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Mindset

Don’t Put Me On Your List

Posted by

Ian Brodie on March 21st, 2009.

A topic I've blogged about frequently is the importance of good follow-up and of nurturing relationships over time.

In The Importance of Good Follow-Up I highlighted the futility of the “Nice to meet you, if you ever need our services…” email follow-up to networking meetings and suggested a number of value-adding alternatives.

One trend I've noticed recently is the increasing use of email newsletters as a follow-up mechanism. It's a trend I whole heartedly applaud – my business is driven by email marketing. But only when you do it right.

And signing people up for your email newsletter without their permission is absolutely the wrong way to do it.

On at least half a dozen occasions recently I've found myself subscribed to email newsletters from people and companies who I've met briefly at networking meetings. I've given them my business card and they've plugged it straight into their email distribution list.

This is a follow-up mechanism that has the potential to add value if the newsletter is of high quality and relevant to me. But how does it make me feel to have my details “harvested” in this way?

To be honest, not great.

It feels impersonal. I've not had an email or call from them. Nothing mentioning any connection we made at the event and no thought from them on tailoring the message to my specific needs. I've just been fed into their email marketing machine.

I wondered whether I was the only one who felt this way, so I posed the question on Twitter to see how others felt:

As you can see from this sample of responses, people's feelings are almost universally negative. They range from “I want to *smack* them!” and “it sucks!” to at best, “my junk filtering can soon take care of them if they fail to send me anything interesting or useful”. And remember, these negative responses are to something as seemingly innocent as adding someone's name to an email distribution list after meeting them. For me, Kneale Mann summed up the sentiment best best when he replied: “A handshake does not make you a customer”.

Obviously, Twitter followers are not a sample that's representative of the public at large. But I do believe they represent an important and growing sensitivity to the appropriate use of information.

So what's the alternative?

Well, since you are interacting face to face with them, there should be ample opportunity to offer to send the newsletter and get their permission.

If the time isn't right when you meet them, then send them an email afterwards with a sample copy of the newsletter suggesting it might be of interest and giving a link to sign-up if they are. Personalise the emails – recalling topics you discussed or better still – add value by suggesting ideas for questions they posed or challenges they highlighted when you were talkign with them.

Now don't get me wrong, this is my opinion as to what you should do rather than something that is proven to have better results. I haven't done any testing to see what results in better long-term subscriptions, click throughs on the newsletter or eventually sales.

But for me that doesn't matter. If you want to establish a reputation as someone who can be trusted then you mustn't do anything early on in the relationship to suggest an abuse of trust. Auto-subscribing people to your newsletter without asking is hardly the crime of the century – but to many people it suggests that you will not treat them as individuals with their best interests at heart.

Personally, I'd rather lose potential newsletter subscribers than lose that reputation of trust.

Ian

PS Many thanks to all the Twitter users who replied to my poll on this topic – your answers were most helpful.

You can follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/ianbrodie

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Mindset

The Magic of Helping

Posted by

Ian Brodie on March 10th, 2009.

Every year in February I make a pilgrimage to the Winter Gardens in Blackpool – home of the world's largest convention for magicians. It's been a number of years since I performed magic professionally – it's purely a hobby for me now, with the occassional close-up performance for charity. But I still visit Blackpool every year to look out for interesting new lecturers and performers and learn new tricks & techniques. But mainly I go to see old friends.

Someone I've shared more than a few pints with over the last few years is Leon Andersen. Leon is a Limerick based magician who recently set up Ireland's first School of Magic. The school helps kids build confidence, self-esteem and motivation by learning how to perform magic.

To help gain publicity and endorsements for this new venture, Leon has been speaking to some of magic's leading lights. From old masters like Eugene Burger to the new wave magic of Dan & Dave Buck. And there's a lot salespeople can learn from the way he has been going about this.

Leon's approach is simple: he offers to help. He spots what the person is most likely to need, and offers to help them with it.

For example, he met one famous magician who had spent a hard day working in the convention dealer's hall. Rather than doing the same as hundreds of other fledgling magicians – asking for a trick demonstration or an autograph. Leon asked if he could get the performer a bottle of water. When the hubbub had quietened down they got talking and Leon was able to mention his school.

Another example: he bumped into a legendary American performer early in the convention. The performer looked busy, so Leon simply said how much he enjoyed his work, and that he'd love to share a drink with him sometime. Of course, he asked if there was anything he could do to help him while he was over in the UK. Later on during the convention the performer spotted Leon and asked him to join his group of friends for a drink. It wasn't long before Leon was able to talk to them about his magic school project.

