143 | Getting Clients in 2023: Marketing That Works (no social media required!)

Social media IS NOT the answer for marketing an in-home service business in 2023...so what IS the answer? Today's podcast answers that important question with our guest Kate from katethesocialite.com. We are giving you actionable tips on what your marketing should look like, and how to create that client funnel to your business.  LINKS FOR LISTENERS: Connect with Kate The Socialite here: https://www.katethesocialite.com Connect with us: https://www.inspiredorganizer.com PARTIAL TRANSCRIPT: Hey, pro organizers. It's your podcast co-host, Melissa, and we have gotten such awesome feedback from people on our episode last week  if you have not heard it, just go back one episode and listen to it. We're talking to Kate. Kate runs a marketing business for home professionals, and we are talking about marketing your organizing business in 2023.  Last week we talked about why social media might not be the thing you wanna do for your marketing, but this week we're talking about what should you be doing for your marketing. With people that I coach, whether it's one-on-one or in our inspired organizer coaching program, the most common question I get. How do I get more clients? How do I get more consistent clients? And what we talk about in this podcast today is how do we create a system to get those consistent clients coming in? This episode is full of really great actionable tips. In editing the episode, I sometimes have to listen to it multiple times and I am writing down like, oh, that's a great idea. I need to do that for my organizing business. So I would love for you to listen to this episode. Take notes, whether it's on the Notes app on your phone, which is what I use all the time, or pen and paper, which I also use quite a bit. There are awesome ideas in here for you,  If you didn't happen to listen to last week's episode and you're listening to this one and wondering, Hey, do I hear a baby in the background? The answer is yes, you do. Kate had her seven month old son who is our third guest on the podcast. He does not know anything about marketing and organizing business, but he is really cute. I can tell you that, I'm not going to waste any more time. I wanna turn it over to my guest, Kate, from Kate the socialite. So we have talked about the thing that you have realized, and I have realized, and many of us have realized, but maybe haven't gotten off the hamster wheel yet, doesn't work. What are your foundation, so when a client comes to you and you say, this is what actually works. What does that look like for you? Yeah, it looks like making marketing personal because really marketing is a relationship and that means that you can't be marketing to just anyone who has a home and might possibly need your organizing services. When a client comes to me, I remind them that marketing is a relationship between them and their ideal client. And that's why you shouldn't have marketing that is so generic  you have to be intentional so that, , it all starts at the website level.  If you don't have a website, you need to get one because you should be talking directly to your ideal client on your website. It shouldn't, you shouldn't start talking about yourself right away and what you do. You should actually say, Hey, busy career woman or busy mom or whomever, do you ever feel like your house is a chaotic mess? But you cannot get on top of it? And they'll be like, yep, totally. Okay, now you've got them. Now you can say, well, here at,  my organizing studio we specialize in helping people just like you because we know that your time is valuable and we know that your home functions better when it's organized. So click here to check out our services. Like, oh, right, okay.  Now they've got the specific call to action. They feel heard, they feel understood, and you can carry that through to your service packages. So instead of saying  it's the pantry revamp, you can give it some sort of, Name that's still very clear, that is aligned with your ideal client. When you describe the package, describe it from the perspective of that particular person. Yes. You know, we are gonna take all your vitamin water, we're gonna take all your kids' snacks, we're gonna take all these things and we're gonna make it organized so that you know when you need to buy more, so that you use the stuff you already have and that actually saves you money. And so that you have that, that visual, that eye candy, when you open your pantry, you're excited to look at it because, man, that looks good. Yeah. And that makes you feel good. .  And I, I love what you're saying because I, a couple things. I had a business coach that used to always use the phrase, use second grade language with people. And I think a lot of times we have people that are like, I have to sound like really fancy, or really, like, I have to make this sound beautiful.  Especially when you're building a website, you just, you think, no, please use simple words and use, use that, connect with people. Yes. Words, like, the words that you hear in every consultation. The word I always hear is overwhelmed. Mm-hmm. . So everybody's overwhelmed.  Whether it's overwhelmed, chaos. Any of these words that you hear clients say to you all the time, use those words in your marketing to connect with people. Mm-hmm. .  Yep. I mean, . It's the really, the most successful trick in the marketing book. Just use your ideal client's words back at them. They're telling you how they want to be marketed to, so pay attention on those discovery calls because it, it's amazing. It'll help your copywriting so much and you don't have to worry about sounding polished. You don't have to worry about sounding professional, obviously stay away from profanity, although I feel like a few WFS might be appropriate if it's that could work situation. Yeah. I mean, you know, let's just, let's just say that, but after you've got your website squared away, Think about the blog, turn your most common questions into a blog post. Yes. And share your projects, share photos. Share what the client's problem was and how you fixed it. But share it from an emotional standpoint. Not, oh, their pantry was a mess, but this couple is super busy with work and they are trying to eat healthy. They can't find anything in their pantry. Here's how we made it easier for them to live a healthy, happy lifestyle. Share the photos cuz now you're connecting with people on an emotional level. You can do the same thing in an email newsletter, but it has to be shorter. You have to have a specific call to action for people to book a call. And it really could be that.  