What if I told you that being an expert in your field is killing your sales, and could be causing you more stress than you need to deal with?
If there’s one piece of advice which seems almost so obvious, it barely needs to be said, it’s that:
“You need to become an expert in solutions to help your customers”.
It sounds sensible and practical.
It’s surely how people grow their businesses and even become experts in their field.
Surely, SURELY it makes sense to become an expert in solutions that can help your customers.
Except it doesn’t make sense.
In fact, it might even be killing your business.
I presume that this mode of thinking comes from academia and school. You study subjects, become well versed in them and then you demonstrate your “expertise” in exams and tests.
And of course, I want experts fixing my cars, performing surgery on me and developing vaccines.
But the expert is the do-er, not the owner.
The owner, as in the business owner, has an entirely different set of skills that they need to focus on.
Businesses are often set up by the “do-er”. The SEO expert, the designer, the developer.
And common sense would suggest that becoming better at those skills, would yield more success and more customers.
But we KNOW that isn’t true.
I am not the world’s best marketer.
I’m not the world’s best funnel builder. Hell, I’m not even the best funnel builder in my own company.
And therein lies the secret to true business growth and success.
You need to become an expert in something entirely different.
Something totally counter-intuitive and something that others will shy away from.
And once you learn what you REALLY need to become an expert in, your business will grow faster than you ever thought possible.
Ready?
Imagine that you have an audience of furniture makers.
And you spend all your time and energy on becoming an expert in helping furniture makers make more sales and find more customers.
You learn SEO and email marketing. You delve into platforms like HighLevel and Facebook ads.
You dedicate yourself to becoming an absolute expert in all the “solutions” available to your audience.
And then I come along and — somehow — steal all your customers.
Within a year almost all your customers have moved over to me.
You’ve lost a massive portion of your sales.
Plus, you look at the work I do and as far as you’re concerned, it isn’t up to the same standard that you yourself deem worthy.
You can’t figure it out.
I (apparently) provide a lower value service, with less skill AND (after some phone calls) I’m more expensive than you!
So WHY are your customers leaving you for me?
You decide to call up one of your ex-customers and ask them.
And another.
And another.
And they all say the same thing.
“Mike knew what I needed better than I knew myself. It’s like he’d been following me for the last year!”
The reason that I’ve taken all your customers is because I could confidently speak about their problems and their business better than they could.
When I spoke to them, it was like I was in their head.
I wasn’t an expert in the solution or the platform. I had no interest in being seen as an expert by my peers or competition.
I became an expert in them and their problems.
