3 Marketing Basics for Personal Chefs
Think of a triangle with the client need/problem at the top, core services on the right, and pricing on the left. Imagine that each side is a string; if you pull one string too much, the other sides will be strained or the triangle will fall apart completely. That’s exactly what you don’t want to happen! Listen to this episode to learn how to keep each side of the triangle aligned in your business.
Listen to the episode to learn:
The 3 key marketing basics for your personal chef business
How to recognize and prevent misalignment in your business
Why you shouldn’t be too focused on food
Why your services should be crystal clear
How to realign your business when you’ve focused too much on one marketing basic
Why you should remember what you’re really selling (a solution to your client’s problem!)
I also share a little bit about what you’ll learn in my course, so be sure to listen if you’re considering joining the Fully Booked Personal Chef!
Featured on this Episode:
Ready to book your next summer sizzling client? Click here for my guide on how to get your next 5 clients!
Interested in becoming Fully Booked? Check out my A-Z program on how to market, sell and set up your cooking practice so you can become fully booked - Join the Waitlist HERE. Course is scheduled to open mid-September 2022.
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Hey, guys. Welcome to this week's podcast. We are going to talk about the three part triangle marketing basics for personal chefs. And I wish I had a better name for it, but that is all I came up with. But it's a really, really powerful, interesting concept that will really shake what you're doing up, especially if nothing you think is clicking yet. Okay, so here we are. Let's get started. I want you to picture a triangle in front of your face right now. The points on the top will be point number one. And then we'll go to the right is number two. And then the last one is number three. So if you feel uncomfortable with marketing in general, pricing your services or finding clients, having a triangle and understanding it like this and how it's all connected is really going to help you a lot. So before I tell you each part of it, actually, I'll tell you each part, and then we'll go into what it looks like if you're having this problem. So the first one is the client need or the problem. That's point number one. Point number two on the triangle is your core services. And then point number three is your pricing. Now just imagine those three things connected by the point of a triangle or with a piece of string. If you pull one out of line, like pricing, the others will be strained or they will fall apart completely, and you won't even really have a good triangle. So when this triangle lines up, you will know because you feel better about your business. Clients will be easy to talk to. You will notice things sort of magically happening around you that may or may not have happened before or that maybe seemed hard before. You'll notice yourself not caring as much about certain things or feeling weird or awkward and lacking a lot of confidence. So that's how you know if it is aligned. So I want to now go to why some chefs have a problem with aligning this triangle. Here's some things that I came up with, and I promise this will all come together for you by the end. So if you have a problem aligning these things, here's how you know. You may be focusing on one of the parts too much. Remember, one is the client's need or the problem. Two is the core services that you offer, and three is the pricing. So if you're focusing so much on one of those, it will be out of whack. Or if you don't understand how they all fit together, it'll also be out of whack. And if you're thinking too much of yourself, your needs, your pocket, your money, why it's not working, feeling bad about yourself and not the clients, it will also be out of whack. So here's how the misalignment may show up in your life and in your business right now. If you're doing any of these things jotted down or nod your head and nothing is wrong. There's no shame in this. This is just how you know that you may benefit from learning more about this triangle. First is you're in misalignment if you are mostly talking about food on your website and on social media and when you meet people, meaning most of the conversation is centered just on food, food products, recipes, not even menus, but, like, just food, food, food. If you're concentrating on that, you may be misaligned, okay? If your services are vague or unclear. So if you have wording on your website that you barely understand and that other people definitely don't understand, if people are looking at your website and they cannot produce a simple, yes, I want that, or no, I do not, in their head, you will know because they're not taking action, meaning they didn't reach out to you to ask a question or book a consult. You're getting little action or interest or reaction. You also may be doing this if your price is really low or really high compared to other factors in your market. So if you have done a quick search and I do think you guys should do this at some point, a quick search of your market area of what other personal chefs are charging. Do this as you have to make sure that it's an apples to apples comparison, and you're not looking at services that you don't provide. So if you're doing in home personal chef cooking, which is what I sell and I teach my clients to sell, don't look at other people's meal delivery. It has nothing to do with what you're doing. Don't look at restaurants. Don't