How to Win Client Business When You Don't Know Where to Start A Rainmaking Guide for Consulting and Professional Services

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.

DOUG FLETCHER is a speaker/writer/educatoron the topic of business development in professional services and consulting and teaches at Montana State University's Jake Jabs College of Business & Entrepreneurship. His is the co-author of How Clients Buy (Wiley, 2018). Additionally, he serves on the Board of Directors of The Beacon Group, a growth strategy consulting firm headquartered in Portland, Maine. Previously, he was cofounder and CEO of North Star Consulting Group, a technology-enabled consulting firm that specialized in global web-survey projects. Earlier in his professional life, Doug served as a consultant with the management consultancy, A. T. Kearney, and was trained at General Electric in its leadership development program. He has an MBA from the University of Virginia's Darden School of Business.

Introduction: Selling a Service Is Different (and Harder) Than Selling a Product

Part I: 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

2. How Clients Buy Understanding the Client’s Buying Decision Journey

3. Where Clients Come From Understanding the Key Client Pathways

4. Rainmaking for Introverts and People Who Don’t Want to Sell Winning Client Business While Being True to Yourself

Part II: The Five Skills We Must Learn If We Want to Become a Rainmaker

Section One: Skill 1: Create Your Personal Brand Identity

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

6. The Power of Focus The Key to Being Remembered

7. Choosing Your Specialty Shrink the Pond Until You’re a Big Fish

8. You Can’t Sell Beyond Your Credibility Zone The Cautionary Tale of EDS

Section Two: Skill 2: Demonstrate Your Professional Expertise

9. How Clients Tell Who the Real Experts Are Clients Need Clues That We Are Really Good At What We Do

10. How to Toot Your Own Horn Without Looking Like a Jerk Proven Techniques for Demonstrating Your Expertise

11. Using LinkedIn to Build Your Credibility Social Media Won’t Make the Phone Ring…. So What’s It Good For?

Section Three: Skill 3: Build Your Professional Ecosystem

12. The Two Hundred People You Need to Know The Closest Thing to Knowing Something Is Knowing Where to Find It

13. Does Cold Calling Work? And What to Do If It Doesn’t Remember What Mom said: Don’t Talk to Strangers!

14. Making Friends in a Natural Way How to Get an Introduction Without Seeming Pushy

15. I Can’t See the Forest For the Trees Segmenting Your Ecosystem into Three Distinct Groups

16. Why Advertising Doesn’t Work for Us Leveraging Your Firm’s Brand Reputation and What to Do When You Don’t Have One

Section Four: Skill 4: Develop Trust-Based Relationships

17. What Is Trust and Where Does It Come From? Do Clients Really Hire People They Like?

18. Conversation Skills for Introverts (and the Rest of Us, Too) Using Small Talk to Find Common Ground

19. The Art of Keeping In Touch Finding Opportunities to Be Thoughtful and Helpful

20. Transparency Is Good, Right? How and When to Be Transparent

Section Five: Skill 5: Practice Everyday Success Habits

21. The Daily Habits of Successful Rainmakers The One Hour Each Day That Will Build Your Career

22. Making the Rainmaker Skills Stick 66 Days That Will Shape Your Future

23. Finding Your Rainmaker M.O. Building Rainmaker System That Works for You

Part III: The Rainmaker’s Journey

24. Thoughts on Becoming a Rainmaker Stop Trying to Be Wonder Woman and Super Man

25. Finding the Work That You Love And What to Do When You Don’t

26. A High Road with a Long View Parting Words as You Begin Your Rainmaker Journey

Appendix A: The Rainmaker Skills Self-Test

What Are My Rainmaker Strengths and Weaknesses?

Notes and References [[CE please move these to the end of chapter]]

Recommended Reading

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Index

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