08 Aug How to Avoid This Costly Business Bottleneck

Are you holding back your own business?

Written by Daniela Cavalletti

5 min read

I just had a chat with one of our clients, let’s call her Annie. Annie’s business competes in the very crowded property and real estate market. Her excellent processes, the team’s work ethic, and the knowledge and expertise they offer their clients, makes Annie’s company one the most impressive businesses I’ve seen in a long while.

And yet, Annie’s company had struggled to attract enough clients – and the right clients – for quite some time when we first met.

Tumbleweeds in the Sales Funnel

About six months ago, Annie was referred to us by another client, and we dug deep into why her business was struggling so much to reach her target market.

Despite the consistently fantastic work they do for their existing clients – why was her sales pipeline growing cobwebs?

Turns out, Annie herself had become the bottleneck in her business: she’d stopped marketing and talking to her ideal clients.

The Oddities of Writing

There’s a paradox that created the professions of copywriters and editors, and made our services necessary. And not just necessary, but often crucial to a business and its success.

The paradox is this: while (generally, in business) we can all write, we mostly won’t or can’t write when we need to. When it is crucially important, we just don’t.

And it’s because we either lack the time, the knowledge, or the confidence that we’ll get it right.

I’ll Do That … Later

As we all can write per se, i.e. perform the action of writing, when we start a marketing or business project – say a website or brochure – we look for the professions first for which we think we lack the knowledge or talent. In case of a new website, a graphic designer or a web developer. Most of us don’t design or code a website daily, after all.

The content, the words, we’ll just add later. “I’ll quickly write them myself,” we think. Because, we all can ‘write’, we all do it daily.

Writing Takes Preparation

But here‘s the thing … Whether you’re creating a new website, go for a tender or submit an awards application: you’ll suddenly find that the ability to write words is only one minor step in creating a powerful message that will get you the clients, jobs and revenue you desire.

A lot of the time that goes into content creation is taken up by research, analysis, creative thinking, years of experience applied, reading ferociously, mulling over concepts, digging deep into what makes a particular business tick the way it does, planning, and so on.

Only when all this is done do we start to write. And then we review and revise.

Don’t Be the Bottleneck in Your Business

Because of this, content almost always becomes the frustrating, accidental bottleneck of marketing, sales and business projects:

• You have the raw data to write your tender – but how do you present it so you’ll win?
• You know what your product or service does, of course, – but you find it hard to express just how you’re different from your competitors, and how to convince your potential client or customer to buy from you, not them.
• Authoring a business book would get you those speaking and teaching opportunities – but you just don’t know where to start and how to write a professional manuscript.

 
As a result of not writing, or not writing persuasively, you become the bottleneck in your business that holds up your website project and your website going live, or that stops you from winning the award or new business, causing you to miss out on growth opportunities and revenue.

Not because you or your services are not outstanding, but because you simply either lack the time, knowledge or the confidence to create the words that will connect, convince and convert your prospects into clients.

The Power Behind the Throne: Your Message to Your Market

A copywriter or editor will give you the confidence that you have the best shot at making that sale, winning that award or that tender, and being seen in a crowded market.

One of our clients recently referred to his long-term copywriter as the secret ‘kingmaker’ of his business. “Flattering, but perhaps a bit grand”, I thought. But, … he does have a point:

• Copywriters are the quirky word nerds that work quietly in the background to make your business a success.
• We work behind the scenes, getting under the skin of your business, goals and target markets so your words will connect, convince and convert – and your business flourish.
• Copywriters and editors know what questions to ask, what words to use, … and know to whisper exactly what into whose ears.

What’s Your Bottleneck?

Whether you’re the owner of a small or medium-sized enterprise (SME), a marketing director in a corporate firm, a budding author or a creative agency: your messaging, marketing and content bottlenecks will likely fall into one or many of these categories:

1. Simply no time to create content
2. No or not enough in-house writing resources / talent
3. Lack of broad-enough writing expertise across all marketing, sales and business content creation needs you have
4. Lack of confidence to produce spot-on, valuable, professional content that sets you apart from the crowd

 
You’re not alone.

Clearing Away the Marketing + Sales Cobwebs

Annie’s business experienced a number of these bottlenecks, which left her sales funnel empty and the leads pipeline dripping rather than flowing:

• Her team didn’t have the time to plan and deliver blog posts and newsletters consistently – and she lost a lot of her followers and hard-won subscribers that would likely have converted into clients over time.
• They left preparing for a sizable couple of tenders and an industry award too late and ended up not submitting their bids and application. Who knows what opportunities and revenue were lost? You have to be in it to win it, as they say.
• Annie put the update of her website content and lead-magnets into the too hard basket during the busy times – and ended up with out-of-date information that no longer was valuable to her (potential) clients.

 
We went right back to basics and worked with Annie on creating value propositions and key messages for each target market. We set up a simple tone-of-voice document that ensured everyone was aware of how the business communicates.

After this groundwork was done, we created a process and schedule for writing her blog posts and newsletter campaigns. We tweaked LinkedIn profiles, edited her website content to match her business focus, and created an ebook for her (which she offers new subscribers to her newsletter as a valuable giveaway in exchange for their email address).

Annie Got Her Gun

Now, six-odd months after we first sat down, Annie is back to being her confident self and is hitting her sales targets again.

By leaving the wordsmithery to our team of professional writers and editors, Annie is able to concentrate on what she does and loves best – working with her ideal clients.

Business Bottlenecks: Small Change, Big Difference

Not every business has as many bottlenecks to fix as Annie wanted to address, of course. Often only a few targeted adjustments are needed to open up a blockage that has become a weight on your shoulders and an obstacle to growing your revenue.

That is another paradox of writing: small changes will make a huge difference. The right words created for you – for the right place and at the right time – will take the pressure off you and make your business flow freely again.

And that’s a great place to be.