Consultant Marketing Is Productizing Next?

Your consulting practice has changed. If you are like my consultant clients you have a new familiarity with Zoom. Partnerships and ensembles may be using Microsoft Teams for internal operations. I put Teams to work to simplify working with my virtual assistant in the Philippines.

All of us, I believe, are going to increase our use of tools like these to operate in a world that now accepts distributed collaboration.

The self-improvement pivot.

Research tells us that the forced sheltering in place has given people the time to do some navel gazing and as a result 3 in 5 Americans say they have decided to purchase self -improvement products. How is that going to impact your practice?

In my opinion that means you can now package the expertise you have to intersect with people’s desire to come out of the quarantine with greater knowledge and skill. They will, it is likely, continue to seek out ways to become more proficient when the “all clear” sounds. The question is how to build the product to take advantage of this shift.

A shift in focus.

Your business model limits your income. You can only handle so many clients at a given time. A team or ensemble can flatten the curve of marketing to find new clients but there are limits there as well. You have only so much time. Yes, you can increase your rates but then what? Change industries? Add lower cost staff?

What if you took the knowledge you’ve developed over the years working one-to-one and figured out how to work one to a few or even one to many? What if you maintained those high fee one-to-one clients but added business with recurring monthly fees?

Client Focus versus Membership Focus

I can hear your objection to shifting your focus. You are not alone. It is tough enough to understand how to build a consulting business. Part of the advice you give our clients is how to assess a situation and build your strategy based on that assessment. This time you need to assess the impact of a worldwide pandemic on how your business model needs to shift. You could decide to keep the model you are operating under now. You could decide to do something entirely new. Or you might consider maintaining your current client base and adding a new kind of client.

I’ve found that the advice most consultants provide on a one-to-one basis can be easily repurposed. Consider providing your expertise to a larger number of clients and being paid on a recurring basis. Look at these conditions to determine if what you do is viable for a Membership focus:

• Is it an evergreen market—one that is going to be around for the future?

• Are people in the market enthusiastic about it?

• Does what you offer solve a current urgent problem

•  Is there evidence of a future problem?

• Are there sufficient prospects with funding that can buy your services?

An Example

One of my clients has a way to increase profits for clients with no expenditures for equipment, training or additional staff. He’s been doing it for years, one client at a time. Evaluating it using the above criteria we find:

It is evergreen. Every business is looking for additional profit and will continue to do so. That makes for a big market.

Enthusiasm requires education Business operators need to be convinced to try it which means that group presentations are required but banks are willing strategic partners.

Profits solve problems Every businesswoman or man is always looking for more profits. How urgently depends on their individual situation.

Initial impact fades and needs regular stimulation Although simple to implement this process must be reemphasized regularly with managers in order to keep working. Think of that regular “treatment” like having a contract maintenance service like a lawn care service.

Mid-market companies are ready now and survivors will be those with cash on hand.

Running the numbers

As part of a standard consulting engagement this process is central. It comes at a cost of $10,000 to $12,000 on average for brief engagement. A similar service could be provided via a half day workshop and planned maintenance check ins (in person and via video) at a cost of $1000 for the workshop and $250/month for 1 year or maintenance. A single company would generate $4000 annually. Ten would generate $40,000. Twenty would provide $80,000. Selectively operating with ten companies in each of five cities would develop annual revenues of $200,000.

The key to profits in a membership-based business is more members being serviced with limited time input by the developer. In this case. Changing the monthly fee to $500/month would significantly impact the revenues: 1 company/year=$7000, 10 Companies/year=$70,000, 20 companies/year=$140,000 and 50 Companies/year=$350,000

Productizing for profit

A year or two ago I did a presentation on Productizing. Turned it into a video. I wen t back and reviewed it to attach here. Don’t bother looking. I’m going to have to redo it. There’s some good information but there were two problems: the examples are out of date and it put me to sleep.

The new version will wake you up to the possibilities of productizing. I’ll get that out to you before we go back to “business as usual.”

And so it goes.

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for on and off-line Trust-based Consultant Marketing advice that builds businesses, brands and lives of joy.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com