I am a huge fan of The Next Iron Chef: Super Chefs. Watching some of the best chefs in the world compete for the coveted title is nothing short of thrilling. Every week I’m amazed by the immensely creative dishes they make under ridiculous time and sometimes physical restrictions. Watching Chef Geoffrey Zakarian work his culinary magic on Wagyu beef? Awesome. And a smoked turkey soufflé prepared by Chef Elizabeth Falkner in 30 minutes? Fantastic.

All of the competing chefs have the skills, talent, and maybe most important, the drive to win. And because they’re all so good, they must do things that make them shine brighter than all of the others. They need to find that edge.

The same can be said for successful salespeople. They, with the support of their companies, do things that help them stand out among their competitors. They even do things that may seem mundane but because their competitors don’t do them, give them an edge over not only winning the sale but transforming it into a long-time loyal client.

Beating the Competition Online

For many firms that differentiator starts with their website and landing pages. As Axway, a B2B software and services company, found out, changing your landing pages to direct visitor to targeted messages can significantly improve lead generation and conversion rates.

By breaking away from the generic templates used for its landing pages, Axway increased conversion rates to 7.5% from 3% to 4%, writes M. Sharon Baker in her case study about the company, Landing Page Redesign Doubles Conversion Rates and Results in $65K Cost Savings.

“It’s not easy for marketers with tight control of their brands to adopt landing page layout or design changes. But you need to be flexible and open to pushing the limits with what you are comfortable with and learning from what the changes reveal,” says Axway’s vice president of corporate marketing, Erika Blaney.

The use of automated marketing and sales tools can also set you apart from your competition, says Mike Schultz in his podcast interview Automated Marketing and Sales Tools Help Drive Business Growth. You can use them to drive email signups from blogs and websites, generate leads, score leads, nurture leads, and gather marketing intelligence to improve web pages and messaging.

Historically those tools have come with a hefty price tag and have required a significant amount of manpower. That has changed, and companies that stop thinking only large companies can use them will benefit, Schultz says.

The Best Cold Callers Do This

For many organizations cold calling is the preferred tactic. And the salespeople who have the best success using it are those who have a strategic plan each time they pick up the phone, writes Mark Heerema in his article The Biggest Cold Calling Mistake—and How to Prevent It from Ever Happening.

When they make a call, they know exactly what they want, they know word for word how to ask for it, and they have a secure backup plan that allows them to meet at least one of their objectives, he says.

“If you invest the time to nail down these three rules, I guarantee you will see results fast. In addition, your confidence will soar when you don’t have to think so much about every call,” Heerema says.

You will have even greater success if you can warm up your calls by getting an introduction to the person, adds C.J. Hayden.

“Ask your colleagues, others in your market niche, or members of the business and personal networks you belong to if they know this person. If so, would they be willing to serve as your connection? You might ask the person to call or email your prospect and suggest he speak with you, or simply ask if you can use your connection’s name as someone who referred you,” Hayden writes in her article Connecting the Dots to More Sales.

An alternative, and perhaps more helpful, approach is to fill your marketing pipeline with prospects with whom you already have a connection, she says. Those include members of your associations or social networks, alumni of your university or training program, and vendors who serve your current clients.

Take the opportunity to develop relationships with those people and tell them about what you do. I’m not talking about a full-out marketing and sales push, but a gradual approach that gives them an idea for what you do and your areas of expertise. Give them a chance to get to know you and your services and hopefully like you. When they know and like you, they’re more inclined to buy from you.

The Secret Sauce for Developing Loyal Clients

A strong client relationship is the foundation for developing loyal clients. It’s what you build on top of that foundation that determines if your clients will not only return but if they send others your way. And the secret to doing that is outstanding customer service, says Scott Hunter in his article The Secret to Profitable Client Relationships.

“Throughout your dealings with your client, remember to always work on what built the relationship in the first place,” Hunter writes. “Maintain frequent communication with the client, and continue to check on how he is doing. This is the essence of service. Rather than assuming you’re doing a good job taking care of the client, ask the client if you are. Find out if he is getting what was expected.”