A final example: Leon spotted a well known magician struggling to carry his materials up to a lecture he was about to give. The other convention attendees were barging past trying to get good seats for the lecture. But Leon stopped and asked the lecturer if he needed any help, and carried his boxes up for him into the lecture hall. After the lecture, the magician gratefully gave Leon one of his books as a gift, and engaged with him in a discussion about the magic school.

Now nothing here is revolutionary or innovative. But the fact is, it works. Only Leon really knows whether he's being helpful in order to get what he wants – or whether he's being helpful because he feels it's the right thing to do – and getting what he wants is a nice side effect (knowing him a little, I feel it's the latter). But either way, the impact is the same. By thinking of others first and helping them, eventually we get what we want.

Ian

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Marketing

Networking: Start Early & Start Right

Posted by

Ian Brodie on February 25th, 2009.

Start Networking Early! I'm currently carrying out a research project into the most effective business development skills as percieved by North West (England) based law firms – and the best ways of developing those skills in staff.

Some of the results are a little surprising so far – but one thing which I had expected was the very high importance attached to the skill of networking for lawyers.

Participants are reporting that:

a) Networking is the most critical business development skill for lawyers

b) In order to build your networking capability – and in order to build a “mature” network of contacts which will bear fruit when you need it; you must begin networking early. Productive networks take time to build – almost always longer than the lawyers initially expected.

c) Networking skills can be learned from experience – but formal networking training can be a real accelerator. A number of participants highlighted the benefits they had personally received from attending networking training (e.g. from North West based expert Will Kintish) but highlighted that they had discovered and arranged funding for this themselves rather than it being part of a company sponsored programme.

While it was ecouraging to hear that most law firms are now making strong moves to encourage or mandate their young staff to go networking; there is a vital lesson to be learned about equipping them with the right skills to do the job rather than just throwing them in at the deep end and expecting them to sink or swim. The same firms that wouldn't consider for one second letting a trainee or associate handle technical aspects of a case without expert training or mentoring do exactly that when it comes to business development. It's time that interpersonal and business development skills were awarded the same degree of thought and investment as more traditional legal skills.

Ian

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Selling

Sales Excellence Podcast – Episode 2 : Let's Get Real – An Interview with Randy Illig

Posted by

Ian Brodie on February 18th, 2009.

The Sales Excellence Podcast Back in 1999 “Let's Get Real or Let's Not Play” was published. It was a groundbreaking work – one of the very first books to focus on selling for consultants and other professionals; and one of the very first to take the stance that selling should be about seller and buyer working together to achieve mutual objectives – not one trying to manipulate the other.

10 Years later, and Let's Get Real is back on bookshop shelves with a new edition, with additional chapters on “advocacy” and initiating new opportunities.

I'll be publishing a review in a few days time (I'll let you in to a secret – I'm a big fan). Co-author Randy Illig generously offered to by interviewed for the blog – and in this podcast you can hear the full interview. In it, I ask him questions on:

The changes in the sales environment for professional services over the last decade
How salespeople with limited contact networks can still use referrals to generate high quality opportunities and business
What experienced professionals starting out in business development should focus on
His one best piece of advice for new salespeople

Randy gave some really interesting and insightful answers – listen to the podcast below:

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Selling

Sales Excellence Podcast – Episode 1 : Selling With Stories

Posted by

Ian Brodie on February 17th, 2009.

The Sales Excellence Podcast Stories and Anecdotes can be one of the most powerful tools in the professional's sales armoury. And yet they're often overlooked in favour of more rational approaches: facts, figures and statistics.

However, those who learn to sell with stories find that they gain credibilty, are able to make complex ideas more concrete for clients, and are able to challenge clients effectively without getting into face-on confrontation. They are able to create a powerful emotional connection with their clients and prospects that those following a “facts and figures” approach simply can't match.

This 12 minute podcast – the first in the Sales Excellence Podcast series – looks at how stories can help in selling, and shows how professionals can develop a bank of stories which can be used in key selling situations to enhance thier credibility and believability.

Listen now:

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Mindset

Optimism vs. Accuracy – The Rainmaker’s Paradox

Posted by

Ian Brodie on February 17th, 2009.

