what are you selling on?
by martin bissett
business development on a budget
the secret to overcoming failure to correctly implement a successful business development strategy is by “winning your first client” and this starts by being accountable to someone for your performance.
more: how to prepare for partnership | stop waiting for business to come to you | four key questions about leadership | showing leadership through customer service | the real math behind the sales pipeline | keep business development going during busy season | walk the commitment walk | two steps toward mastering selling | thirteen ways to show commitment | clients can’t grow without you | seven mistakes in winning new fees | how to develop your communication abilities | five questions for measuring partner potential
now that “someone” may be your fellow partners in the firm. if you are a senior manager, that may be the partner to whom you report.
if you’re a sole practitioner or if you don’t find being accountable to your partners helpful, then you can be accountable to your life partner, spouse or another person you wouldn’t want to see you fail.
so we get that push from being accountable to someone, someone we want to make sure is impressed by what we do, who we don’t want to fall foul of. that is how we overcome failure to implement in a very, very simple way.
once we’re prepared to do that, we can start the process of winning our first client.
what follows are the 8 pieces of value, which empower you to do just that.
- do you create an impressive perception of yourself and your firm to prospective clients?
- do you consider yourself successful in life?
- do you set yourself up to win on a daily basis?
- do you find differentiating yourself and your firm from your competitors to be easy?
- do you chase new fees or do you attract them?
- do you discount and lowball your fees to win work?
- do you set aside specific non-interruptible time to work on business development efforts on a weekly basis?
- do you sell on price or on value?