You should also ask him from time to time if there’s anything else you can do for him, and keep him informed about new services. This continual conversation will make a difference.

Skills, talent, strategy, drive—they’re all requirements for being a “Super Chef” or a super salesperson. So, what do you think? Will you be the next Iron Salesperson?

In every sales conversation some risk is involved. Risks include appearing unqualified, appearing to not understand the prospect’s business, not being understood by the client, and that your price is too high.

Because salespeople are afraid of those risks—afraid of failure—they do things they think will reduce the risk, and in reality they increase the risk, says Charles H. Green in his article How You’re Unknowingly Increasing Sales Risk.

They fear saying something stupid, so they don’t say anything of any consequence. They fear asking stupid questions and appearing ignorant, so they ask only yes-no questions. They fear the prospect won’t understand their services, so they explain every last detail about them.

“By defining ‘the usual suspects’ as saying something stupid, asking stupid questions, or not explaining ourselves, we have implicitly defined our approach to risk management. It is to control the conversation, to avoid unknowns, and to make it mainly about ourselves,” Green writes. “And so it is that we end up shooting ourselves in the foot, actually increasing the risk of losing the sale.”

Prospects trust credentials, reputations, track records, and smarts, but they select providers based on other factors, he stresses.

Those factors include “curiosity, a deep other-orientation, collaboration with clients rather than hiding from them, candor and transparency, a willingness to admit boundaries to our knowledge, and detachment from a particular solution, even from the sale itself,” Green says.

Those are risky actions, but that risk will build trust and lead to more sales.

Sales Training Failures

If you’ve heard the statistic about how sales training fails 90% of the time for companies, you might be hesitant to participate in it. If it’s such a failure, why bother, right?

The thing is sales training fails partially because companies don’t go into it with the right preparation and planning. You can’t just say sales are bad; we need to get our salespeople into training, says John Doerr in his podcast interview 90% of Sales Training Fails–but You Can Fix That. You have to set objectives and expectations for the training, identify the right program for your team, and measure the results.

“If your salespeople know the training you’re sending them to is just another event, another thing that they’re going to go to, and they’re not going to be held accountable afterwards for putting these things in place, they go into it with the attitude that maybe I don’t have to listen,” Doerr says.

Don’t let other companies’ sales training failures scare you off. Learn from their mistakes so that it becomes a success for you.

Online Failures

The online world is also filled with horrible failures: Google penalizes websites for not following their rules, buyers bash companies’ brands in social networks, and salespeople fail to generate client relationships in social networks. But those, too, are situations companies can learn from and change.

If your website goes into “Google Jail,” all is not lost, writes Melanie Yunk in her article What to Do When Your Website Goes to Google Jail. And you certainly shouldn’t give up on the site, for the benefits to your company outweigh the hassle of fixing the offending features.

If you doubt the effectiveness of social media marketing and think your activity there is a waste of time, Landy Chase has some advice for you. With minimal effort, you can easily network with prospects and clients, he says in his article 4 Easy Ways to Use Social Media to Boost Business Development.

“Want to research an account for key contacts? Sign in to LinkedIn and type in the company’s name. Their system will serve you with everything you need to know about that company in a matter of seconds. … Want to send out a new article or item of interest to your prospects? Log in to your email account. There you will see a list of high-quality content, courtesy of the sites you follow, waiting in your in-box for you to review. See something there that you want to distribute? Click on the groups within your social media network that you wish to receive the information, and hit Send,” Chase writes.

Again, with proper planning, your online activity can be a success.

Learning from Failure

Like most companies, MicroVentures Marketplace, Inc. knew it needed to publish content that educated potential buyers and made them aware of their services. An obvious choice for the investment company was a blog. The problem was rules and regulations made it difficult for company founder Bill Clark to write about timely issues. The company’s traditional blog failed to be the big hit they needed, writes M. Sharon Baker in her case study about the business, Startup Uses Media and Sponsored Blog Posts to Prove Concept, Gain Investors.

