What do you do when they choose someone else?
This is another listener suggestion. Alberto emailed me to say that they’ve been getting more people telling them No, which if you’ve been listening to this podcast or reading my books, you know that’s a good thing. But what should they do when they get the No? Just leave it alone? Ask them who else they went with?
Listen to this new, 8-minute episode for some ideas on what to do when the ghosts turn into Nos!
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– What do you do when they choose someone else? Listen to this episode for some ideas. Hi, it’s Alan Berg. Welcome back to another episode of the “Wedding Business Solutions” podcast. This is another listener suggestion. This is from Alberto. He said, you know, “What do you do “when they choose someone else?” He’s been using some of my advice on how to get them to tell you no, right? ‘Cause we want to get a yes or a no. If you’ve been listening to any of the podcasts or read any of my books, you’ll hear that we want to get a yes or a no. We don’t want to get the maybes and the ghosts. So once they do tell you no, then what do you do?
So, first thing is you don’t want to badger them but you do want to thank them for letting you know. And then the way I like to phrase, if you want to go and ask them, you know, who did I go with instead of you? Is do you write back to ’em and say, “Thank you so much for letting us know. “We wish you a lot of success with”, you know, “with your marriage, with your event,” with whatever it is. And let’s just go with, say whether it’s a wedding, you know, “Wish you a lot of success with your marriage, “a long and happy marriage. “Could you please share with us what did you find “with someone else that you didn’t find with us?” That’s the question I like to ask. Instead of, “Who did you go with?” which is a little bit more confrontational. They obviously found something with someone else they didn’t find with you. They liked them better, they trusted them better. Could have been a better price. They could have paid more than you because they felt the value was better for what they were getting with someone else.
Maybe it’s something that someone else did, you also do but you didn’t get to talk about it. Or they don’t remember that you did. Because people remember only a certain percentage of what they hear. I’ve heard that it’s 40% of what you hear and 60% of what you read. I’ve heard seen other things that say that that’s not true but it’s certainly true that we don’t remember everything we hear. When someone’s talking to us, we might be thinking about something else. We may not even hear it at all.
So what do you do when they choose somebody else? The first thing is it’s a learning opportunity. The second thing is, it’s okay for them to tell you no. Because if you think about, if you closed every inquiry that you get, could you handle all that business? And the answer is no. I spent yesterday going through inquiries that I had, reaching out, and doing the one question like I suggested you guys do. Do you still need, right? Whatever it is that you sell, whatever service or products it is, are you still looking for, are you still looking for a creative videographer to capture your wedding memories? Are you still looking for a fun DJ to make your event great? Right, just one question, and I got one conversation started again and I got three nos already, which is fine because they’re sitting there as maybes. They’re sitting there as they inquired, some people said they want to do it, they want to have a consultation. I sent them back the link to schedule. They didn’t do it. Are you still interested? And I went back to probably five, six months worth, right? And started a conversation again that had stalled. And now I have three nos, which is fine. It’s three less people I need to follow up with again. They’re not mucking up my CRM, they’re not mucking up my inbox. So what do you do when somebody tells you no? Again, it’s a learning experience.
If you’re hearing too many nos and you’re not filling up your calendar, then you have to see why. Why is it? Is it the way that you’re communicating with them? Is it the way that the pricing that you’re sending them or the pricing they’re perceiving, right? What is it that they’re finding with someone else that they’re not going with you? And is it consistently they’re going with some of the same people instead of you? And then you need to look at that.
I was in Orlando at the Catersource and Special Event show and I had the pleasure of going to dinner with a bunch of people. There were nine of us who went out to dinner. And there was one person who does high-end planning and design, event design. And she said something interesting that I’ve heard many times over the years. When she started hearing who she was being compared to and realized that those companies were significantly more, higher price than her. She realized her prices were too low. She could actually be losing business ’cause her prices were too low because they perceived the quality of the work to be up there with those other companies. Yet they were going with another company at a higher price because could her work really be that good at that low price? So that’s a problem as well.
So you want to pay attention to things like that. In her case, she could have been losing business to people that were higher priced. Some cases you’re losing it to people who are lower priced either because you’re attracting the wrong prospects. You could be fishing in the wrong pond. That’s possible. It could be that not having price on your website or in your marketing materials is detracting everybody to reach out and then you’re having too many conversations you shouldn’t have with people that just never should have reached out. Or are you losing to someone who’s a lower price ’cause people aren’t perceiving any difference. They aren’t seeing that you are worth more because they perceive that what they’re going to get from somebody else, what they’re going to get from you is going to be similar quality or similar value.
So they’re not assigning the value to you of your price. They’re assigning the value to you of somebody else’s price. They don’t want to pay your price. So what do you do when somebody tells you no? Again, I think it’s okay. I felt fine this morning when those people came back to me ’cause I sent these yesterday, came back and said no. And some had a conversation that I still want to come to a workshop, whatever. One of them was just very curt, “No, don’t need your services.” It’s fine, right? I’m not going to read anything into that and say, “Oh they’re mad at me,” or whatever. No, I asked the question, they gave me an answer. That’s all there is to it. Move on.
Now, if it’s a corporate event or a school event or something that’s recurring, then you might want to ask them, you know, “Thanks so much for letting me know. “When do you start planning for the next whatever? “When do you start planning for your next company event? “Your next school event, your next fundraiser,” right? Things that could happen again, don’t just say, “Okay, we’re done.” Find out when the next one is. I do that if somebody says they didn’t choose me to speak at an event. “Great, when do you start planning for the next one?” Right, no, doesn’t mean necessarily no forever. It just might mean no for this particular event. Sure, if it’s a wedding or a quince or whatever, something like that, maybe you’re done. Well, but if it’s a quince, maybe there is a sister. If it’s a bar or bat mitzvah, maybe there’s a sibling. If it’s a wedding, maybe there’s a friend, maybe somebody in the bridal party. Following up after, maybe you find out maybe they weren’t as happy with the other person. Maybe they’ll refer you even though they didn’t go with you. So, what do you do when they tell you no?
Just think about it. There are some ideas here. And don’t just let it go. It’s a learning experience. And if you find out maybe your prices are too low, maybe it was the best thing you could have done is to find out why did they go with someone else? And maybe they just didn’t perceive your prices to be equal to the value that they thought and maybe your prices need to be higher. Hope it gave you some food for thought.
I’m Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you’d like to suggest other topics for “The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast” please let me know. My email is [email protected]. Look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks.
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