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| What's
Your Web Site Done for You Lately? |
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I stepped gingerly onto the bathroom scale, glared at
the disaster reading, and concluded that my best
option was to have lunch and figure out what to do next.
Objective
scrutiny of ourselves—or what we create—isn’t
easy. But the best consultants always look for ways
to improve, so it’s routine for them to step back
and look at the big picture.
What about our Web sites—are they up to snuff?
To see if we’ve made progress in building better
sites, I did some research on the marketing capabilities
of consultants’ Web sites. I looked at sites of
the mega-consulting firms, medium and smaller-sized
firms, and independent practitioners.
From slogging through consulting Web sites, I learned
that too many of our sites just scratch the surface
of the Web’s potential marketing power. Why waste
valuable time and money on a Web site if it doesn’t
help bring in new clients?
 If
you want to know what your Web site does for you, take
our confidential Guerrilla
Consulting Web Site Self-Assessment. It
will only take five minutes, and you’ll receive
a customized report, which will be available immediately
after you complete the assessment. The results will
also be sent to your e-mailbox.
It’s
easier than facing the scale and it doesn’t cost
you a dime.
Enjoy
the newsletter and, if you have any comments, please
send me an email.
Mike
McLaughlin
Editor, Management Consulting News
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| Interview:
Don Peppers
and Martha Rogers |
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 If
you want to maximize Return on Customer, you have
to create a culture in your organization designed
around earning and keeping your customer’s
trust.
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What’s the most important business asset your
clients have? Don Peppers and Martha Rogers would say
emphatically that it’s their customers—and
they can prove it. In their new book, Return
on Customer, Peppers and Rogers lay
out their innovative way to think about and measure
the value of customers to a business.
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| Upping
the Ante on Creativity |
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Luc
de Brabandere is a vice president in the Paris
office of The
Boston Consulting Group and author of The
Forgotten Half of Change: Achieving Greater Creativity
Through Changes in Perception. He
suggests that the ability to see things in a completely
new way is the essence of creativity. And the more creative
we are, the more value we can potentially deliver to
our clients.
How
can we become more creative?
Read
the article by Luc de Brabandere 
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| An e-Newsletter on e-Newsletters |
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Michael
Katz, founder of Blue
Penguin Development, publishes a great e-newsletter
on e-newsletters.
Here’s
a sample of Katz’s advice to readers:
Publishing
Regularly
“Reader
relationships are like those old fashioned hand pumps.
It's no surprise that when you stop pumping, the water
stops coming out. But that's not all. When you stop
pumping, the remaining water in the pump drops all the
way back to the bottom of the well.”
Balancing
Content and Promotion
“It's
fine (and important) to promote your business within
the pages of your E-Newsletter. After all, the point
of this is to drive business, not simply send out content.
That said, you'll get (much) more mileage from your
monthly efforts if you draw a clean line between the
information your readers want, and the information you
want them to have.”
Dealing
with Cranky Readers
“99%
of the people you come in contact with are going to
be as nice as can be, but every once in a while, somebody's
going to try and poop on your car. Don't let it throw
you and don't get drawn into somebody else's bad day.
Who knows, resisting the natural urge to fight back
might even earn you a new client now and then!”
In
addition to his newsletter, Katz also publishes a Do-It-Yourself
E-Newsletter System. It’s a
great multimedia product that gives you a step-by-step
plan for creating your own newsletter.
If
you’re interested in reading about it, I’ll
give you the link with a warning: Katz has one of those
long sales letters. But his pitch is very low on the
hype-o-meter. Here’s the link: http://www.enewslettersystem.com/.
Just
so you know—I’m not getting any kickbacks
for recommending this product. It’s just a great
resource, particularly for consultants.
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| What
the Media Wants from Consultants |
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By
John Baldoni
Once
you connect with media representatives, you need to
be prepared. Consider the points below; each point is
not relevant to every interview but the overall structure
will help you focus on making the best possible contributions.
So
what’s the media looking for? Members of the media:
Want
stories. Good articles are really comprised
of stories about people—how and what they do.
Think of success stories about clients you can share
with the media. Make certain you get permission to use
a client’s name. If you can’t get that permission,
you can disguise the client’s identity, “a
manager working in a large industrial firm,” but
that has less impact.
