Why Sales Goals Are Destroying Boutique Consultancies

And, of course, on the top of the shuffling madness, there was John Henry, and nice, happy-go-lucky chap in England.

In fact, his full name was John Henry Bonham. He was the drummer of the legendary rock band Led Zeppelin and the composer of the equally legendary song, Moby Dick. Sadly, he died in 1980 at the tender age of 32.

Nevertheless, our story today has nothing to do with him. Not a dickybird.

Our hero for this literary masterpiece is a completely different John Henry. Yes, without the Bonham bit and without significant drumming skills.

Our John Henry was a huge African-American bloke who was a steel driver working on the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad in the 1940s.

He was drilling holes and hammering steel spikes into rocks with his 14-pound hammer.

What made John so outstanding in his profession and so valuable to the railroad company was that he could make 10-12 feet of progress in one single workday. No one else came even within spitting distance of his incredible performance.

Then his day came. Now he could really prove himself in a significant way.

Out of nowhere, a salesman showed up and started bragging to management about his steam drill and how that drill could out-work any human.

"But not me!" – first thought and then shouted John.

After some argument, the contest was set between man and machine.

John picked up a 20-pound hammer in each hand and got to work.

In very a tight contest, John eventually won.

In triumph, he raised his hammers to the sky as his co-workers and managers were cheering and celebrating him.

Then the celebration suddenly ended and panic took over.

John felt dizzy with exhaustion.

The hammers fell from his hands and he collapsed to the ground.

Within minutes, he was dead as a doornail. He died from a burst blood vessel in his brain.

Yes, the human beat the machine… for fleeting a fleeting moment and victory killed him.

And the machine beat the human… forever.

Setting aspiring sales goals can give you a temporary lead, but they alone can't guarantee that you actually reach them.

Just look at your peers. They have sales goals up to the wazoo, but many of them keep falling short on those goals time and time again.

I reckon, John Henry's goal was to be the company's most valuable worker, and it had worked for him for a while.

Then with the arrival of the steam drill, the shit hit the fan and soon after, John hit the ground… not exactly running but, well, lying still.

Yes, John defeated the drill machine, a.k.a. the system, but only for a short time. C & O Railroad's greatest driller, the legendary John Henry was dead. Even the drilling legend couldn't beat the machine.

And the sad reality is that while John was busy walloping spikes in the 1940s, almost 100 years later, many boutique consultancies do the equivalent of manual spike-walloping in their own firms: Using unnecessary manual labour to generate sales leads and convert them to clients despite the fact that 100% of lead generation and the majority of the lead conversion process can be automated.

In fact, many firm leaders are proud of their hard work to drum up new business.

Continue reading ... Why Sales Goals Are Destroying Boutique Consultancies

Enjoy!

The Ins And Outs Of Automating Marketing In Boutique Consultancies

Do you know that there is a chronic shortage of katana sword makers in
Japan? Yes, those masters who make the famous samurai swords. Somehow the younger generation has no interest in learning this honourable trade.
All in all, there are about 250 master swordsmiths in Japan.
Some say it's because of the long and arduous learning curve. I believe it has more to do with government interference.
The apprenticeship takes about five years during which the student lives with the master and his family. This is normal and I can accept it.
What I find totally unbelievable is that, after five years, apprentices have to take their master swordsman exams in front of a committee of government bureaucrats.
Most of them have never made a sword, never wielded a sword or even never touched a sword.
But they are the members of the almighty katana sword examination and licensing board, and they decide who can become a licensed swordsmith.
And no matter how good you are at your craft, unless you have a government licence, you can’t make swords for sale.
In an oddball way, this situation is pretty similar to how boutique consultancies hire their marketing people.
No matter how good you are, unless you are certified by the government, that is, college professors with a heavy Marxist inclination and zero real world marketing experience, no matter how good you are, you're pretty much doomed.
The main reason is that colleges teach B2C marketing of mass-produced commodities, not B2B marketing of high-end and highly differentiated services.
It becomes a problem in the area of marketing automation because as a new concept, it doesn't even exist on most universities' curricula. And even when it gets on the programme, it will teach students how to market $0.99 Big Macs and similar low-priced, mass-produced commodities to the unwashed masses.
So, let's see what good marketing automation can do to your firm in this deliriously delicious episode of Commando Consulting, expertly entitled, The Ins And Outs Of Automating Marketing In Boutique Consultancies
Enjoy!

5 Guidelines To Attracting Sexy Consulting Engagements

Do you know that there are at least 12 species of animals that kill more people than sharks?

Yet, people are scared of sharks while often being extra brave with the other 12 species.
While every year, globally, only six people get killed by sharks, in Africa alone, a whopping 2,900 people get killed by hippos and in the US alone, 53 people get killed by bees.

