You have probably heard of the 4Ps before. You know, the 4 Ps of Marketing Mix? They are: Product, Price, Place (distribution) and Promotion. Consider that in the consulting business, the product is YOU and the other Ps get enhanced, developed and better because the you, the product, is made unique. To leverage from this position, is where many consultants struggle and have the opportunity to get better.

PRODUCT:In consulting, you are the PRODUCT: Get yourself operationally, strategically, physically, mentally, looking sharp. Many of the tips shared already in this series, can help you do just that.

PRICING: Your fees are best elevated with the value you create for your clients, combined with your expertise and experience.

PLACE: Determine your ideal client, which includes many factors, one of which is geography and then position your availability within that geographic constraint.

PROMOTION: You can be your best promotion tool. Write a book, publish articles, do public speaking, get on radio and TV. Get out there and get in front of individuals and organizations.

• STEP 1: PRODUCT: Get clear on WHO YOU ARE and WHAT YOU DO.
• STEP 2: Become brilliant at setting value based fees.
• STEP 3: Get clear on the parameters and characteristics of your Ideal Client, then you will know how to determine your PLACE.
• STEP 4: Write a series of articles that helps you turn them into a book. Publish all articles along the way, then announce your book, and get in front of people promoting both.

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Clients today want to know they have a competitive advantage in utilizing you and your areas of expertise. How do you do that and still accomplish the many basics they need help with?

Utilize the area of competitive advantage in your area of excellence. Your area of differentiation as an consultant describes to your client, the uniqueness of your portfolio of solutions and personal branding. What perceptions do you wish to create and leave a lasting impression with your clients? Being different as an Odyssey consultant is strikingly simple, but never easy. Above all, it means being brilliant on the basics, being appropriately responsive, and realizing that the “devil is in the details.”

The combination of WHO YOU ARE, in terms of character and personality, look and feel, and WHAT YOU DO, and how you do it when you are on site and interacting with the client is what separates the amateurs from the professionals in the field of consulting.

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Clients today want every consultant to have the generalist skills of their best General Manager and at the same time the in-depth knowledge of a technical specialist. This presents a dilemma to the Odyssey Consultant. On the one hand, the more specialized your approach the more difficult it is to obtain business. On the other hand, the more generalist you are the less creditability you tend to carry in the eyes of the client.

SPECIALIZE IN A UNIQUE WAY.

We live in a society today that produces and prefers specialists. By over specializing in consulting, however, you may experience the feast and famine roller-coaster just too often. With the ever increasing avalanche of knowledge and speed of change in the business world a better motto may be “specialize and die, generalize and thrive.”

Go with the notion from clients that you are a specialist; however, create the divisions in your one person practice that you are a specialist in whatever the client requirement is.

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One of the challenges of many consultants is to get their message in front of their ideal clients, so that, the ideal client can call on the consultant’s expertise, wisdom and experience when needed.

An Executive Briefing (EB) is an excellent format to accomplish some of the Consultant’s Marketing needs.

It is where you, as the consultant, can speak to a topic, in your area of expertise, that also resonates and fills the needs of one or many aspects of what your ideal client is dealing with and needs help today. It is mean to have you provide them value, and then, ideally, they call you for more.

Take action and determine a topic/subject that is of value to your ideal client.

Pick a location, date, time, like a breakfast briefing at a local hotel or other type of similar meeting location. Then write out your invitation, with the best language and positioning to attract your ideal client into coming. Determine your ideal clients within 50 miles of where you live/work. Then send the invitations and follow up to get as many ideal clients as you can.

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How comfortable are you asking a client about their profitability? How comfortable are you with business types of discussions? Are you good at it? The challenge for many consultants is to be able to have a discussion with the CEO and business owner on THEIR profitable or unprofitable company and have the CEO and business owner see you, the consultant as someone who can help them become more profitable. Many consultants never approach this discussion, thus demonstrating their less than total business ability to help their client.

Most CEOs and business owners are in business to create profits. If you never talk profits, then how can a business owner see you as a consultant helping them with their profitability? It is very unlikely they will. Then what do they see you as? Most likely as someone who calls themselves a consultant but really isn’t. They might see you as a trainer, coach, specialist, but not someone truly capable of helping them create wealth for them and their business. However, creating yourself, as that business consultant, in their mind, will raise your standing with in their eyes and help you get closer to being the chosen consultant.

You don’t need to go out at get an MBA, but you do need to get a basic understanding of business and business related topics and be able to have the conversation. Familiarize yourself with standard business documents and the appropriate level of business language to be able to have these conversations intelligently and emotionally with your ideal client.

