Navigating a Culture of Distraction: What to do When You’re Getting Ghosted by Prospects Left and Right

[0:08] You've landed on the Business Conservatory podcast. This is a transparency-driven podcast, helping you understand your unlimited earning potential. If you're ready to crush it with your business, let's go.

What's up, guys? Welcome back to another episode of the podcast. This week's episode, I'm going to be really honest with you. This is a note-taking episode. This is an immersive episode. I've, spent the last three or four months perfecting how I wanted to treat this episode. Because ghosting is such a massive problem. It isn't just something that I want to sit here and be like, step one, do this, step two, do this. It is so massive and so ingrained in our culture that it's starting to impact our self-worth, our mental well-being. And so I wanted to treat this episode really responsibly. By the end of this episode, you are not only going to have those action steps that you are craving in order to feel like you can put your best foot forward. But I want you to feel seen. I want you to feel, wow, this isn't a me thing. The more conversations that I have, the more I realize that it really wouldn't be fair or responsible of me to talk about what to do when someone goes to you without acknowledging all of the ways that it can impact us. And so I want you to think of a time.

[1:31] Where you got an inquiry. Someone slid in your DMs, someone sent you an email, someone texted you, someone called you, and you were just over the moon excited. You literally couldn't wait to, respond to them, and you dropped whatever you were doing because you were like, I gotta get back to this. You probably responded quickly enough for them to get immediate feedback, but not so quick that you that you didn't seem crazy then at that point once you clicked send you kind of forced yourself to patiently wait for a response and you're like okay i'm sure they're busy i'm sure, i got back to them too quick and then the thoughts just flooded your head oh my gosh i hope they get back to me and then nothing then you kind of thought did the email send did they get it.

[2:22] I don't want to double ping them i don't want i don't want to get back to them twice i don't want want to seem obsessed, but like, they seemed really interested.

They were very thorough. They seemed like such a good fit. I want you to exist in that space again for just a brief moment, albeit uncomfortably, because no one, no one sits in that space comfortably. Of course, there are many times where we're busy and we get leads and you know, on to the next. But I think we all can relate to those situations where we were so excited about that one, like that one was gonna mean something for us and it was it was going to do things or maybe it was too early to tell but you just had a good feeling about it and I want you to go back to that space for a moment. What was the first thought and feeling that you had when you realized they probably weren't going to get back to you? Now I want you to think about the thought and feelings that you had after that when you knew they weren't going to get back to you.

[3:22] What were the first thoughts that came to your head? And as you're sitting there in that space thinking about that time, your knee-jerk reaction is probably to think about, well, this is uncomfortable. I don't want to be here.

I don't want to exist in this space. This doesn't feel good.

I don't like how that felt.

Now I want you to take a step back from that experience, right?

You lived in that. That didn't feel good.

And now I want to take the situation a few steps back. Remove yourself from the situation.

Now, I want you to think about a conversation that you've had with a friend recently.

It doesn't have to be a business owner. Maybe it could be a friend of yours that's in the dating space.

Maybe it's, you know, a family member who's talking about a friend.

I want you to think about the last conversation that you had with someone else when it came to ghosting.

Not you, but someone else.

[4:14] That was kind of interesting, right? But when you were talking about it in that context with someone else, it had a weird sense of normalcy around it.

I want you to think about another situation. It can be different from the previous one, of a time where you had a conversation about ghosting.

[4:33] Again, it doesn't have to be a business owner, it can be a friend, it can be someone in the dating space, it can be a friend, family member, whoever.

[4:41] I don't think that there's a single one of us that hasn't had a conversation about ghosting with other people. And not even just in a business context, but just in in general, ghosting is a cultural problem. But yet, why is it that when it happens to us on a lead? Why does it feel like they're challenging every bit of value in who we are? Why does it feel like a direct challenge to our self worth? Why is the needric reaction for you to tell yourself that you must not be worth it because of something someone else did.

That's not fair. One of the words that someone in my DMs recently used to describe this situation and how it made them feel was disrespected. So maybe you don't feel low self-worth and maybe it doesn't challenge your self-worth, but maybe it just really bothers you and you're like, wow, I feel incredibly disrespected. And so whether you're willing to admit that it makes you sad or not, there are few people in today's age that are business owners that don't on some small, deep level, take it personally. And why is that when this is such a cultural problem?