And just as people can't distinguish between highly dangerous and hardly dangerous animals, it seems many consultants have equally hard time to distinguish between the types of work to pursue.

While they should pursue engagement work, they pursue project work. In the worst cases, they pursue projects obtained through RFPs or cold calling.

But what is really the difference between an engagement and a project?

Some consulting firms live on almost back-to-back project work, while some others engage only 5-15% of their capacity in project work.

Since projects offer temporary short-term income, I think it's a good idea to keep project work under 50%, say 20-35%, and dedicate the rest of your firm's capacity to other types of engagement work. 

And even if your bread and butter come from project work, make sure the toppings for your sandwich come from other forms of engagement. Well, provided you like super tasty artisan ham, cheese and other sandwich components.

Ideally, you want project clients that hire you for the whole project, as opposed to hiring different consulting firms for different aspects of the project, even if your firm can do all the work.

And this is what we discuss in this month's eclectically enlightening episode of Commando Consulting, entitled, 5 Guidelines To Attracting Sexy Consulting Engagements.

Enjoy!

Wishing For A Kick-Arse Rainmaker? Stop Right Now!

Do you know that a whopping 35.7% of US adults are considered to be obese?

Over 5% are considered to be morbidly obese and 74% overweight.

But interestingly, these ratios are much worse at Wal Mart. It seems almost everyone is overweight there for some reason.

Why? Well, look at people's shopping carts and you'll see why.

They buy all sorts of crap that make them fatter and fatter.

Of course, Wal Mart's low prices are not merely attractive but addictive. It seems that when it comes to food, North Americans want high quantity at low, low prices.

They want food to fill them not to nourish them.

 But what is the cause of this fatty problem? The cause is that people obtain their health information from the wrong sources.

They trust the media that has been feeding them a low fat grain-based (thus high carb) diet for a donkey's years.

People read "expert" health advice in their favourite tabloids, and then go to Wal-Mart to buy the recommended rubbish at obscenely low prices.

And now the media, which is in cahoots with both the government and pharmaceutical companies, has fulfilled its mission of creating millions of sick people, so Big Pharma has a huge and "hungry" market for more and more medication.

And due to the high revenue, the government can collect more taxes.

Not to mention the employees of those Big Pharma companies as future voters.

Then people get fatter and sicker and Big Pharma makes even more money on them.

The government can collect its tax money and the media has plenty of news to blow out of proportion.

And that is what happens when people fail to check the origin of the health advice they rely on.

And the something similar happens in client acquisition for consulting firms too.

And this is what we discuss in this month's brain-fryingly electrifying episode of Commando Consulting, entitled, Wishing For A Kick-Arse Rainmaker? Stop Right Now!.

Enjoy!

Do Premium Consulting Firms Really Need Designated Rainmakers

Over a decade I’ve seen plenty of consulting firms hire salespeople to boost their sales, but all they’ve achieved is bloated costs of sales and high attrition of salespeople.

In many cases cost of sales increased more than sales, let alone net profits.

Yes, gross revenue has gone up, sometimes pretty impressively, but when we look at meaningful indicators like, gross profit per team member, we often see a significant decline.

And when partners realise the loss, they hire more salespeople creating further increase in cost of sales and attrition.

Of course, talking about a consulting firm, we can’t call them salespeople. They are rainmakers, account executives, practice/business development managers or some other fancy title holders.

But the expectation is the same.

Due to lack of marketing, firms have to beef up their hunting-type selling efforts, and to do it quickly, they have to resort to cold-prospecting.

So, half of the salespeople are dialling for dollars and the other half are pounding pavements and knocking on doors.

So, since the firm uses brute force client acquisition, partners don’t want to participate.

Neither do even the most junior associates.

After all, this is not why they worked their arses off to earn their MBAs. One of the reasons is that the consulting profession in general looks down on client acquisition.

Many consultants regard sales and marketing as something beneath them, so they want to abdicate the dirty work to designated salespeople.

Well, the interesting thing is that screwing the client over during the project through billable (bilkable ???) hours is fine and most senior partners happily practise it, but acquiring new clients is a dirty job; something not to be touched by the firm’s holier-than-thou partners.

So, the idea of hiring designated salespeople on straight commission is pretty appealing.

But this approach comes with two big questions... And this is what we discuss in this month's brain-fryingly exciting episode of Commando Consulting, entitled, Do Premium Consulting Firms Really Need Designated Rainmakers?.

Enjoy!

11 Reasons To Walk Away From Consulting Opportunities

And what the sausage is all about William Bullock, the American inventor of the rotary printing press?

Well, an interesting event took place in 1863. Bullock’s weird contraption revolutionised the printing industry by being able to print as many as 10,000 sheets per hour.

But on an otherwise nice day, the shit seriously hit the fan for good ol’ William. While installing a new machine, he got frustrated because some details didn’t work out as he’d planned.

