Episode 174: How to Become the Queen of Client Experience

May 5, 2021

If you’re a service-based entrepreneur, you know how important client experience is in your business! What are you doing to ensure that you’re going above and beyond for your clients?

In this episode, I’m sharing three steps to becoming the Queen, King, or Non-binary Royalty of Client Experience in your business!

It’s easier than you may think.

Three Steps to Take to Step Up Your Client Experience

Client experience is key to the success of a service-based business! If you’re ready to step up your game, here are three steps you can take:

  1. Make expectations known at every single turn.
  2. Guide your clients through expectations piece by piece.
  3. Elevate your client experience by underpromising and overdelivering.

Let’s take a further dive into what each of these mean.

Make expectations known at every single turn.

It’s important that you take the time to educate your clients on what your services, processes, and experience look like so they understand what it means to work with you.

When you set your client expectations up in the beginning, you’re preparing your client to overcome every potential obstacle they may encounter.

This gives you an advantage in eliminating any confusion or issues your clients may otherwise face.

Guide you client through expectations piece by piece

In addition to setting expectations, it’s important to guide them through those expectations piece by piece to create clarity in any situation. Even if this means reiterating those expectations through each step of the process.

When you show up, do the work, and follow through, you’re clients will see how much value you bring to them.

Elevate your client experience by under-promising and over-delivering.

We’ve heard the phrase, under-promise and over-deliver, but let’s break this down. I believe in this concept, but I also believe it’s important that you’re still setting high expectations, then going above and beyond to deliver an experience they won’t forget!

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0:07
Hi friends and welcome to the brand strategy podcast a show created to equip you with the inspiration, encouragement and clarity you need to build a brand of your dreams. I’m your host Bonnie bakhtiari re designer strategist and founder of Yulin retreat, from sustainable strategy to heartfelt encouragement. Each episode is designed to equip you with the tools you need to chase after your dreams. Because you deserve a brand that empowers you to do what you love, connects with your dream clients, and offers a deep sense of fulfillment along the way. So grab a cup of coffee and join me on this journey. Well.

0:47
Hey, friends, welcome back to the brand strategy podcast where today we are talking about how to become the queen, king or non binary royalty of client experience. If you are a service based entrepreneur, then this is absolutely the episode for you to tune into, in order to understand three really simple steps you can take in order to really step up your client experience game, invite your clients into a higher level kind of experience, and really position yourself as a pro along the way. Over the years, I have seen so many entrepreneurs in the creative industry struggle with the idea of how to elevate their client experience. And wow, they’re incredible clients every step of the way, here’s the thing, right, we do not need to complicate the process, it’s actually a lot easier to become the royalty of client experience than you might think and is over the last nine years that I’ve worked with my incredible branding clients, my coaching students, my students inside the brand strategy school, this topic of how to elevate your client experience continuously pops up. So if you are thinking that client experience is a little bit mysterious, or it needs to be complex, I’m here to share that it does not have to be complicated, you actually can allow your clients through some very simple steps that really set the tone for what they can expect and how they can work with you. Now, let’s also take a minute to talk about what your client experience actually is. Your client experience is so much more than just, you know, a cute thank you card or I you know really beautiful gifts that you send someone in the middle of your work together. Right? Like there’s so much more that goes into it, like we unintentionally oversimplify what client experience is, and like, we know that it’s important, we know that it’s a very essential part of our processes. But we don’t quite understand what goes into it. So let’s actually kind of flip the script a bit on what client experience is. And instead of viewing it as, you know, steps that you take throughout the process, or gifts you send or cards that you write, let’s look at it as a multifaceted process. That doesn’t have to be complicated. It’s a multifaceted process that gives you the space to create trust with your clients through thoughtful action based steps, that elevates, guides and provides your client with value from start to finish.

3:17
So let’s dive into three simple ways that you can elevate your client experience as a service based entrepreneur, and wow them along the way.

3:27
First up, make expectations known at every single turn. If our goal here is to wow your clients and create this feeling of confidence with you and your process and you as the pro that you are, we want your clients to know that they can expect consistency from you throughout your time working together. So one of the easiest ways to do this is actually to be just proactive and educate them about what’s to come. So whether they have just inquired about working with you, and you get to outline kind of the overview of your process, or they’ve signed on the dotted line, and they are a newly booked client and you’re going through that onboarding process, it’s so helpful to outline those steps. And actually, I would take it a step further than that something that I love doing when I’m working with my branding clients, and we’re creating a custom website for them, especially if they’re service based entrepreneur, I love to outline just kind of a quick bird’s eye overview of what their process is like on their website on their services or sales page. So that we’re instantly really just provided an overview of what it’s like to work with that person and set that expectation at the very beginning. And also what we’re doing is we’re driving strategically, we’re strategically driving more qualified leads, because already going into that initial inquiry that lead or that potential client knows what to expect about the booking process or reserving a start date or something like that. And one of my favorite ways to Do this in a more personal way, if you have the time. And if this works with your business model, I love to jump on complimentary console calls with any branding leads before we work together. And this allows me to explain my process of what it’s like to work together the value that they can expect to receive, how branding is going to empower them to hit their goals, and the next steps for the coming days. So this allows me to actually build a relationship with my potential clients, before they even book with me, that makes the next step of the process even easier.

5:33
Step number two, guide your clients through those expectations that you set in step number one, piece by piece, okay, this is actually one of the most important parts of the process. If there’s one thing that you walk away with from today’s episode, I want it to be this friend, it’s not enough to just educate your clients, you also need to follow through and take action. So we don’t just want to talk the talk, we want to walk the walk. When you follow through on those expectations that you set for your clients. It not only makes working with you easier, but it also builds rapport and earns trust. So this is true for service based entrepreneurs, but also product based businesses, it creates confusion if you set an expectation of what it’s like to work together, or when a product is going to ship or what a product includes or what a service includes, but then you don’t deliver. So first, we really want to lay that expectation, make those expectations note at every turn. Second, we want to guide our clients through those expectations. And we want to show up, we want to do that work by not only setting expectations, but also following through.

