Over the last year, I've been digging deep into systems. Not an unexpected activity from someone who's daily job is spent inside a marketing system like ONTRAPORT.

Thing was, I'd been creating awesome systems for my clients, but my own systems were few and far between. I was the shoemaker with holey shoes. I knew I needed to walk my talk.

I started looking around my peer group to see who was talking about systems, as they relate to business–not necessarily marketing. That's when I discovered SystemsRock.com and Natasha Vorompiova.

Dipping my toe into the waters of the unknown, I purchased her Evernote for Business ebook (link to my review). It helped me make sense of the massive accumulation of content I was hoarding in that little green elephant. Things were moved, filed adjusted. Tags streamlined. New ways of getting info into that system were revealed. I wondered what other organizational magic Natasha held for me.

When the opportunity came up to enter a contest for a scholarship to her Systematic Success course, I thought to myself, why not? I put in my application, and to my sheer disbelief, I won! It was a game changer for me.

Systematic Success flipped a switch in my brain. It taught me to look at every single thing I do in my business as a process. Before going through the course, here was my client intake process:

1. Respond to client via email from a “Contact Us” form on my site.
2. Go back and forth figuring out when, where and how we were going to meet.
3. Have the meeting and hopefully close the deal, fumbling to remember what they asked, and how I responded.
4. Try to read my chicken scratch from the notes I took for the follow-up email. Draft and send to client.
5. If the project was green lighted—celebrate! Then quickly scramble to write a new contract. Spend 1-2 hours on this process.
6. Send contract, ask they print, sign, and scan me a copy.
7. Wait for it to come back to me.
8. Set the client up in my invoicing system for the project, send deposit invoice.
9. Email them multiple times about the project to start the project.

Frankly, it was a hot mess, and a lot of back-and-forth-where's-that emailing. Hard on me, hard on the client.

After Systematic Success, I revamped the process entirely. I also created a longer form (Get Started Now) on my site for potential clients to fill out, in addition to my contact form. It serves to educate me about their needs before we even get on the phone. Most of my leads come through this form now.

Here's my new process:

1. Prospect completes Get Started Now form. I read over the form answers from my potential client and determine if we are a good fit, on the same timeframe, and if my schedule will allow for their project.
2. I put them in an ONTRAPORT email sequence that sends them an email inviting them to book time with me on my calendar. I use ScheduleOnce and love it.
3. We have the call. If it's green-lighted, I take one of my defined contract templates in ConcordNow, customize it for the project, send it to the client asking them to look it over, suggest edits or ask questions, and then sign online.
4. I also sign online and then the system sends us both PDFs.
5. I set up their project in Freshbooks (my referral link) and send the deposit invoice.
6. I setup their project (usually starting with a template) in Asana, customize it, and invite the client to the project.
7. I put the client in the appropriate email sequence based on their type of project. They get a welcome PDF that sets our project expectations and contains all of my contact info, a little more detail about our working process, my working hours, and has some useful videos like how to buy a domain or how to use Asana for our project. Depending on their type of project they also get a PDF questionnaire, which is their homework to complete.

I've cut down on the on-boarding time considerably—like by several hours, freeing up my time and gaining back hours for billable projects. Clients feel secure knowing that things are running smoothly and there's a process in place. All of our steps are laid out in Asana, and there's full visibility into the project.

In fact, just yesterday a new client I on-boarded this week told me how much he appreciated my attention to detail in our Asana project!

I'd like to extend a special invitation to you for an upcoming webinar to turn clients into loyal, raving fans and create an experience for your clients that they just can’t stop talking about, Tuesday, March 29th at 2PM ET/11AM PT with Natasha Vorompiova and myself. We'll be talking all about how to create a consistent process for your clients using free tools!