This is such an interesting topic to me and I could talk about it forever because I could tell you up and down that this has nothing to do with you. But there are many of you that are still.

[6:09] Thinking, well, this must mean I'm not worth it. What if it had nothing to do with you?

[6:15] It makes sense to me, but it's also like weirdly cringy to me because I'll see business owners on Instagram or they'll like go on their Instagram stories and they'll be like, guys if you reach out to business owners make sure you respond to them. It's incredibly hurtful, all this stuff, and people are really taking this personally. It's interesting to think about why this impacts us. It's interesting to think about how personally this this feels for it not being about us at all.

And I want you to believe me when I say that this is more of a reflection of distraction culture.

[6:55] Than anything to do with you. It is not fair for you to walk away from these single-serving interactions feeling like, well, maybe I'm not worth my price. Maybe they don't see me for who I am. When it's so much bigger than that, we're constantly distracted, we're constantly being bombarded, and our attention is being fought for significantly. And I say this as someone who spent a number of years working in advertising, right? Every big company, Apple, Facebook, Instagram, is fighting for your attention right now because they make the most money when they can get you to stay exactly where you are. So it's not a surprise that people have a hard time remembering to come back to certain things like who they've interacted with. I have a hard time responding to texts. And that isn't because I care any less about people. It's because I think a a lot of us have attention struggles right now.

[7:59] And so while you're sitting there feeling like it's about you, it's, you know, disrespect or that they surely must not like you enough.

This is a byproduct of something much bigger than your business, much bigger than the conversations that you're having.

It's a worldwide thing.

If you've felt alone, and if you've felt like, they must not see me, they must not value me, I'm here to tell you, it's not you.

We're all distracted.

And you might be sitting there thinking, well, that isn't me. Ellie, if I'm going to take the time to talk to someone, I'm going to make sure that they're responded to right away. And that's just common decency. That's common respect. Don't get distracted. I see many of you with those glaring red flags of feeling like, well, isn't it convenient to just write this off as a cultural problem when giving people decency and respect is the bare minimum of what we can do. Yes, but many times we project our own standards onto other people when they don't know us that well.

[9:08] And so I want you to feel seen, but I also want you to say, is it possible that what they're experiencing is wanting more information, wanting to learn more, and reaching out to multiple people and suddenly in a distracted culture navigating one, two, three, four, five different conversations with professionals that all are going to be responding to them at different paces.

What do we do about this? If we're knowing that this is a fight for attention.

[9:45] Then the natural response is to be able to find a way to give them information while we have their attention. It's to meet them where we're at when we have them available. Now, many business owners that I talk to have a really hard time with inquiry responses because obviously you don't want to feel saddled with the burden of being an indentured servant to whenever someone reaches out to you and like feeling like you have to drop whatever you're doing right then and there in that moment. But you know, alternatively to that, an automated response is something that a lot of times people will kind of overlook or be like, oh, that's too fast. Clearly, it's just an automated response. So like, what's the in-between? And for us, we need to find an in-between where we're able to reach people when we have them while also making sure that we can capture their attention and continually gauge their interest. And this can feel like a balancing act and this can be really frustrating. I think bottom line, what this boils down to is finding a beautiful mix of automation and personalization in a way to where you're not feeling constantly.

[: 11:02

Because at the end of the day, we all want to feel seen, right?

Here are a few things that you're going to be able to do to be able to bridge that gap for you.

One way is if you're a business owner that is trying to tackle this on your website.

[: 11:31

If you get them to stay, you can have control over the type of information that they see after that point.

And how cool would it be for you to anticipate what they care about before you even have the chance to talk with them?

And this is about crafting an intentional experience that makes them feel seen.

One of the best ways that you can do this is to take the frequently asked questions that you get on a regular basis from your customers and create a static page that shows up after they inquire with you that talks about, you know, what are the next steps? If you're a photographer, what are some example galleries or maybe you're a graphic designer, what's some example work that they can see where they can really get an idea of what the deliverables are like like, and being able to really give them an inside look on what the experience is going to be like before you even reach out to them.

