Selling Over The Phone
Lesson 86 from: How to Start a Photography BusinessPye Jirsa
Selling Over The Phone
Lesson 86 from: How to Start a Photography BusinessPye Jirsa
Lesson Info
86. Selling Over The Phone
Summary (Generated from Transcript)
The topic of this lesson is selling over the phone in a photography business.
Q&A:
How can I avoid my accent being stronger on the phone? The instructor suggests talking louder and enunciating clearly to come through clearer.
What are the objectives when talking to clients over the phone? The first objective is to get them to meet in person, the second is to disrupt and convey value, and the third is to close the sale.
Does body language still matter on the phone? Yes, body language still plays a role in communication, but it is important to bring up the energy and tone by 30% when speaking on the phone.
How can I improve my phone communication skills? The instructor suggests using a recording tool to listen to your own phone calls and identify areas for improvement.
How should I handle calling someone who is busy? It is important to respect their timing and if they are busy, set up another time to talk.
How should I adapt my speed and pace on the phone? Keep the conversation within a five to ten-minute window and be mindful of the client's time.
What should I do before ending a phone call with a client? Make sure you have established your value and experience to leave a lasting impression.
Lessons
Class Introduction
13:12 2Common Myths & Unknown Truths
11:42 3The Road Ahead
13:03 4Find Your Passion
06:06 5The Lin & Jirsa Journey
13:54 6Part-time, Full-time, Employed, Partners?
03:51 7Stop Wasting Time & Money
06:07 8Your 12 Week Roadmap
04:33Great Plans Still Fail
06:01 10Strategy Vs. Planning
04:16 11Mind Mapping
07:25 12Select a Focus
14:16 13Competitor Research
09:34 14S.W.O.T. Analysis
13:54 15Strategy & Long Term Goals
03:50 16Values, Vision & Mission
27:49 17Effectively Managing Your Time
15:05 18Artistic Development
07:30 19Create Your Plan
13:12 20What's Your Product
10:51 21Luxury vs Consumer Products & Experiences
11:44 22Quick Break for Econ 101
16:31 23Your Target Market & Brand Message
21:25 24What's in a Name
09:20 25Your Client 'Why'
05:43 26Crafting the Why Experience
24:17 27Document the Client Experience
08:29 28Business Administration Basics
27:03 29Book Keeping Management
06:51 30Create the Logo & Branding
07:04 31Portfolio Design
15:11 32Design Your Services & Packages
18:51 33Pricing Fears & Myths
08:46 34Three Pricing Methods
25:39 35Package Pricing Psychology & Design
06:15 36Psychology of Numbers
07:29 37Pricing Q&A
23:51 38Grass Roots Marketing
09:36 39The Empty Party
07:03 40Friends & Family Test Shoots
16:28 41Join Groups
04:32 42Second Shooting Etiquette
07:44 43The Listing & Classified Hustle
14:10 44Make Instagram Simple
13:55 45Your Automated Pinterest Plan
08:01 46Facebook Because You Must
07:37 47Giveaway & Styled Shoots
12:17 48Content Marketing & SEO
08:12 49The Monster: SEO
07:26 50Selecting Your Keywords
05:45 51Testing Your Keywords
07:53 52Grouping Main & Niche Goals
12:39 53Your Content Road Map
11:47 54Content Marketing Q&A
10:45 55Inspiration to Keep Working
07:45 56How to Craft Your Content
15:03 57Internal Linking Basics
05:30 58Back Link Building Basics
04:55 59Link Value Factos
14:38 60Measuring Link Value
04:24 61Link Building Strategy & Plan
06:10 62Link Building Plan: Vendors & Guest Writing
06:45 63Link Building Plan: Features, Directories, Comments
03:11 64Link Building: Shortcuts & One Simple Tool
14:44 65What is Sales? Show Me!
12:58 66Your First Massive Failure
05:17 67The Sales Process
07:31 68Your Second Massive Failure
05:23 69Understand Buyer Psychology
10:00 70Step 0: Building Rapport & Trust
15:14 71Step 1: Identify Need or Want
15:39 72Cognitive Dissonance
12:01 73Steps 2 & 3: Value Proposition & The Solution
14:21 74Step 4 : Close, Make the Ask
04:32 75Step 5: Follow Up & Resolve Concerns
06:13 76Family Photography Hot Seat
12:06 77Business Example Hot Seat
15:52 78Boudoir Photography Hot Seat
16:09 79The Best Sales Person
07:45 80Your Mindset, Vibrations & Frequency
06:56 81Always Positive, Always Affirming
11:55 82The Second Money & Dual Process
07:39 83Chumming the Price Waters
03:57 84Creating Want or Scarcity
09:54 85Timeless Advice on Being Likable
11:53 86Selling Over The Phone
10:59 87Forbidden Words in Sales
11:40Lesson Info
Selling Over The Phone
Let's take it to the phone because this is one of the last pieces in terms of verbal communication. I think most of us are going to get comfortable in in-person meetings a lot quicker then we're going to be comfortable over the phone. 'Cause the phone kind of brings in a whole new set of challenges along with it. Julie. So the phone for me is kind of difficult because of my accent and when you're on the phone the accident is stronger, and when you face to face. So is there a way I can avoid it? Not really, but I know one thing you can do right now. My second major in college was actually linguistics. And if you just talked louder, Okay. It would actually come through less. So if you open and try to enunciate with everything and talk louder, it would actually come through a lot clearer. So, Okay. (laughter) That's, that is the first thing, yeah! So that's a linguistics thing. I majored in Chinese linguistics and accounting. Isn't that odd? (laughter) How would that be at all...