So, in frustration, he kicked a driving belt onto a pulley. And then the real horror started. As a result of the kick, his foot got caught in the pulley and was dragged inside the machine.

It quickly turned his foot into mash beyond repair. Then the wound got infected, developed gangrene, and William died in the middle of getting his foot amputated.

I mention this bizarre accident because as the world is climbing out of the latest recession, it’s only fair to say that there are almost more consulting opportunities than stars in the galaxy. But consulting opportunities come in all shapes and forms, and Pareto’s 80/20 rule is hard at work here too.

So, some 80% of consulting opportunities are not worth going after. They are borderline bankrupt companies, often with dodgy characters in their boardrooms, looking for cheap contract labour to put them back on track.

The other 20% is a mixed bag. And some 0.5-2% of them are perfect clients from all three angles: Perfect buyer, perfect company and perfect engagement.

And there are a certain percentage of engagements that look really great and exciting from a distance, but upon closer inspection we discover that they are just hefty layers of quicksand on the top of stinky swamps, and if you go too close, they swallow you.

And this is what we discuss this month's blood-boilingly conspicuous episode of Commando Consulting, mysteriously entitled, 11 Reasons To Walk Away From Consulting Opportunities.

Enjoy!

11 Silly Direct Mail Blunders Even Smart Boutique Consultancies Make

Well, we’ve all heard that the best way to distinguish between a real Rolex and a Chinese knock-off Rolex is to see if the watch ticks or sweeps. The fake Rolexes tick but the real Rolexes sweep.

But do you know that even the real Rolexes tick, but while fake Rolexes tick in 1 second increments, real Rolexes tick in 0.1 second increments, so to the naked eye, the second hand’s movement seems to be smooth as a baby’s arse? But in reality it’s still ticking. It’s just ticking in very tiny increments.

When done correctly, direct mail is an excellent way of both lead generation to replenish your funnel and lead nurturing to keep prospects moving inside the funnel.

We just have to make sure that we don’t suffer from Fake Rolex syndrome, and don’t try to move prospects forward in too large increments.

It usually happens to commissioned salespeople who want to close sales as soon as possible and then move on to the next opportunities.

And it’s the art and science of moving prospects forward in the sales funnel that we discuss this month’s inconspicuously inspiring episode of Commando Consulting, entitled, 11 Silly Direct Mail Blunders Even Smart Boutique Consultancies Make.

Enjoy!

Do You Have Commissioned Salespeople Wreaking Havoc In Your Consulting Firm?

Do you know that Saharan silver ants can not only survive the highest temperatures, but they are also some of the fastest sprinters?

The highest temperature they can safely operate in is around 128.5°F (53.6°C), and they can achieve amazing running speed by pulling up their two front legs and trotting along only on four.

And the only reason I've mentioned this nipple-piercingly exhilarating factoid is because consulting firms that try to make a living by relying on commissioned sales forces may well need similar attributes to survive the heat and the mad rush of competitive bidding processes and the cruelty of price-obsessed procurement agents.

It has always been a huge issue for consulting firms to keep themselves fully billable, whatever that means, and in order to achieve that, many firms have chosen to assemble commissioned sales forces that are in charge of drumming up business for the subject matter experts, the consultants.

And over the years I've often seen otherwise reputable consulting firms gradually erode their brand and reputation by hiring commission-based salespeople for business development. Oh, yes. Not for sales. That's too crass and vulgar, and consulting firms don't do selling.

They do business development. Just look at the word "Sell" in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary. What do you see? Sell: Transitive verb. 1) To deliver or give up in violation of duty, trust, or loyalty and especially for personal gain; betray — often used without "sell out their country".

Or let's look at the origin of "Sell": Middle English, from Old English sellan; akin to Old High German sellen to sell, Greek helein, meaning "to take". Well. Is it surprising that consultants are allergic to the word?

Most meanings of the word relates to trickery, deception and manipulation. Knowing that selling is the part business development, we can ask the question...

Which Type Of Business Development Do You Do?

And this is what we discuss in this month's brain-fryingly exciting episode of Commando Consulting, entitled, Do You Have Commissioned Salespeople Wreaking Havoc In Your Firm?.

Enjoy!

Associates, Alliances And Subcontractors

Among all business models, the consulting firm, a type of professional knowledge firm, is the only business model in which the same people who get the clients also serve the clients.

This overlap raises a question about how to employ people in the firm whose expertise is not required on a daily basis.

Should firms employ them as associates on salaries or freelancers?

If the firm has too many underutilised people on the payroll, profitability suffers. But if the firm works with freelancers performing the type of work that is core for the firm, then it can undermine the firm’s brand and reputation.

So, how to handle this problem?

This is what we discuss this month's hair-raisingly exciting episode of Commando Consulting, unconspicuously entitled, “Associates, Alliances And Subcontractors”.

Enjoy.