Hey, this is the Daily Overpass! My name is Eric and I make apps!
So today, I want to talk about how when you're quoting for clients, it's your job
to show them what the future looks like.
Alright, so today, I'm coming to you from Goring, hwhich is a beautiful town
halfway between Oxford and Reading. Every two weeks, I have a business mentoring
group here that I meet with. And after the meeting, I always think I have
to stop here by the river because it's just a beautiful, so beautiful scenery.
This is uhm - I talked about this before, George Michae,l his house was just a few
short blocks from here, when he passed away. And it's just - I mean, it's just a
beautiful place. Anyway, enough about that, so today, I want to talk about a bit
more about client acquisition, because a lot of people have been asked me in the
comments. "Can you talk about how to get clients? I'm a developer and I want to
get clients." And the thing is that such a broad topic. There's so much we
could cover in terms of how do you find the right prospects, how do you reach out
to them, how do you get them to find you, all that kind of stuff. But today, I want
to talk a little bit more about the quote. See, I mentioned this before about
how when we do a quote, we always have at the end, we have like a mock up
and I'm not just talking about like wireframes. I'm talking about like an
artist mock-up, like our designer will actually do something that we can show
them what the app is gonna look like. We can't actually build the app
and show them what the app is before we actually get them to agree to it
obviously, but we will try to get them to picture in their mind as early as
possible to show that we know what we're doing and to sell them on the dream
early on. One of the reasons I do this is it has to do with some of the
part-time jobs I had back back in my 20s. So, I a lot of you, guys, know that I
was in the Army out of high school, so rather than go to university straight
out of high school, I joined the army. I went to school and learned Chinese and I
was in the Army for four years. And when it came time to get out, I was really on
the fence about whether or not I wanted to get out of the army or stay in.
Unlike a lot of the people who were the same ETS date as me or the same
date to leave. I had no idea some people were like they were -
they were like I'm gonna rise up the ranks. I'm gonna be a proper soldier and
other people were like as soon as my four years is up I'm getting out.
But for me, I was on the fence. I even went to leadership school in my
last year because I still wasn't sure. I and I got my sergeants stripes and
everything like that. So, when it finally came time to make that decision, I
decided I'm definitely gonna stay in. And then between making that decision, I'm
walking to the phone, I called up the recruiter to re-enlist and I said, "Yeah,
I'm gonna get out. I had no plans, I had no idea what to do, I just
knew I'll try something different . But then once I said that, everybody was
asking me for my plans for life. They were saying like "So, what are you
gonna do, just gonna live off - just live off your wife?" Because I was married at
the time. "Are you just gonna live off your wife? You're just gonna
get her to work for you? What, you're just gonna go to schoo?" I said, "I guess, I'm
gonna go to university." I haven't really thought through the whole thing.
And everybody had all these questions because they were all staying in and
were like - and it made me - it made me feel emasculated in a way. So, I had this big
chip on my shoulder when I got out. When I got out of the Army, I was working
three part-time jobs and going to school full-time to university and when I say
university it was community college. It was Leeward Community College in Hawaii.
But I had three jobs. The first one was I was a stock - like a shelf filler at
Sears, so I work every morning at Sears from 6:00 to 10:00 a.m. At the
evenings, I would work at this photo place in Waikiki Beach where I would
I was called a runner where I would go the photographers, would take pictures of
people at their tables, and it would sell the photos back to them. So, I would take
the film canisters running back to the lab, they would get developed and then I
would take the pictures back to the photographers so they could sell them at
the end of the meal. And the third one was a photo mugs place. I don't know
if you guys remember this, but you know and they might still have these where
they would take a picture of you like say like with Indiana Jones's body or
the Hulk or whatever and they'd try to blend it in. It's so easy to do now with
Photoshop but back then it was kind of like a novelty and then you would try to
sell them on the - sell them the mugs or the t-shirts and things like that. It was
like a stall in a market. So those are - I did that one on weekend. This
was, you know, the three different jobs that I had and I was really - I
don't know why I was just - I had this chip on my shoulder -
I didn't want anyone to say that I wasn't working enough. but two of those
jobs taught me a lot about why people buy. See, the first one was the the
Waikiki Beach one. So basically, what would happen would be
photographers and the photographers was such real prima donnas. They just -
I was a runner so I would just - I would pick up the film canisters, take it
back to the lab and they were just, you know, they look down their noses at
me or whatever. But so, what they would do is they would go up to each
couple at every table of these fancy restaurants like Benihanas or whatever.
