While we didn’t return to pre-recession times in 2011, we did see more businesses emerging from their shelters. They put aside their defensive-only approach and began to pursue new business. For many that involved more content marketing, inbound marketing, and social media marketing activities. They published more articles, white papers, blog posts, and reports to establish themselves as industry experts and attract prospective buyers.

As they did that, however, many began to look “on paper” like the other firms in their industry. What they published didn’t differentiate them and actually contributed to the wall of noise many of us experienced in publications, on websites, and on social media networks.

The challenge professional services firms face in 2012 is how to stand out from the crowd—be heard above the noise—and capture the attention and limited dollars of, as sales strategist Jill Konrath calls them, crazy-busy buyers. Read on to learn what RainToday’s publisher and contributing editors say service professionals must do to overcome that obstacle and grow their business.

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The Year of Sales

Mike Schultz, Publisher of RainToday and Co-President of RAIN Group

Mike Schultz, Publisher of RainToday and Co-President of RAIN Group

Selling is becoming more and more important. Websites are looking better, and it’s easier and cheaper to create them, so you don’t know if it’s a seven-person firm or a 70-person firm. Plus, firms of all sizes are producing more articles, white papers, and blogs. It’s harder for customers and clients to differentiate firms based on those things. That means sales conversations are going to set you apart.

The fact of the matter is when prospects pick up the phone and call a firm, and they say, “Hey, I want to talk to you guys about x, y, and z,” the experiences they have immediately when you answer the phone or call them back are what will differentiate you from the other similar-looking firms.

They get a sense of whether: These guys were bright. These guys listened to me. These guys cared about my needs. These guys did a thorough needs discovery. These guys shared with me not feature, feature, feature but relevant things that were helpful for me to think about what I want to do. These guys called me back. These guys didn’t. These guys were arrogant. These guys weren’t. This guy was like a mouse on the phone.

There are all of these things that happen that can cause their perceived value of you to shoot way up or way down and also build their belief of whether you can deliver on the things they want you to deliver on.

Additionally, if you’re not able to communicate your value to prospects, someone else will get their business.

I think 2012 will continue to be the year of sales where whether you have full-time salespeople, you have business developers, or you have partners and consultants that need to sell, the more that you can help them sell, the more successful your firm is going to be. You’re not going to get very far if you don’t have people who can sell.

Value, Value, Value

Robert Croston, Vice President and Principal Consultant of RAIN Group

Robert Croston, Vice President and Principal Consultant of RAIN Group

As we are likely to see painfully slow economic growth in 2012, many professional service firms will concentrate on capturing a larger piece of a static, or even shrinking, pie. To do this, most firms realize they will need to sell better.

This was largely the case last year. However, in 2012 we will see greater refinement in the approach service firms take toward sales. While many firms have become more proactive in their outreach, they will still face an urgency issue: Why now? Why you? And, most important, where’s the value?

To open stingy wallets and move skeptical prospects forward, the focus in 2012 will be on selling the value of a solution and illustrating the impact it will have on an organization. If you are selling value, you can kill three birds with one stone by driving immediate consideration, positioning yourself as distinct, and clearly demonstrating ROI.

Winning Firms Will Be Advisers and Publishers

Michael W. McLaughlin, author and Principal with MindShare Consulting LLC

Michael W. McLaughlin, author and Principal with MindShare Consulting LLC

Maybe it’s a cliché to say that we’re awash in information. But it’s hard to paint a true picture of today’s world without that reference.

Think about it: More data was transmitted over the Internet in 2010 than in all previous years combined, according to researchers at Intel. It’s a safe bet that the numbers didn’t shrink in 2011.

Every minute, 48 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube; each day, 200 million tweets are sent out; and every month, more than 7 billion photos are uploaded to the Internet. More than 4 billion devices are connected to the Internet, and that number is expected to reach 15 billion in just a few years.

