I was standing in my dad’s workshop, covered in enough sawdust to look like a breaded chicken cutlet, when I finally realized why 'easy' is a trap.
“Persons who go through a great deal of trouble or pain to attain something tend to value it more highly than the persons who attain the same thing with minimum effort” - Robert Cialdini
Have you ever heard of the IKEA Effect? It is a phenomenon coined by Norton, Mochon, and Ariely in their 2012 paper, where they found that consumers place a higher value on products they partially assembled themselves vs. the same product that they received already fully assembled.
The Magic Pill That Makes You Invisible
Helping your clients too much is the fastest way to make them forget you exist.
If you take the route of offering a service that is 100% “done-for-you” vs a “done-with-you” option, you risk having your client devalue your final product.
And trust me, I get the urge to deliver the magic pill because that is what everyone is demanding these days. But if you want to build a relationship with a client whom you would like to see back over and over, you may want to take a look at your offering to ensure there is a touch of IKEA in there.
Co-Creation: The Anti-Ghosting Strategy
So what might that look like, you ask? It is finding the middle ground where you can work with them to co-create something.
It may take a little longer, so you sacrifice the quick path for a higher quality one. One where the client is a part of the creation, not just on the receiving end of the bill and final product.
See One, Do One, Teach One
If you take the IKEA path, you may find that both you and your client gain something….and no, I’m not talking about revenue for you (although that does help).
When you get to teach someone (because that is essentially what this boils down to in a sense), you end up learning that thing at a much deeper level than just doing the thing. Reminds me of when I was in nursing school, and we had the “See one, do one, teach one” method.
The more you understand something → the better you become at it → the happier your clients are → the more revenue you can generate.
Seeing the Sawdust
The other piece of this IKEA effect that I think is often lost on the businesses offering the “done-for-you” option, is that if the client doesn’t see the messy middle (aka the sawdust) of the project, they truly have no idea how complex it actually was for you to complete.
If, however, you bring them into your “workshop” and let them get their hands dirty, they can appreciate it much more.
I have now done several woodworking projects with my dad, and had I not been out in the workshop getting covered in mountains of sawdust, I may have thought that the finished project was easy.
The main project that comes to mind is the large butcher block cutting board we made together. The final product, while beautiful, looks fairly simple. But having started the project with him from the raw board to the final sanded, oiled, and waxed board, I can tell you it was way more complex than I ever could have imagined.
Don’t Be Like Old Me
I used to try to be a silent superhero for my clients, only to realize I was training them to think my work happened by magic.
My point is, if you are able to deliver a high-quality product to a client quickly, they may believe it was easy because all they saw was your delivery….not all the years of experience and complexity behind it all.
Ponder This
- What is the last thing you built from scratch that you refuse to throw away?
- Have you ever handed a client a finished project only to have them respond with a shrug?
- Think of a time you were covered in sawdust (literally or metaphorically), did the result feel more real because of the mess?
Books/Newsletters
- The “IKEA Effect”: When Labor Leads to Love - Michael I. Norton, Daniel Mochon, Dan Ariely
- Influence - Robert Cialdini
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