, creating a proposal, sending the proposal, and then it’s too expensive.
The other thing could be that you’re not a good fit for each other. We reject and they reject quite early for those two reasons.
Our brand is the Wild West. We have had people who inquired to work with us and then realized our brand is based on the Wild West. We’re cowboys. They couldn’t work with cowboys and that’s fine. It’s our kind of filter.
So, for us, it’s usually price and fit. When we have gone up against other agencies, those two things come up one way or another.
Sometimes we’re too expensive. Other times, we’re far too cheap because they’re going for a big London agency.
We try to get a sense of it before we even get to the proposal stage.
Miruna: When it comes to budgets, how do you approach that topic?
Todd: We’re very upfront about it from the start. During the first phone call my partner Joe does, we work out what the client is after. What their budget is. Whether they’re the decision maker or whether we need a decision maker on the next call.
If they’re not the decision maker, they don’t have a budget and they’re not bothered, then we just end the call. Politely. Why are you on this phone call with us? Why are you on this pitch?
If they take you through three or four stages and they still don’t know what the budget is, I’m not into that game. I know that other companies will do it. We just don’t.
Miruna: So, you never bring up the money first? Do you never give a range? Look, this is what it would cost you. Does that fit your budget?
Todd: We’ll say to them: “Do you have a budget in mind?”. They might say £5,000.
That’s great, it will cover XYZ. Have you considered this?
We’ll have those conversations fairly early on. Then we’ll put something together based on that budget. We’re very upfront about it because money makes the world go around. There’s no point in hiding it. Making it kind of dark or like it’s a surprise at the end is just stupid. Why would you do that?
Adam: I think the budget issue is a really interesting one.
If you have a situation where somebody is really negative about it or they don’t want to share it, that would indicate inexperience in buying high-priced items.
The budget question has been around for a while now. It’s pretty normal stuff.
So, if somebody’s freaking out over the concept of sharing a budget, what else is that telling you? It’s probably telling you they’ve not been in this situation before.
Nobody’s ever asked them about the budget. Either that or they’re embarrassed about what the answer will be. That tells you that it’s likely not a good number.
Do you really want someone who’s got no money and has no experience of buying stuff? Probably not.
Or you might. And that might be the level you’re playing it. It’s absolutely fine. You can do it if you can coach people through it.
But if you’re trying to get stuff done and work with professionals who need to solve an active problem with the budget, probably not.
In a weird way, it doesn’t matter what the answer is. If they tell you a number and the number works, great.
If they tell you a number and the number doesn’t work, also fine. Politely decline it. If they get funny about it, that’s also a ‘no’.
It’s actually a good filtering exercise.
Miruna: Killing hope fast is sometimes a lot better than just dragging things on.
What other objections are there besides the price in your experience, Adam? What about things like ROI, the prospect not being convinced enough, and wrong timing? Anything else that pops up frequently?
Adam: There are things you never uncovered in the first place.
The two main reasons people aren’t going to buy things are because they don’t have the money or they don’t understand.
Say you’re selling something very technical. If you have complicated jargon littered throughout your proposal, that’s confusing. if you have really complicated, tiered pricing, it’s confusing. Someone’s sitting there looking at your pricing, trying to work out if they can fit that into their marketing budget.
Confused people don’t buy things. Nobody’s feeling confused and then goes ‘oh perfect, let me hand you the credit card’. It never happens.
A good trick might be the mum test. Take someone over your age group who doesn’t understand tech and see if they can figure it out. It’s not an exact science, but it will give you an idea of what isn’t clear.
Keep your pricing as simple as you can. I’d opt for less profit and clearer pricing if I could. I’d actually do that because I think in the end you’ll sell more just by having simplified pricing.
The industry is atrocious at this. If anyone’s ever bought IT systems, servers, or loads of computers for offices, they are the worst. By far the worst. If you have any of those IT quotes lying around, look at them for an example of what not to do.
Miruna: I was thinking about the timing issue and about the back and forth that happens throughout this entire process.
A lot of times we went into our conversation to pitch Planable. Everything went well – the trial, the demo, all of it. But then it’s not the right time.
I’m assuming it happens a lot to agencies as well. We do the marketing, but people come to us and book the demo. They want to get in touch. They say they’re ready. Then they’re not.
