Jason Swenk

45 Responses

1. Our Biggest Challange: Lack of a concrete systems/processes that limits our ability to scale up the way we wish. If we are able to overcome this internal handicap, we can build very efficient sales engines to get consistent leads and generate a huge employment opportunity in our region.

2. Our Biggest Challange: Lack of a concrete systems/processes that limits our ability to scale up the way we wish. If we are able to overcome this internal handicap, we can build very efficient sales engines to get consistent leads and generate a huge employment opportunity in our region.

3. Great podcast!! Thanks so much, I’ve learned a bunch and can’t wait for Jason’s upcoming Webinar!

   My biggest challenge: Fitting my content into my workflow consistantly. It’s getting better since the Chicago Masterclass but I still am lapsing every so often 🙂 Definitely going to try the assign a day schedule that was mentioned in the podcast.

   Off now to tweak my Continuous Improvement plans <– love it!!

4. Great podcast!! Thanks so much, I’ve learned a bunch and can’t wait for Jason’s upcoming Webinar!

   My biggest challenge: Fitting my content into my workflow consistantly. It’s getting better since the Chicago Masterclass but I still am lapsing every so often 🙂 Definitely going to try the assign a day schedule that was mentioned in the podcast.

   Off now to tweak my Continuous Improvement plans <-- love it!!

5. Awesome – psyched to check this out. It is a little difficult to catch these in real time so we appreciate these recordings! – [email protected]

6. Awesome – psyched to check this out. It is a little difficult to catch these in real time so we appreciate these recordings! – [email protected]

7. Jen, I had that struggle but if you structure your weeks into build, discover, profit and free days, it will be awesome for you. If you check out my post on how I structure my time, it may help you out. http://jasonswenk.com/july-time-report/

8. Radhakrishnan, Systems are everything and I look at every business needing 12 systems in order to get to the next level. I would think about the biggest non-system that you are struggling with that if you fixed would get you closer to your end goal and so on. Hope that helps. Here is a shameless plug. If you want to know the 12 systems that I used that got my agency from a 6 figure business to a 8 figure business go here. http://jasonswenk.com/playbook

9. I am working in Online marketing for almost 10 years now, but only recently I became a freelancer consultant. Building wordpress websites is one of the services I provide. I have the “know-how” but I feel that my biggest challenge is deciding on pricing and crafting a proposals for prospects.

   Until now I was working mostly in big companies so I have no experience working directly with clients as a freelancer or within agency.

   Going to watch the recording now. Getting the proposal template would be extremely helpful, but either way, love your content!

10. This was a great podcast and I was able to take a lot away from it. Thanks for the wonderful conversation Troy and Jason. Very inspirational.

    My biggest challenge is finding the clients that want more than just a “website”. I want to provide them with a solution to their problem, which would in turn allow me to to charge more because of the VALUE proposition.

    I am not sure if it is the way that I have positioned myself, or if it is because a lot of my work comes from referrals, but I don’t want to be viewed as a “website guy”. I am a professional and the way people view you has a lot to do with the value they perceive that you can provide.

    If I was able to find larger clients, it would allow me to expand my business. It would also allow me to spend a lot more time building and growing my business and helping business owners solve their problems. The best feeling is helping a business realize their potential, even if it is just be altering or revamping their online image.

11. Thanks Grant. Who do you serve and be specific. If you develop your own niche you be seen as an agency rather than a website guy. Hope that helps.

12. Jason,

    Thanks for the reply. That is, as we all know, one of the most difficult issues that I (we) face. Since a lot of my work has come from referrals I have found that my clients are coming from a variety of industries. It is still difficult at times to turn down work, but I understand that it may be necessary to move to the next level.

    Thanks again.

13. Not saying to turn down work, but just to market to a niche and become the authority. I work with a lot of people outside of agency owners, but I chose to just market to agency owners so I could become the authority and it has worked. Hope that helps.

14. Yes this makes perfect sense. I just need to do some soul searching and figure out who it is I want to work with. I always think of ideas and then find negatives and talk myself out of that particular niche.

    Thanks again.

15. I personally really dislike this particular show and Jason’s sales pitch i.e. he tries and give the impression that it was so easy for him to build a large digital agency and if only you had the good proposal (i.e. from him $199) and if you only had more focus you get success.

16. Hey Jonathan, Although I don’t like the way you’ve worded this, I appreciate that not everyone is going to like or agree with all of our podcast guests. We believe that Jason has a lot of great strategies to offer the WP community and try to include a broad range of guests on the show to cater for the broad range of listeners that we have. Hopefully one of our future guests messages will resonate more with you.

