Transcript
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Speaker: [00:00:00] the first thing people ask when they meet you for the first time
” so what do you do?”
If you have ever stumbled through that question or greeted it with dread or avoided even going to a networking because you didn’t know how or want to talk about it, and maybe you, even when it happens, end up saying something like “well, I’m a caterer” or well, I do like healthy meal prep” or something like that.
This video is for you. I am going to show you how to confidently explain your personal chef business even if when you try to do it somebody doesn’t understand at first.
You’re going to learn how to describe what you do in a way that makes people say, “oh, wow, I need that. Gimme your number!”
Hey there i’m Chef Shelley. I’ve had a successful personal chef business for almost 20 years, and when I’m not cooking for my own clients, I help passionate cooks, whether you’re a home cook or a [00:01:00] burnout hospitality pro, start your own personal chef business so that you can have freedom, get paid to do what you love, and do it all on your own terms.
So let’s get into it.
Why is it so hard to explain what we do? Right? Part of it is most average people that you talk to have never hired a personal chef before so when you try to start saying what you do, they either immediately think you are a caterer or if you talk about personal chef service, especially if you’re calling it meal prep, at least call it meal prep services. But when you say that to someone who’s not familiar with a personal chef, they tend to picture little Tupperwares full of like workout gym type meals that you can buy at any grocery store for like 8 bucks. Right? Either way, [00:02:00] neither of those is painting the right picture.
So when you say I’m a personal chef, they don’t actually know what that looks like. So what your job is, is to paint the picture for them. There are really two go-to ways to explain what you do so that it’s clear enough that they easily understand. Because remember, when somebody’s confused, they’re never going to hire you.
You’re never going to be their top go-to when they’re talking to someone else that could use your services, that they could refer you to. And you need to be confident when you explain what you do.
Option number one, just for everyday kind of conversation is to say something like,…
” i’m a personal chef. I cook weekly meals for busy people so they don’t have to think about what’s for dinner.”
Now, sure we all know long-term and more advanced that’s not the best explanation. That’s not the most compelling explanation, but it is more clear and gets [00:03:00] you a very good, simple starting place when you’re just starting out.
The second option for when you’re talking to someone and they seem like they’re a little bit confused or they’re really trying to pigeonhole you as a caterer, and especially if you don’t want to be doing catering services in your personal chef business, you want to be focusing just on personal chef services, also known as meal prep services, you can say something like…
” actually, I’m not a caterer and I don’t do like meal prep, like a company or that mail order stuff. I cook homemade meals right in my clients’ homes so that they always get the food they love. It’s made fresh, and then they can reheat it anytime during the week.”
Now if you have to even kick that up a notch, you can say…
” i’m like a private chef, but you only have to hire me for a few hours once a week.”
Isn’t that compelling? Now, do you see the difference there? You want to talk to more about what they get out of it than what you [00:04:00] do. If you’ve been trying to get fully booked with personal chef clients for any amount of time i’m sure you have heard the talk about “the benefits, not the features” but let’s review that for a minute for those of my friends who are just starting out.
Features of your business, if you’re doing personal chef services are:
” I will do the grocery shopping.”
” I will come to your home and prepare the food.”
” I will package it up and put it in the fridge. ”
” It will all be labeled.”
I will completely clean. ”
Those are features, those are things that your service has, right?
If it was a car, it would be, it has four doors, it has all wheel drive, it has, a V eight, whatever. It’s red. Those are all features.
The next stage of that is you want to talk about the benefits. Now when we’re just getting started, and this is all new, the [00:05:00] easiest level of benefits that people talk about are to go back to our example of features I do, “the shopping” is the feature.
The benefit would be “so you don’t have to go to the grocery store.” The feature is, “I do the cooking” benefit “so you don’t have to cook” feature ” I package it all up, label and put it in the fridge.” Benefit ” so your fridge is full of food and you don’t have to worry about what’s for dinner” feature “I clean the kitchen so you don’t benefit, you don’t have to clean the kitchen or you don’t have to worry about that after I’m done.”
