The Irresistible Consultant's Guide to Winning Clients

Author: David A. Fields
Publisher: Morgan James Publishing
ISBN: 1683501659
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 273

Book Description
This deeply insightful guide to understanding what clients really want is “an indispensable resource for consultants” (Keith Ferrazzi, #1 New York Times-bestselling author of Never Eat Alone). Independent consulting is a potentially lucrative enterprise—but the reality seldom matches the dream. Most solo consultants and boutique consulting firms are perpetually within six months of bankruptcy due to the sputtering unreliability of their new business engines. The problem, according to international consulting expert David A. Fields, is twofold: 1) lack of a consistent, proven plan, and 2) fundamental misunderstanding about what clients want in a consultant. Fields, who has helped hundreds of consultants and boutique firms worldwide build profitable, sustainable practices, replaces the typical consultant’s mindset of emphasizing expertise and differentiated processes with a focus on building relationships, engendering trust, and solving clients’ existing problems. In The Irresistible Consultant’s Guide to Winning Clients, Fields synthesizes his decades of experience into a step-by-step approach to winning more projects from more clients at higher fees. From nuts-and-bolts business advice and tactics to a deeply insightful breakdown of the human side of a very human profession, Fields, named one of Advertising Age magazine’s “Marketing Top 100,” delivers a comprehensive guidebook that is at once highly approachable and satisfyingly detailed. “If I could have just one book on client strategy, this book would be it.” —Marshall Goldsmith, #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Triggers

The Executive’s Guide to Consultants: How to Find, Hire and Get Great Results from Outside Experts

Author: David Fields
Publisher: McGraw Hill Professional
ISBN: 0071801936
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 306

Book Description
Maximize Your Return on Expertise Research shows a high proportion of consultants fail to deliver results on time, on budget, and on target. Rare is the project that exceeds your expectations. But help is here. The Executive's Guide to Consultants explains how to ensure that every project delivers measurable benefits every time. This book will help you find experts, invest wisely, accelerate change, and achieve your most important goals by tapping into the genius of others. The Executive's Guide to Consultants contains breakthrough ideas covered by no other book, including: Sophisticated new contract structures that maximize your ROI Essential methods for reducing project risk Cutting-edge techniques for making change stick after the consultant leaves You will also learn to: Spot "chameleons" and other low-quality consultants who peddle tired ideas and deliver disappointing outcomes Get better results faster, while lowering fees Find the ideal consultant, coach, agency, or advisor for your precise situation Enforce accountability with outside experts and your own internal team Imagine if you could collect the wisdom of dozens of the country's top CEOs, combine it with the experience of a hall-of-fame consultant, and add a bucketful of unconventional thinking. You'd have The Executive's Guide to Consultants. Easy to read and packed with examples, checklists, templates, and guidelines, this book is the ultimate toolkit for maximizing your ROI from outside experts. Get extraordinary results from every consultant you hire "An extraordinary book. Clear, comprehensive, and eminently readable, it is THE book on how you can extract true business value from outside experts." -- Scott Cotherman, Chairman, TBWA\WorldHealth, subsidiary of Omnicom Group, Inc. "This is the Master Class for those who are smart, innovative, ahead of the pack, and who intend to stay that way. If you're not yet in that league, you should read this book twice." -- Alan Weiss, author, Million Dollar Consulting and The Consulting Bible "A terrific guidebook, with much of the advice equally applicable in managing your organization's internal talent. It's an easy, engaging read with a wealth of insights and detailed action steps--I highly recommend it." -- Brian Walker, President and CEO, Herman Miller, Inc. "A powerful antidote to the strained relationship between consultants and clients." -- Garry Ridge, CEO, WD-40 Company "This book shows you how to make your consultants' work stick. No more major investments in experts or programs that evaporate after only a few months or years." -- De Lyle Bloomquist, President, Tata Global Chemicals "Fields's messages are delivered in the way that all executives would like our outside resources to do it: capably, with straight talk and incredible insight." -- Ralph Scozzafava, Chairman and CEO, Furniture Brands

How Clients Buy

Author: Tom McMakin
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 111943470X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 279

