Professional Services Marketing & Selling

Traditional outbound marketing methods are becoming less and less effective. Society is tired of being marketed to, and people are better at blocking such things as email and cold calls. So, what's a marketer to do? Pull people toward you with inbound marketing tactics, says Brian Halligan, co-author of Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogs. Take advantage of the modern way in which people learn and shop.

Demonstrating your thought leadership is one of the best marketing techniques for service professionals, and Twitter has quickly become one of the tops platforms for doing so. It's a great way to do lightweight marketing, says Sarah Milstein, author of The Twitter Book, as well as to network with prospects and clients. Listen as Sarah reviews how to get started using Twitter, what you must do to get people following you, and the business benefit of using Twitter.

You can throw a sale off track is by starting an inappropriate conversation with a client. Prevent such conversations by keeping records on clients and prospects in a CRM system. Listen as David Taber, author of Salesforce.com Secrets of Success: Best Practices for Growth and Profitability, explains the benefits of various CRM systems, how to implement such systems, and tricks to getting people to use the systems.

The B2B buying process has changed, and that means your marketing and sales tactics must also change. No longer can you simply say you're the leading provider. Buyers want you to prove it. Listen as Ardath Albee, author of eMarketing Strategies for the Complex Sale, explains why traditional sales prospecting and marketing methods no longer work and discusses tactics firms must use instead.

Acquiring new clients is a top priority among services firms, but you want to make sure you acquire ideal clients. Do not take every and any client no matter how difficult things for your firm might be, says Randy Shattuck, President of The Shattuck Group. Determine who your ideal client is and then decide the best pull marketing strategy to attract them. Firms that do so will see greater revenue and profits.

Selling your services involves more than getting prospects to like what you have to offer. It also involves the buyer getting agreement from all parties and agreeing to change. To overcome this roadblock, Sharon Drew Morgan, author of the new book Dirty Little Secrets, says salespeople need to learn how to facilitate the buying decision. Do so and you can dramatically shorten the sales cycle.

Professional services firms that have strong unique value propositions (UVP) grow faster, produce higher margins, and sell at higher prices. One way to offer such a strong UVP is to include performance benchmarking, says Paul Collins, founder and managing partner of Equiteq LLP. Listen as Collins explains how a value proposition that includes performance benchmarking helps you stand out among competitors and leads to greater sales.

Cold calling--the phrase strikes fear in many sales professionals. It is challenging, but it isn't impossible. With these tips from Colleen Francis, Founder and President of Engage Selling Solutions, you'll learn how to prepare for cold calls, as well as techniques to engage prospects and get them wanting to hear more.

The moment someone picks up a pen to illustrate a point, the people around him pay attention. So, why not use pictures to solve problems and engage clients? Listen as Dan Roam, author of The Back of the Napkin, explains how services professionals can do just that.

By using Twitter, LinkedIn, blogs, and other forms of social media, you can build your credibility and have people, including journalists in traditional media, seek you out for your expertise, says Dan Janal, Founder and President of PR Leads Expert Resource Network..

Want people to notice your firm? Make sure your marketing not only informs but also provides a memorable experience. That's what the authors of Guerrilla Marketing for Dummies say. Jonathan Margolis and Patrick Garrigan, who also work at The Michael Alan Group, say you want to educate and entertain people. Do things that get you noticed—and get people talking.

When people buy professional services, their purchasing decisions are made at an emotional level. Something in a firm's presentation or values strikes them on a subconscious level. That is why it's imperative that services firms not only present themselves well with their websites and marketing materials, but they also differentiate themselves from others in the field.

In this podcast Martin Lindstrom, CEO and Chairman of LINDSTROM Company, Chairman of Buyology Inc., and author of Buyology—Truth and Lies About Why We Buy, talks with RainToday.com Publisher Mike Schultz about his research into people's buying decisions, how service firms must make good first impressions on potential clients, and how service firms must set themselves apart from their competitors.

If you've been speaking at local events and getting rave reviews from attendees, you might be thinking about joining the circuit of big-name speakers. Before you take your speaking material to that level, however, listen to what Vickie Sullivan has to say. Speaking in the big leagues is very different, and you need to step up your game.

