Al McBride 0:03
Welcome to the dealing with Goliath podcast. The mission of dealing with Goliath is to sharpen the psychological edge in negotiation, ethical influencing and high impact conversations for business leaders who want to be more effective under pressure, uncover hidden value, and build greater connection all while increasing profitability. This is the short form espresso shot of insight podcast interview to boost business performance using our five questions in a roundabout 15 minutes format. My guest today is Lisa Larter.

Lisa is a business strategist, digital marketing expert, author, speaker and podcast host her businesses Lisa larter consulting and as US subsidiary company go daxi help their clients to formulate marketing strategies that support their business goals and objectives for increasing their visibility leads and sales. Customer Acquisition leads to provide strategy and advisory services, as well as a full suite of implementation services that include social media and content management, book marketing campaigns, podcast management, and website design.

Lisa recently released her newest book, masterful marketing great, great title, by the way, co authored with the famous and legendary Alan Weiss to help business owners dominate their markets with a value based approach. Lisa, welcome to the show.

Lisa Larter 1:29
Thank you so much for having me. It’s good to be here.

Al McBride 1:32
Well, it’s fabulous to have you on. So let’s dive straight in. So who is your ideal client? And what’s the biggest challenge they tend to face?

Lisa Larter 1:40
I would say my ideal client is an expert who doesn’t know how to market their expertise. And I’m not talking about an influencer. I’m talking about an expert. So I look at someone like Alan Weiss. He is an expert. But he’s not he’s not someone who wants to be an Instagram famous influencer. So I like working with customers who have a deep level of expertise in a specific area of business, but they don’t necessarily have the marketing expertise that they need to create the visibility for themselves that is necessary for them to build their business.

Al McBride 2:17
Right. So that’s very interesting. So it could be a few listeners out there viewers that this podcast might be starting to think, oh, maybe that’s me. So they’re usually by what you’re saying. They’re very competent, what they do, they have that established expertise and knowledge. But as I said, it’s getting people coming to them that that’s a bit more tricky for them. Okay.

Lisa Larter 2:37
So, like a best kept secret, Oh, I like this kept secret. So they don’t understand why they’re not why people aren’t knocking down their door, because they they’re very, very, very confident at their, their skill, that the trade whatever it is that they do, but they’re not as confident in putting themselves out there. They’re not as confident with some of the new modalities in modern marketing and how to actually use them. They don’t know how to take advantage of digital marketing. And even often they don’t know how to optimize their website in order to draw people in.

Al McBride 3:12
Okay, so that’s kind of half answering and preemptively the next one, well, what are the common mistakes people make when trying to solve that problem? So it isn’t that they don’t have a strategy or they don’t know what to do. And they’re tweaking and trying these things, or what’s, what are some of those common mistakes?

Lisa Larter 3:27
I would say that there is a appointed business where when you are in startup mode, you’re typically very lean in terms of your expenditures. Most consultants are experts, they hang up a shingle, and, you know, they, they they start to beat the pavement to try to drum up some business, but they don’t really understand that the biggest part of their business is marketing. And so strategy is missing.

But it’s not just the marketing strategy. It’s really understanding what your overarching business strategy is, and what marketing is going to elevate that strategy so that you can attract the right buyer, who’s actually going to spend the right amount of money in order for you to grow your business. I find that when people lack confidence and how to put themselves out there from a marketing perspective, they often lack confidence in how they value the work that they do. Meaning, they often lack the confidence to charge what they should be charging, because they don’t see themselves as being as good as they are in their industry.

Al McBride 4:29
It’s a very interesting little acid test. So for people listening, if you fear you’re not charging enough, maybe that’s maybe that’s a part of it. Maybe as he said, when you were able to charge that you have that confidence, you have the systems to bring clients and prospects to you. Okay, interesting.

Lisa Larter 4:45
So it’s like I think of it as McDonald’s, he went into McDonald’s, you don’t expect to see a $75 filet mignon on the menu with saw, you know, all of your sides on the side, but you would never walk into have a high end Steakhouse and have it look like a McDonald’s. So what happens is when people start out, they often look like McDonald’s, they need to look like a high end Steakhouse in order for their fees to follow along.