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• What business are you in?
• Do you have a business model for your consulting business?
• Have you taken the time to do it for yourself?
• If so, how is it working for you?
• Are you able to help and advise CEOs and business owners on their business models?

Consider the following definition and see if your business model incorporates the following:

‘A BUSINESS MODEL IS AN INTEGRATION ON ONE PLATFORM OF THE FUNDAMENTAL ELEMENTS AND PROCESSES OF A BUSINESS WITH ITS OPERATIONAL, STRATEGY AND CORPORATE GOVERNANCE. THE PURPOSE OF A BUSINESS MODEL IS TO MAXIMIZE VALUE AND WEALTH CREATION AND GAIN SUSTAINABLE STRATEGIC ADVANTAGE’.

Remember, that great business models are wealth creation mechanisms.

If you are not already comfortable with business models, then plan to get comfortable with them. Search them out, read them and see how others are written, developed and actualized.

Write your own business model and evaluate its effectiveness. Adjust it if needed and as appropriate. Become a resource /expert on business models, such that you can have this kind of strategic discussion with your clients, further raising your value, in the eyes, mind and heart of the client.

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If you are a good systems thinker, then this will help you tremendously in every way. If you are not a systems thinker, there are no two ways about it, you will need to get good at it.

Many consultants fail to see and then make the connections of systems in an organization, business, operations, etc and thus systems thinking in the business world. This makes for a difficult time creating the value of improving one or more key components, that will transform a business, and then have the further problem of NOT being able to demonstrate this to the client and thus NOT creating the value in their eyes.

Systems thinking is about seeing the connections of all the moving parts, knowing which ones affect each other and how the entire system functions or fails as a result of the component parts.

Review books, articles and resources on systems thinking. There are many available. For example, look up Dr. W. Edwards Deming, considered by many to be the father of Total Quality Management. See his comments and thoughts on continual improvement of all processes, as it and much of what he taught, speaks to systems thinking.

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I suspect you have heard the phrase, “a picture is worth a 1000 words” well consider that a model is worth a 1000 pictures” and creating a model that communicates volumes about WHO YOU ARE and WHAT YOU DO as a consultant can differentiate you from most consultants and put you in a category of “one.” Models succeed because they paint many pictures all at once.

Think about some of the best models you have seen in your lifetime. No matter what shape or form they took, nor how many descriptive words they had associated with it, when you saw it and reviewed it, you got the concept and it was something of value, as that understanding became worth a 1000 pictures in your head, driving clarity for you.

In the business world and especially in the world of consulting, having that model, for you to share with potential clients, makes your positioning in a stronger position, driving you to be in the category of “one.” Choose to create a model that captures the essence of WHO YOU ARE and WHAT YOU DO as a consultant and it will increase your ability to communicate with clients the larger and more important concepts, giving you the leg up if you will.

Write down as many descriptions of WHO YOU ARE and WHAT YOU DO.

Then, review other models you have seen to get ideas. Ask yourself why some models work better than others in representing an idea, concept or ideology. Take from those points and incorporate them in the drawing of your model, incorporating your specialty, expertise and ultimately, showing the WHO YOU ARE and WHAT YOU DO through an effective model.

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Prescription without proper examination and diagnosis is malpractice.

As a consultant you want to insure you do the diagnosis and examination correctly and thus have your prescription right for the client.

Just as a doctor prescribes medicine for a patient, the time comes when the consultant proposes a recommendation to the client. Remember, the doctor may go through the examination, diagnosis and prescription several times and in many different ways. If the examination is deep and well-founded, and the diagnosis is true and accurate, then the prescription is much easier to write up.

Now, with clarity about the value you can contribute, based on the examination and diagnosis, the prescription can be made. It can be simple or complex, verbal or written. It is imperative, however, that it embraces the proper solution for your client and it needs to be written from the picture in the economic buyers head.

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Diagnose with Purpose

The purpose of diagnosis is “to get things moving” on solving the problem in hand. It is a means to an end. Some consultants and consulting firms turn diagnosis into research and a never ending search for the causes of the problem. Don’t spend too much time over diagnosing to the point of achieving “paralysis by analysis”.

Proper diagnosis allows you to make a proper prescription.

Remember, you have already gathered preliminary information and made your own observations during the entry and examination phase. This should add to your knowledge base so that you are better positioned to prescribe the right solution to sort out the problem.

Do a proper diagnosis. Utilize records, observations, interviews, special occasions/events, orientation briefings, focus groups, assessments and a list of many other options to efficiently and effectively diagnose problems or issues. With excellent diagnosis, comes the ability to seal a level of collaboration between consultant and client from an early stage in the assignment. Do it well and it will help you seal the deal.

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