Hey there, [memb_contact fields="FirstName"]! 

Welcome to Module 6 of the Breakthrough Revenue for Resume Businesses program.

IN THE LAST MODULE, the topic was about attracting prospects from multiple marketing channels.

You also learned that prospects have a TEMP, which impacts how many sales you successfully close.

Cold prospects need to warm up to you/your business, so these take longer to close. Warm and hot prospects are aware of you and your business, which drives buying intent and makes for faster sales.

So, when your close rates are low, consider things like:

• What prospects know or don't know about you/your business during initial interactions
• Where prospects originate from, such as repeat client (hot), referral (warm), or Google search (cold)
• When (timeline that) prospects need their new resume/LI profile; do they need the resume next week or next month?

Ideally, attracting HOT & WARM PROSPECTS aware of your writing value, client successes, and service rates would be the most profitable path. Sales under this scenario would happen flawlessly. Yet, that would only happen in a perfect world. For many resume writers, too often they receive far more cold prospects than those warm or hot.

To help move prospects further down your buying path, in the last module, we highlighted the IMPORTANCE OF COLLECTING DATA TO FIND WARM & HOT PROSPECTS and use that data within a SAAS CRM. Part of converting prospects faster results from collecting, interpreting, and acting on specific data. For example, links that prospects clicked (aka their consumption of certain topics. Or, maybe their actions to specific calls-to-action (CTAs) found in your emails, webinars, social updates, etc. By strategically setting up a CRM, it will "tell you a story" of each prospect that's easily understandable and actionable.

Actions you could take include:

• Calling prospects who visited your "schedule a free consult" page, but didn't
• Emailing prospects who read your warm content, such as "Why I'm the right resume writer for you," but have yet to request a project quote or buy

Lastly, in the previous module, we provided a multi-channel checklist for you to reference and act upon. As your prospecting ventures deepen, chances are you'll step into pay-per-click (PPC) opportunities, so as a bonus, we provided you with an example PPC ad to customize to your ideal prospect/client.

IN THIS MODULE, the topic is nurturing prospects. In many ways, nurturing prospects is very similar to nurturing a child. Nurturing prospects is about giving attention and taking a vested interest in their needs and desires, which supports their comfort and stability requirements. When there's comfort and stability, there's trust.

The purpose of this module is to provide you with insight into the best uses of automation and one-on-one communication depending upon the TEMP of each prospect. For cold prospects, you're relying heavily on automation (e.g., scheduled blog posts/social updates, email broadcasts) to continue building awareness and relationships. Automation is what marketers call a "one-to-many" tool. For warm/hot prospects, you're relying some on automation, but you're mostly focused on one-on-one communications as prospects step closer to being clients. Also, notice that the types of communications change too, and we talk about that more throughout this module.

As with the previous program modules, we're providing you with downloadable resources (either via Canva or Google Docs) that you leverage to nurture prospects more easily.

HOW TO CREATE WIN-WIN SITUATIONS FOR PROSPECTS AT ALL STAGES

For cold prospects, marketing communications should be multi-channel because those at this stage likely don't know much about you. Sure, prospects are not leads. Instead, prospects are those who've expressed direct or indirect interest in working with you.

Since prospects consume content across different awareness channels, you must leverage a mix of email, social updates, webinars, and so on.

Cold prospects DO NOT always expect personalized interactions, which is why automation works best for those at this stage. As you nurture prospects who know little to nothing about you, you're making small deposits (aka providing informative resources) into the prospect relationship.

Some informative gifts to give cold prospects include:

• Booklets (e.g., The Job Seeker's Secret Weapon)
• Whitepapers (e.g., How to Negotiate a 25% Bump in Salary)
• Templates (e.g., Job Search Timeline to Keep You on Track)
• Checklists (e.g., The Job Seeker's Checklist For Finding Lesser-Known Dream Employers)
• Free Consultations (e.g., Resume Review)

Can you sell to cold prospects? Yes, you absolutely can; however, the odds are against you. Focus instead on delivering value for a time before presenting a low-dollar offer.

PRO TIP: Increase your sales to cold prospects by sending them a low-dollar item when the time is right.

For warm prospects, you're leveraging automation to send things like your monthly or quarterly newsletter. You're also inviting warm prospects to connect with you through social media (e.g., LinkedIn) and attend an exclusive webinar.

The purpose of your marketing communications at this stage is to continue engaging until the prospect grows "hot." To accomplish this, you're switching between one-to-one and one-to-many tactics designed to get warm prospects to the next stage in their buying journey.

To secure more sales conversations and win more sales with warm prospects, send consistent communications that continue to showcase how you can help, tell client success stories, the benefits of your services, etc.

Can you sell to warm prospects? Yup, selling low to mid-priced products and services to warm prospects is ideal. Some of the best mid-dollar items to sell at this stage include masterclasses, intensive resume reviews, coaching sessions, interview prep assistance, etc.

PRO TIP: Mid-priced offers work well for cold prospects who've purchased any low-dollar items from you as well as warm prospects who've visited core content on your website, downloaded a piece of content, engaged with you through social media, or attended a webinar/event.

For hot prospects, these are the folks who've entered into sales conversations with you. You've participated in an initial project consultation call (or Zoom) and provided these hot prospects with a project proposal. But, they haven't bought ... yet. This is the most important stage for you, so spend the bulk of your attention here because hot prospects are the "low-hanging fruit" in your sales pipeline.

Conversations move fast during this stage. Because of this, arm yourself with quick answers to common prospect questions and objections. We dive more into the initial sales call, handling objections, and closing the sale in the next modules, but for now, here are a few sales objections to get you started:

• Why should I hire you and not your competition?
• Your services cost more than I expected.
• Do you offer split-pay options?
• What are the next steps if I decide to proceed?

Can you sell to hot prospects? Yuppers, you're going to continuously ask hot prospects for the sale. And, don't just offer them what they asked for. Instead, offer them more than they think they need. For example, not only should you be selling your high-ticket products and services to hot prospects, but you should also be upselling and cross-selling them. Some of the best add-on products and services to those who buy a resume include a professionally written LinkedIn profile, cover letter, and executive bio.

PRO TIP: Most hot prospects should be presented with your top-priced services. To do yourself a favor and close more sales, have two sets of service options available to hot prospects. Offer ala carte services to those prospects you feel are more price sensitive and high-priced bundled packages to those who have already expressed requiring a mix of services.

A MAIN PLAYER FOR NURTURING PROSPECTS: EMAIL+

Nurturing prospects can indeed be completed using multiple channels, including social media, phone/video calls, and instant messaging. For prospect nurturing, we're focusing on email.

Email should be an intricate part of your nurturing strategy for four main reasons. Email can be:

• Segmented & Personalized
• Measured (think opens, clicks)
• Scalable (one-to-one versus one-to-many)
• Low Cost

The use of email enables you to send exclusive welcome messages and offers to specific prospects based on any segmentation you've established. This additional layer enables you to add more personalization to your email communications to ideally move prospects down your sales funnel and closer to becoming buyers.

• Build a list (do this by offering a lead magnet, webinar, or some other high-value deliverable that enables you to collect email addresses) REVISIT MODULE 3 FOR 2 DOWNLOADABLE LEAD MAGNETS
• Segment the prospects in your list to improve your conversions
• Create nurturing sequences that resonate with prospects on your list that match your avatar (aka ideal client)

What about nurturing prospects using other channels? Certainly, this section focuses on email, yet the strategies we're about to show you can easily be used with very little customization on other awareness channels, such as LinkedIn and Facebook. We'll dive into this deeper as we progress in this module.