Clark didn’t give up on the idea of publishing content, though. A better option for him was to write sponsored guest blog posts. The price was high, but he could reach his targeted audience and he could write about anything he wanted.

“It was the most successful thing I ever did to grow signups,” he says. “When I wrote a little 300-word post, it brought us the most traffic and the most signups.”

A single sponsored post drove 700 to 1,000 unique visitors to MicroVentures’ website the day it posted, Clark says. In addition, he typically gained 50 to 100 investors from sponsored post traffic.

Remember, failure is an opportunity to learn and grow from the situation. It took Thomas Edison nearly 10,000 attempts to discover how to create the electric light bulb. Kathryn Stockett received 60 rejections before The Help was accepted by a literary agent. They didn’t give up. Neither should you.

Are you pushing away buyers?

“Why should I buy from you?”

You’ve all received that question from prospects—probably many times—and I’m sure you have a solid answer at the ready for when it’s issued. But have you also considered the question, “Why shouldn’t I buy from you?” Have you thought about things you do that would turn buyers away?

As Michael W. McLaughlin points out in his article Why Don’t Clients Buy From You? it pays to put yourself in your clients’ shoes and consider the view from their angle.

“Dwelling on the negative can be counterproductive, but answering that question could take your business to a new level,” McLaughlin says. “What you’re looking for is a handful of substantive areas for improvement that would benefit your clients and your practice.”

Revisit past losses. Did you make a misstep that caused the buyer to walk? Were your follow-up communications effective?

According to Wendy Weiss, poor follow-up strategies often cause prospects to fall through the cracks and never become paying clients.

One reason why providers struggle with follow-ups is that they don’t have a system for following up with prospects, Weiss says in her article, Why Your Follow-Ups with Prospects Fail. Before you make any effort, you must determine how you will follow up. Will it be via email, telephone, or note cards? Then you have to decide what you will say, your goals for each communication, how often to contact them, and when you should let go if the process gets you nowhere.

“Most sales professionals do not take the time to develop their process and are left winging it every time. When you have a process in place with scripts and templates, it is much easier and far less time consuming to reach out to the prospects you need to contact,” Weiss says.

Your marketing communication could also be a source of trouble. Consider, for example, email marketing. It can be wildly successful or it can be a huge flop. If you want your email marketing to generate leads, make sure you aren’t following any of the bad habits Jason Jacobson describes in his article, 5 Bad Email Marketing Habits You Must Kick.

Top on the list of things to do: be consistent with your mailings.

“Always remember, your subscriber base chose to be included in your email mailing list,” Jacobson writes. “This means they want to know what you have to say. Don’t leave ‘em hanging. If you set up an email marketing schedule, make sure you stick to it.”

On the flip side, be aware of over-sending email to your list, Jacobson warns. Nothing turns off subscribers more than being swamped with emails.

If you use direct mail, a more unique approach may be needed to catch the attention of buyers. Commerce Payments grew its business significantly after it sent out a mailer recipients couldn’t help but notice: a 11×17 tri-fold mailer expertly designed.

“If somebody is interested in accepting credit cards and they get a piece from us, there’s no question that they’re going to see it and read it. My first objective was to make sure it doesn’t get thrown out or put into a B pile with all the other solicitations,” says Michael Mendlowitz, founder of the credit card processing company.

Testing was also critical to the campaign, Mendlowitz says in the case study describing the company’s efforts, Direct Mail in the Marketing Mix Generates 100 New Customers Each Month for This B2B Company. “Testing is so key. You can spend all the time in the world and think you have the best piece, but ultimately you have to listen to your prospects,” he says.

Leonard A. Schlesinger, co-author of Action Trumps Everything, agrees that businesses must embrace such unexpected results and learn from them. More than that, they must change their course of action and not try to force things onto their original path, he says in his podcast interview with Mike Schultz, How Professional Services Firms Can Benefit from Entrepreneurial Thinking.

“New learning provides you with not only an opportunity for a new plan, but also for a new and different outcome,” he says.