useful? It's pretty useful, sure, why not. Yeah, but get good on the phone. You need to get good on the phone. And accents, honestly, they're totally fine. So, your first objective on the phone. This is number one. First objective is to get them in person. Second objective is to disrupt, and then convey value. Third objective, which is totally doable, is to close. If you feel like you can get them to close over the phone, do it. Now this is the big thing is that when it comes to body language it still matters on the phone. That's why I told you guys earlier, when you're going to go into these phone calls, sit in a place that's not relaxed on your couch. Sit forward on a chair. Okay? You're going to lack visuals, meaning right now I can convey a sense of presence and charisma to you. Jason, if I call you by name, I can pull you right to me. I can bring my hands, and I can use all this to help me convey a message to you. But then when I am behind the TV, Jason, I'm still talking to you with the same emphasis and the same everything, but do you feel like I'm getting my message across to you the same way? (laughter) No. (laughter) No. It was literally the exact same voice. It was the exact same everything. I even did my hand gestures from behind the TV, but when you pull the visuals out of the meeting you lose, what is the, you know, funny thing about studies is that every study is so different. And the other thing that's funny about studies, when you repeatedly say, "Studies have been done, studies have been done," I feel like I'm saying things that are very cliché. But either way, Some studies say that body language is 90% of your communication. I think that that's BS. More reasonable numbers is more like 50%, because this is where I get back to the fact that no matter what my hands are doing, all this, if I say, "Go screw yourself," it doesn't matter how loving I do that. It mattered what I said, right? So obviously the words that we're saying have a huge impact. But probably 50%, 50% what I say is from my mouth, the other 50% is from my body language. Either way, when you take that away, generally we require 30% more effort, more energy, more tone, to convey the same language through the phone than we do in person. So just bring everything up a notch, up 30% on the phone. So Jason, I would love to talk to you right now and this time I'm going to bring my volume up and bring my tone up by 30%. Was that a little better? I mean, don't yell at your clients, okay? (laughter) But he's really far away. The point is, I might talk to you, Julie, like this when we are in person, okay? But when I pick up the phone, this is my phone, "Hey Julie, how are you doing?" We all do that kind of naturally, don't we? You all pick up, I know you all have this where you are talking to your friend, you've all heard it, and me and Lee are having a conversation, "Hey Lee, what's going on? Dude, are you gonna get that picture of me and the salmon? That's gonna be awesome, I can't wait to put my frushi in your photos. (laughter) And then Kenna calls in, and I'm like, "Yo Kenna, what's up?" (laughter) And Lee's like, "Man, why he's not that excited to talk to me? You know that actually, like we, that's how people respond to the phone, but I want you to carry that through your phone conversation. Carry that same energy, bring it up 30% through a phone dialogue and smile throughout the entire thing because it's actually detectable in your voice. If you're smiling through what you're saying you can actually hear it on the other side. Sit forward and this is my last tip, this is a personal one. If you sit at home in your sweats you're going to call somebody as if you're sitting home in your sweats. (laughter) Okay? A lot of you are smiling right now because the way that you dress kind of dictates the tone of how you feel for the day. And some of us know this to an extent that even when we go to work in our own homes we will dress up. We'll put on our nice shirt, we'll put on our nice pants. You'll dress up just to go work in a home office because you know that the simple act of doing it gives you kind of a different sense of your day and what you're there to do. Okay? So that's a big thing when you start calling people, dress the part. Here's a few things to keep in mind when you're on the phone and again, we're going to practice. I gave you guys a little tool called Rev Recorder. You can use Rev Recorder to call. You call into Rev Recorder and then use Rev Recorder to call out to a client. What this allows you to do is actually record the call and you're going to save it back and you're going to listen to it yourself. So now you can record your client calls and hear yourself speaking and you can hear all the missteps and then you can practice them. Would that help, Shannon? That would help, right? Okay, that should help. Paige, you're smiling, would that help? Yeah. Okay, that should help. What you're going to do here is you're going to, number one, when you call somebody, you're going to respect the timing of the situation. Because that's one thing that you just can't get over. If you call somebody when they're busy, how do you feel when somebody calls you when you're busy? And how do you feel when they don't respect it? Is there any potential of getting past the croc brain in that