The mind-boggling stats have profound implications for professional services providers in 2012 (and beyond). For starters, we have to re-double our efforts to remain effective information filters for our inundated clients.

Also, clients will become increasingly dismissive of those who try to market services by publishing over-simplified stuff like, “The 7 Secrets of Servant Leadership” in 300 words or fewer.

Service providers who rely on thought leadership to generate business will have to ratchet up the quality of what they produce, and they must be ready to distribute that content across the many channels clients will use.

Winners in 2012 will be both client advisers and publishers. They’ll apply the same uncompromising standards to their publishing activities as they do to client service. They’ll work tirelessly to put the “thought” into thought leadership.

They’ll stress substance and depth in their marketing content, not volume. They’ll be generous with their best ideas because they realize that’s the way to get clients to notice. And they’ll treat the communities they create through their publishing and marketing activities like clients—those they will listen to, serve, and eventually convert into buyers.

The Demise of Nice Salespeople

Jill Konrath, author and sales strategist

Jill Konrath, author and sales strategist

Crazy-busy decision makers have absolutely no interest in working with relationship-oriented salespeople who willingly go the extra mile to take good care of them. Instead, they want to work with savvy professionals who bring them high value on a regular basis.

To be one of those people, sellers need to sharpen their personal expertise in areas relevant to their customers. Then, they need to proactively bring customers fresh ideas, insights, and information to help them achieve their business objectives. Salespeople need to realize they are the differentiator, not their products or services.

In short, being nice is simply no longer sufficient in today’s business environment.

Be Prepared for Volatility

Vickie K. Sullivan, author and President of Sullivan Speaker Services

Vickie K. Sullivan, author and President of Sullivan Speaker Services

The key word for next year: volatility. Watch for done deals to be derailed because of buyers’ overreaction to unexpected events. Many people are still cautious and will default into doing nothing in response to outside forces, such as the economy or an unexpected dip in cash flow.

My suggestions to deal with this are two-fold: first, pack your pipeline full of opportunities so that your firm can quickly fill the void. Second, be prepared to give buyers’ compelling reasons for why it’s still good for them to move forward. The more specific the reasons are the better. Listen to the buyers’ stories and then explain what will happen if they wait.

Continued Unemployment Will Lead to More One-Person Firms

Charles H. Green, Founder and CEO of Trusted Advisor Associates

Charles H. Green, Founder and CEO of Trusted Advisor Associates

I do not believe 2012 will look materially different from 2011. But more of the same is meaningful nonetheless. It will mean:

• One more year of unemployment for a great number of talented people
• One more year of experience for all of us with new technologies
• One more year experience for all of us using social media

Those three items alone mean:

1. More one-person firms will seek to do business, especially in professional services
2. Marketing will more and more resemble networking
3. Social media will stratify into more-personal and less-personal groupings
4. Consortium-bidding will become more common and effective
5. Personal collaboration skills will be at a premium

Learn more in Tom Kennedy's on-demand webinar Persuasive Presentations: How to Capture the Hearts and Minds of Buyers

Think about the worst presentation you ever sat through. Did it feel like you were experiencing “death by PowerPoint”?

If the speaker was like your typical speaker, he relied completely on his PowerPoint slides and bored the audience by reading verbatim the text on those slides. Just thinking about someone doing that is enough to make you yawn.

That approach is the primary mistake people make when giving a presentation, says Tom Kennedy, who is giving a webinar November 8 titled Persuasive Presentations: How to Capture the Hearts and Minds of Buyers.

“There are probably three primary mistakes,” Kennedy says in a recent RainToday.com interview. “First of all people calling the slides the presentation. They aren’t. And when someone says send me the presentation, the only answer is ‘I can’t’ because you’re the presentation.”

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Listen to the complete interview here:

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Other mistakes people make when giving presentations:

* Using your slides as notes: Slides can be effective, but not if you load them up with your speaker notes.

“There’s nothing wrong with having slides. Great visual aids are wonderful,” Kennedy says. “But text on slides is invariably the speaker’s notes. Have notes, but don’t show your audience your notes.”

* Failing to target the audience: Often speakers feel they need to talk about themselves. If it’s a keynote or seminar, they’ll spend the first 10 to 15 minutes talking about themselves, their firm, and their accomplishments. If it’s a sales presentation, they’ll talk only about their services. The audience wants to know how what you’re discussing affects them. They don’t care about you.

“It’s always about [the audience]. It’s not about the presenter,” Kennedy says. “The ‘I/me’ talk I call it—about us—is not the way to target the audience. Make it about them.”

The key is to cultivate a relationship with your audience, particularly if it’s a sales presentation, he says.

“We buy from people that we like and trust and are comfortable with. So, it’s all about relationship. It’s not about the data,” Kennedy says.

* Handing out your slides in advance: Audience members often want a copy of presentations in advance. Don’t do it, says Kennedy. If you do that, people will look ahead and not pay attention to what is being said.

It’s better if you provide a handout after your presentation. And that handout can include more information than what you included on your slides, such as your speaker notes. That way people can pay attention while you speak, and they won’t worry about taking notes.

Everyone is a salesperson, says Kennedy. Whether you’re presenting to a client, giving a keynote, or networking with prospects, the people you speak with matter the most. Develop a relationship with them and you will then be able to sell yourself and your ideas.

“Can I trust you?”

That’s my first thought whenever I begin researching service providers. Whether it’s a lawyer, accountant, vet, or hair colorist, I need to know that I can trust them. Do they know what they’re doing? Will they have my back? Will they make me feel like a valued customer?

I’m not the only one who feels that way. Your prospects and clients are in the same boat. Are you doing all that you can to demonstrate your expertise and value—and make them feel comfortable with you? Do they trust you?

Equally important, says Charles H. Green, is whether you trust your clients. In a strong client relationship, trust runs both ways. You’re both taking a chance and putting faith in one another. Your client trusts you’re doing all that you can, and you trust that you can discuss things openly—even negative things—without fear that they will abandon you.

“If you don’t believe in the power of trusting and being trusted, then you won’t achieve either. You will be suspicious, and others will be suspicious of you,” writes Green in his article, Good Trust Leads to Good Business.

Now consider the value you offer. Are you trying to win sales by beating your competition—doing the same as them but touting it as better? That’s a tough one because buyers usually end up deciding who to go with based on price. If you want to capture their attention and break away from the pack, start creating new alternatives, says Ron Karr in his podcast interview, Why You Need to Stop Trying to Beat Your Competition.

When you go into the mindset of creation rather than competition, “you tend to be able to cross-sell a lot more of your … services because you’re selling on an outcome that they’re not currently realizing and they want to do it. And when you get to that point, you get to be known then as a trusted advisor. And if you get to that level, well, then frankly, there is no competition,” says Karr.

Demonstrate Your Expertise and Trustworthiness

If you want to show prospects you are skilled, provide unique value, and are trustworthy, start writing. A few years ago when I was looking for a therapist, I received recommendations but then I did a web search of them to learn more about them. Those who wrote blogs and provided advice in social forums rose to the top of my list. They provided an opportunity for me to get to know them better before picking up the phone to call them.

More businesses are discovering the value of such content to not lead to immediate sales but to eventual sales, writes Eric Rudolf in his article, 9 Non-Technical Ways to Increase Website Traffic.

“Are you an IT consultant? Start a group for people struggling with ERP implementations. Do you provide accounting services? Start a group for people who have questions and concerns about their taxes. Helping people without expectation of profit is a great way to not only build credibility, but to also drive web traffic in the future—when members of your social group are finally ready to make a purchase,” Rudolf says.

As you write, be careful with your writing. Make sure you don’t have typos or misspellings, use correct punctuation, and use complete sentences. I might be more critical because I’m editor (oh, how I hate the misuse of your and you’re), but other people will notice as well. And as Ernest Nicastro points out in his article, Misused Words that Lessen Your Credibility, bad writing can cause you to be less credible.

In your writing and in your communication with prospects, clients, partners, and co-workers you want to put your best foot forward. That means you have to write carefully. It’s one thing to email friends and family members. It’s another when the things you write represent your business.

Writes Bryan Garner, in the preface to the third edition of his Garner’s Modern American Usage: “There aren’t just a few dozen trouble spots in the language, or even a few hundred. There are several thousand of them. Given the critical acumen of many readers, for a writer to remain unconscious of these pitfalls and write whatever sounds close enough will inevitably lead to a loss of credibility. Vague intelligibility isn’t the touchstone; precision is.”

Photo by David Dufour

How do you stand out from the sea of competition?

Let me ask you this: when you look at the services you provide and how you market them, do you look and sound like other firms in your space? Does your website look eerily like your competitors? Are you blogging and tweeting similar content?

If the answer is yes, then you need to stop right now.

The only way you are going to get the clients you want and the fees you deserve is if you differentiate yourself. Do something that sets you apart from the rest, elevates buyers’ perception of you, and increases your value.

The fact that you have a website, are publishing content, and are active in social media is a great step. But thanks to more and more firms doing the same thing, it isn’t enough to just have a blog or a Facebook page. Now it’s going to take more work. Now you have to publish high-quality content, not just any content.

“You have to say something important, and you have to say it succinctly. And you have to have a strategy for packaging it that makes it something people will find and will want to read,” says Paul Gillin, co-author of Social Marketing to the Business Customer in a recent podcast interview, It’s Time for B2B Firms to Be More Like Publishers.

Firms have to adopt a publisher mentality and use high-quality articles, blog posts, podcasts, and video to demonstrate their expertise and distinguish themselves from the competition, Gillin says.

“Lots and lots of people are in social media right now, and the competition to get visibility to be seen is more intense. That means you have to get better at producing high-quality content,” he says.

Make a Lasting Positive Impression during Sales Meetings

Publishing quality content certainly helps get people to notice you, but how you handle yourself during meetings that occur as a result can make or break a deal. First impressions mean everything.

If it’s a scheduled meeting, you have an opportunity to set yourself as the standard all vying providers will be compared against. You want to do what Vickie K. Sullivan describes as “call the game and then predict the future.”

You want “to show the value of your expertise and to leave the buyer with a different perspective that they will now use on everybody else,” Sullivan writes in her article, Be the Benchmark: How to Become the Buyer’s Best Option.

First, question what’s really going on with your prospect, Sullivan says. Their definition of the problem may be way off base. Work with them to dig down to the root of the problem, go beyond the symptoms. After you do that, ask them, “What will happen if …” and insert their plan of action.

Once you redefine the problem with them, you can brainstorm the criteria needed for the solution, Sullivan says. The trick is to make the criteria very specific so that only you are able to meet it.

“When you contribute to the criteria, you better control the comparison among options. That’s how you can come out on top,” Sullivan says.

Distinguish Yourself during Unexpected Meetings

Unexpected meetings with potential buyers are equally important and possibly more difficult. You could be at a conference or a social event and find yourself face to face with someone who is your ideal client, but the circumstances don’t allow for in-depth sales conversations nor do you have an opportunity to plan what to say to the person.

That does not mean, however, you cannot prepare for such situations. In fact, you must prepare if you want to make a good, long-lasting impression that leads to a second meeting, according to Anne Scarlett in her article, The Best Way to Handle Unexpected Business Encounters.

“You can never be certain of whom you will run into or when,” she says. “Strive to be concise, conscious, consistent, curious, and captivating.”

To do that, you must feel comfortable with the content. You need to know your firm’s top three messages and become skilled at thinking on your feet. Be prepared for wherever the prospect decides to take the conversation.

Sales Success

With your sales process under way, don’t forget to go back and measure your results. Are you meeting your goals? Are there areas that need to be adjusted? Successful organizations do not operate on whims. They make decisions based on performance, striving to continually improve results.

“They review everything from their forecasts to their pipelines, looking hard at important numbers such as cost of sales, percentage of market share, salesperson effectiveness ratios, and customer lifetime value,” says Ken Thoreson in his article, Pay Attention to the Numbers: Using Metrics to Improve Sales Results.

But organizations aren’t just examining the numbers. They’re looking for ways to improve sales results. They combine their goals with individual salespeople’s business plans with a set of metrics designed to gauge everyone’s progress in meeting those objectives. Metrics measured include actual sales activity, win-loss percentages, average order value, and dollar value of pipeline.

If you don’t measure, you don’t know how effective you are. But the real route to success is adjusting as needed to improve those results each month and each quarter.

Photo by: flickkerphotos

Earlier this year, we asked you to share your selling services challenges. You flooded us with your challenges and concerns, which included communicating the value of your services, client relationship management, and qualifying leads. In this blog series we identify 12 of the major selling obstacles you are struggling with the most and offer advice and suggestions for overcoming them.

This week’s challenge: turning speaking engagements into new business.

It sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? You give people a sample of what you have to offer to encourage them to pay for the full service. Why, then, do people have such a hard time turning audience members into clients?

Target Your Audience

It starts with your audience, says Anne Miller, a communications coach and author of Make What You Say Pay! “My best strategy for selling my training and speaking services is to speak before carefully selected groups so that people can experience what I do,” she says.

That means not taking any speaking engagement for the sake of it. Target your audience the same way you target your ideal client. What are their needs and challenges? Do your services meet those needs? What venues do they prefer–do they like intimate in-person settings or are they partial to online/virtual events?

RainToday Publisher Mike Schultz presents at the ICCA Congress & Exhibition in Florence, Italy

Once you have your audience and venue, it’s up to you to engage attendees, grab their attention, and keep their attention. You do not want to be the speaker that puts people to sleep or has them pulling out their smart phones and laptops to check email.

Appeal to Challenges and Emotions

One way to command their attention is to go beyond showcasing what you know and appeal to their challenges and emotions, says Vickie K. Sullivan, founder and president of Sullivan Speaker Services, which helps professionals with their branding and marketing initiatives.

“The key is to be beyond smart and go straight to urgent. That’s a content and focus issue,” Sullivan says. “Many speakers show they’re talented, but buyers sometimes leave with, ‘She’s great. I’ll work with her someday.’ And someday never comes. Buyers have more priorities than budget, so if your speaking can direct solutions to a problem they are already funding, well, it’s a beautiful thing.”

Strong speakers also have a demeanor that shows they’re comfortable in their skin, Sullivan says. And that allows audience members to also relax and enjoy being around them. Consider, for example, former Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano, who is currently United States Secretary of Homeland Security.

“I heard her speak at Harvard University and immediately saw why she was so popular,” recalls Sullivan in her article, Clever and Compelling: 3 Traits that Instantly Attract Buyers to You. “This audience of equally powerful people was enthralled because she was so comfortable. Everyone knew she could break some eggs if she had to, and yet she came off as if she were having a fun conversation with friends. Did she say anything in particular that gave us that impression? Not a word. This relaxed confidence permeated everything she said. ”

Interesting and compelling speakers also use their words to paint pictures for their audience members. Metaphors are an important tool in their skill set.

“Metaphors are so important today because we live in a world of constant information that’s coming at people at increasingly accelerated rates. People cannot absorb all of that, and in fact they tune more out than in primarily as a survival mechanism,” says Miller. “You need to get through that stuff so they can see you in a unique light, see the value of your proposition, and want to take action with you.”

Metaphors can help you turn a seemingly boring topic into an exciting one that keeps people talking about it—and you—long after your presentation is over. When used as openers, they seize attention because they’re unexpected, writes Miller in Make What You Say Pay!

Success Story

Linda Rey, whom Miller profiles in the book, discovered the power of metaphors after she gave a presentation at a breakfast meeting of the business council to which her insurance agency belonged. She wanted to make sure she left with more than a stack of business cards, so she turned to her skydiving experience to help grab the audience’s attention and address business’s insurance challenges.

Rey placed an envelope on each table that included pictures of her jumping out of an airplane. When she took the podium, she asked everyone to open the envelopes and share the contents. As they did, they all began murmuring: Was that Rey? Is she crazy? How could she do that?

After everyone settled down, Rey said it was her in the picture, but she jumped only after she had proper instruction. And she said you should follow the same practice when buying insurance—only after you have proper instruction.

Rey told the audience, “As with skydiving, when you don’t know what you are doing, there is a very good chance that you are going to get injured. You could hit the ground really hard, financially speaking. And that would hurt, not only you, but both your family and your business.”

Once Rey had their attention, she offered useful tips on choosing a broker and buying insurance. Eighteen months later, she was still receiving business from that speaking engagement.

Think about the last conference you went to. Chances are there was one speaker who droned on while reading the text from his PowerPoint slides while audience members checked their email or even nodded off. And then there was one speaker who energized the room, woke everyone from their drowsing, and perhaps got people tweeting what he said. He was interesting, energetic, entertaining, and offered ideas and advice. People couldn’t get enough of him.

I would bet that Mr. Persona acts similarly with prospects and clients, causing people to seek him out for his opinions. He stands out among his many competitors, who in most cases don’t take the time to understand clients’ needs or to develop a core expertise. He is, as Andrew Sobel says, “a person of interest.”

“This is not about charisma or personal flair, but rather about authenticity and value—about being an interesting person to spend time with, someone that clients feel stimulates their thinking, someone from whom they learn and get ideas,” Sobel writes in his article, What You Can Do to Keep Clients from Walking Away.

It means you must become a “Deep Generalist.” This is someone who has a well-developed core expertise about an industry, function, or other niche and layers broad business knowledge on top of that, Sobel says.

“This enables you to have discussions with your client about their business issues—whether they’re talking about operations, organization, or strategy—and to always put your specific solutions in the context of the overall enterprise,” he says.

Vickie K. Sullivan adds that successful service professionals also possess certain qualities that clients and prospects are unable to describe, but they “know them when they see them.”

“There are three things that require a unique way to communicate and turn into a signature persona. When buyers see these dynamics, they are instantly attracted,” writes Sullivan in her article, 3 Traits that Instantly Attract Buyers to You.

The three traits Sullivan writes about are comfortable transparency, effortless brilliance, and being approachable yet unavailable. Those three things tap buyers’ emotions, which drive most sales. Use them to “create a persona that intrigues a crowded marketplace,” Sullivan says.

Dynamic Phone Conversations

The traits Sobel and Sullivan describe are not restricted to in-person meetings. Wendy Weiss, the Queen of Cold Calling, says they apply to initial phone conversations you have with prospects. If you want the conversation to result in a meeting, you must be prepared to speak with the prospect and you must communicate things in a compelling manner.

“A lot of people don’t do the upfront homework that they need to do to understand the issues, the challenges that those prospects might have, and how to introduce [themselves] in such a way that it resonates with the person that [they're] talking to,” Weiss says in her podcast interview, Don’t Let these Myths and Misperceptions Derail Your Cold Calling Efforts.

The key is to talk about things your prospects are interested in and in a way that compels them to learn more.

Writing with Flair

You can also apply your communication style and business and industry expertise to your writing—articles, blog posts, ebooks, tweets, etc. Take a look at the tweets of industry gurus Alan Weiss (@BentleyGTCSpeed), Scott Ginsberg (@nametagscott), and David Meerman Scott (@dmscott). Or consider Seth Godin’s Blog and Jill Konrath’s Selling to Big Companies blog. Notice how their distinct style and voice comes through while at the same time they give you information you can apply to your business. It helps drive their success in the social media world.