Al McBride 5:11
So it has to appear to be in alignment, as you say, so does McDonald’s, do what they do, and people love them and all that jazz, not my bag. But you know, people, but as you said, you get what you expect. Whereas in a Michelin restaurant, whatever, you also get what you expect, it’s just a different thing.

Lisa Larter 5:28
Exactly. You can’t charge Michelin prices. Sorry, if anyone says. I have a dog that barks like a rooster. My apologies.

Al McBride 5:40
I see the painting behind you there. Yeah.

Lisa Larter 5:44
Yeah, you wouldn’t you go to a Michelin restaurant, you expect to pay a premium and you expect to eat really good food and have a wonderful experience. So if you are an expert, and you provide great value, you should be charging for that value. But your business should look that way. And your website is really your retail storefront on the internet.

Al McBride 6:02
Very, very good point. Very good point. So what is one valuable free action that the audience could implement that will help them with this issue. So it might not solve it, but at least it gets them thinking in the right direction.

Lisa Larter 6:16
I would say one valuable free action that they could take is to really spend some time getting clear on who their buyer is, and connecting the dots on the value that they provide that buyer with. I think sometimes when you’re really good at something, and it’s easy for you, you undervalue it, because it was easy for you, but it’s not easy for someone else. And so if you can connect the dots between who that perfect buyer is and what the value is that you bring to the table, that one thing will give you clarity, that can help you with your marketing and your positioning in a much stronger way.

Al McBride 6:58
Very, very interesting. Yeah. That’s a great, great piece of advice. So what would be one valuable free resource that you could direct people to? That would help them with that?

Lisa Larter 7:10
I would say there’s two resources. So one, I run a business book club called thought readers. And every month I read a business book, and I share my insights and I share discussion questions with the community, you just have to buy the book, you can join thought readers at thought readers.com. And if you go to my website, on the homepage, there’s a an opt in for a program called the pilot project. And the pilot project was really a course that I built before I wrote my first book, pilot to profit.

And that course was really my aha, in what I uncovered was a root cause issue, instead of the marketing issue. So people will come to me and say, I need help with marketing. And the more I would ask them about their business, the more I would have realized they didn’t understand their business model. They didn’t understand their buyer, they didn’t understand, you know, how to position their services. And so the pilot project walks you through a lot of those things. And it’s a free course, I used to charge $200 for the course. And I now give it away for free.

Al McBride 8:11
Excellent, excellent. That sounds like a tremendous resource. Yeah. I love that, that as you said, it’s so often the case, the presenting problem was, oh, I need help with marketing. But in actual fact, all those elements that go into answering those marketing questions as to what is the basis of your marketing, that has to be addressed, or fundamental business questions, you have to deal with first Brilliant stuff. So what will be your maybe number one insight or principle on how to negotiate, build rapport and connection? Or uncover hidden value with clients?

Lisa Larter 8:49
Ah, that’s a tough question. I think, you know, one of my insights around building rapport with clients is really, I mean, one of my key strategies in my business is retention of business. So I think that we often focus too much on the acquisition of new business. And if we actually focus on the retention of business and the long term relationship with our customers, it can be a lot easier to grow your business, you need to have some type of, you know, recurring revenue model where you can continue to work with those customers.

And so I think it’s really, really important that you build a deep relationship with your customers. And I’m not talking you know, romantic relationship, I just mean, a really solid, trust based relationship with your customers. Because when you do that, you don’t have to negotiate. And when you do that, you don’t have to sell as hard. You know, I have clients that I’ll text on the weekend and say, Oh, I was just thinking about you and your business. And I had this idea that I thought might be good for you.

