Free Training Expired
Video 1: Consultant's Opportunity
Video 2: The Expert's Error
Video 3: Create An Obvious Offer
Video 4: How to Talk to a Busy CEO
Video 5: What is Your Next Step?
Create an Obvious Offer
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The point of leverage that is most exciting to me, is definitely ‘charge the premium’!
I hear THAT Steffie!
Hi Alzay … same as Steffie … I like the opportunity for charging the premium as it gets me out of the hustling mode jumping from project to project in short time frames. I have to say also in the beginning I struggled with narrowing my offer start point since my area of expertise is in the leadership space and it was challenging to get clarity on a specific leadership problem (there are so many that require differing solutions).
Charging the appropriate premium is certainly a leverage point, Joan!
Are you more comfortable with your current leadership offering or are you still revising it?
Getting there … I am thinking through my niche offering within the leadership space as clients come to me to address several leadership challenges. It is a legacy focus based on my experience running global learning organizations where I had to provide solutions to varying leadership issues. Also in consulting projects, I never know what surprises I will uncover in the diagnosing stage. I guess it is a nice challenge to have in the short term, but still need to get more clarity on my niche area.
The point of leverage that is most exciting to me,the way to make a “one-d4y-project” make as a unique and high personalization offer.
Rafael…let me tell you…when I finally understood this concept it simplified SO many things in my business. It’s an important place to focus.
I am having a hard time making the transition from my process based service (part-time CFO) to selling using a one-d4y-project. Your offer makes total sense to me for use in project based business, i.e. my friend is an expert witness for financial issues. Using the one-d4y-project to answer those questions about how he would address certain uncertain aspects of the testimony would be great to put an attorney at ease. A proposal such as I can do steps 1, 2 and 3 in order to give you a better understanding of how steps 8, 9 and 10 will impact your case and the research that must go into it.
But how do you structure this for a “I will be your sounding board on financial, process and compliance matters.”?
Ah, complexity. I hear you Del. There are details here, but allow me to offer you a direct response.
You want to offer, “I will be your sounding board on financial, process and compliance matters.” – this sounds broad…and dangerously close to Bad Offer #1 described in the video. Be careful of trying to make ALL of your expertise available at once. Shrinking the scope of your advisory service makes the offering easier to understand (and the relationship easier to manage).
This is kismet. I was considering (reconsidering) what my offer to prospective clients was going to be last night. The D4Y approach solves all of the problems I mapped out, especially what to charge. In essence, it allows me to give them a road map to solving their problem, then they have the option to: 1) Hire me to execute it, 2) Hire someone else, or 3) Attempt to do it themselves. I think they’ll opt for #1, but I really don’t care because I’ll be well paid to have outlined the solution they are looking for!
Xavier, I’m honored to be a part of your journey. Keep going.
The initial project… Well, yes, Alzay. Leaning in beats leaning out.
But who will pay for that scoping effort?
To keep it simple, we need to know in advance how far NOT to go to produce the FEASIBLE outcome that produces the most IMPACT at the lowest risk for that client. That’s not a freebie analysis we can sustain for long. And it’s possibly the toughest sale to make to someone who knows all the wrong things to have focused on and still can’t figure out yet what the right thing to focus on to resolve may be, in order to achieve the outcome he so lustfully has been seeking after!
Let me give you a case in point to illustrate.
Last year, I had a small business CEO contact me to visit with him and his leadership team. He was dying for extra sales and wanted me to explain how to take his brick-and-mortal business online. This is what I’m able to specialize in today. It’s the direction I want immediately to take. So, he was my ideal client. I came prepared to turn that discussion into a working session, if the opportunity permitted, because I knew the topic could become convoluted very quickly. Since I wanted to get my hands dirty, I’d take the chance to demonstrate I can do the job if allowed.