Hitting the Target The objective of the rainmaker – the high-end salesperson – is to bring in sales. High quality sales, of course – work the firm can actually deliver, in areas of strategic importance with target clients. But at the end of the day the their overriding objective is to bring in as many sales as possible.

The sales manager, on the other hand, often works to a different agenda. They care about accuracy – will we hit the numbers? Those who work for publicly quoted companies know the extreme pressure to hit quarterly revenue and profitability forecasts to meet City/Wall Street expectations. Often (very, very often in my experience) , the focus of sales or pipeline meetings is less on figuring out how to sell more and more on getting an accurate forecast.

Now in theory, those aren't incompatible objectives. Strive to sell as much as possible and provide an accurate forecast as to how we are most likely to do.

In the real world however, human psychology acts to make it very difficult to achieve both.

By nature, successful salespeople are optimistic. In fact, Ford Harding's research for his classic work Creating Rainmakers highlighted optimism as the first and most striking defining attribute of a Rainmaker. Optimism is vital because it causes the Rainmaker to interpret events in positive ways that encourage them to keep progressing and chasing opportunities long after the rest of us have given up. It gives them a thick skin which allows them to brush off the rejection that's inevitable in sales and to keep knocking on doors, picking up the phone, and heading out to networking events. Developing the relationships necessary to deliver sales in complex, service oriented business such as consulting, law and accounting takes time – much, much longer than most people realise. And it's only the optimistic salespeople that hang in there long enough to reap the rewards.

The side effect of this optimism shows up in forecasts. Rainmakers are inherently prone to be optimisitic and overestimate their chances of winning a deal. Despite the fact that “sandbagging” (deliberately producing a low and easy to beat forecast when setting sales targets) can be very lucrative – in fact the vast majority of forecasts I've experienced in my many years selling, managing and consulting in professional services have been significantly overoptimistic.

So how can we square this circle and produce accurate forecasts despite the inherent optimism of successful Rainmakers?

Well, here's how not to do it: grill the Rainmaker, question their judgement, highlight all the risks and potential slip-ups, and browbeat them into lowering the forecast.

Apart from royally pissing off the Rainmaker, dampening their optimism damages their ability to sell. All of a sudden, they stop going the extra-mile – because they're not quite so certain the client is going to buy. They stop making quite so many calls, or going to quite so many networking events. Their dampened optimism even projects itself to client prospects who notice the Rainmaker doesn't seem quite so confident: perhaps his firm can't help after all?

Now, I'm not saying that analysing and qualifying opportunities is a bad thing – far from it. Done in the context of identifying the actions the Rainmaker needs to take to win the sale, or to help him focus his time on the highest payoff activities, it is tremendously helpful. But using it as a hammer to beat down the Rainmaker's optimism in order to produce a realistic forecast can have the side-effect of killing his effectiveness as a salesperson.

So what's a a more effective approach?

Well, one option is to lessen the need for accurate forecasts. This is easier done in partnerships than in publicly quoted companies who live or die by hitting their quarterly numbers. But remember – these are aggregate numbers for the whole company. An accurate company-level forecast is not necessarily one that is built from highly accurate micro-forecasts from each salesperson. When aggregated, forecast inaccuraces can balance out, and optimistic biases can be corrected for. In many leading consumer goods companies for example, sales forecasts are not calculated by asking each salesperson to accurately forecast then rolling them up – they are calculated statistically using overall demand and environmental factors – and are often far more accurate than salesperson projections. It also makes sense to reduce the firm's reliance on accurate forecasts by thinking through: apart from our external reporting – why do we need accurate forecasts? Capacity planning is an obvious reason – but often, accuracy is not needed so far in advance – and clients can often be surprisingly flexibile over scheduling & start dates. Outside of that, there are often few reasons to maintain an accurate forecast (especially in professional firms) – other than the fact that it gives leadership a feeling of “being in control”.

Another option is to remove responsibility for forecasting from the Rainmaker. The Rainmaker's job becomes one of selling as much as possible (of course, at bare minimum hitting the sales targets). Forecasting becomes the responsibility of the sales manager or a staff function – who are measured on the accuracy of the forecast. It's their job to understand the pipeline – and the Rainmaker – enough to make an accurate forecast. It's not the Rainmaker's job to hit the forecast – it's the Rainmaker's job to sell as much as possible.