Of course, I can relate. I’ve stopped an acquisition process in the past. I’m learning more about it and it doesn’t feel like the right fit. Or it’s more of a budget problem than I thought it would be.
I’m wondering if any of these timing-related objections can be prevented. How would you go about it during the qualifying process and the following conversations?
Todd: We do that as part of our first call when we are looking to get this completed.
I had a sales conversation with someone today. They want a new website. When do you want the new website to go live? In September.
I could have stopped there, but I asked them why. Why do you want it live in September? What’s wrong with the other one? Would October be okay? They say, “No, it needs to be done in September”.
Whereas sometimes you ask people and they’ll tell you it doesn’t really matter when. I’m a bit more cautious of that one because there’s no real deadline to it.
We’ve all been tasked by someone on our team to shop around. You just keep your options open. But if you’re looking to work with three agencies, you’re usually making a big decision. You have a thought about it.
I’ll tell you the worst thing that happened to me many years ago and I’ve never forgotten it. I went all the way down to London for this pitch and they were just checking prices. They were always going to stick with their agency.
I realized the moment I went into the room they weren’t interested in anyone else. They were just saying to that agency, “We’re sniffing around. Pull your socks up, and do a better job. We’re going to give you the tender for another three years or whatever”.
There’s a bit of that sometimes.
I don’t want to be a third wheel. I’m very open to conversation. I think it cuts a lot of our time and their time. It stops people from messing around.
People are really nice about it too. It’s not like they leave our pitches and sales courses thinking we’re rude. It’s quite refreshing. You just said how it was and that saves everyone’s time.
Adam: Timing is an interesting one. I think you just gain a sixth sense for it.
I’ve been selling stuff in various forms for about 25 years now. It’s just one of those things that comes with experience.
After a number of bad meetings, you know when someone’s just kicking tires.
At the same time, you also get a sixth sense for when somebody is really up for it and then you can ask great questions, exactly as Todd said. Why then or why not now? Why in the future? Why not leave it?
‘Why not leave it?’ is a really good one. It forces them to think the opposite. They go, “No, we need it now because..” And whatever reason they give you then is going in the proposal. That’s a real genuine one.
So, trying to use a bit of reverse psychology to suggest to them it’s not that important, gets them to reveal exactly why it is important to them. That obviously becomes the reason they’re going to end up buying from you.
Todd: The one person you listen to the most in all of your life is yourself. So if you say you need it now on a call, talking to a stranger, then you’ve just bought into it.
It’s not trickery. If you do need it, this isn’t some kind of sleazy sales technique. Most people are on autopilot. They think, “Oh, I’m on a sales call”.
Everyone’s done this. You walk into a clothes shop. Someone comes up to you and asks if you need any help. You say no.
Well, what are you doing in the clothes shop then? Why are you in a clothes shop? Have you come to buy a burger? No, you came in to buy some clothes.
I don’t want any help. Why have I said that? Do you want a receipt? No.
It’s all autopilot. So when you ask them random questions, the pattern interrupts. They break that and you get the actual human being.
I find it fascinating. I love sales. I just find it such a fascinating thing because nearly everyone turns up to sales on autopilot. I’m going to be sold to. I need to go into a sales pitch poker-faced. I haven’t got a budget and I can’t make a decision.
But it’s all rubbish really. You ask the right questions, you get the information out of them.
Miruna: You just have to be persistent and bold enough. Remember it’s just a conversation with another human being.
Miruna: Which is better when sending a proposal to a client – a short pitch or a long pitch? I’d like to expand on that a bit. Talk about common mistakes and definite no’s when it comes to the pitch.
Adam: I’m going to give you the cop-out answer first, then I’m going to explain it. The cop-out answer is that it should be the appropriate length.
Say you’re doing an incredibly complicated build for something or it’s super in-depth and you sent them a one-pager. How in-depth would that feel? How appropriate would that feel?
Probably not quite right. It would feel like you’ve undercooked your proposal. You don’t have enough detail in there, you haven’t justified it enough.
But imagine you’ve worked with that client for 15 years and they know everything about you. They turned around and said, “Can you do this for us?” Maybe giving them a one-pager works then. You don’t need a case study, you don’t need anything else related to how payment works. It might be fine.