Yeah. And blog posts in particular, I think that there are a few words that start to scare people a little bit, or phrases. So I think when, when sometimes when people are like, oh, blog posts, oh, I have to like, basically write a a book quality piece of, of marketing, you know, it has to be perfect.  Nope, it doesn't have to be, none of these things have to be perfect, first of all. But you can take something, a simple concept in your in your business, and you can write a blog post. It could be what, what do you recommend for blog posts? 500 words. What's your.  Yeah. So 500 is the minimum. You could go up to a thousand. I think most people get tired of writing at that point. Yeah.  even. I do, and I'm a writer. Yeah. But yeah, if you have a 500 word post that's basically a single page document in Microsoft Word or Google Docs. So single space, single page, and make sure that you have headings so that people can skim it. Make sure you've got a nice balance of photos. Like you don't want it to be all images because that's not really helpful for your seo, but you wanna make sure that you're able to tell the story and don't stretch it out to make it 500 words if it's just not that long. But also make sure that you're hitting on the emotional points and then ending with. , are you ready to take the next step? Well, the next step for people reading your blog posts wouldn't necessarily be to book a call with you right away, though. You could have that as an option. Maybe the next step for them is actually to get one of your free downloads. Your free download should not be, here's how you can organize this yourself because you're not trying to sell. Yeah. Why? But it's more so like, here's what you can expect when working with a professional organizer. Mm-hmm. , and it walks people through the emotional component of it. We're not gonna throw away your stuff. We're gonna help you make streamlined decisions. And then we're going to get the appropriate sized, you know, organizational things for your space. We're gonna put it all together. We're gonna teach you the organizational system so that it doesn't get screwed up within a week. Yes. And then that's also when you can talk about the maintenance packages that you might offer so that they're not like, oh, so I hire you and then you're gone forever. Don't leave me like this. You know? Right. And it's a great upsell, but as long as you're focusing that download on. , here's how we are gonna help you and not, here's how you're gonna do it yourself. Yeah. People are going to get so much value out of that, and the value isn't necessarily the knowledge of, okay, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do this. It's more like, okay, they're gonna help me. They understand my problem. It's not gonna disrupt my life. It's actually going to improve my life. Then once they get your download, because they had to sign up for it via their email address, now they're in your contact. You can't ignore them, okay? There's a lot of untapped revenue in your mailing list, even if you've only got 12 people  there. Even if it's 10 people. You guys, yes. It doesn't matter how small  your list is, it really does not. So make sure that you're reaching out to them once a month. Now we get down to you. Okay, well, what could I say in that newsletter, you could talk about one of your previous clients, but if you don't have a lot of clients right now, that could be pretty hard to do. So instead, you can talk about here's how I approach organizing the kitchen. You know, here's how I organize the cabinets. Here's why. And it's again, not d iy. And then you could also just talk about like, one of the newsletters that we have in my membership is the emotional cost of. . Mm-hmm. . And then we also have one about how cluttered eats equity. And that one's for people who are like trying to get ready to sell their home.  But they've got so much stuff in it that when people come for showings, it's like I can't see past your stuff. Sorry. Yep. You know? And that can actually cost you big time, even when the market is hot. Sure, your home might sell, but it's not gonna sell for what it could have sold if your stuff was just not in the way. Yeah. And so really taking people up to a bird's eye.  and helping them understand that this is why organizing matters. It's not just about having Instagram perfect pantries. It actually has real world implications. And talking to them about that once a month in a newsletter, that's where we're seeing conversions happen. People will click reply and they'll be like, I really need your help. When are you available? And all of a sudden they're just in a huge.  because they're like, oh, I didn't know I needed this, but I need it and I need it now. And that's like the perfect situation. So, that's the sales funnel. Now people are getting to your site because you're blogging once or twice a month or they met you in person or someone referred them to you. You have to have that blog to really engage with them. That lead magnet or the, the free download to capture their contact info and then the newsletter once a month to nurture them into a client. And that's what you can do. And you can do that in addition to being social, on social media. Right. Or you can do it completely in place of social media. Right.   And here's the crazy thing I'm gonna throw out there  the return on investment for email marketing versus social is 40 times higher.  Okay. So I want everyone to like stop and absorb that because I do, I talk a lot about  it's, and we're gonna talk about this, but email marketing is the most slept on thing in our business. I think it's something that people  maybe know that they should be doing, but 40 times the return even, I assume you're gonna agree with this. With a small  list. Even with a small list.