In this podcast, Sullivan, President of Sullivan Speaker Services, explains the important aspects of a speaker's platform—and what should be included in that platform, talks about how publishing a book can lead to big league speaking engagements, and discusses the pros and cons of speaking at trade shows.

Social media networks are excellent tools for marketing your services, but it isn't enough to simply sign up to use those tools. It takes work. You can't confuse the tool with doing something meaningful with the tool, stresses Paul Gillin, writer and content marketing specialist and author of the book Secrets of Social Media Marketing. You have to have something interesting to say, and you have to be willing to respond to people who want to comment on what you say.

Listen as Gillin advises beginners on how to get started using social media, explains some of the advanced things people are doing with social media, and discusses how you can incorporate social media marketing into your traditional marketing plan to create a symbiotic relationship between the two.

Too often professional services firms practice "random acts of marketing." They don't have a real strategy for marketing the firm or for generating leads, and as a result leads get lost or are discarded. To successfully generate leads, service firms have to do three things: identify the companies they should be working with, identify the right people within the companies, and nurture an ongoing dialogue with them and build trust.

Before you can do that, however, you need to identify what is a good lead. Brian Carroll, CEO of InTouch and author of Lead Generation for the Complex Sale, talks with Mike Schultz, Publisher of RainToday.com, about the importance of having a Universal Lead Definition. Build a profile of the ideal client, then marketing can use it to identify quality people and certify when someone is ready to talk to a partner, and sales management can use it to nurture a dialogue.

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In this day and age, when the Do-Not-Call list is so often put into action, you might think phone sales are things of the past. Not so, says Colleen Francis, Founder and President of Engage Selling Solutions. In fact, she says the phone is still the most effective sales tool.

To succeed at cold calling, however, you need to have a different mindset and you need to follow certain best practices. Think about cold calling as new business development or opening a relationship. Listen as Francis offers advice for leading successful conversations and points out statements that will kill relationships before they even have a chance to get started.

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Providing sales proposals for prospective clients can be challenging. You want to win the client, but it's often a lot of work with low chance of success. And sometimes things can happen that can turn the process into a horror story.  These tips from Michael McLaughlin, a Principal with MindShare Consulting, LLC and coauthor of Guerrilla Marketing for Consultants, can help prevent that from happening.

Listen as Mike discusses whether you should charge for a diagnostic, methods for establishing trust with a prospective client, steps for following up after the proposal has been submitted, and what to do when you're denied access to the decision makers.

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If your referrals run dry, chances are you're going to have to turn to cold calling to bring in new business. That may seem daunting, and you might consider hiring an agency to make the calls for you, but it's better if you do it yourself.  John Doerr, Founder of RainToday.com and President of the Wellesley Hills Group, offers tips to ease the cold-calling process and help you establish good practices that will lead to sales.

Advice John offers:
•    Whether presidents of companies should make cold calls
•    How to conduct a cold call
•    If a prospect agrees to meet with you, how to prepare for that meeting
•    What to do if a prospect says he isn't interested

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Services professionals know everything they need to sell their services. It's how they organize that information and how they approach prospective clients that determine whether or not they make the sale. Michael McLaughlin, author of Winning the Professional Services Sale, talks about how services professionals can convert a sales lead into a paying client.

With more people turning to the Internet for information, you have a great opportunity to turn your marketing ideas into Internet sensations and create what David Meerman Scott calls World Wide Raves. It's all about creating good content that gets people blogging about it, Tweeting about it, and downloading it. Get people doing that, and you'll generate sales.

Scott, author of World Wide Rave, talks with Mike Schultz, Publisher of RainToday.com and President of Wellesley Hills Group, about what you need to do to create a World Wide Rave around your marketing ideas, how to treat this type of marketing effort, and how to measure results.

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Chances are you've had difficult client relationships. Communication stops, the client doesn't give you what you need, and you don't get the results you want. Before you throw in the towel, you should make every effort to resolve the problems and get the relationship back on track.

In this podcast, Andrea Howe, founder of BossaNova Consulting Group, talks with Mike Schultz, President of Wellesley Hills Group and Publisher of RainToday.com, about how to identify a relationship that's falling off track and what you can do to set things right.