So the same service to two completely different people, in two different situations, can require something completely different.
Again, it’s a sliding scale of the relationship that you have with that particular person. I think it makes a massive difference how well they know you. If they know you do good work, you probably don’t need case studies. It would be overkill.
But then it’s a complexity sliding scale on what you’re selling them as well. If you’re selling them something really simple – maybe a social media update or a new set of header graphics – there’s no complexity, no confusion. It’s a simple graphic design job that probably doesn’t need a massive proposal.
If you’re doing a full service for someone, you need to make sure you have a bit of everything in there. That way you’re going to be covered.
You need to have an introduction, what it is you’re going to do, some sort of social proof, your pricing, ideally something like a guarantee, your T&Cs, and most importantly your next steps.
If you have those bits in there, you can scale them accordingly.
Todd: I agree.
The way I look at it, people have different discovery profiles and different learning profiles. People prefer to watch videos or read content. So we try to make sure that our proposal will appeal to them. If we don’t know, then we’ll make sure that we’ve put in all the details. But also a short summary. We use bullet points and subheadings in the proposals anyway.
If I know someone is high D on a discovery profile and won’t read the proposal at all, I’ll just put a quick 30-second video in it instead. Here’s everything we do, here’s some bullet points, here’s a video. The rest is in there too. So they can go and check it. Their team can go through the T&Cs. You need to have that stuff in there.
Once they’re on board as a client, sometimes I just send an email. However, now we have embedded Better Proposal into our system so I get slapped whenever I do that because it ruins things.
I wouldn’t read a long proposal. But that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t send a long proposal. Some people like details. So I try to factor that in – either match them or cover the bases a bit.
Miruna: I’ve mentally recorded some of the mistakes that you’ve mentioned so far.
Adam, you started with ‘never a PDF’. Todd, you mentioned that you have to always listen and don’t gab throughout the meetings. We’ve talked about making the proposal too long, too complex, or simply inappropriate in terms of length.
Are there any other big mistakes that you see agencies making frequently?
As the end client, I can tell you about one.
When I’m talking to potential agencies, I really hate being spoken to in a condescending tone. It’s not a good look if they’re assuming I have no experience in whatever their service is and they’re explaining the very basics to me.
It’s not about ego for me. I don’t get upset because I want them to think I’m smart. I get upset because I feel like they’re ruining their own pitch by devaluing the level of expertise that I now give them credit for. Because if they’re explaining the basics to me, then it doesn’t feel like this will work out.
Todd: I have a question I always ask at the beginning. How much do you understand about SEO? How much do you know or want to know about this?
I have done this in the past – I start explaining something and then realize they’re some sort of tech developer of 50 years and I’m teaching them about WordPress. You lost then, haven’t you? You’ve just made them feel ridiculous. They look at you and think, “Well, you could have asked”. So it’s a big one.
I’m going to ask you how much you know or what you want to know about it. Again, these are questions you have to ask when you’re in the pitch process. You’ve got to work and get to know them. It’s about rapport building for me and that’s really important.
Adam: A really easy mistake to fix is timing. How long does it take you to send a proposal? It’s honestly the easiest way to screw it up.
Imagine you’re in a meeting with somebody. Everyone’s been there. You feel that excitement because you know it’s gone well. You have a great rapport with them, you can fix their problems. They’re excited about it. They’re not just trying to fix one thing, they’re already on to the next problem. It’s just such a good feeling.
They’re telling you it all sounds great. They can’t wait to read your proposal and get everything started. Then you get home and you have a screaming kid. Or you sit down and play the Xbox. You get distracted. All the real detail you could’ve put in the proposal fades away. As Todd said, you could use their words, their phrases, their situations. You could speak their language.
You might think “Well it’s Friday, I’ll get it to them on Monday”. Before you know it, it’s been five, six, seven days and their enthusiasm has just gone. You send it to them, but all of a sudden they have a million other things to do.
We tried to find out the effect of getting your proposal created and sent within 24 hours. We ran over some data in the last five or six years and we found that it’s 50% better compared to a week later.
That’s nuts.
So if you want to improve that conversion rate, just get the proposal done as quickly as possible. It’s such an easy thing to do.