Well, the CEO had not updated his website in 5 years. He had 20K fans on his social media page that he had done nothing about. And his team had no clue how to do any online marketing — zilch. This I discovered in the first 15 minutes. I had no clue what exactly they wanted to achieve by going online, which is why I arrived to the meeting only with a pen and pad to listen and ask questions. I began with the CEO alone. One hour later, he had his senior team in the office. By his own request, I regurgitated what he had told me that he wanted and everyone nodded approvingly. In the space of that hour, I’d actually become the CEO’s chief communicator in his very presence!
Now, since he ended up hearing the matter twice over, once I was done he simply tapped the desk impatiently and said, “Art, so what is the solution to this problem? How do we take advantage of this opportunity?”
Hell, now I was about to build it for them for FREE. It wasn’t enough I’d done the gap analysis. Now I had to develop the proposal. I had to recognize, however, that I had them all eating out of my hand. Did I want to postpone for a later meeting to collect my thoughts or should I keep feeding them?
I love the work I do and I know my stuff. So, I said, “Let me tell you what you need to do.” And I told them what to do in the simplest of terms. Here’s what came next.
“You need to create a sales funnel,” I told them. “I can install the software and, with your in-house marketing resource or your website agency, we can plan and execute a direct marketing campaign to fill the funnel, directing orders straight to your cash register to create a new stream of income for you company entirely online.” This is exactly what they wanted to hear…by that point in the conversation. So, I said it to them. There was only one catch. THEY wanted to upgrade their website BEFORE building the funnel.
“We’re only 4 weeks from completion of that project,” the CEO told me. “You can help us with the funnels then.”
Fast-forward 12 months. They barely completed the website upgrade last week. I knew that would happen. I knew it as far back as a year ago at that meeting, because I know my stuff! But that 4-hour+ FREE session that I had with that company 1 year ago taught me that it can be pricey to get to understanding what a company actually wants done. And THEY WOULDN’T HAVE WANTED TO PAY to figure out what their REAL remedy would entail. I had to reveal it to them ONLY THEN TO point the actual problem I could remedy to achieve the outcome they told me they were after.
It proved to have been a conversation of enormous value to them. They paid me lunch. But that was all. Repeating this behavior is not a sustainable consulting practice.
The discussion about the funnel began with our discussion of how to leverage Amazon as a product distributor. It was completely 180-degrees from where they needed to be. But that was the “solution” THEY had in mind and wanted confirmation on. They did not get it from me. I had to dissuade them from that objective, given my expertise and eventual understanding of their current state. But that took 4 hours of actual analysis and strategy work I didn’t get paid for, except with a 40-minute working lunch.
The good news is that we’ve kept a sound connection throughout these months and they want the funnel even more now and I have a more elegant solution for them today than 1 year ago. But, that initial project I was trying to get from them cost me time that I didn’t get paid for. I look at it as an investment because I may get business this year from them and I’m giving them no more freebies and told them so.
Still, Alzay, how much of a freebie are we to expect to have to offer just to get the foot in the door to see what’s going on in the kitchen, that we may know what to cook for the company, given what they really want to serve on their table, if you know what I mean?
Art, what an interesting (and awesome) scenario. Thank you so much for sharing. Please allow me to be direct. I want to be as helpful as I can in this limited format.
“But who will pay for that scoping effort?” – The client does. Period.
“Fast-forward 12 months. They barely completed the website upgrade last week.” – Who is surprised? You prospect (patient) is NOT the expert. They cannot solve their own problem efficiently, that is why they need help from you (a doctor).
“that initial project I was trying to get from them cost me time that I didn’t get paid for.” – Here comes the uncomfortable feedback: You allowed the scope of the conversation to spiral out of control.
I understand this is a dynamic, complex situation…but it’s a common one. And you can break it down fast IF you use the right approach. Video #4 offers help with that.
The Obvious offer is an awesome solution to my sales process.
I am working on that INITIAL Offer… I understand the concept but I definitely need guidance on execution.
Indeed Dominic. The concept is easy enough to grasp, but the execution can have it’s challenges.