Dramatically grow your client base following pragmatic and insightful advice by bestselling author Doug Fletcher
How to Win Client Business When You Don't Know Where to Start: A Rainmaking Guide for Consulting and Professional Services serves as an invaluable and indispensable guide for everyone in the business of selling professional and consulting services. Author Doug Fletcher dives deeply into the five skills required to "make it rain":
- Create Your Personal Brand Identity
- Demonstrate Your Professional Expertise
- Build Your Professional Ecosystem
- Develop Trust-Based Relationships
- Practice Everyday Success Habits
How to Win Client Business When You Don't Know Where to Start provides a masterclass in teaching the practical techniques and concrete strategies that professional services providers were never taught in school or on the job. Pragmatic lessons take the place of the vaguely defined principles found in competing books to turn readers from sales novices into rainmakers.
Written by the same celebrated author who brought readers the best-selling book How Clients Buy, How to Win Client Business When You Don't Know Where to Start is perfect for any professional services provider or consultant who seeks to dramatically increase their book of business.
Table of Contents
Introduction: Selling a Service Is Different (and Harder) Than Selling a Product 1
Part 1: If I’m So Smart, Why Do I Feel So Stupid about Selling?
1 Things Rainmakers Do That Most of Us Don’t: The Five Rainmaker Skills Universities Don’t Teach Us and Our Firms Don’t Train Us 7
2 How Clients Buy Understanding the Client’s Buying Decision Journey 17
3 Where Clients Come From Understanding the Key Client Pathways 25
4 Rainmaking for Introverts and People Who Don’t Want to Sell Winning Client Business While Being True to Yourself 35
Part 2: The Five Skills We Must Learn If We Want to Become a Rainmaker
Skill 2: Create Your Personal Brand Identity 43
5 Decide What You Want to Be Known For and Who You Wish to Serve You Can Be Known for Anything, But You Can’t Be Known for Everything 45
6 The Power of Focus The Key to Being Remembered 53
7 Choosing Your Specialty Shrink the Pond Until You’re a Big Fish 61
8 You Can’t Sell Beyond Your Credibility Zone The Cautionary Tale of EDS 69
Skill 2: Demonstrate Your Professional Expertise 75
9 How Clients Tell Who the Real Experts Are Clients Need Clues That We Are Really Good at What We Do 77
10 How to Toot Your Own Horn without Looking Like a Jerk Proven Techniques for Demonstrating Your Expertise 85
11 Using LinkedIn to Build Your Credibility It Won’t Make the Cash Register Ring, So What’s It Good For? 95
Skill 3: Build Your Professional Ecosystem 101
12 The Two Hundred People You Need to Know The Closest Thing to Knowing Something Is Knowing Where to Find It 103
13 Does Cold-Calling Work? And What to Do if It Doesn’t Remember What Mom Said: Don’t Talk to Strangers! 109
14 Making Friends in a Natural Way How to Get an Introduction without Seeming Pushy 117
15 I Can’t See the Forest for the Trees Segmenting Your Ecosystem into Three Distinct Groups 125
16 Why Advertising Doesn’t Work for Us Leveraging Your Firm’s Brand Reputation and What to Do When You Don’t Have One 131
Skill 4: Develop Trust-Based Relationships 139
17 What Is Trust and Where Does It Come From? Do Clients Really Hire People They Like? 141
18 Conversation Skills for Introverts (and the Rest of Us, Too) Using Small Talk to Find Common Ground 149
19 The Art of Keeping in Touch Finding Opportunities to Be Thoughtful and Helpful 155
20 Transparency Is Good, Right? How and When to Be Transparent 163
Skill 5: Practice Everyday Success Habits 171
21 The Daily Habits of Successful Rainmakers The One Hour Each Day That Will Build Your Career 173
22 Making the Rainmaker Skills Stick 66 Days That Will Shape Your Future 179
23 Finding Your Rainmaker M.O. Building a Rainmaker System That Works for You 187
Part 3: The Rainmaker’s Journey
24 Thoughts on Becoming a Rainmaker Stop Trying to Be Wonder Woman or Superman 195
25 Finding the Work That You Love And What to Do When You Don’t 201
26 A High Road with a Long View Parting Words as You Begin Your Rainmaker Journey 207
Appendix A: The Rainmaker Skills Self-Test
What Are My Rainmaker Strengths and Weaknesses? 213
Recommended Reading 217
Acknowledgments 219
About the Author 221
Index 223