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Now is the perfect time to expand your consulting services into global markets, according to famed consultants Alan Weiss and Omar Khan. Opportunities are abundant, as there are many industries that are doing well despite the depressed economy, and technology makes it so that you don't need a physical presence.

Weiss and Khan, authors of The Global Consultant: How to Make Seven Figures Across Borders, talk with Mike Schultz, President of Wellesley Hills Group and Publisher of RainToday.com, about how to get started working internationally, how to make inroads in developing markets, and how to build critical mass and establish yourself in overseas markets.

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Changes to a prospect's internal or external business environment could be just the thing to get you in their door and gain their business. Jill Konrath, author of Selling to Big Companies, explains the importance of tracking such triggering events, how to use them to engage prospects in conversation, and techniques for contacting prospects.

Questions Jill answers:
* How much time should you spend researching companies and trigger events?
* How can you use trigger events to move a sale along?
* How often should you contact people after a trigger event?
* What language should you use when you talk to someone after a trigger event?


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Service firms oftentimes have no problem creating marketing plans. They have problems implementing them. John Doerr explains what it takes to get things done.

Service firms oftentimes have no problem creating marketing plans. They have problems implementing them. And, even when they do implement them, they often stop prematurely, before the results have a chance to materialize, and declare, "Marketing doesn't work!"

John Doerr, president of Wellesley Hills Group, founder of RainToday.com, and co-author of Professional Service Marketing, explains what it takes for firms to implement a strategy, wait until the returns arrive and more.

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Every consultant wants to form solid business partnerships with their clients, but many things can get in the way. Andrew Sobel, author of All for One: 10 Strategies for Building Trusted Client Partnerships, explains how to address some common challenges consultants face when trying to partner with their clients.

Questions he addresses include:

 How do you relate to clients as trusted advisors when you're an expert in your own business and not theirs?

How do you move past the function executive to the executive who makes the buying decisions?

How do you increase your skills at forming partnerships as well as the chance that you will?

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Many professional services firms see their competition winning new business by blogging, connecting on social networks, and launching podcasts and online videos. And they want to know, "How can I do the same?"

Dana VanDen Heuvel, founder of the Marketing Savant Group, explains how firms can create a social media marketing strategy. Topics he addresses include what questions firms need to ask themselves and how firms should integrate a CRM system into their plans.

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Interested in hearing more? Watch the full presentation with Dana.

Millions of business professionals have a LinkedIn profile. So how does a marketer tactfully and effectively use this resource?

Jason Alba, author of I'm on LinkedIn -- Now What, explains the finer points of netiquette (Internet etiquette), the best way to build a list from your connections, and what your personal profile should look like

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Interested in hearing more? Watch Jason Alba's on-demand webinar.

The strategies for marketing and selling for professional services firms aren't that complicated. But getting the leaders together and choosing a strategy often is.

In this podcast we look at what leaders can do to make change happen at their firms with Dr. John Kotter, professor of leadership at Harvard Business School and author of New York Times bestsellers A Sense of Urgency and My Iceberg Is Melting, as well as the world's most influential book on organization change, Leading Change.

He says people fail to successfully make change not because they lack capability and intelligence, but because they simply haven't been through a lot of big changes. The good news is you can learn it. You can do it. You can make some remarkable things happen. You just have to think in a different way.

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In this episode, Andrew Sobel, author of the book All For One: 10 Strategies for Building Trusted Client Partnerships, reveals approaches to building long-term trusted partnerships with flagship clients—those key clients that provide a disproportionate share of revenue and profits.

Andrew provides research-based strategies for individuals and institutions to develop these trusted partnerships and shares examples from his book.

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Interest in Hearing More?: Reserve a seat a Andrew's upcoming RainToday.com webinar, From Vendor to Trusted Partner: Breakthrough Strategies for Developing Clients for Life.

In this episode, we talk about how your firm can transition from basing its fees on hourly rates to basing its fees on the value your firm delivers. Alan Weiss, author of the seminar book, "Value-Based Fees: How to Charge and Get What You're Worth," explains why firms should use value-based fees, how firms can start adopting them, and how to respond to client objections.