So those are first level benefits. What I really encourage you to do, especially if you know your specialty and it’s something like health. If you’re doing a high blood pressure specialty, if you’re doing vegan specifically for health or keto for health, or if you’re doing keto [00:06:00] specifically for weight loss, if you’re doing healthy food for weight loss, whatever your specialty is there.
And again, if you are a general American style comfort family food cook, that is a specialty. Then you will want to know too, who is your person? Is it that busy mom who’s overwhelmed with all her kids’ stuff? Is it too hardworking professionals that don’t have kids that are exhausted at the end of a day and don’t have time and inclination to cook and are eating out too much or tired of Uber Eats all the time?
Or is it a retired couple who has no desire to cook in their retirement age and they’re busy playing that 18 hole golf course in their affluent community they live in now, whatever it is, the more specific you can get, the better. But think about this is that level two benefit, the result that they actually want, the transformation that they’re going to [00:07:00] get.
Because again, the most basic level is maybe that they don’t want to cook ’cause they don’t like to cook. But what is it really? What do they want to do with the time that they’re going to have instead of that? Or why do they not like to cook? Or what’s it going to feel like when they don’t have to cook?
When you can get into those kind of details in your conversation, that’s what makes it so much easier to, even if they end up not being a client, them to refer you to any friends and family and other professionals they know to refer to you when you can speak to them about your services in a way that’s about how it affects them. That’s what makes it easier to get clients.
That is the level two, the more advanced direction that you want to work toward and get really good at.
And here’s a little tip, the easiest way to do that is not [00:08:00] to, practice or memorize a script or whatever. That stuff’s important. It’s important when you’re really starting out and in the beginning. But the easiest way to do that when you get the basics down is having a conversation with someone else and getting them to talk, getting them to tell you:
what are their problems?
Why do they hate to cook?
Why do they hate to cook?
And finding out what things they like to do. What do they, want to do the more. You can find out every detail about them and their life and what they like to do and what they don’t like to do, and the foods they like and don’t like, and what their problem is and why are they even so interested in hearing about you and your services.
Because it can be a little bit different for everybody, and the more you can speak to what they tell you and even use the words that they used, if they say overwhelmed, you don’t say busy. You say overwhelmed. If they say busy, you say busy. If they say they hate to [00:09:00] cook, you say hate. If they say loath it, you say loath it, these things are what really help you connect with the person and make it easier to get the clients.
If you struggle with talking to people and having these conversations, a little mind shift that can help will be when somebody asks
“so what do you do?”
It’s not a pop quiz or a test. You don’t need to immediately break out in the flop sweat.
It’s just an opportunity to have a conversation, right? It’s just your chance to help them understand what really the result and transformation of having your services is for people and whether you’re explaining that in terms of what it would do for them, if you want to make it a little bit softer, what it does for the clients you already have.
If you don’t have clients yet, what it does for you or friends or family you’ve been practicing on what they’ve said and things like that, and it just helps, again, paint that picture that it solves a problem. They weren’t even aware [00:10:00] that there was such a delicious. Available solution for right in front of them.
So instead of getting awkward and feeling like you just have to talk about yourself, or even that, you have to try to sell them because you need a client, just get curious about them and about having the conversation and just think about how can I explain this in a way that is going to appeal to them in what they’re going through right now.
So does this help? Does this explain a little bit better? Do you feel like this would make a difference for you if you used this strategy and these techniques in how you talk to people about your services? Well, if you need more help feel free to DM me. You can hit me up on
Insta @ChefShelleyB
You can hit me up on Facebook @ChefShelley
Don’t forget to like and subscribe wherever you’re hearing this. This is an audio this week, not a video whether it’s YouTube, TikTok, [00:11:00] Facebook, I try to be in as many places so you can get this information, whatever platform you like to get it on. So be sure to subscribe so that you never miss one of my weekly infos to help you build a personal chef business.
That makes sense for you, whether that’s one client or six figures, that it gives you the freedom and everything else you want. It fits your life so that you can get paid to do what you love on your own terms. Because I’m telling you, the clients are out there and they’re hungry for what you’re cooking.
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