Whether you’re trying to land more clients…

Or you want to boost conversions in your funnel…

There’s one simple thing you can do to increase your chances of success.🏆

Do you know what it is?

It’s to reduce friction.

So what do I mean by that?

If you’re a freelancer, and you’re talking with a prospective client…

Then you should explicitly tell them how hiring you will mean less work, hassle, and headaches for them.😎

Explain that you’re not going to need a ton of direction, you won't need to hop on a bunch of phone calls, you're not going to ask to pick their brain, and you're not going to bother them.🤷‍♂️

Instead, you have a quick and easy process for getting whatever information is required…👌

And once you’ve got that, you won’t need additional direction…

You'll simply go forth and nail it – providing the client with polished copy that they can immediately deploy.

Oh and by the way…

If for some reason the client’s bandwidth is tight, and they need help deploying your copy…

You’ll be able to help with that too.

And here’s another example…

When it comes to your actual sales copy…

You always want to remove the mystery (aka reduce friction).

So in your copy, make it clear what happens after the prospect clicks the “buy now” button.

Make it clear how long until they get their order.

Make it clear how they can get in contact with the seller if they have questions.

Make it clear that there’s no re-bill. Or, if there is a re-bill, make it clear what that looks like and how it works.

Clarity = conversions.

And this principle applies throughout your sales funnel too.

Don’t give the customer too many choices when selecting their quantity…

Don’t make your guarantee confusing…

Don’t make your checkout form long and complex (or ask for unnecessary information)…

Reduce friction at all points possible.

This is such a universal maxim…

The first person to coin the term fiction was Karl von Clausewitz, who is considered one of the greatest military strategists of all time.

He wrote that friction is: “the concept that differentiates actual war from war on paper”…

And goes on to specify that friction comes from those unexpected things that occur during war, and that makes “even the simplest thing difficult.”

The stakes are lower when selling to a client, or selling a product/service…

But the concept of friction remains:

If there is a lack of clarity and unexpected surprises, it’s usually a negative. It reduces your chances of winning.

And now finally one last example:

We were hiring for a new Biz Dev type position for one of our projects.

I posted on Indeed and got 64 applicants before pausing. Out of those applicants, I reached out to 8 for interviews.

Of the 8 potential interviewees, I sent each a Calendly link with available times to book an interview.

7 of them booked an interview and I’m talking to those folks tomorrow and Friday.

Meanwhile, 1 of the candidates replied to my message asking if there were any times available on Wednesday instead.

I didn’t respond.

He then followed up and said “hey, you didn’t respond. Let me know. If not Thursday works too.”

I didn’t respond.

He followed up again yesterday, but I haven’t responded.

There’s a 0% chance I would hire this guy, so I’m not going to interview him.

Why?

If he’s creating friction now, what will it look like when he’s working for us?

​​Part of the job is conducting calls and meetings with various biz owners. I can just imagine him overcomplicating things constantly and being less effective than he could be.

This guy loses the opportunity because he created friction.

And that’s the same for all of us too…

The more friction we add into the selling process, the worse our results will be.

– SPG

P.S. This post originally came from an email I sent to my private list. If you want to see more stuff like this from me, you can apply to join my list using this link