Book Description
The real-world guide to selling your services and bringing in business How Clients Buy is the much-needed guide to selling your services. If you're one of the millions of people whose skills are the 'product,' you know that you cannot be successful unless you bring in clients. The problem is, you're trained to do your job—not sell it. No matter how great you may be at your actual role, you likely feel a bit lost, hesitant, or 'behind' when it comes to courting clients, an unfamiliar territory where you're never quite sure of the line between under- and over-selling. This book comes to the rescue with real, practical advice for selling what you do. You'll have to unlearn everything you know about sales, but then you'll learn new skills that will help you make connections, develop rapport, create interest, earn trust, and turn prospects into clients. Business development is critical to your personal success, and your skills in this area will dictate the course of your career. This invaluable guide gives you a set of real-world best practices that can help you become the rainmaker you want to be. Get the word out and make productive connections Drop the fear of self-promotion and advertise your accomplishments Earn potential clients' trust to build a lasting relationship Scrap the sales pitch in favor of honesty, positivity, and value Working in the consulting and professional services fields comes with difficulties not encountered by those who sell tangible products. Services are often under-valued, and become among the first things to go when budgets get tight. It is now harder than ever to sell professional services, so your game must be on-point if you hope to out-compete the field. How Clients Buy shows you how to level up and start winning the client list of your dreams.

Consulting Success

Author: Michael Zipursky
Publisher: Consulting Success
ISBN: 9781775041115
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 306

Book Description
How can you take your skills and expertise and package and present it to become a successful consultant? There are proven time-tested principles, strategies, tactics and best-practices the most successful consultants use to start, run and grow their consulting business. Consulting Success teaches you what they are. In this book you'll learn: - How to position yourself as a leading expert and authority in your marketplace - Effective marketing and branding materials that get the attention of your ideal clients - Strategies to increase your fees and earn more with every project - The proposal template that has generated millions of dollars in consulting engagements - How to develop a pipeline of business and attract ideal clients - Productivity secrets for consultants including how to get more done in one week than most people do in a month - And much, much more

The Consultant's Guide to Winning Clients

Author: Herman Holtz
Publisher: Wiley
ISBN: 9780471627593
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 262

Book Description
A consultant's guide to finding potential clients and developing prospects into long-term customers. Offers a range of how-to marketing methods, including seminars, newsletters, brochures, and direct mail. Shows how to qualify prospects, submit proposals, and negotiate contracts. Also presents the best ways to keep clients and develop add-on projects with them. The book contains a valuable section on government consulting opportunities, including listings of federal, state, and local agencies that use consultants, with advice on how to reach them.

Name Your Price

Author: Kate Dixon
Publisher: Oceanside Press
ISBN: 9781734699227
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 236

Book Description
Are you running your business, or is your business running you? Too many consultants, freelancers, coaches, and service providers rely on gut feelings and the rumor mill to make pricing and terms decisions for their businesses. If that's you, then you already know those strategies don't work - they can prevent you from earning what you're worth, keep you up at night, and may even get you into situations that can threaten the health of your business. But you can do better. Name Your Price offers clear methods and easily tailored principles so you can focus on what's important to you - running your business with resounding success. In Name Your Price, you'll learn: How to set your core pricing structure based on proven models used by top freelancers and consultants How to identify risks and build them into your pricing model How to set terms and write agreements that benefit you and your clients - and protect your time How and when to negotiate with clients and how to have tough conversations When to adjust your pricing and how to do it smoothly When to say no to clients and how to do it gracefully How to set the tone and teach clients how to treat you How to shift your mindset and get out of your own way And how to put it all together so you can move forward with confidence Discover simple and powerful ways to take the lead in your business to get more growth, more energy, and more satisfaction. Author Kate Dixon's clients use these principles to run profitable and fulfilling businesses - now you can, too. You've done the work. You've built your brand. Now Name Your Price!