What about you? Are there things about your firm, your sales efforts, or your marketing programs that can be improved on? Are you taking what you learn and changing your course of action?

Photo by Ocal

Avoid hype and hard sells. (Photo by Deb Walker)

I’ve been seeing many more articles about how professional services firms need to stay away from using over-hyped marketing copy. Stay away from the hard sell, and do not make promises of miraculous results to hook prospects in. And if you’re thinking about adding an exclamation point to that eye-popping copy, think again. Buyers do not want to be yelled at.

But you need to catch prospects’ attention immediately if you want them to eventually buy your services. If super-charged copy or sales pitches don’t work, then what does?

You have to demonstrate that you’re an expert and that you can help a prospect solve a particularly challenging business problem, says Kelley Robertson, President of The Robertson Training Group, in his podcast interview, Perk Up Their Ears: Sales Techniques that Get Prospects to Take Notice.

Before you make a prospecting call, research the company to uncover their challenges. Then figure out how to position your service and how it can help solve their challenges. Whatever you do, resist the urge to focus on the features of your service. Prospects don’t care about those. They want to know how to solve their problems.

If you “can accomplish that, then resistance will drop and the person you’re calling is more likely to stay on the telephone or give you time to meet with them face to face,” Robertson says.

If you shudder at the thought of cold calling, you can warm up the prospect with an introductory letter. But again, stay away from typical sales letters. Use a trigger event, such as the opening of a new office or the promotion of an executive, to introduce yourself, says Kendra Lee in her article, Prospecting Letters Still Open Doors with New Clients. And if you send it as a handwritten note, that’s even more effective because people are becoming numb to the overabundance of digital exchanges, she says.

“In this digital age increasingly people respond positively when you take the time to write a personalized letter,” Lee says. “Chances are the company president will not only take your call, but he may even reach out to thank you for acknowledging his company’s accomplishments. Once he does, you can segue into setting an appointment to get to know him and share ideas you have for his business.”

It all begins with a letter the executive appreciate and remembers, such as this one Lee includes in her article:

Dear Tom,

Congratulations on your outstanding success! I saw your award as one of the Top Places to Work in Houston. What an honor! You’ve built a business of high caliber. I look forward to congratulating you personally at an upcoming Chamber event!

Sincerely,
Sarah James
Company Name

Lee provides more examples and tips for composing letters in her article.

You Got the Prospect to Buy. Now, How Do You Keep Them Buying?

If you can get the prospect to buy your services, you’ve accomplished the hard part. Now you need to hold on to them. While that’s easier than wooing new clients, it still takes work. You can’t sign them up and then forget about them. You must provide an exceptional experience—one that not only makes them want to stay with you but also gets them referring other businesses to you, says Michael McLaughlin in his article, What It Takes to Keep Clients Coming Back for More.

“Today, competence is rapidly becoming a commodity, that is, table stakes to get in the game. Every serious contender for a client project can claim [and substantiate] a high degree of competency. Predictably, when faced with numerous, equally skilled providers, clients look for something extra to help them choose,” McLaughlin says. “Increasingly, they are thinking about the experience they can expect while working with you as a way to sort out the competition.”

To address the experiential aspect, you have to understand all of the possible sources of value for your client. Try asking this question, McLaughlin advises: “If we had already completed this project and you were looking back on it, how would you describe the project if your experience was an ideal one?”

If the response focuses on schedules, budgets, and delivery of promises, follow up on the intangible sources of value, “especially how the clients might have changed and what they gained personally and professionally,” McLaughlin says. Only then will you get a true picture of what’s important to them and how they want to work with you.

Don’t Go It Alone

For many professional services firms, the journey to attract, sign, and retain clients is a one-person project. That doesn’t mean you have to go it alone. In fact, you shouldn’t. You need feedback and outside opinion on what you do. To get that, Lisa Nirell suggests starting or joining a “mastermind group.”