A third option is for the Rainmaker to retain responsibility for the forecast – but for firm management to be more hands-off in how this is done. Allow the Rainmaker to manage their own pipeline “in private” and pass up forecasts (either per major opportunity, or just overall). In this case the Rainmaker can keep their own optimistic perspective on the opportunity 90% of the time, but is asked to pass a number upwards which they can “guarantee”. The sales manager (or managing partner/practice head in a professional firm) will work with the Rainmaker to give coaching on how to progress each opportunity – but they don't browbeat the salesperson into changing their forecasts.

Now these methods aren't perfect. But individually, or in combination, they are a lot better than the traditional approach of beating up salespeople in pipeline meetings to get accurate forecasts – and actually damaging their ability to sell.

Ian

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Marketing

Staying "Front of Mind" with Referral Partners

Posted by

Ian Brodie on February 10th, 2009.

One key feature of selling many professional services and other high value business-to-business products and services is that they are bought relatively rarely.

As I detailed in Three Painful Truths for Business Developers this means that whenever you make a proactive sales outreach to a potential client, the chances are very, very high that at that point in time they will not be actively looking for your type of services. In fact, they will most likely not even be aware at all that they have potential problems or needs in the areas you can help them with. And no matter how memorable your interactions with them, the reality is that a few short weeks later they will struggle to remember you.

Smart professional firms and sellers adopt a variety of tactics to overcome this with the core principle being to nuture the relationship with high potential customers over time. Each interaction – be it a call, a meeting, a useful article clipped and sent, or an email newsletter – is designed to add value to the customer/prospect and to strengthen the relationship. Done well, these approaches have a huge payoff.

But few firms adopt a similar approach to their referral partners – be they clients, ex-clients or network contacts. They may adapt the best practices of preparing for and asking for referrals – timing the request for when they have delivered value to the partner, being very specific in who they are asking to be referred to, clairfying the value the referrer and referred-to will get, etc. But these are all “outbound referrals”. A one-off contact or approach by the referral partner to introduce you to someone you want to be referred to. They suffer the same challenge as a proactive sales outreach you do yourself – the chances are that at the time of contact the prospect will not be aware of a need in the area you can help with.

By far the best sort of referral is what I call an “inbound referral” – when someone contacts your “referral partner” looking for a recommendation and you are referred then – at the point of need.

In this case the prospect is actively looking for help in your area – and the referrer's opinion is clearly respected because they were called rather than initiating the contact.

The problem, of course, is that just like with your sales prospects themselves; you aren't necessarily front of mind for your “referral partners”. So they may not give you a particularly strong referral. After all, how many other accountants does that lawyer you count as a partner know and refer to? How many other printers does the marketing consultant you speak to at the chamber of commerce know? Usually quite a few.

In order to get these referrals – the most valuable ones – you must be front of mind with your referral partners when they receive the call.

Now, if they are a current or recent client you have done great work for then chances are that you will be the only one referred. Or if you are part of a “leads group” like BNI – then members of that group will automatically refer to you. But these situations are in the minority for most referral situations for most professionals and sellers. In order to maximise the number of referrals you get, you need a wide network of high potential referral partners, and you must be front of mind with them despite them not being recent clients or part of a “club” with you.

How do you do this? In the same way you stay front of mind with high potential clients. You invest in and nurture the relationship. You may not be able to work with them daily or meet them every week – but you can keep in touch and you can add value to them with every interaction.

A great example of this approach comes from Paul Halliwell, the Business Development director for the Urquhart Partnership in Manchester. Paul is a great networker and keeps in contact with a wide range of professionals from allied industries – all of whom could be potential referrers at some point.

In order to build his relationship with this network (and in addition to all the normal pracitces good networkers do), Paul produces a monthly “Take 5 Minutes” newsletter. It's the referral partner equivalent of an email newsletter to clients. Because it's to partners it's very relaxed in tone and just done in simple Word format manually emailed to a distribution list, rather than using HTML and an email management system. It doesn't feel at all like a sales document. It includes some personal news, Paul's views and reviews of local networking events he's been to (really useful information for his contacts to know which netwokring events are going to be valuable for them) and a couple of really bad jokes.

It's fairly simple stuff – but does involve an investment of his time. The end result is worth it though. I know many firms who provide the sort of training & recruitment services that Urquhart do – but none that keep in touch and nurture their relationship with me the way that Paul does. So when anyone asks for a recommendation for HR services, training or recruitment – guess which firm is at the front of my mind?