Todd: That’s why we don’t send them. We present them.
We have the calls, we deal with the questions, and do most of our pitches on Zoom. I use Otter.ai to record the meeting. Then we’ve got all the information and you can actually chat to Otter and see what language they use, what discovery profile they are, etc.
I create the introduction from that. But the final Zoom meeting we do with them is a proposal presentation. We screen-share Better Proposals on Zoom and we walk them through it. We change anything that needs change. And when we finish, it gets sent within 10 minutes.
I think it makes a massive difference. They’ve already agreed to it. It’s already there and then I book a meeting to onboard them. They agreed to it on Zoom, I sent them the proposal, and then I’ve already onboarded them.
I think other cultures do this – where signing a proposal is just part of the ceremony. It’s not actually saying yes or no because they’ve already agreed to it. That’s what we’ve taken on board here. I don’t send a proposal and hope they’re going to sign it in a minute.
Yesterday we had an onboarding call booked. My partner was coming on the call. She asked if the client signed a proposal. I checked and they hadn’t. So I emailed him to see if we’re going ahead or not because the onboarding call’s booked. They signed a proposal immediately. I saw them open, go down, and click it.
They said they would sign a proposal before the meeting. So it’s all agreed upfront.
The timing aspect of it is huge.
I’m interested in that data, if it comes out, Adam. I like a bit of data.
Adam: I’ll send the reports. They’re all available on the website. If you scroll to the bottom of the Better Proposals website, it’s about five years’ worth of data in those reports.
You’ve got a lot of data about how many pages people use and the effect of opening pages on mobile devices etc. It’s all changed over the last five, six, seven years.
But the one thing that’s pretty much stayed constant is the effect of sending your proposals quickly. That’s because it’s a human thing, not a tech thing.
Also, to your point about screen-sharing – I know so many people who do it. It’s a really good method of using Better Proposals.
Todd: Even in real life, I’ll go and hook up to a machine and screen present a proposal. It helps to be looking at the same thing. I’ve realized since 2020 that it’s a great way to do a sales conversation.
If your client says the website isn’t great, you put it on the screen instead of contextualizing it in your head and drawing on a whiteboard. You look at the same thing and talk about the same thing. It’s a fabulous tool.
Even when I’m out, I’ll plug in and use Otter.ai on my iPhone to record everything. Just in case there’s something I can’t remember.
Miruna: It also helps a lot with tackling objections on the spot. You can feel when their enthusiasm drops or when they have questions. Questions can easily become turn-offs. As Adam said: if they’re confused, they’re not buying.
But if you can fix that feeling of being confused on the spot, it really increases your odds.
Miruna: Another huge part of crafting a proposal is how much you can prove the value.
If they can already understand and feel the promise you’re making them, it highly increases your chances.
So how much do you showcase the work that you provide in the actual proposal or even before it?
Adam: You have to think about where they are mentally. They are about to make a big mistake if they get us wrong. Instead of thinking about it in terms of putting up a case study or showing a screenshot, just try to do the opposite. Try to think about it from their perspective first. They’re about to make a seven, ten, or maybe twenty grand decision. What does that mean for them? Does that mean a substantial change for them? Are they risking not paying their mortgage?
So try to understand it from that perspective.
When you put that social proof, evidence, whatever it is they need, it needs to be in the appropriate amount.
I’ll give you an example. A guarantee is fantastic, right? A guarantee is absolutely brilliant and I’d always recommend using guarantees where you can. But you don’t have to put everything in the form of a money-back guarantee.
Way back in the day before Better Proposals, we used to sell custom software. The price was somewhere around 20 grand almost every time. It was a massive ask for a small business that wanted custom software. We had to convince them to spend £20,000.
They had no problem spending the money if it worked. It was the ‘if it worked’ bit that they couldn’t get their head around.
So we focused on the refundable deposit. Okay, it’s a 10% refundable deposit. For the 10%, we’ll design the screens for three main flows that are going to be a problem in your business. Might be your sales order or your marketing system. We’re going to redesign these screens, come back and show you exactly what these look like. They might not be perfect, but if we’ve not greatly misunderstood you, we’ll give you the two grand back. No problem.
All we’ve done is spend a little bit of time on some graphic design. That’s it. But if we walk away from that meeting and the client is happy, then they’ll commit to the rest of it.
