How to Sell Advice

Thinking of selling one to many offers? Subscriptions, memberships, and group coaching are great ways to generate income on your path towards more leverage. But if you don't plan the business model right, you could end up with a model that isn't aligned with your members/clients.In this episode, I chat about some of the distinct elements of each and how to price them so they make sense for everyone. Here's some rough notes I used for the episode:1. Subscription (content, media company model)NewspapersSubstack, Ghost, StratecheryQ&A calls or Community (low touch)$5-$15/mo+2. Membership (content, community, resources)Community (i.e. on Patreon, Slack, Circle, others)ChecklistsTemplatesVideo recordingsWebinarsSwipe FileRolodexQ&A calls$10 to $150/mo+3. Group Coaching (content, 1:1 advice, transformation)Value-based goalsHigher-ticketLess scalableSmall group coaching (Everspaces)$250 to $1,500/mo++Are you interested in starting one of these models (or have one already?)Let me know what you're thinking and if you have any questions we can mull over together. Yours,—k

Sukiyabashi Jiro is a 10-seat restaurant located underground next to the entrance of a train station. And yet, this is one of the most prestigious restaurants in the world.If you haven't seen it yet, I highly recommend watching Jiro Dreams of Sushi, a documentary about sushi chef, Jiro Ono, and his Michelin three-star restaurant, Sukiyabashi Jiro.Listen to this post to see how it inspired me to use scarcity to create a more premium positioning during my sales process. And for more inspiration, you can read an article with other lessons learned here: https://kevin.me/consistency/Happy Friday!—k

What if you could buy an air conditioner/furnace from someone who only made money on the service, not the actual unit.As it stands, HVAC providers sell the furnace AND installation. And that puts you, the buyer, at odds with their interest. They want to sell you the most expensive unit.What if, instead, they carried a wide range of options and didn't limit themselves to a few available options. In this case, they could actually advise you on what the right unit is for you. No up-sells, no pushy sales tactics, no "renting" a unit and baking in the service. Not only would it make them into a "category of one" in the market, you'd be more likely to trust them the entire time. If they gained a reputation, people would be more likely to refer them to everyone they knew. And as a buyer who had a great experience, you'd be more likely to call them when things broke down. You trust them.While this might not be practical for this industry, it's entirely possible. Yours,—k

Most people start off selling implementation work before being able to sell advice.If that's you, I recommend one of these two options if you wish to transition into selling advice.1. Offer it as a tier of service in your proposals2. Offer a fractional CMO/managed marketing serviceThe second one will severely limit you in terms of how many clients you can take on, but at least you can begin to:get paid a full rate for your skills (without marking up others' work)stop doing the work yourself and start overseeing it insteadtake on a more strategic role and be seen as a trusted advisor This approach worked really well for me in the beginning. The second approach in particular. Eventually, you phase out of the managed stuff and start doing real consulting and advisory work. And once you start selling work this way and it works, you'll never go back.Leave a comment and let me know what you think!Yours,—k

This is a follow up episode from two days ago. I want you to listen to this and empathize with your clients' inner world when faced with the decisions you help them make. To summarize, I'm finally ready to buy a new AC machine. It's been an interesting experience navigating a world I have no knowledge or experience about. Luckily, I have a friend who is an HVAC expert. He's been my trusted advisor.And if it weren't for him, I definitely would have ended up making the wrong decision (or completely guessing about which one was right for me).Now, remember also that this is a one-off scenario. But your clients have to make all kinds of judgement calls about their marketing every day. Often, they have no way of knowing whether they are making decisions until it's much too late.That's why it's so valuable to be a neutral advisor to your clients. And if you're going to do that, whether you sell implementation or not, you need to act in their best interest.Even if it means short term sacrifice to you. Otherwise, you're just like the first sales guy spoke to who wasn't really trying to fit me with the best possible option, but instead the one that made him the most money. (I know you're not like that, of course.)Yours,—k

Clients will come to you and prescribe a solution to their problem. But that doesn't mean you need to listen to them. In fact, you need to do your own investigation first. You need to diagnose their situation, find out what future state they're looking for, why it matters, what the financial impact will be, and only THEN do you decide how to get there and what it should cost.Not only does this help keep everyone focused on what matters (the end result) it helps you overcome price objections and find creative solutions to their situation using various levels of involvement.Give this a listen and let me know what you think!Yours,—k

My air conditioner broke in the middle of a heatwave.Someone came to look at it and told me it needs to be replaced. They also recommended I replace my furnace at the same time. How do I know if what they're saying is true? I trust them, but my guard is up. Now, imagine I had to make decisions like this every single day. Complicated choices with financial impact on things I have no expertise in.I'd want someone on my team I could trust. Someone with no financial incentives in the implementation. An advocate. And if I didn't have in-house expertise, I'd want an advisor to help me make these decisions. That's what a good advisor does. They're an advocate. Incentives aligned. So if you want to be a full-time advisor, you have to get paid for your expertise and facilitate implementation, not necessarily offer it yourself. More on this soon.Yours,—k

There's a funny phenomenon I noticed when it comes to any kind of success in marketing. You can apply it to almost anything you do and get greater success. The phenomenon is this: go two levels deep. Give this a listen and hit the like button or reply with your thoughts!Yours,—k

The problem with not knowing who you're trying to target with your marketing is that you end up not getting anyone interested enough to reach out.To succeed as a marketer, you need to have a target and then put the right things in the right places at the right time. Listen to this strategy and tell me what you think.Yours,—k

Want to sell advice for a living? Well, there are at least two ways you can do it. But only one of them will get you real success. Listen in to the differences between a fiduciary standard and suitability standard of advice, and why the fiduciary standard is the only one to aim for.If you want to learn more, here's a link to an article explaining the differences applied to the financial advisor industry. Yours,—k