“Our careers may have become more sophisticated in the past few decades, but the need for collaboration and support in this volatile economy is stronger than ever,” writes Nirell in her article, The Secret Weapon for Outpacing Your Competitors.

Mastermind groups offer “endless benefits,” Nirell says. They minimize the sense of isolation, foster new ideas, and provide a forum to help others.

Nirell says she needs to belong to a mastermind group because she lives in a remote area and cannot find a group of like-minded business owners in her local area and the support and accountability the group provides keeps her on track and energized about her company’s mission.

Many successful business owners have participated in such groups, including Benjamin Franklin, Nirell says. You may want to, as well.

Is your business growing strongly? (Photo by Riyas Hamza)

How does your business grow? If you find it is struggling, then you need to reassess your cultivation techniques. It could be that tactics you employed in the past no longer work or that your competition is eclipsing you. Whatever the cause, you need to do something now.

Where do you start? Begin with the leadership at your firm. As Ray Patterson writes in his article, 7 Traits of Strong Business Leaders, strong leaders inspire their organizations to provide outstanding services while taking care of their employees and other stakeholders.

“Leadership is about the future. It isn’t just tomorrow or next month, but next year, the next decade, and beyond. Leadership is about dealing with uncertainty, ambiguity, and possibilities. Leadership is about creating and inspiring,” Patterson says.

Are you and/or your managers providing that? If you aren’t sure, take a look at the seven traits Patterson outlines in his article.

Next, consider what it means to have a wealthy company. No longer does it involve just money, writes Lisa Nirell in her article, 7 Wealth Builders that Most Professional Services Firms Ignore. It also includes ideals that honor your values, vision, and core strengths.

“This expanded mindset about wealth can simply lead to greater self-awareness, a more clearly defined sense of purpose, and more committed teams moving in the same direction,” Nirell says.

By following the criteria Nirell outlines in her article, “your chances of running a wealthy company worthy of successful exit or longevity will increase dramatically.”

Ineffective Publicity Tactics

You should also take a look at the publicity strategies you’ve been using. The deluge of articles written by and featuring industry experts has created so much white noise that it’s hard to get heard above it, writes Vickie K. Sullivan in her article, White Noise: 3 Changes that Impact Your Publicity Efforts. As a result, once-useful media campaign strategies, including being quoted in articles and writing feature articles, no longer bring in new business like they used to.

Such publicity strategies still play a role in your overall campaign, but you must take a new tack when applying them, Sullivan says.

“The new benchmark for publicity must go beyond getting in front of people,” she says. “That is no longer the challenge. We have to get strategic about what we know, not just get our ideas out there. The attention we get must inspire action: to go to our website, to inquire about our services, or even buy a book or two.”

Effective Growth Tactic

One tactic that has proved to be effective at getting your name and expertise out there and at generating new business is blogging. People want to do business with real, genuine people, says professional blogger Chris Garrett in his podcast interview, Tap Into the Power of Blogs to Grow Business, and blogging allows you to demonstrate that you are one.

But it takes time to get people to notice you, he warns. Don’t make one of the biggest mistakes of blogging and give up too quickly.

“If people aren’t seeing the success many other blogs have seen, it’s probably because they haven’t given it enough time. They have a rush of enthusiasm at the beginning, but they don’t get the traffic and comments they’d like right away. And they give up right when they’re about to hit the tipping point where people are starting to engage them,” he says.

You must also get out and spread the word about your blog, Garrett says. You can’t simply put up a blog and expect people to find you. You need to direct them to it using newsletters, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and comments on other blogs.

“It means networking. It means getting outside of your blog, getting outside of your own head and into where people you want to attract hang out,” he says.

Your Turn

What tactics are you using that are helping you to grow your business?

Slay the dragons that are preventing your firm from growing (Photo by Paul Kemp)

Over the past several months, or even couple of years, many of us have been in survival mode. We’ve been doing what we can to avoid hazards, hold on to current clients, and seek out new prospects with the hope of simply making it through the economic downturn intact.