look at food trucks, don't look at vending machines. Don't look at grab and go places. That's not what you're doing. You got to do a quick market analysis of apples to apples of what other personal chefs are charging in your area. So if your prices are very low or higher or much higher than your market area, your triangle could be misaligned. If you're not listing your prices at all on your website or when you're talking to people, if you're listing services that are, again, very vague and not specific, like, I can cook anything for you. I can cook any cuisine you want, just let me know. Or you don't have any sample menus. So there's no framework for somebody to look at your website or at your social media and say, I want that, or I need help with that. So let's go back to the triangle. If any of those you checked off the box, no problem. We're going to realign the triangle. So the first part of the triangle is the client need or the problem. And you want to start with asking yourself, what is their real problem? There is a previous podcast episode. I think it's the one or two before this selling I forgot what it's called. It's basically like, what are you really selling instead of food? Sell this. And you really have to tap into what their real problem is, because you aren't just selling food. You can get food anywhere. What they really want is health, wellness, luxury, freedom. They want their time back. You want to be able to address that problem in your website, on social media, and when you're speaking to people, the reason how we know it's not just food is people are not googling, I'm hungry, or like, where should I eat? You're not just solving the problem of hunger. A personal chef solves a much, much bigger problem, and you want to be focusing on that and tapping into that because they're Googling what their real problem is. And they might be Googling something like a chef who can cook low salt meals because I have a health issue. Not that they're Googling just like that, but I'm just going to give you some examples. Losing weight for a wedding. That's a problem. Food is not the problem. That's their actual problem. Or recent heart attack need to change diet. Then they're telling you the problem. The problem goes into Google. The answer is not just food. So you have to talk about the problem. When you really understand their problem, the real reason why they're reaching out, it's really easy to go to the next part of the triangle number two and have your core services and your packages match exactly the problem that they have. When your packages and pricing match the problem they have, you will notice people reaching out more. You will be getting a yes more, because it's in alignment right now. It's out of alignment because what I see a lot of times from students or people in my tribe who follow me is they're talking about food or they're selling meal delivery, just food. They're not really solving a problem, so pay attention to that part of it. Once you know what you're really selling, which is a solution to their problem, you can then go to point to your core services. I suggest, and I teach this in my course personal Chef secret to fully booked. You start with one to two core services that are directly related to your clients problem. If you don't know what the specific problem is, like, if you're not sure if you want to focus on health or luxury or wellness or specific medical diets, you can always start with time. Everybody wants more time. I literally cannot think of a person on this earth that doesn't want more of their own time back to do what they want. So that could be a problem you're solving. And then as you get more into it and get more experience and have more clients, you can get more specific. But here's how that might look. If you're starting out with time as the problem, you may start to think of and use words like moms who work, or dad stuck at the office and don't want greasy takeout anymore, or you're sick of getting chipotle for your kids after school, do this instead. Like you're tapping into the problem of time, and I want you guys to play with it. Make it fun. There's no right or perfect way when you're deciding your core services. But the two actually, I teach my students three, and they choose one or two to start with. But the most popular one is a multi meal service, what we call the four by four, where you cook that in the clients homes. There's also a previous podcast on this as well, exactly how to do it. But basically, if you start with the four x four, you decide, that's going to be one of my core services. I'm going to try it out. Your job is to now sell yourself on why this service is the answer for them. So again, we chose time. Everybody has the problem with time. Busy moms who work, dads are stuck at the office and don't want greasy takeout. Kids are sick of going to drive through after school with like, gross processed food. Your service, the four x four, is going to be the answer to this problem. What problem you're solving is they don't have to go to the grocery store. They do not have to go online and find recipes or search the web. They do not have to spend any time cooking. They don't have to stop for takeout. They don't even have to drive there anymore. They don't have to have expensive trips of getting takeout food which is healthy or unhealthy or fried. I just got Chinese food. It was like once a month we do this and we plan for it. And it used to be really good, high quality Chinese food, but we walked out of there. Take out. Seriously? With a $60 bill for two people? That's expensive, especially if it's