Exhibit A: American small business owner, Exhibit B: Trinidadian small business owner. Both provide online payment for their clients but despite the appearance, only one has one specific way they accept payment online. The other, for all their talk about “getting very specific”, have multiple payment options for different people.
What’s the real problem here? Specificity scares local small business owners. It’s much easier to sidestep the direction you’re heading in to accommodate someone who isn’t in the best position to do business with you because “one solution can’t possibly fulfill all your needs”. But this isn’t about not wanting to say no to a paying client, it’s about the fear of targeting specific clients.
In a situation where one crappy client begets another crappy client, the value stops being about money when the atmosphere you need in order to give your very best work is being impeded by avoidable issues. I think the irony here is even though we all want a profitable work environment, many of us sabotage those chances by our refusal to really make tough decisions and don’t even realize it.
The Narrow Way vs The Broad Way
A few years ago, I wanted to make a specific investment in myself to strengthen my chances of being self-employed. I reached out to the person offering the course to find out what my payment options were because at the time, processing my payment through their website wasn’t working. “You can pay through PayPal,” she said. Further to that, she admitted her company, “only takes credit cards because it’s just an easier, faster way to pay”.
In contrast, I heard a local business owner say depending on the situation, she will sometimes give her clients multiple ways to pay, whether it’s by cash, credit/debit card or cheque, but also used a variety of different payment gateways.
It's quite obvious that although they both serve local and international clients, only one is specific in their approach. And without discounting the nuances of online payment locally, these decisions do reflect the quality of clients you go after. And while it’s sensible to make doing business with your clients easier, you have to also connect that standard with protection of your time, energy and enthusiasm. If you choose to focus on attracting clients who have a negative impact on how you can do business, logically, one solution won't fulfill your needs”.
Clients of the second business owner have different payment needs; they aren’t all in a position to use one method to pay her online but, if she decided to double down on the percentage of clients who were able to pay one way, and only focus on aligning herself with more of those types of clients, she’ll be able to streamline the way she provides online payment for both her local and international clientele.
Buzz PayTT
My clients are always pleasantly surprised to learn that they can easily receive debit or credit card payments through their website from local or international clients through a local gateway called BuzzPAY.
Some time ago, I was in the market for another way to receive digital payments from local clients through the wix platform. After testing a couple providers, BuzzPAY proved itself the best option for me and ultimately, my clients. Not only does the platform serve Caribbean and International clients, but it’s also super easy to integrate with the WIX platform.
It keeps the client’s approach to doing business with me simple and clear. There is no need for me to come up with a different solution because I’m not trying to tell a possible client that they can come into my work space in a way that’s unhealthy for the both of us. There’s already a consistent way and that’s on my website and the more consistent I am upholding that, the fewer encounters I’ll have with clients who aren’t the best fit for me to work with.
I am the Founder and Visual Brand Strategist at The BrandTUB **Get online in one day with The One-Page™ **Schedule a call a call to see if you're a good fit **Sign up to receive these weekly articles in your inbox if you’re not quite ready to work with me yet.
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