Being among those who survive is a worthy accomplishment, but now it’s time to plan your real attack against those obstacles that prevent you from growing, as Lisa Nirell says in her article, 2 Surefire Steps to Slay the Dragons Preventing You from Growing. There are actually only two things that prevent firms from growing: lack of a practical growth plan and limited beliefs in you and your staff. The good news is both are within your control to overcome.

When it comes to a growth plan, consider whether the services you provide offer real value. Are you in danger of looking and sounding like many others in your industry? Do you truly understand your prospects’ needs and concerns?

You also want to look at your marketing strategy. Is it on target for your audience? Are your prospects using different channels these days? If you sell technology services, you need a systematic approach that allows you to demonstrate their value, says Laurie Young, author of Marketing Technology as a Service: Proven Techniques that Create Value in his podcast interview, The Right Way to Market Technology Services. Again, plan your approach; don’t follow an erratic and tactical method that prospects will never respond to.

That planned approach starts with understanding where prospects get their business information and how they seek out service providers. When it comes to social media channels, Business.com’s Business Social Media Benchmarking Study shows that webinars and podcasts are the number one social media research that North American business professionals use. That’s good news for service professionals, as those resources provide an opportunity to showcase your expertise, share client stories and experiences, and give buyers a taste of what it’s like to work with you.

Working with Buyers and Clients

As you put your growth plan in motion, you will still come across buyers who object to certain aspects, the most common being price. Many of your prospects are still struggling to do more with less. But before you cut your prices, follow some of the ideas Kelley Robertson suggests in his article, How to Deal with the Dreaded Price Objection. And remember, the fact that the buyer raised the objection means they have an interest. Talk it out with them and try to get to the heart of the matter. You very well can come to an agreement that works for both of you.

Once you win the client, you must continue to nurture the relationship. Yes, you beat out many others to get the job and your expertise is valued, but that doesn’t give you the right to go in with a huge ego and treat others as if they’re beneath you, writes Michael W. McLaughlin in his article, What Your New Client Really Thinks. Heed the advice in McLaughlin’s article, and you will not only have a good working experience, but chances are high the client will want to work with you again.

Dragon-Slaying Success

Crisis Prevention Institute is one firm that knew it had to take the offense and stop playing defense if it wanted to continue growing, writes M. Sharon Baker in her case study, Crisis Averted: Proactive Sales Effort Stops Training Organization’s Revenue Loss. The bad economy, misdirected energies, and poor management put the organization in danger of losing revenue. It had to do something fast if it wanted to prevent that.

The previous management “took their eyes off the core business, and growth didn’t occur,” says CEO Tony Jace. “What I did was simplify the whole thing. We paired down initiatives, reoriented some of the workload between the senior management team, and put the focus back on our customers and our core products.”

Thanks to those actions, the organization stopped the losses and posted revenue growth that was 4% higher than expectations.

So, what are you doing to slay the dragons that are preventing you from growing? What success have you seen? What hasn’t worked as well as you hoped?

Are you doing the right things to be profitable? (D'Arcy Norman CC BY 2.0)

Every firm wants to be profitable. But often those running firms make the mistake of thinking acquiring new clients is the best way to achieve that, especially if they aren’t discriminating and accept any business as a client. New clients often are high risk and may not be good clients over time.

The best way to become profitable is to sell to existing clients and charge more for your services, says Randy Shattuck in his podcast interview, The Best Path to Profitability for Professional Services Firms. It’s always easier to sell something new to existing clients than it is to sell something existing to a new client, he says.

Getting existing clients to buy additional services, however, means signing on ideal clients—those who believe you offer great value. You do that by building a value proposition and brand, Shattuck says.

“The more you build your brand, the greater the likelihood that you’re going to get the right deals with ideal clients with high profit per deal,” he says.

Tony Tiernan agrees, but says in his article—Does Your Firm Suffer From an Identity Crisis?—that you must also make sure you provide truly great services. If your firm is experiencing a lull, take the time to make sure your firm has a clear identity, offers outstanding value and services, and is targeting the right clients.