not even stuff you really want. Okay, back to this. You don't have to clean up. They don't have to leave work during the day. They don't have to hear their kids complain that they hate that rubber chicken. Again, all of these things that I just mentioned saves your clients time. Remember, we're solving the problem of time, not just food. This saving of the time, all of the things that I mentioned could save a client anywhere from ten to 15 hours a week. When you believe that your multimeal service is the answer to their problem, it will become very easy for you to sell. The key to this is for you to try it on yourself. It's weird for us to try to imagine how much time we're going to save other people if we haven't experienced it ourselves. Try it on for yourself. Do this service literally for yourself. Even if you're single or you don't have anybody to share it with, put half of it in the freezer but walk through the whole thing yourself. Offer it to neighbors. Offer it to your friends. Do practice cook days. Maybe you do the service for free and they pay for the food, or maybe they have some food on hand. This is only for practice. I don't suggest doing this with clients, but using the food they have and really see the savings of time that they are getting throughout the week and have them report back to you. Like, if you do this for your neighbor, and let's say you do the four x four, you have 16 meals for the week left in their home. Talk to them after a couple of days and be like, how much time did you save by not going to the grocery store? Or you didn't even have to look on the web all week and look for recipes, or how many trips to take out did you skip because you have all this food in your home, see how it affects their lives, see how much time they're really saving. That helps you believe that the multi meal service is the answer, and then it's easier to sell. So once you see the value, and by doing this service for yourself, for friends and family, for neighbors, for maybe past clients that you want to try it out on, you will see how much value you're providing the client. Once you understand the real value and can wrap your brain around it, pricing becomes way less sticky. You become way less emotionally involved. You don't get stuck on price, and you don't make it an issue. That's where we come to .3 of the triangle pricing. This is what I see with my students a lot when pricing is out of whack. Either it's very low, they don't know the value of what they're doing, or it's very high, and they're not even, like, on planet Earth with their pricing. And I actually had a student, like, this many years ago. Like about five years ago. She was in one of my programs, and she was just starting out. She really didn't have any clients. She was working a full time job separately, like, starting this business on the side, and her pricing was off the charts. It was like $800 for four meals, like something crazy. And I was like, okay, how did you come up with that? Why is it this price? I was trying to get more into it and coach her around it, and she really had no idea what the value of the service was. So she was just making it up of what she wanted her time to be and what it was worth to her to then get off of work at 05:00 and then go cook and then do all of this extra hard work. That is not how you price something that actually has nothing to do with it. You can't insert just your random pricing because you think it's hard for you. Your pricing is about what you are delivering, the amount of value to your client and the marketplace, not you. So if you're priced very, very low, also, I see this as well it becomes very emotional and very frustrating and aggravating that you are so scared to charge more or you are getting clients who are consistently asking you to lower the price, then you know that you're making pricing like this triangle is not aligned. And you're making pricing so much of the problem, and it is not. So if pricing is not simple, meaning you have one price, it rolls off your tongue, it's easy to say, and you know exactly how much value they get in return for it. You're making pricing about you. Your emotions, your feelings. You're not wanting to be rejected. You're making the pricing about you. Do you think McDonald's or Chipotle cares about their pricing? They do not care about their pricing. Your price is reflected on the value you deliver to your client, not based on your years of cooking, your time spent planning, or anything else that has the word you in the equation. This is really important because people have this fantasy that a personal chef opens up their doors, gets $100 an hour, and cooks for big, rich, fancy people. That is not the case. And even if it is, then you still have to learn how to run a business and offer other services. So it's really good to keep this triangle in mind and see which part may not be aligned for you right now, because these could be really quick, easy fixes for you. Okay, back to pricing, and then we'll wrap it up. So if the four by four we just talked about it you tried it out on a couple of people, you tried it back on yourself. If it gives families back 15 hours a week and both parents are working, let's say, I don't know, regular jobs, let's say office jobs or one's, you know, a doctor, maybe one has a really great job, one has a regular job. Let's say it averages to $50 an hour. If you're giving them back 15 hours and they make $50 an hour about you just save them $750 a week in time to do whatever they want. Think about that for a minute. That is a smoking deal. If you save them $750 in time remember, we're