6:45
Third and final step of this really easy to follow process, elevate your client experience with the idea of under promising and over delivering. Now I know that this is a popular mantra in our industry, and it has gotten just like used to death. But I really do like building relationships in this way, not not from it, I think it’s important to to mention, I don’t like doing this from a place of under promising by setting like really like low expectations. I mean, set high expectations of what you’re able to deliver and what your clients can expect from you, and then go above and beyond, it really makes a difference in the way that your clients view you and how you can show up for them and serve them well. So delivering in this instance doesn’t mean like a grand gesture or an expensive gift or complicating your life to provide what you think your clients actually need. Instead, it’s it’s something as simple as creating a timeline for your project, letting your client know that you’re going to provide a mock up or a preview of their photos if you’re a photographer on a very specific date, and then surprise, over deliver show up in their inbox a few days early. You already if you know that this is part of your process, you already can build it into your workflow. And so you already have that in your timeline. And this not only delights your client, but now you’ve created just a touch point an opportunity where you went above and beyond. So let’s say that you are a wedding photographer, and you love to surprise your couples with prints from the engagement session before the wedding day. Now you have this little touch point in your your client experience, kind of overview or workflow where they have something really thoughtful that they can share with their family. And they also have these beautiful images they can frame and actually use at their reception, their wedding reception. And as their photographer, you take that extra step, you surprise them in a way that solidifies yourself in their mind as a truly top notch vendor and someone who cares about them, who cares about their relationship and the way that they’re celebrating this new season of their life. Now friends, creating the client experience that sets you apart in the industry and helps to build that level of trust and rapport with your clients like we’ve been talking about does not need to be complicated. The key here, just pour your heart into the process you’re creating. Well, first of all, have a process, create a process create a workflow so that you don’t have to be reinventing the wheel every single time you book an onboard a new client. But if you’re intentional and you think about how you want to make your clients feel, then it’s going to shine through every step that you take. And it’s going to be so apparent as you guide them through your process and it makes such a big difference. If we think about how so many of us especially in the service based industry, we benefit from word of mouth referrals client experience building that kind of incredible top notch heartfelt client experience not only helps you show up and serve your clients right then in there in real time as you’re working with them, but it also helps to just build such a strong mental connection. And, you know, memory of you and the experience they had working with you and their mind. So then, when they come across an industry friend who needs help with branding, or website design or strategy, they think of you, or they have a friend who’s also getting married, they think of you, or if they if you’re a coach, and one of your past students runs into a friend or a family member who needs help with the level of service you provide, they’re going to think of you. And now, if you are ready to take intentional action to continue to set your client experience apart, I am just so excited that you tuned into today’s episode, if you’re looking to elevate your brand strategy and your design so that you can have an elevated client experience and invite your clients into that high level kind of really just incredible experience, then I would really love to chat with you. I’m actually currently accepting custom branding clients. And I would love to connect with you hop on a totally complimentary console call to learn more about your business and how I could serve you well, and where your brand is dreaming of going, where you see your brand going, and how we can create an experience as a part of this new season for your brand and your brand strategy that empowers you to serve the people that you love serving at a high level.

11:31
So if you want to go to brand strategy podcast calm and click on the show notes for today’s episode, you’re gonna find all the resources that we talked through today in this episode. But if you want to hop on a completely complimentary totally free, no strings attached call with me about building your brand rebranding or branding from the ground up and how your cleaning experience can be a part of that just head to my website, click on the Contact Form and get in touch. I would love to chat with you and connect with you in that way so that we can explore what it looks like to create an elevated visual identity founded on a clear sense of strategy that empowers you is the go to expert that your ideal clients are searching for. Friend. As always, thank you so much for tuning into today’s episode. And if this was of any value to you, I would be so honored if you share this episode with one of your industry friends who is taking intentional action to elevate their own client experience. And said to big believer that together we can go so far. And I would much rather us be focusing our energy on lifting each other up and sharing actionable free education with each other so that we can pursue what success looks like to each one of us.

12:44
Friend, I hope that this episode on how to become the queen or a king or non binary royalty of client experience has been encouraging for you and you’re walking away feeling excited about how you can serve your people at such a high level. As always, I’m so grateful for you and I’m cheering you on from waco.

13:06
Thank you so much for joining me today friend. Before you go, I would be so grateful to receive your feedback on the brand schizoid podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, or the podcast in general has helped you grow your brand. I’d really appreciate it if you left us a review in iTunes. Your positive reviews enable the brand strategy podcast to continue to grow and reach like minded creatives just like you. Plus, I’ll be randomly selecting a handful of lucky reviewers each month to receive a little Thank you surprise for me in the mail. Thank you for all your support and encouragement as together we pursue building brands with purpose and intention. Until next time, I’m cheering you on from waco

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My name is Bonnie – I’m a brand designer, strategist, and writer which all adds up to one eclectic conglomeration of qualities that enables me to serve you well! Past clients have dubbed me "the Joanna Gaines of brand design," and I've had more than a few call me a dream maker, a game changer, and a design wizard (my Harry Potter-loving heart didn't hate that one, let me tell you!). At the end of the day, I'm a big-hearted creative who will get teary-eyed as you share the heart behind your business; who will lose sleep over the perfect font pairings and color selections to bring your brand to life visually; and who will work tirelessly to empower, encourage, and equip you to share your work with the world intentionally. 

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