17. Hi Gin. I have no problem with Troy or the podcast I’m regular listener and in general I’ve really enjoyed the majority of the episodes and normally they have been excellent.

    However, we going to have to agree to disagree on Jason sales pitch techniques.

    I’m sure that Jason has been very successful in his past agency career and I’m sure he has a lot of good quality insight and advice to give to right clients. However, I personally have some major problems with his sale approach and some of the core messaging that is linked to this approach.

    I just feel that this episode Troy was just a little bit too prepared to take Jason remarks and comments on face value and and also allow Jason to give quite broad generalities as answers without really challenging him. To my mind there wasn’t any real balance in the episode.

18. This episode gave me a lot to think about.
    As of late I’ve been juggling my day job while doing freelance web work, getting 4-5 hours of sleep every night, working non stop (It’s 2:44 on a sunday AM, still working) and I’m starting to think I need a better way to inform clients the scope of a project, what I’m willing to do when and how much to do it. I’ve slowly been putting a proposal template together along with a skeleton of a contract but it’s pretty slow going. I’d love to take a look at Jason’s. My end goal is to find higher paying clients so I don’t need to do 4 small jobs at once, just one big job at a time..
    Thanks again for the great podcast.

19. My biggest challenge is finding bigger clients. Winning larger clients would allow me to be solvent and be completely independent.

20. Jonathan, I’m sorry you feel that way, and that you feel you did not get any value out of it. At no time did I say having a good proposal is the only way to build a large agency. It is a small piece in a very big puzzle. You know what would be a great show is for Troy to have the both of us on, and for you to raise your concerns and challenge me. I always love a challenge 🙂

21. Hi, Jason. I’m up for it or if you are prepared to enter the lion’s den you can come on my podcast wp-tonic. You will be treated with respect. However, the questions I would ask you would be a l little bit harder then what you got from Troy. you can email me on [email protected]

22. Like I said, I am up for coming on Troy’s show with you but not yours. Life is to short to chat with people that I really don’t want to chat with. You said you would be respectful, but you were not on the comment below. I know I can’t make everyone happy, but I ran a successful agency for 12 years until I sold it and gave my perspective of what worked. If you think that is a joke, good luck to you. This conversation is over and I am not going to waste anymore time with responding or chatting with you.

23. Jim, I would ask you if you know the exactly what that client looks like that you are targeting? Industry, buyer persona, etc?

24. Corey, You can not do both and while you hold down your day job. You have to burn the bridge and go full at it. I chatted about FOCUS in this episode and this is so true for you. If you want to do this full time, set a date and make it happen. Hope this helps.

25. Hey Jason,

    Thanks for the reply.
    Doing just one isn’t possible at the moment for numerous reasons I won’t go into here but I have given what you said about focus some thought in regards to types of clients.
    Thanks again

26. Hi, Jason. I’m sorry that you feel like that. However I do understand and on reflection some of my remarks have been a little bit too harsh. But the core of what I have started is in my opinion are correct and I have attempted to give honest feedback. As you said in our last reply it took you “12 years” to build a successful digital agency. What I found quite difficult to handle in your interview was your position connected to how important proposals are in process of the winning of large contracts. I just personally found this part of the interview was filled with contradictions. However, this is only my opinion.

    However, if Troy was to invite me on his show I more then happy to discuss my concerns with you in public and defend my position.

27. Thanks for the reply Jason.

    My only criteria are: the client has enough money to afford my services; and they want my services. I’d want them to be happy with the value of my work, but beyond that, I’d create a website for any industry, buyer, etc.

28. Anytime Grant

29. This was really great podcast and gaining insight into on how you pros work.

    My biggest challenge is creating concrete leads and managing workflow . I have a sleep condition called Narcolepsy which hinders me from writing well structured proposals and agreements. I have tried to find good templates and systems but not having much success so when I heard what Jason offers, this would be the ideal solution to 1 of my biggest huddles.

    thanks Daryl

30. I found the podcast entertaining and inspiring. Love the F.O.C.U.S acronym.

    My biggest challenge right now is breaking through the ceiling I have hit. A year with WPE has seen my business elevate but I am now squidged against what I can only describe as a ceiling. All current systems and resources are maxed out.

    I now have to find a way to break through and attracting larger clients would be one way to achieve that…..

    Really, looking for ward to the member’s webinar next week.