solving the problem of time and not just food, that they can do whatever they want with it. Maybe they do want to work. Maybe they want to be with their kids. Maybe they want to go to yoga or go hiking. Who knows? And your service is $300 a week, and you save them $750. That is a return on an investment that is solving a serious problem. And that is something that will keep you rebooked and fully booked over and over, because that is value. The way that I just explained it. Okay, so this triangle is not about these things. You ready? I gave you three big categories of what it was about. I'm just going to tell you quickly what it's not about. This triangle is not about your self worth at all in any way, shape or form as a human or a business owner. It has nothing to do with who you are as a person. It just has to do with how you are portraying your service in the marketplace and how much value it is. Second thing, it only relies on the value you give to your clients. I know I'm saying that over and over, but that is the metric or like the scale of this triangle. And you get to increase the value by saving them more time, more of the feeling of luxury. You're giving them the more of health and wellness, whatever. You can continue giving them more of refining it, doing it better, faster than your price can go up and up and up until there's almost no ceiling on it. And the clients you get are better and better and better because they see the value right away and they don't question your price. That's how you know your triangle is in line. And this is really important. Like I said in the beginning, if you're getting clients that are constantly saying, why is this so expensive? Can you lower the price? I'm not booking this. Your triangle is not aligned and it's attracting the clients that you don't want. And it makes sense once you align this triangle and you're giving them more time, more luxury, more health and wellness, you will get clients that never even question your price. And I'm going to use the example of athletes or very high level CEOs and people that run companies and stuff like that, they never say, why is that the price? Or can you lower the price? Or I don't understand this. And it's not because listen really carefully, it's not because they have a lot of money. It's because they understand the value of your service before you even perform the service. That is such an important distinction. We all think since rich people have so much money, they're going to spend this money and they don't care about it. That is absolutely not it. I have met many, many multimultimillionaires, even billionaires that don't see the value in this service. They just don't want it. They get food elsewhere. It's not important to them. Doesn't have to do with the amount of money they have. It has to do with the fact that they understand the value for themselves ahead of time. It is a total waste of time for a billion dollar CEO to sit and go to Target or to go to Walmart or to go to Safeway or some food store and go food shopping for 2 hours, picking out stuff they have no idea what to do with. They just know that that's not a good use of their time. That's where you come in. You make perfect use of that time that they can then spend on something else they want. That is the value connection. Okay, that was a big one. All right, here are some final notes. Remember, picture the triangle. Write it out. See which parts you may or may not be misaligned at. See which parts you are aligned at, because I'm sure you're aligned on one of those parts. And it could be a really quick fix to just kind of do a tune up and get it in line. So it's important to talk this out. It's weird. Like, when we learn new concepts, you want to talk it out. You want to either, like, talk to your spouse, your partner, your friends, and be like, what is the value of saving you 10 hours? If I did XYZ for you, what would that do for you? Also, question your thoughts about what you know about food and value. This is really, really important. Most of us, we are probably very alike, if you're listening to this, grew up regular people, not with tons of money, not with parents owning big companies or anything like that. Both of my parents were New York City public school teachers. I've never had a personal chef before. You've probably never had your own personal chef before. So we are skewed on the value of what it actually is, because just because it comes easy for us, like, to cook, like, I can cook 16 meals in 4 hours blindfolded. It's so easy for me. It doesn't mean it doesn't have tremendous value for someone else. So don't take just your upbringing of not having your own personal chef and lowering the status of it or lowering the value of it, because that's really what you're selling. Also, don't ask a bunch of strangers who have also never had a personal chef and think it's way out of their reach what you should charge or what you should do. Do some valid market research. Remember apples to apples and don't get stuck with what other people are charging. It's actually irrelevant. You're going to produce your own value with the service you offer. Okay, I hope you guys like this little triangle analogy. I'm definitely going to come up with some more. Let me know which ones may be out of whack for you or what little changes that you've now learned from this podcast, that you can shift it on your own and get it in line and have the best amazing clients starting to reach out to you. That's how you'll know you're getting on track. All right, guys, I will see you in the next one. Have a beautiful weekend. Bye.