From their perspective, it’s now only a couple of grand and not a massive decision in relation to the price. It needed to be broken down into smaller chunks that we could guarantee. The alternative was to simply say, “Don’t worry about it, commit to it and we’ll give you the whole £20,000 back if you don’t like it”.
But that’s unrealistic because if they believe £20,000 is a lot of money, they might think we don’t have it. To be fair, a lot of it would have gone into labor and we wouldn’t have it.
So I think breaking things down is a really good idea. Try to put yourself in their mind frame and understand where they’re at. When you do that, everything’s just so much easier.
Todd: We ask this question a lot: what does success look like in three, six months? What does success look like next year?
Say we’re going to work together in a year from now. What will need to have happened for it to be a success? You’d be amazed to see how low the bar is set.
The answer isn’t going to be that they expect to sell their business, be a millionaire, sit on a boat. It’ll be more along the lines of wanting more consistent content or better social media than their competition.
Whereas if you go in guaranteeing all sorts of things, you’ll overreach yourself. And maybe the client only wanted a few emails, a bit of this, that and the other.
Again, it comes down to simply asking the right questions. What do you want? What will make you happy? Can we achieve it?
Rather than telling your potential client you’ve got guarantees and case studies.
If someone’s asking for Facebook ads, the case study is based on Facebook ads. But I’m more of a fan of third-party stories. So, if I’m talking to someone on Zoom and they ask me a question, I’ll have stories from clients. I’ll tell them what worked and what didn’t for another client of mine.
We did this and it worked. It’s more real for them and better when I can find a case study for their proposal and it’s the same person I was talking about earlier. Definitely stick to the same ones.
Adam: If you ask that question Todd just highlighted, which is a brilliant question by the way, you’re then in line with them.
If you assume everybody wants the moon, you start pitching according to that. Meanwhile, they might be thinking that’s too much, it’s too difficult or they simply have no interest in going there in the first place. And if you’re trying to get them to the moon, they’ll think that’s why you’re expensive.
You don’t know what they’re thinking unless you ask the questions.
Miruna: That’s enlightening. I feel like the theme of this talk is ‘ask the questions’.
It often sounds simple, but it’s complex. You’re trying to juggle so many things during a meeting or sales call. But just keep in mind that it’s another human being and you’re trying to figure out whether a collaboration would be beneficial or not. Everything becomes a lot simpler when you do that.
Miruna: What about client red flags that you might spot on the discovery call? Are there any we haven’t covered?
Todd: I think we’ve covered a few of them – no budget, not a decision maker, shopping around, a little bit guarded, etc. Another one is when you’re not a good match. It’s why we’re front and center with our brand all the time. We’re very straightforward about how we do things and I think that’s the best way of doing it.
In terms of red flags, it’s the usual issues – they can’t make a decision, can’t buy from you or they’re not ready yet.
Those aren’t big red flags, but they’ll let you know you’re not a good fit for now. It saves time going that way.
Adam: I’ll just say professionalism. If somebody can’t make a meeting on time without a solid reason, maybe you give them another chance. But lack of professionalism and defensiveness over questions would be another two red flags for me.
Also, demanding a proposal or information before a phone call. I feel like growing up is saying ‘no’ to that question. That’s maturity.
Absolutely not. Somebody asking for a proposal before they’ve invested any time in you is not okay. It’s got to be equal.
Miruna: Onto the next question. What does a pitch actually include? Just pricing and our portfolio? Or ideas we suggest to them, like any sample work?
Todd: It depends. Typically, the bones of our proposals will always have an introduction, price, T&Cs, case studies, and then obviously we chuck in the servicing. But it depends on the conversation we’ve had. If we’ve specifically talked about a user journey or an email sequence, we will actually write that in there. We’ve already talked about it, they probably scribbled it down, so we’re not giving away Mom’s secret sauce. We put it in there so that we make sure they’ve seen it.
The other thing we’ve done that’s really important is the cover photo. In Better Proposals, we always make sure that the photo is going to match their business. So we spend quite a lot of time finding a picture that fits them.
We used to put the logo on it. That’s a bit lazy. So now we go and find some cool image that matches.
