Create “continuity” packages instead of one session at a time

One of the major complaints new clients of mine had before working with me is that, although they are sometimes able to attract a sufficient number of clients, the clients are not sticking around long enough for the person to make money or really help them. What happens is, they spend most of their working hours attracting new clients, as opposed to working with their existing clients and bringing them results. I don’t blame them. If clients didn’t work with me on a continuous basis, I’d have to work much harder tha
I do now to make sure my new prospects list was much longer.

It takes a considerable amount of time and effort to get a new client and when you’re not keeping them around long, you have to put that much more effort into getting new clients.

The client, on the other hand, is not getting the full benefit by working with you just once or twice. Often, it takes regular appointments (depending on what you do) to get continued and lasting results, so the client loses too. This doesn’t sound like a win-win situation to me.

When I first learned nutrition at the Institute for Integrative Nutrition in New York we were taught to offer 6- month programs instead of one session at a time. I thought this was brilliant for several reasons:

1) As the practitioner, you were able to sign the person up for 12 sessions at a time, rather than trying to have the person sign up for one more session each time, one after the other. It made payment easy, scheduling easy and you made more money than if you just offered a session here or there.

2) Even better, the client got SO many more benefits that if they’d only come once or twice. Think about it. If it’s taken you 12 years to put on 50 pounds, then having just one or two sessions to help break old habits AND create new ones, while giving you all the resources you need to stay on track, isn’t really realistic and doesn’t really set you up for real success. Having someone to guide you through the process, slowly but surely, was what created LASTING results for the client. (And with lasting results, the client stayed healthier and would write raving fan testimonials and send referrals.) This wouldn’t have happened if we’d scheduled only 2 or 3 sessions.

So, I noticed early on in being in private practice that offering a program was better for me AND the client.

Client example: a personal trainer client of mine, years ago, was struggling to make ends meet before we worked together. He was spending all his time trying to find new clients and these new clients would only come in once in a while for a personal training session in the gym. The problem was, my client wasn’t making a lot of money doing it this way and the clients weren’t sending him lots of referrals (probably because the dramatic results they’d wished for weren’t there).

Then I shared this “continuity package” idea with him, showing him that the way he was doing things wasn’t working. I told him we needed to come up with bigger packages, based on frequency and time periods. At first, he resisted. He’d say that this wasn’t the way things were done in his industry, but I asked him to be open to a drastic paradigm shift, even if other personal trainers weren’t charging this way.

So we came up with several different packages and programs, at a much higher frequency than what his current clients were accustomed to. The biggest package (Fast Track) consisted of something like 3 or 4 sessions per week, the second slightly fewer and the third, one session per week, each with a price incentive over the one time only session. Lo and behold, he started selling PACKAGES as opposed to one on one sessions and his clients started getting amazing results, most not even worried about the extra cost because they were seeing the results. Do you think he got more referrals because of his clients getting better results? You betcha!

You can do this for almost any service business. Ask yourself what quantity or frequency level would give your clients the most beneficial end-result and the greatest incentive to stay on with you.

Clients then won’t have to worry about scheduling or staying on track (you’ll have done that for them) and that’s one less thing they have to worry about. Additionally, they’ll get better results than working with you just once, and when clients are happy, they start telling others about you.

That means more client referrals. You can’t beat that.

Best of all, you’ll finally be able to forecast your revenues for the year like you’ve never been able to before. That’s a HUGE relief for any entrepreneur.

The client benefits, you benefit. Now that sounds like a win-win scenario.

Your Client Attraction Assignment:

Why have someone work with you just once or twice if you can get him or her to work with you on a consistent basis? Instead, create a continuity package that keeps the client receiving your services for an extended, preset period of time.

Transform the services you offer into continuity programs that include continued time periods (weekly, 6-months, a year, or several sessions per month, at a certain number of months) or agree to work with them this way until further notice.

Put these on your rate sheet and eliminate the one-shot session once and for all. It doesn’t serve you OR the client.

Think about how you too can package what you offer into a program that gets people better results, and keeps them staying with you longer than just one session at a time.