Love
quotes. Do you have clients or client organizations
willing to speak on your behalf and be quoted for the
media? This is especially important for industry publications.
For example, if you are working in the automotive industry,
seek to get noticed and quoted in automotive trade publications.
If you want to be quoted in your own words, think about
the issues your clients face and prepare pithy observations.
Crave
facts. As much as stories add color and dimension,
it is always good to back them up with data. You can
include survey statistics, especially those depicting
before and after results, and research sources. Whenever
possible, include data to demonstrate your case.
Depend
on clarity. Think about what you do and why.
Develop your media pitch in two different forms: first,
a ten-word or so description of what you do, such as
“a behavioral coach working with CEOs”;
and, a thirty-second elevator speech about your work—“My
firm works to help men and women achieve their leadership
potential by focusing on behavioral coaching. I believe
we all have the potential to improve and so I aim to
bring out a person’s inner self to help that person
connect more effectively with others.”
Seek
how-to advice. Think about the general advice
you give clients and share it with the media. Be prescriptive
and describe, for example, the five things people can
do to become better listeners, better leaders, or better
coaches.
Appreciate
accessibility. What can you do to make yourself
available for interviews? One way to promote your accessibility
is to publicize your public speaking engagements in
the local media. Be available when reporters are available.
Media people live by deadlines; this may require you
to bend your schedule to accommodate interviews.
Convey
your message. What is your unique point of
view? How can you express it with a story? What is your
ultimate goal and why does it matters to the world?
Make certain you stay on message. Get in the habit of
opening and closing with your relevant key message.
Reiteration helps to ensure that you get your point
across.
A
note of caution: while you want to aim high, do not
be disappointed if it takes time to get noticed by publications
like the Wall Street Journal or
the Harvard Business Review.
If
you want to reach your clients, target the forums and
journals your clients and prospects reads. You have
a greater chance of success and will see your recognition
quotient rise where it counts—with clients!
`````````````````````````````
John Baldoni
is a leadership communications consultant who works
with Fortune 500 companies
and non profits. He is the author of five books on leadership,
including his latest, Great
Motivation Secrets of Great Leaders.
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| More
Business Planning for Consultants |
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We
received lots of feedback on Tim Berry’s article,
Business
Planning, Consultants, and Cobblers' Children.
One
reader, Tony Wanless, wrote:
Tim
Berry’s article highlights a problem that I often
see in my day-to-day dealings with consultants and other
knowledge-based businesses. It is my experience that,
when it comes to their own businesses, most consultants
are poor planners and worse marketers.
Both
issues are important because they point to a common
syndrome: Many consultants are not very good business
managers. Instead, they are often "doers”—an
elevated form of tradesmen. They are purveyors of specialized
knowledge or skill, but they rarely organize their businesses
optimally to sell that knowledge or skill.
Perhaps
the reason most consultants don't have business plans
is, as Mr. Berry says, they don't really need them.
What they do require are adapted strategic plans, or
business management plans.
I
don’t view this as a matter of semantics. A business
plan is, for the most part, a marketing document used
by most businesses for a specific purpose: to persuade
financiers to pony up operating cash. An adapted strategic
plan, or management plan, is an internal guide to operation
of the business.
All
businesses should have these, of course, but they are
more important for knowledge businesses because these
enterprises rely more on intellectual capital (organizational,
management and marketing skills) than financial capital.
Tony
Wanless, Knowpreneur Consultants, www.knowpreneur.net
Email: twanless@knowpreneur.net
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| Coming
Attractions |
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 “Yes,
the pursuit of immediate gratification, properly conducted,
can open the door to long-term success.” –
Rapid Results!
Next
month, consultant and author Robert H. Schaffer joins
us to talk about his new book, Rapid
Results! He’s the founder of
Robert H. Schaffer & Associates, and he helped to
found the journal, Consulting to Management,
for which he’s long been an editor. His previous
books include High-Impact
Consulting and The
Breakthrough Strategy.
We’ll
ask Schaffer how we can help clients succeed with large-scale
change using the rapid-results approach.
Look
for the interview with Schaffer in the next issue of
Management Consulting News
on November 1, 2005.
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