situation? No. You hit the croc brain like straight on and you're stonewalled. And if you fight it, you're done. That's it. I'm gonna hang up. I'm done with you. Even if it ended cordially, I'm just like, "I just don't like that person. I don't like that photographer." So when you call somebody and they are busy, we go back to our dialogue. Chelle, do you remember it? Um, I don't know. (laughter) Dialogue. That's cool, I'm not going to put you on the spot. That dialogue was when you call someone, Chelle, I called you, you're busy. (imitating phone ringing) Hello? Well, hi! Hey, is this Chelle? Yes. Chelle, this is Pye with Lin and Jirsa Photography. I just got your inquiry, actually. Do you have a minute right now? Sure! Damn it, Chelle! (laughter) Oh, I'm busy! (laughter) No, I don't. Okay. Sorry! No worries! That's just my natural reaction! I always say 'sure'! (laughter) No worries, Chelle! Um, I have a minute tomorrow at 4 pm, Do you have time then? No. No? What a good time for you? Now. (laughter) It's cool, you guys got it. We're good, let's move on! Thank you my dear, I love you. Great! As soon as you get stonewalled on that, I want you guys to just set up a second time. And then give them a time slot. Tomorrow at this time. And that way if they say no, you say "What time works for you?" And they will give you a time. But you give them a time first, okay? But don't try and fight through that. "Hey, I'd just like to chat with you for a minute! Oh, I know you're busy, but just give me a minute." No, it doesn't, there's nothing to be had, nothing good can come from that. Your speed and pace is going to be different, okay? When somebody agrees to come meet with you in person, they're expecting 30 minutes of their time to be taken up, if not a little bit more. But when they get a phone call from you they don't have that expectation. And we're also reaching them at a weird time so everything we do, for example, when I take you through the wave, Erin, if I took you through the wave, I'd do it quicker. Okay? It would be, "Erin, look, this will only take a minute or two. It's an odd question. Can you think of a place in your home where you might--" And it would be a condensed version of whatever wave you set up, okay? But you're going to speed it up to kind of keep everything within a five to 10 minute window. Respect that time. 60% of them are still gonna have that issue with price and that's where we need the disrupter and we need to take them through the wave. Okay? And then an invitation. "I would love to see you in the studio." "I would love to meet you for coffee." "I would love to do this" and then you give the time. Okay. I need, before that phone call ends, before it's done, and this is what I'm going to make you guys go through Rev Recorder for, because before it's done, Matt, you better make sure that before your client leaves your phone that you've established your value and experience. Because if you did, and if you set up the cognitive dissonance by having them agree and understand with what it is that you're providing then you're good. At that point if they choose to not patronize you and your studio they weren't your client. Right? 'Cause they have to make a very big mental leap now to say that what it was that he presented it's still not worth paying a little bit more money for.
Class Materials
Bonus Materials with Purchase
Ratings and Reviews
Armstrong Su
This class and materials are to the point and eye-opening on the business side of photography. Pye Jirsa is an amazing and fun teacher as well! Most photographers need more business classes offered to bring us who love to create art back to reality for a more successful business that makes a living on it's own. This course will definately get you started in the right direction and so cheap too! Great investment! armstrong outdoor tv case outdoortvcase Pye Jirsa is one of the best instructors that I have the pleasure to learn from. He and his team have given me so much more than they'll ever realize. Knowledge, wisdom, training, friendship, mentoring, inspiration, joy... I cannot thank Pye enough for changing my life for the better. I owe them more than they'll ever realize. Thank you, Pye Jirsa!!!
Angela Sanchez
This class has been an eye opener for me; a point of change in my vision as photographer. Pye is and AMAZING, INSPIRING, GENEROUS instructor, with an, authentic desire to help people and to share with them the best of his knowledge. I will not have enough words to say thanks to Pye Jirsa, as a teacher and as a human being, and thanks to Creative Live who allows us to benefit from the experience of such a knowledgeable, educated, well-versed photographer and instructor. 1000% recommended!
Yenith LianTy
Been following this guy forever. Pye Jirsa may be well known in the wedding & portrait photography world and if there is something that this guy knows it is how to create a business, a sustainable one. The workbook he provided is comprehensive, and I honestly wish I had this when I first started out as a photographer! I love that he talks about his failures, keeping it real and honest for anyone starting out. He is definitely one of the best instructors around, super humble, down to earth and with a sense of humor to boot. The course is worth it! THE WORKBOOK is AMAZING! SUPER DETAILED!