31. A very educational and entertaining interview and I learnt a lot – not fussed by any “pitch” as per one comment below!

    Finding that the biggest challenge is, like Dee has said, breaking through the “glass ceiling” of small business/small websites vs a complete solution. Still spending too much time on the proposals and trying to really clarify the scope of work, rather than really clarify the benefits and get to those bigger projects and clients. The discovery meeting as part of the WP Elevation blueprint is fantastic and maybe I’m doing something wrong at the next step, but just seem to take too long on the proposal and then not end up with something that “people will crawl over broken glass to have”! Perhaps the answer is offering options (as pointed out in another podcast episode). BTW, we we help smart, innovative business owners who need REAL, tangible results from the internet, transform their online presence into a business generation machine, that works 24/7.

    Of course, if we get bigger clients/projects, we need to have less of them to make the same profit or even better profit, which would allow me more time to spend with family, riding my bicycle and feeding my photography habit! Not that I don’t enjoy my business – love it and love these resources, that we have access to!

    The FOCUS acronym is gold, as is the continuous improvement analogy. I tell people “A website is never really “finished”, but an ongoing journey during your business life and we partner with you on that journey.”

32. Awesome episode, Troy and Jason.

    I don’t think that Jason was doing a sales pitch, not at all, and I’m pretty sure he gave tons of value here.

    For me the biggest challenge I’m having is finding a way to enter the big leagues. I’ve been working with WpElevation and I’m having great results applying all this, but In a way I think that the big 2clients are all been hoarded buy the beautiful rich guys who has the big contacts, because of their life style and family heritage, etc.

    I see that really their work is not as good as the one we do, but, they just got the contacts! so, how can you solve that, is there a way to cross that bridge… surly is not gonna happen putting some facebook add or just creating great content, I’ve seen that most of the times you don’t really need to be good to work with them just need to have acces

33. Thanks man! So I would tell you that they are getting the deals because they are establishing the relationships. What are you doing to establish relationships with your target market?

    Its also about the way you position yourself in the beginning. I hope that helps.

34. Thanks Jurgen. The only way to break through that glass ceiling it to have the right systems in place to get you there and to know where you are going. Knowing is half the battle and then finding mentors or people that have been there in the past that can help you with the systems is the other part. Hope that helps.

35. Thanks Dee. Do you know what that larger client looks like from what they want and their biggest struggles?

36. Thanks Daryl. You need to setup a system that will help you nurture your leads along.

37. Thanks for the response, Jason and great webinar at WPE this morning! I’m spending quite a bit of time getting my systems in order and improving and the proposal template will certainly get some attention after today’s webinar! Thanks for all that information.

38. Hi Jason.

    Thanks for taking the time to respond and thank you for an excellent webinar last night. Stunned at how much of your methodology you shared with us – very generous. Thank you.

    To answer your question…… I didn’t respond straight away as the answer would have been a simple ‘Don’t know’.

    Having slept on it and pondered, for me larger clients have technical teams in place and have a website but there’s something missing which means the website isn’t generating the business it should. Working with these clients would be as much about acting as a facilitator to get the departmental teams all working together as it would working on the tools to improve the web presence. It would perhaps be a trouble shooting role.

    The client struggle would be in managing a technical team without technical knowledge and in getting everyone rowing in the same direction, pulling together as opposed to working departmental agendas. I don’t see it as consulting but rather more as facilitating meetings/workshops for the client to bring order which will ultimately improve website performance.

    If that’s the answer to how I achieve the next step for my business then my next step would be to ‘productise’ some kind of offering………..

    I think with growth, in an ideal world it would be gracefully linear and the infrastructure to support the growth could be put in place along the way. In real life, growth opportunities seem to arrive all at once which necessitates a lot of scrabbling and backfilling of systems after the event (all the while hoping nothing collapses until that backfilling is done!)

39. Glad you liked the webinar and you feel you got a lot of value. You should check out the rest of my site. I give away a ton at http://jasonswenk.com

40. Congratulations Dee! Jason has chosen you as one of the lucky winners of his podcast template.
    We’ll be in touch shortly to award the prize.

41. Congratulations Alejandro! Jason as awarded you the prize of one of his proposal templates! We’ll be in touch soon.

42. WOW! Thanks Gin. 🙂 That’s very exciting. Thank’s to Jason and to you all

43. awesome! thanks, guys!

44. thanks, mate, awesome, thanks for the prize!

45. How do you ask a client to rate you on google. Could you share me a sample email. The article was informatiive