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By Victor Bassey As you start your journey to highly paid expert status, sooner or later you will face the one issue that all clients throw in our face directly or indirectly: Why should I pay you so much? Most of us in answer to this question try as much as possible to justify our value to the potential client but I’ve discovered that this is a losing strategy. It is much better to demonstrate your value to your prospect before the question of your value comes up than you wait till you have to justify it. So how exactly do you demonstrate your value in a way that is so compelling your prospects literally fall over themselves to pay you what you’re worth? Well, first you must understand that as highly-paid experts, we create value for our clients by providing them with either one or all of three very important things: 1.Clarity of direction In today’s highly complex world, people need clarity of direction. They need you, the expert, to provide them with a plan, path or strategy to navigate through a sometimes confusing, and overwhelmingly complex world. With the speed at which everything changes today, it is very easy to lose focus and become paralyzed by fear or indecision, especially when you have more opportunities than you know how to handle. When you help people think effectively about their future, you create value and place yourself in a category of one. 2.Confidence More often than not confidence is a function of the quality of our relationships and the people support systems in our lives. To give confidence to your clients, you need to show them that you can be trusted and are reliable. Ironically, you can demonstrate that you can be trusted and relied on by practicing 4 simple habits: i. Show up on time ii. Do what you say you will do iii. Finish what you start iv. Always say please and thank you. Simple right? 3.Capability Your clients are not interested in your products and services. No! They’re interested in the skills, the technologies, the knowledge and the tools that your products and services will help them develop in order for them to reach their goals fast. As a highly-paid expert, your job is to help them identify the areas they need to develop capabilities in other to reach their goals. When you help your clients boost their creativity by providing them with new ways of thinking or problem solving, you create massive value. These three things are what we all want at some level or the other. If you systematically provide these three things at the level your clients require them, nobody will argue with you about price. So the question now I guess is: “Victor, how do I systematically provide these three things?” The answer is in asking your client or prospect 4 simple questions:

If you and I were meeting again 3 months from now (use whatever duration you want depending on how long you want to build the relationship), what needs to happen in your (business, career, health, life, marriage…just insert what area you’re helping them solve problems in) in order for you to be happy with your progress?
What are you afraid would stop you from achieving this?
What opportunities would you need to capture focus on in order to achieve this?
What strengths would you need to maximize to achieve this?

These four simple questions provide you with the ability to provide your prospects and clients with clarity of direction, confidence and capability. The answers to these questions provide you with a map to your prospects mind and what’s important to them. They also let you know up front without stress whether or not you should invest in the relationship. Try it out and let me know what you think!

Victor Bassey helps entrepreneurial experts, coaches, consultants, trainers, small/medium scale business owners and corporate executives become commercially smart with the positioning, packaging, promotion and distribution of their knowledge expertise and life experience. Follow him on Twitter @mrvictorbassey