And I’ll share the idea and they’ll reply by text and say, I love it. Can we do that? Can you quote me? I want you to do that for me. And I’m not I’m not selling I’m sharing I’m serving. So I think that when you actually care about your clients, and you build a good relationship with them, you can avoid needing to negotiate things. The other thing that I would say is, the more you publish for free, and the more you allow people to see who you are and what value you offer, the easier it is to command the fees that you command without having to enter into any negotiation, it your fees almost become non negotiable.

Al McBride 10:30
Sonny, I love that, because you, you talk about negotiation, in a level where it’s ideal for most people, which is more of a collaboration, that as he said, it’s not so much a tussle, but we’re just coming to the agreement that’s best fit for both of us. And I love that. Yeah, that’s the ideal negotiation. So it’s good to see we’re on the same page. And it you raise a brilliant point about retention, because so often people spend so much time and effort in and they use language, like winning over the client and closing the deal and all this sort of stuff.

But then when it’s done, they kind of does that honeymoon period that dies offs slowly and sometimes quickly, depending on the individual. And then when it comes to any, if depends on your business, when it comes to renewal time. How often the people then are not feeling the love anymore, you know? Exactly the problem that appreciation, just like you say, you’re dead, right? We need to appreciate the people we’re already working with.

Lisa Larter 11:28
Yes, absolutely. And look for ways to continue to help them right. There’s usually other things that you can do to help them. And so if you’re curious, and you look at ways to help them, even even using language, like have you ever considered trying this, instead of hey, we have this new service, we’d like to offer you use language like have you ever considered trying this? And if they say no, I haven’t, that’s a great idea.

We can help you with that if you decide you want to do that. So I think just learning how to sell without selling is something that a lot of people need to do. And it’s not that I don’t think that there’s anything wrong with selling. But I think sometimes we we we go too close to closing, we jumped too fast to closing the sale. And we don’t spend enough time building rapport and strengthening the relationship with the existing buyers we have.

Al McBride 12:19
That’s absolutely true. As you said, when you have that trust, you know, trust isn’t built in a day, it’s built step by step, a rapport can be nearly instantaneous. But it’s building on that building that goodwill, but actually caring about what the other person thinks, what they’re actually feeling what their needs are all that? Absolutely, absolutely. And this goes back to the very interesting description of your latest book masterful marketing, which as you said, was co authored by consulting legend, Alan Weiss. So as I mentioned, to help business owners dominate the markets with a value based approach, it’s a very interesting turn value based approach. Can you expand on that for us for a moment?

Lisa Larter 12:59
Well, when I first approached Alan and asked him if he wanted to write this book, I wanted to call a book value based marketing, because I was really a fan of his original book value based fees. And my belief is that when your marketing provides your buyers or your potential buyers with value, it makes the whole process of attracting customers and selling a lot easier, because you already made deposits into their life and business through the value that you’re creating in your marketing. And so that is really the crux of the book. If you can do on, if you can provide enough people with enough value through the marketing that you produce, then it becomes really easy for you to generate inbound leads and grow your business.

Al McBride 13:43
Absolutely. And that’s that’s kind of the ideal for a lot of experts isn’t other people know and appreciate your expertise and come to use the dream the inbound, right? Absolutely. And the warm because they are already. They’re not so much checking. But you know, are you good enough for anything or that they’re checking? Are you a good fit?

Lisa Larter 14:01
They feel like they already know you. Thanks. Yeah, exactly.

Al McBride 14:05
You’ve jumped the line. Yeah, absolutely. That’s where it’s a fabulous version. Yes, you’re right. Of course, the value based value based fees was very much on why stuff. It all makes sense now. Absolutely. So Lisa, where can people reach out and find you online?

Lisa Larter 14:21
The best place to find me is Lisa larter.com. That’s my my website. You can find me on social media. Almost every single one of my social media handles is forward Lisa larder. So I’m pretty easy to find a simple Google search and it’ll land you on my website.

Al McBride 14:37
Outstanding stuff at Sandy. So, Lisa, thank you so much for being on the show.

Lisa Larter 14:42
Thank you very much for having me. It was great. I love your short format.

Al McBride 14:46
Thank you.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai