(Image by Mohamed Ibrahim)

The uncertain economy is making it difficult for many firms to break out of the economic doldrums that have been sitting over us for what seems like a really long time. Every once in a while we get a peek at the sun coming out from behind the dark clouds, but the clouds won’t move completely out of the way. The result is worried professionals trying to get business from companies whose leaders are also worried, stressed out, over worked, and bombarded with offers.

What does it take to get through to those buyers, who don’t see an end in sight to the chaos? It calls for analysis, planning, and old fashioned hard work. No one is going to give you a magic wand to wave.

You want to start by acknowledging your buyers’ predicament. They are, as Jill Konrath writes, suffering from “Frazzled Customer Syndrome,” and you need to approach them differently than how you have handled other prospects and leads in the past. In fact, “traditional sales strategies actually create insurmountable obstacles that can derail your sales efforts,” Konrath writes in her article, What to Do When Clients Suffer from ‘Frazzled Customer Syndrome’.

Following Konrath’s SNAP Rules, however, you can change how such prospects react to you. Start by keeping it simple. Make it easy for them to buy from you, she says. You also want to show that you’re invaluable, align what you do with what they want to achieve, and raise priorities.

Colleen Stanley adds that successful selling starts with having the right intent. Enter each sales call with a sincere desire to understand and help your prospects and clients, not simply make a quick sale.

“A salesperson who enters a sales call with a sincere desire to understand the prospect’s business and challenges will close more sales than the articulate, polished, lower-priced competitor,” Stanley writes in her article, The #1 Factor to Increase Sales Results. “Human beings are wired to sense dishonesty and lack of authenticity. Likewise, they can spot a person who is genuine and desires to do the right thing. Whom would you rather do business with?”

If you follow Stanley’s advice, not only are you more likely to win that sale but chances are high the client will refer you to others—the sweet spot for generating new business. They key is to make sure they’re quality referrals, which can be more challenging, writes Daniel Kehrer in his article, 7 Steps to Better Client Referrals. And that calls for first implementing a referral-generation plan, Kehrer says.

“Referrals aren’t automatic. Some business owners assume that a great product or terrific customer service will generate referrals by default. Not so. You have to learn to ask, and make sure employees are on board as well,” Kehrer says.

Follow that with giving clients some ammunition to help them refer you: business cards, brochures, link to your website or blog, he says.

If those items are content from your thought leadership platform, that’s even better. Those pieces of content—blog posts, white papers, bylined articles, articles in which you are quoted—help establish your authority.

You can also use those content pieces to build up your brand and become a go-to person in your industry, says Craig Badings in his podcast interview, Stop Practicing Random Acts of Content. But they must be part of a thought leadership platform that your entire firm adopts, says Badings, author of Brand Stand: Seven Steps to Thought Leadership.

“If thought leadership is not a part of corporate culture, then that thought leadership campaign is going to limp along and will never really achieve any great height,” he says.

Doing otherwise is just a PR campaign to drive coverage that is dressed up as thought leadership, Badings says.

Photo: Jason Gulledge

Last week, I had a long-overdue chat with a former colleague, a marketing director. We met in her office, and as I sat down at her work table, she scooped up piles of papers to make space for my coffee.

“Sorry,” she said. “I’m in major overwhelm mode here. Juggling too many writing projects and a new product launch.”

Well, I know that feeling, so I jumped right in.

“What are the writing projects? Is there anything you could hand off to a freelancer?” I asked.

“Well, there’s a white paper that needs writing, and we have no sales collateral for the new product launch,” she responded. “Why, do you know someone?”

“Sure.” I rattled off the name of a writer who specializes in writing white papers for the IT industry and another who would be a good fit for the sales collateral.

My friend was thrilled. I was happy to be able to help. And, importantly, those two writers each just received a referral. And, not just a generic “I need a writer referral.” I didn’t simply offer my friend the names of some “writers;” I gave her the names of an “IT industry white paper writer” and a “sales collateral writer.” Professionals who specialize in solving the exact problems she was facing.

Despite the growing number of ways to generate leads for professional services, e.g., direct mail, cold calling, email, online, webinars, and more, research shows that referrals are still the top way professionals generate leads.

Yet many professionals I speak with wonder why they don’t get more referrals. They wonder what they’re doing wrong—Not doing enough networking? Not going to the right events? Not asking for referrals? And often, those are indeed real problems. However, in many cases the lack of referrals stems from something else.

How did I know whom to refer to my friend the marketing director? Well, each of the professionals I referred did the groundwork for me.

Each has a tightly defined niche. They describe the work they perform in terms of the types of writing they specialize in, as well as the industries and clients they serve. Not only have they clearly defined their niche, but they communicate and reinforce that message.

• One is a frequent speaker at events that showcase her white paper expertise and industry experience. She reinforces her niche on her website and in her tweets. She writes blog posts and articles about white papers on related industry sites.
• One keeps in close contact with me, with phone calls and email updates. She lets me know about projects she’s working on, recent successes, and her availability to take on new work. Her email signature includes her special focus, a link to her blog and website, and association awards she’s received.

Unlike some professionals who try to be all things to all people, neither is afraid to define the niche they serve and devote all their energy to cultivating that niche.

They make it easy for me to refer them.

How do you make it easy for your contacts to refer you?

Get Back to the Basics: Services Marketing 101 (photo by drp)

Back to School;
Back to Marketing Basics

It’s that time of year: back to school time. You can’t visit a mall or department store without seeing kids fighting over backpacks and picking out their first day of school wear.

This is also the time of year when vacations wind down and professionals return to their offices recharged and ready to kick off new initiatives to carry them through the end of the year, as well as set the table for a strong 2011. (Can you believe we’re already thinking about 2011?)

As students get back into their school routines, we’re getting back to the marketing basics for professional services firms. Here are seven foundational elements that should be a part of every services firm’s marketing plan:

1. Writing: Writing articles is a great way to increase your reach and your authority. Look to publish your articles in industry and association publications, business journals, on your blog or newsletter, and on industry websites. It takes time for this tactic to take hold. You can’t write one article, publish it on a website, and expect the leads to start flowing in. You need to write and publish on a regular basis. Do this and you can start to build a real guru status for yourself in your particular niche.

2. Speaking:  Public speaking goes hand-in-hand with tip #1. Speaking engagements are an incredibly powerful way to share your expertise, boost your credibility, and meet new prospects. I know of professional services firms that have been successful in building their entire firms simply by getting their professionals out and speaking on a regular basis.

3. Networking: When it comes to marketing and selling professional services, it’s all about relationships. The first place to look for new business is from the relationships you already have with family, friends, colleagues, past clients, etc.

You should work constantly to build up your network and to strengthen your relationships. Find two or three industry groups or associations that your clients and prospects are members of. Attend events held by these groups. Better yet, speak at these events (see #2), write in these industry publications (see #1), and then network with the members.

4. Referrals: This is an oldie but a goodie, and it’s something that often gets overlooked. Diligently ask for referrals. Your clients want to help you succeed, so help them help you.

5. Warm and cold calling: Warm and cold calling are tremendously effective tactics to generate leads with prospects. While many professionals shy away from making calls—and it’s certainly not for everyone—if you have a good list and strong message, it can get you in the door of prospects who may not have even known you existed. For tips on how to get started, check out these three  Cold Calling Scripts.

6. Direct mail and email: Warm up your cold calls by sending a direct mail letter in advance. I’ve found that a letter, call, email, call sequence works very well to warm up cold prospects. Use value based offers  such as a recent article you wrote (see tip #1), information on an upcoming speaking engagement (see tip #2), or an upcoming networking event (see tip #3) that they might like to attend.

7. Lead nurturing: You can implement all of the above tactics and generate a steady flow of new leads, but if you don’t have a lead nurturing plan, all’s for naught. Don’t let the prospects that you’ve worked so hard to get fall through the cracks. Stay in touch and walk them through the sales process.

While there are many tactics (too many to list in one blog post) that can, and do, generate leads for professional services firms, these seven will help you build a strong foundation for additional marketing activities. The key is to not rely on one tactic alone. You can see how each of these tactics work together to help you build credibility, boost your authority, and generate new relationships that ultimately lead to new business.

So this fall, get back to the marketing basics, and you’ll start to see the new leads and new business begin to flow in.

(Photo by Ravenwood)

How are you reaching prospects and clients? If you’ve settled on one tactic (email, social media, or phone calls, for example), you might want to reconsider that. Chances are that one tactic doesn’t allow you to reach your entire audience. Different people like different approaches, and you owe it to yourself and your business to figure out what those are and use them.

What tactics are working for B2B professional services firms? Let’s take a look:

Online video: Prospects, when they don’t have a referral, turn to the web for advice, solutions to their problems, and companies who can help them solve their problems. Even if they get a referral, they will still go to your website to learn about you before meeting you in person. They’re trying to get a feel for you and if you are a right fit for them, and online video can help win them over.

“Videos are a strong marketing tactic for any type of professional services firm,” writes Sharon Berman in her article, How to Use Video to Get Up Front and Personal with Your Prospects.

You can create videos that show the people behind the firm, as well as video testimonials that have clients telling powerful success stories. Either strategy will allow you to connect with website visitors on a personal level, Berman says.

Webinars: Webinars take the online experience for prospects up a level. They allow you to demonstrate your expertise and skills, as well as interact with attendees through Q&A segments. For an hour you can help attendees work out a problem and give them an opportunity to get to know you and start to trust you. At the same time, you help build your brand and establish your thought leadership.

When done well, webinars can result in new clients. But the key is to do them well, stresses Lee Salz, author of Stop Speaking for Free: The Ultimate Guide to Making Money with Webinars. For example, you can’t write a white paper (which people can download for free) and then do a webinar on that white paper. That’s because you’re basically giving an infomercial on the paper, which people already have access to. No one will attend a free webinar on that topic, let alone pay to attend.

Salz explains in his podcast interview, How to Attract Clients and Make Money Using Webinars, strategies for producing webinars that not only get people’s attention but lead to new business and revenue for your firm.

Mobile devices/smartphones: These days when nearly every professional has a BlackBerry, iPhone, Android, or some other smartphone, you can count on those people to use those devices to access information quickly while they’re on the go. It could be to check email, get directions to your office, or learn more about your services after their friend recommends you. Is your marketing email mobile-friendly? Is your website optimized for mobile access? Can they easily find your phone number and address on your site?

Those are just a few things to consider when devising your mobile marketing strategy, writes Jessica Wilganowski in her article, The Rise of the Smartphone: Why Your Business Needs a Mobile Presence. If you have loyal clients, you might also want to consider developing a mobile application to keep them engaged with you and your firm.

Don’t make the mistake of assuming your prospects and clients aren’t interested in or won’t respond to mobile marketing techniques. Do the research to find out for sure. If there’s interest, and your competitors aren’t using them, this is your chance to distinguish yourself from the pack.

Articles and white papers: Increasingly traditional advertising and PR campaigns fail to generate new leads. There’s too much competition and what prospects see doesn’t help them connect with providers. They’re seeking advice and solutions, and articles and white papers provide that while at the same time put your name in front of them.

e-LYNXX Corporation, a high-tech firm that helps organizations with print projects, has seen significant success with that type of content, writes Karen E. Klein in her case study, How a Specialized High-Tech Company Used Monthly Articles and White Papers to Reach C-Level Execs. The company is leveraging in-house expertise to write monthly articles, building media relationships, and taking advantage of free online posting opportunities.

“We feel that an article or an interview carries more influence than a paid-for advertisement, and that is another reason why we develop editorial content as tools for telling our story,” says company founder William Gindlesperger.
The effort is paying off for e-LYNXX. As a result, it gets its expertise in front of thousands of c-level executives and it ranks at the top of search engine results.

What Doesn’t Work

If prospects and clients think Requests for Proposals (RFPs) will help them make a good decision about which provider is best for them, they are greatly mistaken, writes Charles H. Green in his article, Open Letter to Clients: Why You Should Drop the RFP.

While RFPs serve a purpose for government contracts, where “the appearance of improper influence is per se destructive of our faith in government,” and in private organizations where there’s a history of buying abuse, in most other cases they are used “to the detriment of the buying organization,” Green says. For example, they prevent prospects and clients from having open dialogues with providers. With RFPs clients shut themselves off from any advice and guidance a provider could offer—usually for free.

Fear is often the motive for RFPs, as buyers are afraid that weasely sales people will talk them into something they don’t need. But any professional worth his grain will stay away from doing that and instead provide “some level of insight, perspective, and information that the client didn’t have, if only to demonstrate their competence,” Green says.

Your goal as a services professional is to help prospects and clients understand that.

(Photo by David Ritter)

On the RainMaker Blog we often share tips, tactics, and strategies to help you bring in new clients, grow your business, and succeed with marketing and sales.
But just as important as what you should do to grow your business is what you should not do.

Here are six all-too-common sales mistakes professionals make when selling their services:

1. Not building rapport: Trust is the foundation of all sales. If someone doesn’t trust you, they won’t buy from you. And trust building starts early on with rapport. The lifelong lesson your mother taught you when you were young rings true: you have only one chance to make a good first impression.

Within the first few seconds of meeting you, a buyer’s opinion will form—is this person real, are they credible, do I trust them in my gut? All of these questions flood the buyer’s mind the first time you open your mouth. Either they feel like they’ve made a positive connection with you or not.

In your selling efforts, don’t jump in and ask tough questions or probe too deeply into the company’s financials or other sensitive data. Take the first few minutes to make a connection with the prospect and show that you are interested in them as a person.

2. Uncovering only surface-level needs: Often what clients initially state as their need is not the true need. Beneath the surface is a slew of other needs waiting to be uncovered. For example your client might say:

• “I need a website.” What they are really saying and what you can get them thinking is: “I need a way to take online orders to increase our distribution and grow revenue.” Or, “I need to generate more leads, and I see opportunities to capture leads on our website.”
• “I need my technology supported.” What they are really saying is: “I need my networks up and running 24/7 so people can work all day and not lose productive time.” Or, “I can’t afford to hire a full-time IT person, but we need regular preventative maintenance so that I can rest easy knowing our data is safe and secure.”

You must learn to ask questions and peel back the onion to get to the core of the need. What you want to get to is the “why.” Why do they have this need and why is this important to their business? Once you know the “why” behind the need, you can craft the best solution that covers the full range of needs and addresses the root of the problem.

3. Failing to demonstrate the value of your solution: You’re selling something intangible, and it is often difficult for your prospects to know exactly what they are buying. If you fail to communicate the value of your solution—the outcome the client will get as a result of working with you—the client will see only the cost and the risk associated with it. You need to help mitigate this perceived risk, and the best way to do that is by making the business case for engaging your services.

Demonstrate your value in terms of the revenue growth you’ll help them achieve, the cost savings, the increased productivity, etc. Spell out the value as clearly as possible and present the cost within the context of that value.

4. Talking too much: Whether it’s because you want to demonstrate your expertise, you are nervous, you want to fill the silence, or you like to hear yourself speak, the fact is most professionals talk too much in their sales conversations. When you talk too much, prospects feel like they aren’t being heard, and that often leads to a disconnect in the needs you uncover, your ability to truly understand those needs, and your ability to dig down and uncover the root of the need (see mistake #2).

A general rule of thumb is to talk only about 20% of the time. If you’ve attended to mistake #1, you’ve already built the necessary amount of rapport and the prospect feels comfortable talking with you. Now you need to ask thought-provoking, open-ended questions to get the prospect to open up and share what’s going on in their business. The more you can learn about them and their business the better you’ll be able to tailor your solution to exactly what they need.

5. All planning and no action: You may talk about doing business development and spend days planning for it—two days at a training program building your selling skills, hours building a list of folks in your network to contact, working with your marketing team to make sure your CRM system will support your efforts, writing your script and exactly what you want to say on the phone—but all of it leads to little action.

Half of sales success is actually showing up and doing it. You could have the best list and the best script in the world, but if you don’t pick up the phone and start dialing, none of that is going to matter. Stop planning and thinking about doing business development, and start doing it.

6. Failing to plan: On the flip side of mistake #5 is failing to plan at all. If you don’t have a plan and hold yourself accountable to that plan, it is likely that your business development efforts will get pushed to the back burner the second you kick off that next big client assignment.

Plan not only the time you’ll spend on sales (we call this your sacred selling time), but also each and every sales conversation. Know what you want to get out the conversation and go into the meeting with a next step in mind. Once you have a plan and you’re executing according to that plan (see mistake #5), you’ll find that your meetings and overall selling efforts will become much more productive.

Think about the last sales conversation you had. Did you make any of these mistakes? If so, what can you do during your next conversation to avoid making them again? Share with us how it goes!

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?

(Photo by Taro Yamamoto)

We’ve all seen blogs that have made us shake our heads. The design is outrageous, you can’t find contact information to save your life, there are broken links, pages don’t render, or (here’s a comical one) they have keywords listed over and over again in attempt to fool the search engines.

As bad as those are, they aren’t the worst things you can do. The worst thing you can do with your blog is pretend to be something (or someone) you aren’t. This is especially critical for services professionals, as you are essentially selling yourselves. You are providing the services your prospects seek. They need to trust you and believe in you. And that can’t happen if you are a phony.

Unfortunately this misrepresentation happens all too often, professional blogger Chris Garrett told me in a recent interview. In his preview to his upcoming webinar, Attract Clients and Grow Your Business Using Blogs, Garrett said he sees people taking other people’s blog posts, changing the name and posting them as their own. Sometimes they don’t even change the name and republish the work in its entirety without permission. He also sees people making outrageous claims about what they can do.

People—your prospects—want to connect with real human beings, Garrett said.

Chris Garrett presents "Attract Clients and Build Your Business Using Blogs" on Aug. 26

“The power of being yourself means you do create a bond with your prospects. People do feel like they have a connection with you. And they feel like they’d rather work with you than somebody else,” he said. “Whenever I write about a mistake I’ve made so people don’t make the same mistake, I get more inquiries because people see me as someone not trying to be this perfect robot. I’m a real human being.”

Blogs, when done correctly, allow you to establish trust and build relationships. Both of those are critical when selling professional services.

“Given the choice, we’d rather work with people we know, like and trust. And blogs help you do that because you’re communicating over a period of time. You’re not trying to get the sale in 10 minutes on the first visit. You’re actually building up a relationship, and that is really powerful stuff providing you’re open and authentic rather than trying to be a fake,” Garrett said.

Want to Hear More?

Listen to the full interview with Garrett to learn more about mistakes people make when blogging, features that work well on blogs, and techniques to get people to notice and comment on your blog:

And for even more information about the business benefits of blogging, watch Garrett’s webinar (available on-demand), Attract Clients and Grow Your Business Using Blogs.

(Photo by Microstock Photography)

It would be nice if we could say someone or something else is the reason for our not succeeding. The burden would be off of us. Someone else is making us do something, so blame them. It’s kind of like when you were a kid and everyone else controlled what you did—your parents, your teachers, your coach, etc. “It’s not my fault. Dad said to do that,” as my 13-year-old daughter is fond of saying.

She may be right in a certain sense. But it’s those guidelines and restrictions that enable us to eventually make our own decisions. As an adult, you cannot say, “Blame my mother. She told me to do that.” As an employee, you cannot say, “It didn’t work because my boss didn’t tell me I had to do that.” As a business owner, you cannot say, “It’s not my fault we don’t have clients. It’s because of the economy [or the weather or the holidays or the full moon].” You are the only person who can determine your success and your business’s success. It’s up to you to take ownership of it and do all that you can to make it work.

Consider professional services sales. Are you doing all that you can to generate leads and keep the pipeline full? Are you in contact with prospects, making sure they understand the value you offer over others in your field? Are you maintaining and even building on existing relationships with clients? As Rob Benson writes in his article, How to Deal with Lost Sales: A Lesson from the Links, you have to “work the system. Do the basics, and do them well.”

Yes, you will lose sales and clients may walk away, but those misses won’t cause you or your business to fail if you have a strong sales system, Benson says. If you work the system effectively—clarify your value proposition, establish credibility, and put yourself in a place to meet those who might need your services—you will generate enough leads so that a lost sale doesn’t hurt so much.

Get to the Decision Makers

Working the system effectively also means figuring out how to get to the decision makers and get them to listen to you. There’s no doubt that they’re insanely busy and that many firms are vying for their attention, but you cannot let that be an excuse. You must find a way to stand out among all the others, Larry Stybel and Maryanne Peabody write in their article, Selling Services to Time-Starved Executives Who Desperately Need to Ignore You.

“You are seeking to get noticed by leaders who have too many responsibilities and too little time. If they pay equal attention to all stimuli, they will surely be ineffective. Cognitive guidelines that allow them to avoid paying attention can be an important leadership mechanism for success,” they write. “This is The Spiro Agnew Framework. And it is both crude and necessary for leaders to be successful.”

It is up to you to break the Spiro Agnew Framework, and you can do it if you follow Stybel and Peabody’s suggestions: create a new category and dominate it and focus on your services as an answer to a management dilemma.

Blogs can help you achieve that, as The Search Agency discovered. Until recently, the online search marketing firm had a relatively low industry profile. It decided it had to change that if it wanted buyers to not only find it but recognize it as the online search marketing firm. It turned to blogging as a way to establish itself as a thought leader and trusted resource, and as a result has grown revenues by 37%.

“Our company is engaged in dialogue that shows our depth and breadth of expertise. And with our team members in India and the UK contributing, the blog helps position us as a global agency with the talent and technology to optimize search marketing campaigns in many different markets,” says Alec Green, vice president of marketing for the agency.

Communication is Key

Your sales success also depends on your non-verbal communication skills, says Sharon Sayler in her podcast interview, Is Your Body Language Hurting Your Sales Efforts? You can have the best website with all of the SEO tactics in place, the most creative blog, and the most dynamic sales collateral, but if you give off negative signals during meetings with prospects or during presentations none of that will matter.

Your body movement, voice, and eye contact all play a role in drawing people toward you—or pushing them away, Sayler says. For example, breathing quickly can cause prospects to think there’s something wrong and being too friendly too quickly can cause them to think you’re ingenuous.

You might think that those are your personality traits and that’s just the way you are, but then you would be pointing the finger again instead of taking responsibility if the deal falls through. You can change these things. All it takes is practice, Sayler says.

When you win the deal and sign the new client, you’re not off the hook. The success of that business relationship depends on you making it work. Be up front about what your new client can expect from you, initiate dialogue so that you both understand each other, and encourage them to be a part of the process so you can better help them.

In Michael W. McLaughlin’s recent article, A Letter to Your Client: Help Me Help You, he has written an open letter to a new client about how to make the project a success. While I don’t suggest sending this letter to your new clients, I do think you need to address the issues included in it and make sure you and your client are on the same page. Your initiative will help you deliver what you promised and help you retain the client for future work. You, and only you, are responsible for its—and your—success.

Are you doing the right things to turn cold prospects into new clients?

There’s a distinct difference between those prospects who contact you to learn more about your services (we’ll call these inbound leads) and those prospects whom you contact and secure a meeting with to talk about your services (we’ll call these outbound leads).

When it’s an inbound lead, the prospect comes to you because they have a need and already have an understanding that you are someone who could help them.

When generating outbound leads through your marketing and selling efforts the dynamics are very different. The prospect often is unsure of the need, the value you bring to the table, and if it’s worthwhile to engage in a conversation with you.

The differences are obvious, yet our marketing and sales process and communication for both types of leads is often the same. This leads to unproductive conversations with cold prospects that go nowhere. Outbound-generated leads can and do result in new clients; however, the process requires a different approach. Here are five tips to help you turn those cold prospects into new clients:

1. Be patient with the prospect.

Don’t expect the prospect to go from a first conversation to a new client in 30 days. It rarely happens that quickly. Remember, this is a “cold” prospect, he’s never heard of you before, and you are initiating the conversation.

Have patience with these prospects, and be prepared to shepherd them through a long buying cycle. Trust, credibility, and expertise are essential elements to a professional services sale and do not happen overnight. Be prepared to invest time in the relationship to help it grow.

2. Stay in touch with the prospect.

Nurturing and planned follow-up is required. Refer to tip #1—it is a long buying cycle. Develop a touch plan where you reach out to the prospect monthly through direct mail, phone, and email. Stay top of mind, and when the prospect’s elusive time of need does arise, you’ll be the first person they think of.

3. Provide value in each contact.

With every touch provide some piece of value. Following up just to “see how it’s going” will not enhance the relationship. Instead, answer questions and send articles. Have a reason to reach out. Provide examples of how you helped similar companies with case studies and stories.

If it is a first conversation, have questions that start a dialogue and uncover needs related to your services. Then share some best practices based on your experience working with companies in similar situations.

