Five Questions to Ask When Your Sales Aren't Converting

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So your services and offerings aren't selling. What gives? Listen to today's episode where business coach Katrina Widener walks you through the process she takes with her clients when their sales aren't converting.

The episode:

Hello everyone! I am very excited because today is the first recording of season three of the podcast! Which I am almost in disbelief that it is now the third year of having this podcast and I just wanted to quickly take a moment before we dive into today's topic to thank everyone who has been listening since the very beginning, thank everyone who even if this is your very first episode of listening to the podcast. I just feel so grateful that I have had the opportunity to do this as long as I have, and to consistently bring amazing information to entrepreneurs, feature guest experts, feature members of the Badass Business Squad Mastermind...

And yeah, I just wanted to start off this episode by giving everyone listening a big old thank you, from me to you. My name is Katrina Widener and if this is like your first time listening, I'm just glad to have you here.

So it is currently January of 2023, and I wanted to really kick off this new season with a solo episode, where you're just getting yours truly bringing you some information about sales. So I know that generally when it comes to January, people are doing goal setting for the next year. They are getting really into this mindset of like, "What do I want to do? What do I want to achieve?" And a lot of those goals oftentimes look like sales. We're talking about how to make money. We're talking about how to scale our businesses, and that's why I wanted to kick off this season and kick off this year with talking about things to look out for, for when your sales are not converting.

Because it is so easy to sit down and say, "All right, so here are ways that I can try to improve my sales." But really every sort of goal setting starts with, taking a step back and evaluating what you're currently doing. What is and is not working. So today we're going to talk about some questions to ask yourself when your sales are not converting, and hopefully they will help you get some clarity around where to make some slight adjustments moving forward. Because also as I've mentioned several times on the podcast beforehand, what we really want to focus on when your sales are not converting or when anything is not working in your business, is really sitting down and instead of starting from scratch — like, going to create a whole new service or going to scrap my entire marketing or launch plan and start from the very beginning all over again — it's really just making small, subtle adjustments that can help you get closer and closer and closer and closer and closer to the results that you want.

And the truth is that's what an entire journey of owning a business is. It's just a series of subtle shifts getting closer and closer to your most aligned business. So we're just going to dive right in and talk about what the five questions to ask yourself when your sales are not converting are, so that you can evaluate and make new changes and just adjust what you're doing to let it feel easier, let it be more successful.

So the very first question that I always want to talk about... When it comes to "Katrina, I am doing this work. I'm getting leads. I'm getting on sales calls and then no one's signing up with me," or even to take it a step back even more is to say like, "I'm not getting leads. I'm not getting sales calls. This isn't working." When I sit down with a client and we're really starting from the very beginning of our working together, and before we dive into any strategy, before we dive into any changes. The first question I ask them is if they are in love with, and incredibly confident in what they're offering and in their ability to get results.

Because here is the truth, people. If you are not... forgive me, but balls to the walls confident about what the thing is that you are selling? You are not going to sell it. It is like business 101, the very first thing :you are not going to make sales if you are not confident about that thing that you are selling. There has to be a very strong level of confidence around how you feel about what you're selling. There has to be a strong level of both like, "I'm confident in how this offer looks. I'm confident in how it feels to be within it. I'm confident that I can get people results at the end of it." Because if you are lacking any confidence around any of that, people can feel it. People can really, really feel it.

Sometimes there are different ways that this shows up. There are different things for us to focus on when this shows up. But oftentimes if I sit down with people and I'm asking them, "Are you in love with your offer?" and they're like, "Well I think it's going to be really successful." Or, "I think that this is going to work really well." that's not enough.

When I talk to you guys about the Badass Business Squad Mastermind, I gush! I am sure I annoy the crap out of people because I'm sitting there being like, "Oh my gosh, it's so amazing. I love the people that are in it. The massive, massive shifts that they're making are huge. I have had clients who have like doubled their income. I've had clients who have hired on full new team members. I have clients who have gone from being like, 'This is just like what I want to do,' to being like, 'Okay, I absolutely love being in my business on a day to day basis. I am excited to show up to these calls.'" I can't tell you enough how good it feels for me to sit in every single mastermind meeting and work through things with my clients, and then see at the end of us working together them be like, "Katrina, I just booked the largest client I've ever booked ever." Or, "Oh my gosh, I can't believe that I get to work with these people."

And if I was sitting there being like, "So I have this mastermind and I think it's going to be pretty successful for people, but I don't really know." Or, "It's the thing that everyone's doing right now, so I want to have a mastermind because blah, blah, blah who's also a business coach has a mastermind." That is not... that's not going to fly guys. That is not how this shit works. That is not how you get massive, massive scalability and massive, massive results in your business. You got to freaking adore what you're doing, and you have to know that you can replicate results outside of your own experience working on yourself, in order for it to be successful.