Because at that point, it wins you a little bit of time to respond to them.

[: 13:00

So...

[: 13:13

And this is why I'm such a huge advocate for putting your pricing on your website and having that information readily available.

believer, especially like in: 2023

I really, genuinely, sincerely want you to think about a time where you were looking to hire a professional. Maybe it was like a plumber. Maybe it was someone to help you fix something. Maybe It was a service professional to help you with something in your business.

I want you to think about when did you want that information?

When did you want to know what they charged?

[: 14:40

I would have a very hard time believing you if you told me I was so excited to.

[: 14:57

And I had all the time in the world, they could respond to me whenever and that was totally fine.

I would have a hard time believing that.

[: 15:08

Would you have wanted to go through those hoops?

I wouldn't believe you if you said yes. Like, I truly wouldn't.

In this day and age, people just want to know what it is.

And so, I would be totally doing you a disservice if I said, take your time responding to people.

And don't get me wrong, like, I'm a girl that loves balance as much as the next person, right? Like, I love that.

I think that that's really helpful, but I do think response time matters.

And I'm noticing, especially in the case of ghosting, a lot of times people will, who are looking for a professional and looking to hire someone, you have a 30% increased likelihood of getting that job if you were the first to respond. Let that sink in a little bit.

[: 16:28

And there are some of you that are like, Ellie, I'm out. That's bullshit.

I don't wanna hear that.

Before you leave, let me tell you how you're gonna navigate this because there is a middle ground here.

I am not asking you to drop everything you do at a moment's notice and go into every situation customizing everything perfectly.

But what you can do is you can go back and look at all of your past inquiries or all of your past DMs and you can start noticing patterns. You can start noticing, huh, I'm noticing a lot of people are coming to me asking this question, what's a fairly customized, fairly personal response that I can make in response to that and have a directory of responses for all those situations. So I can respond quickly, I can copy and paste it from my phone notes or I can copy and paste it from my drive and have it sent to them very quickly. I can just pop in the bathroom really quick if I'm at home with my kids. Copy, paste, send, boom, sent out. You are so much better off responding quickly.

[: 17:44

When you do that, you're more likely to secure the sale and you're saving yourself time.

It is not a black and white way of thinking.

It is very much a, what can I do that can meet in both ways?

And: 2023

So rather than doing the email responses that are automated, which we know they're not going to always completely see, What if you responded in a orderly time frame that allows you to cultivate that balance but also increase the likelihood of you getting that job?

That is going to help you tremendously.

Now let's shift gears a little bit here because I think both of those things were incredibly helpful, but I want to talk more specifically about like the instances where maybe you got a DM and you responded back and you didn't hear anything, and then you followed up with him and you didn't hear anything.

This happens a lot too. There is a right way to approach this. And I would say probably about a good 10% of the time, you can plan on your leads just never getting back to you. I would say 10%.

[: 19:00

But that means you still have a 90% chance of being able to go in and assuming that you approach this in the correct way and in a way that's thoughtful and intentional that you can go into this space and feel like wow okay I put my best foot forward and like I'm more likely to encourage a response back. And so with that in mind, manage your expectations.

[: 19:33

[: 20:04

If you are ending your emails in anything other than a question.

[: 21:03

[: 21:17

We haven't captured their attention enough. So what I really want you to do is I wanna make sure that you are putting an automated reminder for yourself 12 hours from when you sent that response to make sure to get back to them if they haven't gotten back to you already.

Again, the game is all about communication.

Now, one thing that I wanna keep you clued in on that is coming to my mind that if I don't say it now, I'm gonna totally forget.

[: 22:40

Because even if someone reaches out to you right now, that doesn't always necessarily mean that they're ready to make a purchasing decision.

Sometimes they're in a shopping around phase. And there is something to be said for the impact can be cultivated when you are swinging back around at a later time. Knowing that there's going to be a handful of people that never get back to us, I would say that after every inquiry that you get that you know is a no-show, I would put that in a no-show email list. I would compile all those people and even look back on the previous no-shows. Email lists, usernames, phone numbers, save all of that information, and plan on two weeks from that date, having an automated email go out, are you still interested?