People they're out having a holiday and they're just having a good time. So,
they'll take their pictures like they're they're movie stars. They don't ask, "Can I
take your picture?" They just take their picture and then I would take the
film back to the lab. Then I would - when it was developed - I was going
multiple labs, so drop this one, pick up the film for another one, take it
whatever. So, I'll take back the photos and then they would take it
back to the people before the end of their meal this is oh it had to be fast
right so the runner had to be really fast I mean almost literally running you
take it back and it would show the pictures of the people saying look at
this nice picture of you would you like to buy it for ten dollars right and a
lot of times they would say yes and a lot of times they say no so you had to
throw it away but it always used to strike me that if you would ask them
before they sat down to eat whether or not you could take their picture and
sell them a picture and sell it to them for ten dollars they would always would
have said no right but when you cook to show them what it actually is if you
could actually produce it and say hey would you like to buy this right it's a
picture of themselves and they couldn't say no to something where they look
really good in right so that was how the whole business ran it was all about you
build it you show it to them and then they buy it because it's of them they
can see it the other thing was a photo mug place right it was the same kind of
concept right out I wouldn't ask people hey would you like to put your pic your
face on Indiana Jones's body and then have it put onto a mug and I'll
sell you the mug everybody would have said no so we always said would you like
to try it out which like a free sample and all we'd sit people down in the
chair and I would put the camera on them and it would take a picture of them and
I try to blend in the colors of their face with a body of Indiana Jones or the
Hulk or whoever it was there was all these cutouts of people Power Rangers at
the time was a big thing because they were talking about like 1994 right and
and then afterwards they would look at it and that
that point I would say would you like to buy a mug would you like to buy keychain
would you like to buy a t-shirt right and that's what got them in right if
you'd asked them before would you like to buy would you like to buy a mug with
your picture on it they would say no but you say hey would you like to try this
for free then they would say yes this is the mentality we have when we quote
right we always we can't just say beforehand hey we could build you this
app and it's gonna cost you all this money no we have to say hey we could
build you an app would you like to discuss it would you like to have a try
right and then at that when we actually go through the requirement I'm gonna
give a ballpark just so that we're not wasting people's time but at the end we
show them this is what your app can look like this is you know walk through the
steps so you click on hear you do that you do that and you're trying to sell
them on the future trying to get them to picture in their minds so what they're
buying is totally customized to them right and this is how we do everything
right you cannot pitch the product beforehand before you actually show them
something right and this has worked very well for us and those those lessons are
what I learned from those part-time jobs I had as a kid right if you if you if
you go through this a hey can I take your picture and sell it to you you say
no but you took their picture and I know there's a lot of gdpr things and stuff
now if you took their picture and then later on you showed them a beautiful
picture of themselves and they look fantastic how could they say no if you
were quoting for an app and you showed them an app that look fantastic and they
can see in their mind hey you know what my employees are gonna love this my
clients are gonna love this I love this there's my logo I cuz I can see it all
in my mind then how could they say no anyway those are just my thoughts for
today I may have talked about this before in the past but it is really it's
really really important are the things that we do that I think that though I
mean we probably could when we give a quote we probably get a yes about 60% of
the time right is that but you know that's how that's how well it works yeah
if we can walk them through the steps beforehand and this is also one of the
reasons why we have a full-time designer on staff because we have to turn those
things around you know constantly so anyway let me know what you guys think I
mean is that the kind of thing you do if you do quote for clients it is this
helpful at all anyway that is it for today I will talk to you guys again
tomorrow