I think there are a few image sites that Better Proposals use. It’s made a real difference to us.
So a good cover, good intro, obviously the price and we just tailor those boxes in between.
Miruna: Do you think it’s appropriate to send a form to answer some questions to a prospective client? So that you can better understand their needs. Or is it better to discuss it one by one through email or messages?
Todd: We’ve contemplated doing this on our contact form. We were thinking this would filter out spam, but it would also pre-qualify the call.
It’s difficult because it’s so cold and you’re not there to ask questions organically. So we’ve never really done it.
Adam: I don’t like it. If you can’t spend 10-20 minutes on the phone with somebody new who’s in business, it’s not the best look.
I’m showing an interest already – I’ve found your business and looked through your website. I’m thinking you might be able to help me. Now I’m trying to contact you and you’re making it difficult. I have to jump through extra hoops.
Unless your lead generation is so unbelievably brilliant that you literally need it as a filter-through mechanism. In that case, you don’t need us anyway. You are fine.
If you’re in that situation, then fine. Other than that, if it’s a normal flow of leads, then no. Just go on the phone and talk to them. Have a nice conversation. And if it doesn’t go anywhere, you at least had a nice chat.
Todd: It’s why our first calls are so short, around 20 minutes.
Miruna: Worst case scenario, you can make them even shorter.
I’ve been on pre-qualifying calls for 10 minutes and I was fine with it.
I’ve seen other companies set up the actual 30- or 60-minute call, but they still call to pre-qualify beforehand.
It happens a few days in advance. “Hi, we have this call set up. I just want to get some details to make sure that we’re right for each other. We don’t want to waste an entire hour of your time if that’s not the case.”
As Adam said, if you are in that scenario of getting too many leads, there are some tricks. If your calendar is fully booked and a big percentage of that is not qualified enough or not relevant enough, you can pre-qualify. You can also limit the time you spend on calls.
Adam: It reduces the friction. Friction is awful. You really don’t want friction in business at all. Whether it’s a form, whether it’s trying to get a signature from someone, or questions and answers, the less friction the better.
The answer you’ve just given there is perfect. Book the big call, then interject in the middle without necessarily agreeing to that part but it seems like a nice thing to do. Then you can clear out anything. And if it’s a total car crash, then you can cancel it.
Miruna: How many times would you say it’s appropriate to call when they have stated they don’t need the service you’re offering? I guess we can expand this to include emails as well. How persistent are you when you follow up?
Adam: If they said, “Don’t call again.” And you call again, that’s not alright. Don’t. Move on.
Todd: You can’t lose what you never had. Move on to the next one. I think that’s why we’re trying to filter out all the time. If they say no at that early stage, it’s fine. There’ll be more coming your way.
Miruna: What about the ones that ghosted? How much do you continue asking them for a clear answer?
Todd: We have a three-step process. We use it when they don’t turn up to a call as well.
If you ghost us twice on a Zoom call, that’s it. We cancel the call.
If we’re following up and they were genuinely interested but something went wrong, we go for three and the third email is basically pre-written. Obviously, it isn’t the right time for you, this is the last time we’ll email and we just wanted to let you know that we’re closing the file on this particular proposal.
If we’ve got anything wrong, let us know. We get loads of replies to that. Because if they are just waiting, the email is reminding them to get back to you. We’ve all done that as well. Oh, I need to do that, I’ll wait for them to email me again.
So if they’re really interesting, then follow up a little bit. But if it was a hard no, don’t.
Miruna: Ghosting is frustrating for me. I’m always thinking we talked, so how can you not even give me an answer? It feels personal.
Adam: I’ll add something to that. We’ve all used LinkedIn. I can’t tell you how sad it seems when people are moaning about somebody ghosting them or not replying. They’ve put about an hour’s effort into the conversation.
Come on, it’s business. Grow up! Move on! Try to have an abundant mindset.
You should get really good at lead generation. Get a lot of conversations going, have a ton of good quality conversations every day and I promise you will not care about being ghosted now and then.
Don’t dwell on it.
There are so many people opening businesses now that it doesn’t matter.
Todd: I totally agree. It’s something you learn. When you start out, you want to please everyone. I was there 12 years ago. Now, if someone says ‘no’, great! It means another person over here will say yes. Let’s go!
