How Do You Get Clients Who Have Never Heard of You?

0:00Victoria Bennett:Hello, this is Mark Satterfield and welcome to the Velvet Rope Playbook. Tonight's chapter, how do you get clients who have never heard of you? For almost 20 years, everybody who mattered seemed to know Victoria Bennett. Then she moved 900 miles away and discovered that nobody did. Victoria was 51 and owned a boutique interior design firm in Washington, D.C. She hadn't planned on becoming a designer. She'd studied political science at Georgetown and spent five years working on Capitol Hill before realizing that she was considerably more interested in renovating her boss's Georgetown townhouse than writing briefing papers.

0:40Victoria Bennett:So at age 29, she went back to school for design. Victoria was good, very good, but she also had another advantage that became increasingly valuable as her career progressed. She knew people. Her first major client came from a former colleague. That client introduced her to another couple. An architect she knew sent her two projects. A wealth advisor introduced her to a family renovating a$6 million home. Twenty years later, Victoria rarely marketed herself at all. Her business ran almost entirely on relationships and referrals. Then, Victoria and her husband made a decision. They bought a home in Palm Beach, and Victoria decided she wanted to build a significant part of her business in South Florida.

1:26Victoria Bennett:That's when she discovered something uncomfortable. Almost everything responsible for her success in Washington was missing. Nobody knew Victoria Bennett. Now, Victoria's work hadn't suddenly become less impressive. She hadn't forgotten how to design beautiful homes, manage complicated projects, or deal with demanding clients. But in Washington, Victoria had something invisible working for her. Context. When someone recommended Victoria, the prospective client frequently already knew someone that she had worked with. They might have been inside one of her homes. They knew the architect referring her.

2:05Victoria Bennett:They recognized the neighborhood where she completed a project. Victoria didn't have to prove everything from scratch. In Florida, she did. So initially, she tried to solve the problem the way many successful professionals do. She became more active on Instagram. She attended events. She introduced herself to real estate agents and builders. She even hired someone to help with digital advertising. She got attention, but very little of it turned into serious conversations. One afternoon, Victoria was having coffee with Andrew Rosen, a 64-year-old real estate developer she met through a mutual friend.

2:42Victoria Bennett:Andrew had grown up in Queens, working weekend at his uncle's appliance store. He eventually moved to Florida, started buying small apartment buildings, and spent the next 35 years building a substantial real estate business. Victoria told him how frustrating the expansion had become. Andrew asked her a very simple question. If I didn't know the person who introduced us, how would I know you're any good? Victoria started talking about her experience. Andrew stopped her. No, I mean before I ever spoke with you. And that was the question. If most of your business has historically come from referrals, there's a good chance you're benefiting from something you barely notice.

3:23Victoria Bennett:People arrive pre-sold. Someone they trust has already said you're good. But when you move outside your existing network, that disappears. Now you're dealing with strangers, and strangers need evidence. That's where I think a lot of people get the strategy wrong. They decide they need more visibility, more followers, more posts, more advertising. Look, those things can certainly help. But visibility alone doesn't solve Victoria's problem. She didn't simply need more people to see her. She needed people who didn't know her to quickly understand why they should trust her. And those are very different objectives.

4:02Victoria Bennett:So Victoria went back through her projects and selected three of them, not necessarily the three most beautiful, the three that best demonstrated how she thought. One involved a couple who purchased a spectacular home but couldn't agree on what to do with it. Another involved a renovation where Victoria spotted a major problem in the architectural plans before construction began. The third involved a client who initially wanted something Victoria believed would ultimately disappoint him. She persuaded them to take a completely different direction. Victoria turned each project into a story. What was happening when the client came to her?

4:39Victoria Bennett:What was the problem beneath the obvious problem? What did Victoria see that someone else might not have noticed? What did she recommend? And what happened? Now, someone encountering Victoria for the first time wasn't simply seeing photographs of beautiful rooms. They were seeing evidence of judgment. And that's particularly important when you're selling an expensive service. Your prospects aren't simply buying what you produce. They're buying your ability to make good decisions on their behalf. So if you're trying to attract clients outside of your existing network, I suggest doing something very simple.

5:15Victoria Bennett:Identify three clients you've helped where the story demonstrates something important about the way you think. Then write down four things for each one. What situation were they in? What did you notice? What did you recommend? What happened as a result? Now you have three pieces of evidence and use them everywhere. put them on your website, turn them into videos, talk about them on LinkedIn or Instagram, include them in presentations, tell them on your podcast, use them in conversations with prospective clients. Because saying I've been doing this for 25 years is a claim. Showing me how you solve three different problems is evidence.

5:57And evidence travels much better than reputation. Victoria eventually began doing something else with those stories. When she met an architect, builder, or luxury real estate professional in Florida, she didn't simply send them a brochure about her firm. She sent them something interesting. A short story about how she solved a difficult design problem. An article she'd written about something affluent homeowners frequently overlook. A video explaining how she approached a particular kind of project. Those people now had something they could forward, and that's an important distinction. If you want to expand beyond your existing network, you need marketing that doesn't depend upon you being there to explain why you're good.

6:41It needs to travel without you. Eventually, Victoria began getting inquiries from people she never met. One came after someone forwarded one of her articles. Another came from a woman who watched several of her videos. A third came through an architect Victoria had met only once. None of those prospects knew Victoria personally, but by the time they contacted her, they knew how she thought. That's the bridge that you're trying to build. Look, there's nothing wrong with building a business through relationships and referrals. In fact, if you're targeting affluent clients, they're extraordinarily valuable.

7:17But your existing network has natural limitations. It contains only the people it contains. At some point, if you want to grow beyond it, your expertise has to become visible to people who have never met you. That doesn't mean becoming famous. It means creating enough evidence that the right stranger can encounter you and quickly think, this person understands the kind of problem I have. So if you're trying to get clients outside of your existing network, don't simply ask, how do I get more people to see me? ask, what could someone see that would make them trust me even if nobody introduced us?

7:55Find those three stories. Show people how you think. Give your expertise a way to travel beyond the people who already know your name. Because you can't personally know everyone you'd like to have as a client, but your reputation can reach them before you do. If you'd like more practical strategies for attracting affluent clients, positioning yourself as the expert in creating marketing that brings better prospects to you, go visit GetWealthyClients.com. There, you'll find information about my books, programs, resources, and the different ways that you can work with me personally. That's GetWealthyClients.com.

8:33And before you go, make sure you subscribe to the Velvet Rope Playbook so you don't miss the next episode. And if you know someone who's trying to grow beyond their existing network, hey, pass this episode along to them. Sometimes the person who needs to hear what you have to say is someone you haven't met yet. This is Mark Satterfield. I hope you enjoyed this chapter of the Velvet Rope Playbook. I'll be back at you soon with something new, but until then, bye for now.