How to offer ‘unlimited’ without overcommitting

Have you thought about adding an “unlimited” offering to your services but worry about overcommitting?

Does the fear of a customer actually taking you up on that offer hold you back from selling it?

It’s actually not only possible, but it could be incredibly profitable, to add an “unlimited” offering to your customers.

“Unlimited” probably evokes an image of a phone endlessly ringing, an email inbox with a growing unread count, and a to-do list a mile long. The thing is, you probably already have those things (or feel like it, anyway).

You desperately want to reduce your workload, not increase it! So how could expanding your commitment to customers help?

At the Recurring Revenue Retreat, Thiago Carvalho tackled this question. He started by redefining what “unlimited” means:

As long as what you’re offering is greater than the need of your customers, you’re offering unlimited. -Thiago Carvalho

In other words, you only offer “unlimited” in what your customers actually need from the marketplace.

Consider Netflix. The movie catalog, while large, is certainly not complete. Netflix doesn’t have every single movie ever made; in fact, we all get the notifications about which movies and shows are leaving at the end of the month.

Netflix’s unlimited offering is summarized by its tagline: “Watch anywhere.” You don’t get an unlimited number of movies to watch, but you did an unlimited opportunity to watch what’s in the library, as long as you have Internet access.

Offering unlimited isn’t about always working or even being available 24/7; rather, it’s genuinely understanding the one thing your customers actually need and clearly and consistently providing that.

So successfully offering unlimited requires just two things:

1. Perceived value Customers feel they get more than what they’re paying for.
2. Transparent pricing Customers know exactly how much they’ll pay.

When you successfully incorporate an unlimited offering in your business, the benefits far outweigh the costs of implementing the guarantee:

• Foster trust and loyalty between you and your customers.
• Differentiate you and your business from your competitors.
• Increase revenue—especially consistent recurring revenue—for your business, reducing the need to generate revenue from project- or time-based billing activities.
• Generate “lock-in” as customers come to rely on the unlimited offering.

So let me know…

What unlimited offering do your customers actually want?

What do you really need in your business to be able to offer an unlimited service?

How could your unlimited offering help differentiate your business from others?

Hit REPLY and tell me about it!