Their success using social media often results in their content going viral. Hundreds if not thousands of people share their content via Twitter, Facebook, and email. Such viral success, however, is not limited to well-known gurus. As the Geisheker Group discovered, if you uncover a need, the solution you create to meet that need can lead to not only a surge in web traffic but thousands of dollars in revenue.

In a case study about the Geisheker Group, How a Small Company’s Ebook Went Viral and Generated $100K in Revenue, Gwen Moran explains how the firm’s ebook fulfilled a need many small businesses were struggling with—creating a marketing plan—but also established the company as an expert in the field and resulted in new clients.

“While some firms balk at giving away ideas and intellectual property, this has been a windfall for [founder Peter] Geisheker,” writes Moran. “By sharing his marketing ideas via the ebook and his information about specific marketing tactics each month in his newsletter, the firm has landed more than $100,000 in new business.”

Social Media Isn’t for Everyone

If all this talk about social media has you feeling pressure to use them, relax. The fact that these marketing vehicles exist does not mean you have to use them, says Andrea Obston in her article, Social Media: Take Two Breaths and Email Me in the Morning.

“They won’t necessarily drive the right clients to your bottom line if they don’t suit your marketing objectives and their needs,” she says.

Before you jump on the social media bandwagon, you need to ask yourself a few questions about your clients, what they want from you, how they want it delivered to them, and what it would take to get them to automatically seek you out.

If it turns out social media provides the vehicles your clients and prospects are interested in and you’re ready to commit to it, remember to use your distinct voice and persona, as well as your expertise, to add value. Add an interesting voice to the conversation; don’t bore them with talk about just you and your services.

Photo credit: Adam Bindslev

If you were given an additional $200,000 to spend on your lead generation efforts how would you spend it? Would you…

• Hire more marketing and sales staff
• Implement a marketing automation tool
• Run more seminars and events
• Improve search engine optimization
• Launch a new website
• Develop more content
• Publish thought leadership content (articles, white papers, case studies, etc.)
• Increase pay-per-click advertising
• Invest in email marketing
• Add a new CRM system
• Send out a 3D mail campaign
• Build a target list
• Advertise
• Build your social media presence (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, etc.)
• Implement sales training
• Hire a PR agency

With all of the various ways to generate new leads, what would you do?

How 636 Service Firm Leaders Would Spend the Money

In a survey RainToday.com conducted in partnership with ITSMA, we posed this same question to service firm leaders. Here are the top six ways they said they’d spend the money.

Top Ways Service Businesses Would Spend Extra $200K for Lead Generation

It’s no surprise that hiring additional staff is near the top of the list, especially since over the past two years we’ve all been asked to do more with less. Whether you’re in a company of one or 10,000, you always feel like if you just had another person to focus on X, Y, and Z, you’d be able to get so much more done.

The other items on the survey takers’ list show a huge shift away from traditional marketing and sales tactics – advertising, cold calling, direct mail, and email – towards content marketing and thought leadership development.

From our experience working with and speaking to professional services firms of all types and sizes, we know that thought leadership and content development help businesses build brand, develop targeted lists, build credibility and trust, get found, nurture leads, improve SEO, and build a PR platform—all of which help generate more and higher-quality leads. In fact, in another research report published by RainToday, we found that behind referrals in-person seminars are the leading way buyers find new service providers.

The move to content marketing and thought leadership development does not mean more traditional tactics are no longer important. In fact, I’d go so far as to say traditional tactics are even more important than these. Think about it:

• If you run a seminar and don’t invite target prospects via mail, email, and phone how many people do you think will show up?
• If you build a new website and don’t optimize it for search engines, send out emails directing prospects to the site, or advertise on Google, will anyone visit the site?
• If you write a new white paper or publish a new article, how are you going to get it into the hands of prospects?

