Sorry, we’ve decided to use someone else on this occasion

 

Back when I had my first Recruitment business…

I was on a follow-up call with a client who after all the niceties, promptly said nine words that changed my whole outlook on what I was doing…

“Sorry, we’ve decided to use someone else on this occasion”

The nine words he used weren’t particularly unusual…

I had lost out on business plenty of times before… It’s just the way it goes…

But this time was different…

Mainly because I knew who had won the business instead of me…

It was a friend of mine… An ex-colleague actually…

We had both started our businesses around the same time and because of our past experience, had both decided to target the same niche…

Again, nothing about this was particularly unusual… We had often pitched against each other for the same piece of business… And it was always done in good sport…

The reason this time was different was because I knew what terms he had offered…

I actually had a bigger team than he had, more experience and I knew from our time working together I was the better recruiter…

We’d both pitched for a retainer…

I went in at 17%… And he went in at 20%…

And the client choose him!

Why?

This is something I’ll never know for sure…

But I can say with absolute certainty… That it wasn’t because of his experience (I had more), it wasn’t because of his fee (he was more expensive), it wasn’t because he had a more established business (he didn’t) and it wasn’t because he was a better recruiter, …

I used to think all that stuff was important…

The truth is, all your clients care about are themselves, their problems and how well you can demonstrate your ability to fix them…

He had obviously done a better job than me and so won the business EVEN though he was charging a higher fee…

And there’s a lesson here (several if you look closely) … If you feel like you’re being paid less than you deserve by clients, and you want to increase your fees, all you need to do is get better at demonstrating your ability to fix their problems…

And if you want to know how, click the link below and get your free blueprint –

Get your blueprint here –

 

 

 

 

 

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