These types of value touches help build the credibility and trust necessary to win an initial engagement with any prospect.

4. Focus your energy on leads that will be a good fit for you and your services.

Your first task when initiating a conversation with a cold prospect is to determine if they are a good fit. This involves knowing your ideal client profile, including industry, revenue size, and level/title of individuals within the company.

Beyond that, it also requires determining the prospect’s BANT—budget, authority, need, and timeline. Focus first and foremost on the authority and need. If you can uncover a need with a decision maker and move it up his priority list, that person can usually find or make a budget and develop a timeline.

5. Have a clear value proposition.

The goal with any prospect is to start a relationship, and all relationships start with a first conversation. The key is to have a compelling and succinct value proposition so the prospect understands the value you bring to the table and the areas where you can help. Demonstrate how you are different from the thousands of other accountants, lawyers, or consultants out there.

With these five tips you’ll eventually see the temperature of those cold prospects rise, along with your revenue.

(Photo by Brent Moore)

The competition among professional services firms is tough. There are some signs of economic improvement, but still more firms are vying for fewer buyer dollars. You have to do something to get their attention and get them to want your services.

For many firms, that something is free offerings and services—not just lower prices, but free. Now, it makes sense to offer some things for free, such as articles, video and audio recordings, and online assessments, because those things help you build up trust and demonstrate that you provide value. In fact, Andrew Sobel says in his article—Should You Offer Free Services?—that the higher your fees, the more free digital content you are likely to give away.

But if you think providing free samples or major pieces of work will help you beat the competition and win deals, think carefully before doing anything. It could work if it’s done strategically, as Sobel illustrates in his article, but it could easily backfire and portray you as weak and desperate.

“You can give away work from strength—if and only if it’s positioned properly and the circumstances are right—and you can do it from weakness, which may make you look desperate and even pathetic,” he says.

You might consider advertising as a way to get prospects to notice you, but this is another area in which you must tread carefully. Advertising for professional services is significantly different than product advertising. The goal ultimately is to help a firm build a reputation and name recognition that reinforces other marketing efforts to attract and sell clients. It is not to sell a specific service that day. You can’t sell a service unless there’s need.

Many firms struggle with advertising, but the law firm of Ogletree Deakins seems to have created “the perfect law firm ad campaign,” says Bruce W. Marcus in his article, Ogletree Deakins Gets it Right: The Perfect Law Firm Ad.

“Ogletree’s committed program seems to recognize that the purpose of law firm advertising, as opposed to product advertising, is to build name recognition and reputation, which cannot be done effectively with infrequent ads,” Marcus writes. “The problem with most law and accounting firm advertising is that it tries to create clients with its ads, which it rarely does. Who hires a lawyer or accountant from an ad?”

If you’re considering an advertising campaign, check out Marcus’s article for more information about what Ogletree Deakins did and to see an example of a firm that handled its campaign badly.

How else can you get prospects to notice you and build relationships with prospective buyers? Through social media networks, says Todd Schnick. You may not believe it, but your buyers do use social media networks, and you’re foolish to not try to connect with them there, he says in his article, B2B Businesses and Social Media—No More Excuses.

“Mail me one penny for every time you’ve heard this line: ‘The kind of people I sell to aren’t on social media,’ ” Schnick says. “I hear this all the time. And while I want to get angry at these souls for feeling this way, I don’t. Because I know that they just don’t see it, just don’t believe it. Or, in many instances, they aren’t willing to do the work necessary.”

That’s the secret—it takes work and time. Social media is not a quick-sale platform. Follow the guidelines Schnick outlines in his article, and you’ll build a structure that will allow you to demonstrate your value and will eventually lead to new business.

If it’s your firm’s sales skills that are standing in the way of success, a training program might be needed. But how do you choose a provider that’s right for you? Now the tables are turned and you’re the buyer. Fortunately, there are some resources to help you decide, including the Sales Training Vendor Guide from ES Research Group. In this week’s RainToday podcast—Which Sales Training Program Is Right for You?—ES Research CEO Dave Stein discusses some of the findings in the report, including the top companies in the different categories, the state of online training, and the effectiveness of sales assessment tools.

My question to you now: What are you doing to stand out among the competition and make the sale?