Whether you’re acquiring new clients or reaching out to current clients, you must still sell to them. And selling is not something many services professionals feel comfortable doing. In fact, many when faced with selling for the first time say they won’t be good at it, don’t have the time, don’t like talking about money, and more.

The good news is services professionals already possess the skills that make them great salespeople, say Mike Schultz and John Doerr in their article, The Story You Tell Yourself About Selling. You must simply change your mind set. If you believe you can sell and will sell, you can become a big gun rainmaker.

Publishing content can help with client acquisition, but it takes work, as C.J. Hayden explains in her article, Publish or Perish: Why You Must Make Publishing Part of Your Marketing Plan. By publishing quality content that shows your expertise and in some cases shows what it’s like to work with you, you create awareness and build your brand. So, when you talk with prospective clients, they already know about you, are ready to work with you, and don’t question your rates, Hayden says.

One firm that has discovered the power of original content is Resicom. The company wanted to become a thought leader in its market, so it turned to publishing articles and white papers, writing a blog, and speaking engagements, writes Gwen Moran in her case study, How a Service Firm Cut through the Noise to Create Conversations with Hard-to-Reach Prospects. As a result, Resicom improved its website ranking in search engines by 300% and opened dialogue with several prospects who were particularly difficult to reach in the past.

Resicom joins a growing number of small U.S. businesses that have discovered the power of social media such as blogs. In fact, the use of social media tactics such as blogs, Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn doubled from 2008 to 2009 for small businesses, according to “The State of Small Business Report” from Network Solutions and the Center for Excellence in Service at the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business. And of those surveyed, 39% said they publish a blog on their area of expertise.

Blogging, however, is just one piece of the pie when it comes to marketing your firm and creating a brand. Consider the type of media your prospects prefer and the tactics they best respond to and build your plan.

With careful planning you can still grow your firm during economic distress. (Photo by WTL photos)

Some people say the recession is nearly over, but the reality is many firms are dealing with economic distress and will for some time still. They’re scrambling to hold on to clients, find new clients, and retain staff. How can they plan in such an uncertain time? What can they do so that when things do improve they emerge with the strength to live and thrive? RainToday contributing editor Bruce W. Marcus has some ideas in this week’s article, 10 Steps to Planning Effectively During Economic Distress. Following his 10-step process, firms can better understand the strengths and weaknesses of their client base and can make informed decisions about the allocation of resources.

Growing your business during challenging times is difficult, but it isn’t impossible. One thing firms can do is build a community to interact with and engage prospects, says RainToday contributing editor Vickie Sullivan in her article, 3 Types of Communities That Can Grow Your Business. Start by deciding what you want the community to do, then determine what type of community is good for you: a big group that can create big buzz, a small group of people who have big budgets, or a big group of people who have small budgets? Read Vickie’s article to help you decide.

If a big group that generates big buzz is for you, one obvious choice is Twitter. In this week’s podcast, How to Become a Marketing Success on Twitter, Sarah Milstein says Twitter is one of the best places to demonstrate your thought leadership. It’s a great way to do lightweight marketing, as well as to network with prospects and clients, says the co-author of The Twitter Book. 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.

Participating on Twitter and showcasing thought leadership is definitely one thing staff can do if they find themselves with less billable work. In fact, there are many things staff of all levels can do to help with the firm’s marketing, says Anne Scarlett in her article, Mobilize Under-Utilized Staff to Help With Marketing. Following her four-step plan, determine areas in which staff can help and how to motivate them to want to help.

Firms may also want to consider online video as a way to demonstrate thought leadership and capture the attention of potential clients. That’s what Blyth Valley did when it discovered it needed a way to differentiate itself from the competition and attract more customers. The insurance brokerage produced an online video campaign that resulted in greater requests for quotes and more policy purchases—at higher rates.

“The idea is that the person watching the video could pick up the phone and talk to this person,” says says Alex Wright, the firm’s marketing director, in this week’s case study, Testing the Value of Video: How an Insurance Firm Doubled Conversion Rates. And obviously people did.