Ian

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News

Carnival of Trust for February 2009

Posted by

Ian Brodie on February 3rd, 2009.

Welcome to the February 2009 Edition of the Carnival of Trust.

This month sees the publication of the 10th Edelman Global Trust Barometer – and it makes for frightening reading. Across their sample of “informed publics” in 20 countries across the globe, 62% of 25-64 year olds reported that they trust corporations less now than they did a year ago. In absolute terms, in the US, trust in banks for example, has fallen to 36% among 35-64 year olds; with trust in automotive companies even lower at 33%. In the UK, even trust in “people like me” dropped 13 points to 38%.

Set against this backdrop of falling trust levels, it would be easy to fill this months Carnival with lurid tales of corporate misdeeds and breaches of trust. And in the aftermath of the recent Madoff, Merill Lynch, Blagojevich, Satyam and other scandals we have no shortage of candidates.

But if we truly believe – as I firmly do – that increased trust is an absolute necessity underpinning not only successful businesses but successful societies – then what we need are examples we can look up to and learn from, not just ones which allow us a self-satisfied “tut tut” at other's misbehaviour.

Of course, it would be impossible to do a round-up of this month's trust-related blog posts without some mention of recent scandals. But I've tried to balance that with some rather more inspiring and uplifting material too.

Before launching into this month's selection a few words of thanks to Charlie Green for the opportunity to host the Carnival, and to Ian Welsh for his support in preparing the selection. Please share with us and the authors your reactions and comments.

Posted before the outcome of the Superbowl was known, in Pittsburgh Steelers and the Titans of Wall Street Rob Jewell provides an inspiring “compare and contrast” story highlighting the leadership of Steelers' owner Dan Rooney. Rooney's ability to bring his organisation's values to life through his personal conduct is the perfect example of how individuals can inspire trust amongst whole communities through their actions.

In Leadership Scruples: What Would You Do? Dan McCarthy lists 20 great ethical questions to test your leadership calibre. It's the sort of test where you “know” what the right answer is instinctively – but whether you'd be able to carry out that behaviour in the real world is the true test of a leader.

JD Hull reminds us in In Praise of Structure: Getting a Standard that the setting – and maintaining of standards is one of the key foundations of an effective culture for professional service firms. If our client's and our own people cannot trust us to meet basic deadlines, how can they trust us with their most important work and their careers.

In the final post on Leadership and Management this month, Brad Kolar talks about the difference between equality and fairness. In an article echoing W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne's work on Fair Process, Brad's When Equal Isn't Fair talks about how leaders must treat their staff differently – adapting to their individual needs – in order to treat them fairly.

On the Connecting with NLP Blog, Lisa J lays down a post chock-full of common sense, and of equal value to professional advisors and parents alike. is the kind of post I wish I'd written myself. For me, item #2 in Lisa's list – Tell the Truth – is the cornerstone of establishing trust in almost all situations.

In a short and sweet post on Influence: Understanding & Fulfilling The Needs of Others Steve Roesler brings his experience from counselling and coaching to the world of influential presentations, and notes that in order to influence, one must listen as much as one talks. Standard advice for 1-1 interactions – but almost unheard of when it comes to presentations. And yet from my own experience, this advice rings very true – I'd urge readers to give what he says careful consideration.

First up in Sales & Marketing is an interesting article from Sims Wyeth: Dress for Success which shows how what we wear and how we look affects how others trust us (and, of course, how we trust others). To be honest, this is one of those articles that both impresses me with its accuracy while at the same time depressing me that we can all be so shallow. While I'd like to think I base my opinions of others on how they act, not on what they wear – Sims highlights that the evidence points to the contrary. And we need to bear this in mind while attempting to build trust when selling or marketing to others.

Next up is perhaps my favourite post of the month, from my friend Tim Rohrer. Tim is a great storyteller, and in Belligerence Kills he recounts the tale of his encounter with a sales trainer who really should have known better…

Inevitably, recent financial scandals loom large in the economics roundup. Perhaps the most interesting perspective is provided on Barbara O'Brien's Buddhism Blog. In Greed and Delusion on Wall Street she avoids the obvious knee jerk reactions to draw wider lessons for us all from a buddhist perspective.

Finally, in “The Gullible and Bernie Madoff” (post no longer available online) Neil Senturia brings us right back to the core issue of trust – highlighting that Trust is Only Earned in a Deeply Personal Way – it cannot be garnered and granted by someone else.