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Interested in hearing more? Sign up for Alan's upcoming teleseminar, Getting Paid What You're Worth: How to Use Value-Based Fees at Your Firm, on Thursday, May 21.

Most people automatically say, "So, what do you do?" at networking events, but don't care what the answer is. Scott Ginsberg, "the authority on approachability," explains how to create a "soundbite" that will have people actually take interest in what you do. Listen as he offers tips to opening a whole new world of business opportunities, in this excerpt from Scott's recent webinar with Raintoday.com.

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Hear the rest of Scott's advice by visiting the RainToday store and watching Scotts webinar Networking for New Business: 7 Ways for Becoming More Referable.

Everyone needs two or three people who will tell them the truth, who will push and encourage them, and who will hold them accountable. Everyone needs two or three people who are committed to their success. Yet, most people, when ask, "Who's got your back," aren't sure that anyone does, particularly in a professional context.

Listen to this podcast with Keith Ferrazzi, bestselling author of Never Eat Alone and the forthcoming book Who's Got Your Back?, as he explains the keys to forming these vital relationships.

 

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Interested in hearing more? Reserve your online seat for Keith Ferrazzi's May 7 webinar, Through Thick and Thin: How to Build Relationships with People Committed to Your Success.

In this podcast interview with Scott Ginsberg, the authority on approachability, Scott discusses how to become more approachable, how to connect with people about their passion, and how to break through the barriers which stop us from initiating conversations.

Becoming a more personable professional is vital. Clients choose service providers they like, and rarely those who only serve their needs.

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Interested in hearing more? Register for Scott's upcoming webinar, Networking for New Business: 7 Ways to Become More Referable.

Twitter, blogs, LinkedIn, and Facebook have marketers abuzz. The tools can generate exposure for their firms, increase website traffic, and result in new business partnerships, but marketers still don't know how to best use them.

Michael Stelzner, who just published the Social Media Marketing Industry Report, discusses how marketers can tell if social media is paying off, what they should think about before diving in, how much time they should invest in it, and much more.

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In an economic downturn many service firm leaders turn to marketing, and specifically brand building efforts, as the first place to cut. When in fact, your brand building activities (when done right) are the ones that can help generate leads, relationships, and trust—all key ingredients to winning new clients both in boom and in gloom.

Listen as we talk about building up your brand in a downturn with Mike Schultz, the publisher of RainToday.com, president of Wellesley Hills Group, and co-author of the forthcoming book Professional Services Marketing. Specifically, we're going to revisit a Q&A session I had with Mike in a recent RainToday.com webinar.

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Want to hear more? Become a RainToday.com member to watch our archive of on-demand webinar and one year of live events.

None needed.

Where does a professional services practitioner, marketer, or salesperson start with all the social media out there? The choices can be overwhelming and many people choose to ignore the social media landscape altogether.

We talk with Paul Dunay, author of the forthcoming book FaceBook Marketing for Dummies, and discuss what social networking is worthwhile and how to have a blog and content that is relevant.

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In professional services firms, the experiences we create for our clients plays a huge role in our ability to satisfy them, generate the return on investment they are looking for, and ensure they stay loyal clients. Listen to this episode as Peter Merholz, author of "Subject to Change" and president of Adaptive Path, explains what service firms can do to deliver valuable experiences to clients.

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Most services firms want short-term leads, leads that are ready to buy now. In contrast, the best service firms focus on the 75% of leads that are long-term opportunities that take six months to two years to develop. It's not easy to do, but successful marketers do just that.

In this podcast we talk with Dan McDade. Dan helps B-to-B companies fill their forecasts with qualified revenue opportunities as President of PointClear. Specifically, we revisit a questions-and-answer session we had with Dan in a recent webinar with Raintoday.com.

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If you're trying to sell a 1960s automobile in the next century, you have a very limited market. The same goes for firms trying to sell services which haven't adjusted to the realities of the current recession.

Listen as Paul Collins, managing partner of Equiteq LLP, explains how to build a value proposition that sells in a recession, drawing from his vast experience helping consultancy owners improve their profit performance and realize equity value in their businesses.