Question mark. Either send them an automated message, send them an automated email, send them an automated text message, which you can do. Everything can be automated with the right apps. I personally really love Klaviyo, but I'm going to throw a few additional suggestions in the box below in case you guys are kind of wanting to kind of see what that looks like.

[: 24:04

If you just simply, a week or two later, hey, is this something you're still interested in?

Being able to swing back in that way is incredibly impactful.

Following that up three or four days after you send that, hey, are you still interested?

Sending the magic email, which many of you who are in the wedding photography space know what the magic email is, but for those of you who don't know what the magic email is, It's really powerful.

And it's one that I use on leads that have ghosted me or like leads that I just am not getting any attraction on.

I say, hey, it sounds like your priorities have changed. I'm gonna go ahead and open up my calendar to other inquiring parties.

Thank you so much for reaching out. I'm gonna go ahead and link the exact words that you can use. You can literally copy and paste this email.

It's called the magic email.

Sounds like your priorities have changed.

I'm going to go ahead and open up my calendar. Let me know if anything changes." Something like that.

For many of you, you're probably like, wow, that's really confrontational.

I don't like that. But, guys, it...

[: 25:18

This isn't something that you necessarily have to feel like you're booking right now.

For example, I had a client of mine who had someone reach out to hire as a wedding photographer.

[: 26:07

And that client ended up remembering how much she loved her work and ended up hiring her for a family session later on because she had been following her that whole time.

She wasn't in a position to hire her as a photographer for her wedding.

Something came up where like her family ended up encouraging her to go with like a family friend or something.

You never know what people are experiencing on the other end of it, right?

It all feels so personal, but when you get the full context of it, It's kind of crazy because when I talk to that client, she's like, I was so mad at her for never getting back to me.

[: 26:50

And so...

[: 27:01

[: 28:19

Now that's a part of what the industry is like. I was looking at some articles last night. What was the stat that I have? I got to pull up my paper. It said that according to businessleader.co, 92% of business owners now get ghosted by prospects universally.

And this isn't just the creative industry. This is every industry. And so what does this tell us? This isn't a you problem. You aren't to blame. This isn't your problem, but you.

[: 28:53

Are there still going to be times where it's disappointing?

Absolutely. Are there times where you're just going to feel so lonely?

It crushes me that that's what we're experiencing.

But I hope that this gave you some hope and some perspective that it isn't you.

This isn't people going out of their way to disrespect you, although it certainly feels like that, especially as people ourselves that hold ourselves to high standards of how we like to communicate with people. But I want you to know that it's going to be okay.

And if you're able to implement some of these tools, I think it's going to provide you incredible peace of mind. Sometimes all we need is just someone giving us like a new standard of moving forward and how we can approach it to help us feel like infinity times better about it.

This was all systems that I've come up with, that I've created. I didn't like take this from another program or anything like that. This is something that, like, I...

[: 29:55

Many of you know that I went from being a business owner that was crippled by my own anxieties about my business and could barely show up because I was so stressed out to viewing everything in a very neutral way. I don't get personally offended anymore the way that I used to, although I would be lying if I didn't say that I wasn't in the same boat as many of you all, which was, it must be me. My prices must have scared them away. I must not be worth that much.

Boy, was that just so destructive for me. Now when I get a no-show, it's on to the next.

I ideally would like you all to be so busy in your business to where things like that on a smaller scale don't impact you. Although there are going to be a handful of you on some level that might realize that having help in that capacity may do wonders for your mental health. If you find that you have a hard time showing up in your business because of how this is making you feel.

[: 31:03

If not indefinitely for a period of time when you're struggling or when things are particularly hard. I want to let you know that ghosting, as I mentioned, this is a cultural thing. This is something way bigger than you. This is something your friends are experiencing. This is something your family is experiencing. This is something other business owners are experiencing.

And I want you to know that it's going to be okay and that we're going to be able to navigate through this. And you know me, I'm always going to be giving you the updated new tips and tricks on how you're going to be able to navigate this and there's always going to be ways that kind of, push the needle forward and help encourage people to want to reach out to you more. But I think implementing these things that I shared today is going to be really transformative for you. If this changed the game and if this got your response from someone that you hadn't heard back from, please DM me and let me know and we can celebrate together. Have a wonderful rest of your day and and I'll talk to you soon.