And so if you guys are sitting down and saying like, "I'm not getting any leads converting. My marketing's not working. I'm not able to get someone on a sales call to purchase with me." My question for you is, "How in love are you with what you're doing and how positive are you that you can get results from it?" because if it is not off the wall like high, high, high, high, high levels of just absolute adoration of your own work, then there's going to be some friction. There will not be the results that you want. So that is like the very first question to ask yourself, and if you are ever in that space? This is where you have to do the most foundational work. This is where I would recommend working with a coach, talking to your business friends, showing up to your local Rising Tide Society groups, or other networking groups and saying, "Guys, I need some help because what's going on in my business is not lighting me the F up."

So once we have this offer that we're like, "Nope, I know my offer is incredibly successful and I am absolutely in love with it." The second question is, "Are you marketing to the right people?" And I'm actually going to kind of partner this with the third question which is, "Does my messaging and language match the people I'm marketing to?" So this is something that I'll use my own anecdote on how this happened for me in my business.

So I'd been doing group coaching for years and I liked group coaching. Did I love it the way I love my mastermind? No. So I made some shifts. I was like, "I'm going to shift this so that I absolutely adore it." But then the second thing that I did was sit down and say, "Who is the exact person I want in my mastermind?" and make sure that I was marketing to them, and make sure that the language on my website and in all of that marketing was specifically geared toward this new person.

So it was really me sitting down and saying like, "I need to nail who it is that my mastermind that I adore is for, so that I can nail down what platforms I'm marketing on. How I'm creating content on those platforms. Who I am partnering with." For me, let's use like a very, very obvious example. My mastermind is for mid-level entrepreneurs. People who have been in the game for a while, who are really looking to scale. Who are really looking to be like, "No, I'm a success. I'm not just a beginner, and I'm not just that person who's like spinning their wheels trying to get this shit to work."

So if I am sitting down and I'm saying one of the ways that I'm going to market my mastermind is to show up in groups, and then I start showing up in beginner only groups? How is that me marketing to the right people? Of course they're not going to have those leads, are not going to convert. If I offer a free strategy session to someone in a networking group for beginners, and then I try to sell them on a mastermind for mid-level entrepreneurs who are ready to make six figures and beyond? Sure they might want that, but are they the right fit for that group? No. And so why am I spending my time marketing those areas? Of course, those leads aren't going to convert.

And then for that third part, if the language on my website, if the language in what my speaking event is talking about, if the language within my marketing or on my social media is not matching that right group of people? Then I could maybe even attract the right person and then they show up on my website and they're like, "Oh. This isn't for me," and then they leave. Really the goal of the copy on your website is to have someone be like, "Holy shit, you are talking directly to me. I know that this is exactly what's going to help me get my goals figured out, and I'm ready to take action now." That's how you get those sales that are regularly converting.

So if we move on to the fourth question... we have an offer that we absolutely adore, and we know we can get results in it. We are marketing to the right people and we know exactly who that person is, and we are using the language to bring them in. And then they show up and they're like, "I want to purchase from you," and you don't have a clear purchasing journey? They're going to be like, "Heh?" and you're going to lose them. To clarify what I mean by a clear purchasing journey is it goes hand in hand with a buying culture. So if someone does not know how to purchase from you or does not know the journey of how to meet you, through to how to work with you? They're not going to know when to sign up. They're not going to know that this is the right option for them.

It's way harder to cold convert someone who just lands on your website to purchase something. Especially if it's a high ticket offer like a mastermind, or even like wedding photography sometimes if you think about that. Anything that's a high ticket offer, it's way harder to purchase from someone. But if I have it set up where I'm like, "No, the buying culture or the purchasing journey is you show up and you do this first, and then you do this thing second, and then you do this thing third," that's going to feel way easier.

Think about if you are someone who's maybe looking for a business coach. Goes on Google. Shows up on my website. Cool service, great language marketed to the right person. But you show up and you're like, "Huh? It says I can sign up now, but I don't know when the next mastermind is. Is this something I can join immediately? There's a high ticket price on this. I just am going to cold sign up for this?" No. I immediately direct people on all of my services to sign up for a free strategy call or sign up for a wait list. If they sign up for the wait list then they get an email with information on how to work with me, how to go through this. I am educating and directing and have already thought out the process of how someone works with me.

So for the flip side, someone shows up on my website through SEO. They look there and it says, "Hey. Schedule a free strategy call with me. Let's see if you could be the right fit for a program like this." They schedule that strategy call. In that strategy call I give them the expectation of how we're going through that strategy call. I fulfill everything on that expectation, and at the end I say, "So here are your options. You can go ahead and sign up for the mastermind now. This is when doors open. You can get on the wait list if doors aren't opening sometime soon. Or what you could do is sign up for an intensive with me, and the amount that you spend on that intensive is going to go toward the mastermind if this shows up." I have given them an easier opt-in than the bigger ticket item, and I've also told them exactly how the process of working together goes. Exactly how they will purchase from.