Miruna: It sounds like you know the right thing to do is keep going and grow. That’s sound advice. And if it resonates at the right moment, it can feel like the piece of advice you need.
Miruna: I’ve got a bit of a tough one for you now. We have a question from someone who says they’re having a hard time getting clients to agree to their rates. There’s a lot of outsourcing to India, Pakistan, and other countries. This person is based in Dubai. What can you do when the potential client is constantly comparing your services with cheaper alternatives?
Todd: Sometimes I’m not sure it’s a problem of price. You don’t always buy on price.
If you did, most people wouldn’t use an iPhone. It’s the classic story, isn’t it? The iPhone is actually not the best phone and it’s also the more expensive one.
I think if someone’s outsourcing to India and they’re happy with that, great.
We’ve done that with elements of our business and the product we get is great. Why would you use the UK, the US, or Dubai? That’s going to be more expensive.
Unless the quality of the service and the experience are better or you get more things, there’s no point.
If people only bought on price, there would be one car. Everyone would just buy the cheapest car. But they don’t buy the cheap car, they buy the one that they want to have.
We’re definitely not the cheapest, not even the cheapest in the town we’re based. Yet people choose us. It’s because they want to work with us, not someone else.
Adam: Just do some really basic competitive analysis. Really think about why people are outsourcing to India or Pakistan.
What does that service typically look like? Are they getting face-to-face meetings? Probably not, it’s remote.
What are some of the tendencies that generally come with that? Maybe they don’t stick to a time frame, they change the spec midway through the job, and so on.
So what can you do to guarantee you won’t do that? You can address the issues that potential clients are going to face, without necessarily directly calling them out. You can talk about those problems and strengthen your marketing around not doing those things.
Also, if you’re confident, just tell them to go use those cheaper services and you’ll speak to them in six months. It’s the hardcore answer.
Miruna: Your numbers and your price are sometimes reflective of how confident you are.
It doesn’t necessarily mean you’re not confident enough if you’re pricing low. But you need to get that confidence up. Otherwise, you’re going to have such a hard time pitching and standing behind the numbers.
If you fold immediately and give a 60% discount, that’s going to set you up for a very unhealthy relationship.
Adam: Don’t discount, don’t do it. If you can eliminate discounting as a word in your vocabulary, do it.
Miruna: What about negotiations? You don’t offer any discount. But you might drop a service or do it less frequently.
Adam: Great question. Yes, exchange something. If they want to get the price down, they have to give up something. It can be a part of the job or they can offer something valuable back, like a really well-shot professional case video.
They’re really good. You get two or three of those done a year and they make you look like a million bucks.
So, that would be a good trade.
Somebody might come along and tell you they can’t afford 10 grand. They only have the budget for eight. Say you’ll meet them in the middle at nine, but you need a favor from them.
It’s going to be nice and easy, only a couple of hours of their time. You’ll send the videographer to do a case study.
Everyone wins.
Miruna: Make them do anything back to keep the relationship on a level playing field.
Todd: You’re keeping yourself on equal standing at the start. Otherwise, they’re beating you over the head with the price, taking you down. They’re winning, you’re losing.
It’s not about winning and losing. But you want to both go into it with a level of trust in each other.
If they don’t trust you to deliver on that price, that is not a great way to start a relationship.
Miruna: It goes like that on other levels as well. If you give a huge discount from the beginning with the smallest hesitation, then you create a huge distrust.
Now they think the initial price you gave them wasn’t legitimate. What does that tell them about you? How honest are you with your prices? Or your thoughts?
Will they have to check on you every single step of the way?
Todd: Although, there is a cultural aspect to how you have to negotiate. There’s some cultures around the world who like to banter and barter. You have to go in high and they will tell you to go in high so they can barter. It’s a sales custom.
Miruna: There are so many tricky things about pitching and proposing that we could talk for hours on this subject. Thank you Todd and Adam for dropping your wisdom here!
Miruna Dragomir, CMO @Planable, ex Social Media Comms Manager @Oracle & ex Marketing Coordinator @Uber. 9 years of experience in social media and marketing. Built Planable’s brand and reputation and helped grow it from 50 customers to over 6.5K. Social media fanatic, tech geek & a sucker for learning.
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