Stop Stuffing Your Clients Full

When I take on fasting, as Muslims do during Ramadan, or Jews do during Yom Kippur, there’s a tendency to want to act like a camel and stuff myself as full as possible to “make it through.”

This just doesn’t work. I end up feeling bloated for the first few hours, and then just as tired and hungry later as I would have if I’d eaten a normal meal.

The end of the fast is just as treacherous. You’re tired, you’re hungry, and there’s food in front of you. So you eat. And eat. And eat. And there you are, bloated again.

Guess what? A bloated client is not a happy client.

Stop Stuffing Your Clients

I get it. You care. You have a big heart. You worry. Maybe your clients will end up getting hungry.

So you stuff them full. You try to fit every last thing into your sessions. You create offers that cover all they could possibly need from Achene to Zinc. You impress them with all you provide, and they surely are taken care of.

And bloated. And overwhelmed. And unhappy.

Remember How Long It Took You?

You probably don’t. You probably aren’t remembering the long hours, and weeks, and months, and maybe years and decades you’ve spent learning what you know about what you do in your business.

You probably aren’t remembering all the many different experiences you’ve had with yourself and your other clients that has helped to integrate what you’ve learned.

Take a moment right now. Remember what you’ve gone through to gain the experience, expertise, and knowledge you now offer to your clients.

Honor it. Honor your learning and growth and wisdom.

Now Look At Your Client

If that client were you, where is she on the learning path you just honored? At the beginning? A little ways in?

When you were there, what and how much could you take on?

I think you’re getting my point.

Segment Your Offers

Don’t create huge, all-encompassing offers that give your clients everything. Break them up into smaller pieces. It’s going to be challenging, I know. You’ll feel like you’re holding out on the people who trust you. But it’s okay.

Take a moment in your heart and ask to be shown how your clients will react if you “hold out” on them, and only give them what they can actually digest. Rest into that.

Feels much better to give them less, eh? So, let’s get you started on segmenting. I know it can be difficult- what do you cut? Where do you draw the lines?

Here’s two ways of approaching segmenting that will help.

1. Sequential Segmenting

This is when you have a large amount of information, and you split it up according to the best order to learn it.

Helping students learn yoga? The first course is the basics of body mechanics, the basics of meditation, and some very basic poses, perhaps. The second course goes deeper into the structure of yoga and the spiritual teachings behind it. The third course would go into more advanced techniques, and how to maintain your practice over the long term.

The trick with sequential segmenting is to let the segments be different lengths. The first one can be very short, for this example maybe a one or three class intro. The second class is longer, maybe four weeks. And the third class would help them really deepen, so could be a three or six month commitment.

In the beginning it’s hard to take in new information and experiences, because you don’t have a context for it, so a little bit goes a long way. Once you have some familiarity with the topic, you can take in more, so the sequence can be longer.

This just happens to also help your business, because the longer commitments are good both for the clients and for your profitability.

2. Topical Segmenting

People like to have a sense of accomplishment and outcome when they buy something. Segmenting your offers according to topics, or mini-topics, can help feed that.

If you’re trying to help people with their parenting skills, you could have a course on how to parent young girls. And another course on how to parent teen girls. And another course on young boys. And another on teen boys. And how to deal with sibling rivalry. And how to maintain sanity and self care during the intensity of parenting.

Each course brings in a slightly different group of your clients, and allows for repeat business (parents of both boys and girls, and with kids at different ages).

Of course, a master stroke, if appropriate, is to combine sequential and topical segmenting, so each topic has an intro and advanced.

You do have to watch out, because having too many offers makes it different to market them all effectively. So don’t get too complicated.

Yet, if you stay in your heart, honor your learning and experience, and pay attention to how much your clients can actually take in, you’ll find yourself with happier clients and more repeat business.

p.s. Check out our training programs- they start at free.

Need your business to work, and refuse to sacrifice your heart in the process? Maybe Heart of Business is just what you’ve been looking for.

We’ve been segmenting our offers for years, so you can get what you need. And we’ve taken the effort to provide some of the trainings at no cost, so you can get started, and so you can taste what we offer without risk.

Enrolling clients, marketing your business, creating momentum, writing articles, getting your website done, having a healthy relationship with money… Come take a look:

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