Attracting Perfect Customers

Author: Stacey Hall
Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers
ISBN: 1609940377
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 234

Book Description
“A step-by-step approach to increasing your happiness, as well as your profitability and success in business . . . A very provocative concept.” —Gerry Myers, author of Targeting the New Professional Woman Most businesses spend far too much of their time and energy struggling to get new customers or hang on to existing ones—even customers who are ultimately more trouble than they’re worth. Attracting Perfect Customers invites readers to move beyond the notions that “business is war” and winning market share means “beating” the other guy. The authors outline a simple strategic process for making businesses so highly attractive that perfect customers and clients are naturally drawn right to them. Sound too good to be true? Hall and Brogniez have successfully shown clients how to do it for years, and now they share their secrets. They prove that war-like marketing techniques seem antiquated and labor-intensive when compared to the Strategic Attraction Planning process, which requires just five minutes each day and enables any business to easily attract customers that are a perfect fit for their organization—the kind of customers it is a pleasure to serve. The authors reveal the six success standards of strategic synchronicity and share simple, fun, and easy-to-follow exercises that can be applied to any organization. They walk you through the process of creating your own personalized Strategic Attraction Plan and provide 21 supportive tips for making any company more attractive to its perfect customers. Attracting Perfect Customers will take you to a place where there is an abundance of perfect customers and clients with whom you can build strong, satisfying, profitable, and lasting relationships.

The Consultant's Guide to Proprosal Writing

Author: Herman Holtz
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 9780471249177
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
THE CONSULTANT'S GUIDE TO PROPOSAL WRITING Third Edition When clients make the decision to hire you, they are putting more than money on the line. They are also putting their company's future and its reputation in your hands. That's why your success depends on your ability to gain prospective clients' complete confidence, not only in the solutions you offer, but in you -your capabilities and character. In this latest edition of his bestselling guide, Herman Holtz-the "Consultant's Consultant"-shows that the most effective means of doing this is with a strategic, well-written proposal. But that's only part of the picture. He also shows you why and how a winning proposal, when correctly used, is an indispensable tool for forging lasting relationships with clients and increasing income. The first book devoted exclusively to this critical consulting skill, The Consultant's Guide to Proposal Writing takes you through all of the steps involved in researching, planning, designing, writing, and presenting winning proposals. Drawing upon nearly three decades of experience as a successful consultant to both government and Fortune 500 companies, Herman Holtz shares everything he knows about what clients really want to see in a proposal and how to give it to them. He also provides valuable tips on effective language and design, what information to include and what to leave out, how not to undersell or oversell yourself, and how to generate interest in additional and future services. This Third Edition has been thoroughly updated to cover all of the important technological advances that have occurred since the last edition, as well as important new trends in the consulting markets themselves. You'll find a new chapter on how to market yourself in cyberspace via Web sites, e-mail, and other online resources, plus a new section on the latest in desktop publishing technology and how to make the most of it. This edition also features guidance for the growing numbers of consultants specializing in proposal writing, and for professional writers who would like to add proposal writing to the services they offer clients. The Consultant's Guide to Proposal Writing, Third Edition gives you everything you need to know to simplify one of the most difficult consulting jobs-winning clients. From America's foremost expert on consulting, a complete guide to developing winning proposals A winning proposal is more than just a statement of proposed consulting services. An effective, well-crafted proposal is a valuable marketing tool that can: * Win new clients * Generate new business from established ones * As much as double your income! In this updated Third Edition of America's #1 consultant's guide to proposal writing, Herman Holtz -the "Consultant's Consultant" -tells you everything you need to know to research, design, write, present, and get the most out of winning proposals. He tells you what clients are really looking for in proposals and how to give it to them. And he shows you how to: * Get the most out of the latest desktop publishing technology * Market yourself via the Web, e-mail, and other online vehicles * Find and tap key online research sources * Discover the keys to creativity * Avoid common errors in proposals * Safeguard your proposal against piracy * Solve the problem of page-limited proposals * Develop cost, technical, presentation, and competitor strategies * Sell to the government * Make the bid vs. no-bid analysis and decision

Who Says Elephants Can't Dance?

Author: Louis V. Gerstner
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 0060523808
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 310

Book Description
Who Says Elephants Can't Dance? sums up Lou Gerstner's historic business achievement, bringing IBM back from the brink of insolvency to lead the computer business once again.Offering a unique case study drawn from decades of experience at some of America's top companies -- McKinsey, American Express, RJR Nabisco -- Gerstner's insights into management and leadership are applicable to any business, at any level. Ranging from strategy to public relations, from finance to organization, Gerstner reveals the lessons of a lifetime running highly successful companies.

The Prosperous Coach

Author: Steve Chandler
Publisher: Prosperous
ISBN: 9781600250309
Category : Counselor and client
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
With over 100,000 copies sold, The Prosperous Coach has helped thousands of coaches and consultants build their businesses by invitation and referral only.