Unlike the field of dreams, if you build it, prospects won’t come knocking.

Firms that attend to marketing basics—traditional marketing—and integrate their tactics online with content see the greatest growth and success.

How do you reach C-level execs?

Getting the word out about a high-tech company with a specialty service is always a challenge. But when the service is a patented procurement process, traditional approaches such as advertising and public relations are particularly ineffective.

William Gindlesperger, founder of e-LYNXX, recognized this, and he knew it would be crucial to market his patented technology exclusively to key decision makers.

For years, Gindlesperger relied on word of mouth from satisfied clients. But once his pending patent was approved and ready to be marketed, he needed to ramp up the company’s marketing efforts.

Here’s what they did to reach C-level executives:

• Build on your strengths. For many years, Gindlesperger wrote regular columns for the national and regional printing trade press. When he wanted to get the word out about the new technology, he returned to that venue.
• Get the word out. Once an article was written and edited, the marketing staff sent it to journals and trade associations that have published the company’s material in the past. They then posted the article on the company’s website and distributed it through free news release websites.
• Follow up. Once trade journal articles were distributed, marketing staff followed up with the publications’ editors to see if they wanted to interview someone at the company or have them customize an article just for their publication.
• Demonstrate expertise with content. White papers delivered the substantiated facts that B2B technology buyers required. Within one year, e-LYNXX wrote three white papers that were circulated during prospect and client meetings, as well as on its website.
• Never turn down the chance to make presentations to industry groups, business clubs, or potential clients. “I know that if I talk to a room of 100, 20 people will love me, 20 will hate me, and 60 will sleep right through my presentation,” Gindlesperger says. “That’s OK if I can connect with the 20 who love me.”

[Excerpt from RainToday case study How a Specialized High-Tech Company Used Monthly Articles and White papers to Reach C-Level Execs by Karen E. Klein.]

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Do you differentiate your services?

As Ren J. Carlton began to get Dynamic Advisory Solutions  (DAS) off the ground in 2000—or, at least, out of the basement of his metro Detroit home—he began to realize just how many other people offered services similar to his. Certified public accountants, garden-variety tax prep specialists, enrolled agents, retail storefronts selling financial services—the market was awash in people making a living doing other people’s tax preparation on the cheap.

“I heard a statistic once that there are more people who prepare tax returns in the United States than people who are in the military. So, at first, [our new business philosophy] was ‘anything for a dollar,’” he says, describing how he eked out a living.

But after spending thousands on a direct mail coupon campaign that generated zero results in spite of the 20% off services discount it offered, Carlton knew something had to give. He had to find a way to differentiate his firm from the many other tax preparation and financial advisory firms in the market.

Here’s what Carlton did:

• Stand out in a saturated market. Rather than promoting generalist accounting services and trying to be all things to all people, Carlton realized he had to differentiate the firm. He did that by taking a laser-focused approach to target clients in his most profitable segment: serving as an outsourced CFO or controller for small and mid-sized businesses.
• Build a reputation in a niche. To succeed in this niche Carlton had to build trust. So, he focused on networking with key influencers in the market.
• Become the expert in the field. To further build his reputation and give himself an even bigger boost as an expert, Carlton spread the word about his business with speaking gigs, a radio talk show, and a book.
• Leverage what you’ve built. To grow the firm even more, Carlton realized he could leverage the business processes he had already created and developed a plan for franchising.
• Follow a different path. The firm’s success at every turn was based on bucking conventional wisdom. Carlton narrowed his niche in a crowded market. He offered franchises—something few accounting firms do. In doing so, he increased the quality and profitability of his client base.

[Excerpt from RainToday case study Accounting Firm Discovers Niche and Sees Business Take Off by Gwen Moran. Photo credit: Jessica Spengler, WordRidden]