To convert more website visitors into prospects, and prospects into customers of your business, you must help your audience get to know you, so they come to like you and find their own reasons to trust you. Once you have their trust, the relationship is generally yours to lose.
Sometimes, this very same customer trust can be an enormous inhibitor to your business being able to “scale up” to the next level, when you bring on new partners, associates, and employees to handle many of the customer issues you originally did yourself when it was just you in the business. Without the ability to scale up, your ability to convert new customers takes a hit.
The glue that binds… can also be binding.
Not too long ago, I spoke with a dentist who had been in solo practice for 25 years who had brought another dentist into his practice and needed to transition some of the patients to the new dentist. This was necessary so he could move himself into more of a management role, and focus on marketing and business development that would lead to more satisfied patients served at more locations.
This transition proved a challenge as most of the patients said they didn’t want the “change” and wanted their own dental needs to continue to be handled by the original dentist. This dentist shared his frustration with me: as much as he loved his patients and valued relationships that dated back two decades, he was feeling frustrated with these same patients who were “selfishly” refusing to let him be more successful.
So: why wouldn’t his patients let him grow his practice? Continue reading
