Search traffic is such a mixed bag.
Sometimes it completely boggles me the path some of my visitors take to get from that little white box (so full of potential) to my website.
Searching for a certain diet company’s logo? There’s a good chance you’ll end up here. Have questions (especially ones I’ve yet to answer) about acrylic wedding invitations? We’ll probably be crossing paths soon.
Some of it’s my own doing and easily fixable. I could get rid of the J* logo hunters with a couple tweaks and I could actually answer the questions people have about acrylic invitations – that might pre-qualify (or at least educate) the inquiries that come in as a result.
Pinterest traffic can be frustrating, too.
I think the thing that most frustrates me is this: it appears to me that most of the inquiries I get as a result of this traffic are from people asking for customized (or barely edited) versions of what I’ve already done. Can I tell you how many storybook wedding invitation inquiries I’ve received in the last couple weeks?
Honestly? Probably not going to happen.
I want people to come to me because they trust me to create a completely custom, hand-crafted wedding invitation. One made just for their day, not one they saw in a blog. I can’t repeat myself.
It’s not because of some deep-held artistic belief. It’s because I’m not sure I have the discipline to stay fresh if I’m working in the same space all the time. If it were all letterpress, or all laser-engraved acrylic, I don’t think my output would be as good as you deserve. My clients deserve an invitation that is uniquely crafted for their day, not someone else’s.
So what are your secrets?
How do you get potential clients to call on you for custom work, not to rehash your last project that got blogged or pinned? How do you convert clients who want you to repeat yourself into dream clients?
Rejecting their desire to have you repeat past success is a step in the wrong direction to start with. Acknowledge their love of a particular design or style because its rooted in love for your work then sit down with them so you can sell them on how unique their day is and what you can create specifically for them. If they want you to create something for them youve already done then youve already made the sale, you just have to educate them on how much better ‘their’ product can be than one youve already created. Just my two sense.
Y’know, I’ve been mulling this one over in my head for a while and wasn’t even sure if I would post it. Having read your comment, I’m wondering if I misidentified the focus of my frustration. Frankly, what’s tiring at present is inquiries from couples who haven’t begun to consider the cost of this work.
Then again – to say it more bluntly: There are a thousand ideas swimming in my head (many would be far more costly than the work currently in my portfolio) that I want to engage clients with, but am usually fielding calls about letterpress or lasered acrylic or storybooks. How do I get the calls about taxidermy and custom auto panel invitations, etc?
Ah yes, the million dollar question: “How do we get our clients to think outside the box?” Closely followed by the question “can they afford it?” Well, the simple answer is that most people only buy what they see. Thats why the album we sell the most is the ones we have samples of. People fall in love with a product or style and they want THAT.
So the solution is to have samples of everything you want to sell because its very hard to give someone the vision of a product that doesnt exist yet that they are going to spend hundreds or thousands or dollars on.
Youre a super creative guy so having a storefront/studio where a client can experience all of what your capable of might be essential to getting that kind of client.
I think you’re asking a very crucial “early career” question, and Brian has hit on the answer. Every creative has limitless possibilities in mind when they begin, but nobody can see those things inside your head. As a painter/sculptor/designer/engineer/scientist/inventor, I want to be able to create gigantic works of art that convey complex ideas, but if I don’t have any gigantic works of art that convey complex ideas – and require enormous amounts of blood, sweat, and tears, not to mention supplies/costs for said works – nobody will have any idea what I can do for them. This is the catch-22 every creative and artist faces early in their career. For example, I’m building a deck behind my parents house. I created it from scratch and have some hundred pages of drawings and calculations that I intend to use as fodder for future work. My parents are buying all the materials, but I’m doing all the work. I’m learning new things everyday. Do I intend on building decks for the rest of my life? No, but I intend to use this project to catapult me into other things. It will definitely be a part of my portfolio, because this type of large-scale project – tools, engineering, schematics, purchasing, artistic flair, building materials, fastening systems, foundations, anchoring systems, finishes, site management, preparation, occupancy, usability, etc. – is this kind of thing that excites my mind. So maybe I have to do a project out of pocket or off-center ideal-wise. It’ll show people what I’m capable of.
Also, you most definitely want to covey to anyone that approaches you, that yes, you can do it. From my experience in the sales industry I learned that until you sit down with a client, neither you, nor they, have ANY idea what the other is thinking. Maybe they do want something exactly like what you did for so-and-so, BUT they want a little something different. But you’ll NEVER have a sale if you don’t have a sit-down. You will never have the chance to show them that YOU are the expert here and that YOU know what they need. This isn’t their business, it’s yours. Confidence is one of the most undervalued traits in the creative industry. When you sit down with someone you need to show them that you are the most amazingly gifted printer who has ever existed…that you’ve seen and done EVERYTHING… that you are SO gifted you would feel bad if you didn’t make their project fantastically personal to them, and ONLY them. One of a kind. If you get them to feel like that, they’ll pay anything. (And don’t even talk about cost until they want it.)
You aren’t selling invitations. You’re selling you.