A lot of people think "trust in business" is a little soft, a little oxymoronic, and a little odd. But it's not. It is an essential component of successful client relationships and a key element in winning over prospects.

In this podcast, Charles H. Green, founder and CEO of Trusted Advisor Associates, breaks down how trust works in professional services, what the components of trust are, and how trusted advisors can reconcile that role with their responsibility to develop new business.

Lead nurturing is a highly-relevent topic nowadays with most firms struggling to win business in the current recession. Why? Roughly 75-percent of all leads are long-term opportunities that need nurturing.

Listen as Dan McDade, founder and president of Point Clear, explains how the best firms focus on these opportunities by using meaningful, thoughtful, and enjoyable communications.

Interested in hearing more? Attend Dan's upcoming RainToday.com webinar, Best Practices: 10 Actions to Immediately Improve Your Lead Nurturing Program.

If you're looking to create a culture of business development at your firm, you'll want to follow all six factors in the window into business development performance. Miss one of the factors for any reason and you'll severely limit your success.

In part two of this two-part podcast, Mike Schultz, publisher of RainToday.com and president of Wellesley Hills Group, outlines factors #4-6 for creating a culture of successful business development performance. Be one of the rare service firms that focuses on all six factors and you'll need more people to get all of the new client billable work done.

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Lately, business development has been on the minds of service firm leaders, and for good reason: The recession has made firm leaders work extra hard to keep their firms' revenue flowing.

So, how do you get the best business development results? Mike Schultz, president of Wellesley Hills Group and publisher of RainToday.com, believes there are six key factors. In the first part of this two-part podcast, Mike explains the first three of those factors: Expectations & Feedback, Tool & Resources, and Consequences & Incentives.

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This recession has spawned innumerable how-to-survive-a-down-economy pieces of advice: Focus only on the things that get you ROI and leads; focus on Internet marketing and cold calling; focus on relationships and networking; focus on your client base; build your brand. The list goes on. But, as Mike Schultz, publisher of RainToday.com and president of Wellesley Hills Group, explains, the one key insight you need to remember is that what has fundamentally changed isn't what you should do, it's what is happening inside the heads of firm leaders.

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When it comes to growing revenue and growing market share, professional services firms must effectively integrate marketing and selling into everyone's job.

In this podcast, we listen to Suzanne Lowe, president of Expertise Marketing and author of the forthcoming book, The Integration Imperative, as she answers some important questions about how firms can do just that:

• How can firms involve new-hires in marketing and sales?
• How can business developers help with their firm's marketing?
• How can firms motivate practitioners to bring in new business?

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Interested in hearing more? Get access to the full "How to Create a Culture of Growth" RainToday webinar with Suzanne Lowe.

Every professional service provider tries to make themselves distinct in the eyes of buyers: We seek to show our expertise, to respond to their needs, to listen, to articulate things well. Yet, in sales conversations, according to the buyers, we often don't do these things, making ourselves distinct in a very different way.

Listen to this podcaset with John Doerr, founder of RainToday.com and president of Wellesley Hills Group, as he discusses the top five mistakes service providers make when engaging in sales conversations with potential buyers:

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In this episode, we look at the whether buyers of professional services plan to increase or decrease their spending. The data from our How Client Buy: 2009 research report shows the news isn't good for nearly every kind of firm out there.

Our research does show an upside though. As Mike Schultz, president of Wellesley Hills Group and publisher of RainToday.com, explains, the majority of professional services buyers are not loyal to their current firm and are willing to switch providers.

Listen to learn what spending looks like in your industry and what you can do to begin making your competitors' clients your own:

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Interested in learning more? Click here to see the details of our How Client's Buy: 2009 research report.

In this episode, we share results from our How Clients Buy: 2009 research report. Specifically, we talk about the top five ways buyers identify and find their professional service providers.

Mike Schultz, publisher of RainToday.com and president of Wellesley Hills Group, also delves into ways four and five—speaking engagements—and discusses what you should do to lead your own and speak at conferences.

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Interested in learning more? Click here to see the details of our How Clients Buy: 2009 research report.