And to take it even one step further. What I can do on that level is say, "All right, so what you would do is you'd go here. You would sign up for this intensive, you would schedule it at this link. I'll provide you all that information, you don't have to do anything but show up in your inbox. And then after the intensive, you all have 30 days to apply this toward either one-on-one coaching with me or the mastermind." They're going to know before they even opt into anything exactly what that's going to look like, and having that clear purchasing journey and setting those expectations is really building trust in you before they even work with you. And the biggest key for getting someone to convert and purchase from you, is to trust you. So that clear purchasing journey is huge!

So we've gone through all of those like really, really big key things. And again, for anyone listening, there's show notes on the website with a full transcription so that you can get more information on how to do this. Like, you don't have to memorize all of these things, basically is what I'm trying to say.

But my fifth tip, my last tip. The thing that I want you to ask yourself, is if all of these things are happening and you are not converting? Is if you are stuffing your offers. This is something that might feel very confusing. Cuz you're like, "But what are you talking about Katrina?" Well, first of all, stuffing your offers is adding so many things to your offers that it actually confuses your audience.

I saved this for last because this is probably the most common thing that I see people do. This is something that I see people do all the freaking time, and it's a combination of a lack of boundaries between yourself and your business, or yourself and your clients, and a lack of confidence in your offer. And so what often happens is someone says, "You can join this, or you can sign up for this, or you can purchase this, and I'm going to throw in six other things that you can get for free in addition to this thing." My favorite analogy to explain this, is say you are trying to sell a $2,000 ticket item. It's not even like the highest of high end, but it is not the low end either. It's on the more luxury level. And you're saying, "I would like to sell this $2,000 thing."

Imagine if we think of a physical store. Where you go into Target and you see something that's 99 cents, and you see something that's $5, and you see something that's $20, and then you see something that's $2,000. Are you going to be more likely to purchase that $2,000 item in that store? Or if you go into something that is purely beautifully curated. You go into... let's say we're taking this analogy pretty far, and we're going with like a sofa or couch. And you go into this beautiful high end luxury store, and you're saying, "Hey, I am looking for a new couch," and they're like, "All right. Well, here we have this couch, and here we have this couch, and we have this couch. This one's been perfectly curated. I've picked it out just for you. I've made it as easy as possible to purchase this. I have eliminated all of the noise. Here is the thing that I have already gone through and done all of the brain space and the work to curate this boutique. Here's the $2,000 price tag."

You're going to be like, "All right, great. I trust you. I'm going to purchase it." Instead of being like, "There's so many bright lights and noises, and there's 800 things in this store, and there's people walking around all over the place. Am I going to be purchasing a high end item from this store or from the beautifully curated boutique?" Really the idea is to look at this as if, instead of trying to entice your buyers to purchase with you by adding a ton of stuff in there, approach it as if you are a highly curated boutique. You are saying, "Come and purchase this thing. I have already sat down to create the strategy for it to a T. I've gone through and edited it. I've gone through and I've made sure that every single thing is super, super impactful and important. I've vetted it. I have had people go through it beforehand. I know that this gets you results. No, you don't have six extra things tagged onto the end. Because I know that you don't need them."

People will actually have more trust in you if you come across as someone who is highly curated and has already done the vetting and the editing for them, then if you're someone who's giving them a crap load of things. Because that's just noise. That is more mental clutter for them. That is more shit to wade through. Instead of being like, "Here's this perfectly created, curated item to purchase."

Really the whole goal with all five of these questions is just saying like, "How can I get more and more aligned with my ideal audience?" And that's by really having an offer that's really aligned with them, that you absolutely love. That is making sure you can get them the results that are going to work for them and getting those aligned with them. That is getting your marketing aligned to the right people. That is getting your messaging and language aligned with the right people. That is getting your purchasing journey really aligned to that particular client.

I know that as a coach and as a podcast host I talk about alignment all the fricking time, and it can seem like this abstract nebulous topic. Where maybe it's like, "Okay, Katrina. So you're talking about alignment. But really does that just mean I'm like, 'I'm doing the thing that I want'?" it's like, "No, you are actually sitting down and using strategy to get things aligned with you and your clients. So you can make more sales in a way that feels easier. Whenever our sales are not converting, that's when it can feel really, really difficult to be in business. That's when you can get burned out, you can get overwhelmed. There are obviously other things that cause those things as well. But this is like the core of that.

So I hope that this was helpful for everyone listening. As always, please feel free to email me, DM me, pop in. However makes sense for you. Ask me follow up questions. We can go through this together. But in the end, my goal is really just to help you guys get sales that convert at a higher frequency and have a higher conversion rate overall, and I hope that this was helpful for everyone listening!