Amen to that!

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News

How Clients Buy 2009: Mandatory Reading for Professional Services Marketers & Business Developers

Posted by

Ian Brodie on January 22nd, 2009.

Raintoday have just released their latest research report: How Clients Buy 2009. This really is required reading for all marketers and business developers in professional service firms. It looks at buyers' expectations and forecast spending levels, levels of switching, the top ways clients identify potential providers (and how to be effective at them) and the top methods buyers use to finally decide who to hire.

You can download a research excerpt here. If you subscribe to Raintoday's regular newsletter, you'll also see a different excerpt – this time looking at the level of influence websites play in identifying and hiring professional advisors.

In tough economic times, you really can't afford to be “shooting in the dark” – you need to know what marketing and sales approaches are going to work, and how to get the most from them. This report lays it all bare.

Ian

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Marketing

What's Your Backstory?

Posted by

Ian Brodie on January 22nd, 2009.

One of the most common pieces of “wisdom” we're repeatedly told in marketing and sales is that since our clients are tuned in to WII FM – What's In it For Me we need to adjust our messages and our interactions with them accordingly. In other words everything we say about ourselves must be geared to how they can benefit by working with us.

And to a large degree this is true. Our “elevator speech” or “audio logo” must be set in client focused terms to create empathy and interest – or they will simply switch off. However, it's not the full story.

Our clients and prospects are not completely self-centred creatures. They are normal human beings. As the old saying goes: people buy from people – and we are all inherently interested in other people's stories. It helps to humanise and cement relationships. Think of the strongest relationships you have with your best clients: are they purely business oriented? Or, in fact, haven't they transcended the “what's in it for me” and moved to a level where you are genuinely interested in, and care about the interests of the other party?

So in addition to the business-focused elements of your elevator speech and the initial discussions you have with people at networking events – you must be able to move on and open up about yourself in an interesting way which lays the foundation for a deeper human relationship with your prospective client.

One of the best ways to do this is with a compelling backstory. In fact a frequent follow-up question in initial meetings is “so how did you get here?” or “what's your story”.

In the world of literature, TV and the movies, the backstory is the history of the characters. How they got to where they are today. It gives logic and legitimacy to their thinking and their actions. Helen is bristly and reluctant to form close relationships because of a painful divorce she went through. John is lacking in self-confidence because he was always told he was no good as a child.

In similar manner, a well-constructed and engagingly told backstory can really help further your relationships on both a business and personal front:

Your personal backstory humanises you – it helps people see inside to what motivates you and why you do the things you do and why you are the way you are.
It provides mental hooks for people to remember you by. “You're the guy who gave up the big corporate job to focus on helping local businesses”, “Ah yes, you're the lady who was thrown in at the deep end and learnt her selling skills the hard way.”
Most importantly, it provides evidence and credibility to back up the claims you make about your business. Did you spend 5 years in Japan learning their quality methods? Perhaps you witnessed the pain of your parents' messy divorce and were motivated to become a divorce lawyer who did things a better way.

Used in this latter way, your backstory can stand alongside testimonials and qualifications to “prove” you are highly competent at what you do. And it feels so much less “salesy” and more natural than trotting out customer quotes or a string of letters.

Of course, it goes without saying that your backstory must be true. But unless you think about it and prepare it carefully you won't be able to articulate it well and link it to the key selling messages you are trying to get across. You need to look at your value proposition or USP and think through: what is it I have done that makes me uniquely qualified to do this? Then find a way of articulating this in your backstory.

My own personal backstory focuses on how I have both consulted for 15 years in strategy, sales and marketing to some of the worlds leading firms – and have been in the trenches myself selling professional services (in my case consulting projects). It tells of how I learnt the hard way through mistakes – so it's a relatively self-deprecating backstory and doesn't sound like I'm showing off. The key is that it tells potential clients in a subtle and understated way that not only have I expertise from consulting, but I have been in their position and “walked the talk” and sold professional services successfully myself.

One of the best backstories I've heard is from a local accountant (Jesse Oldfield of Lymm) who, before returning to accounting, ran a number of small businesses as MD himself. Without shouting it out loud, this tells prospective clients that he really knows what they're going through running their own business. Any accountant can claim to be able to give solid business advice to their clients – but Jesse can do so with real credibility because of his backstory.

You won't use your backstory every time you meet someone. But you will be asked about your history or “how you got here” surprisingly frequently. And if you've prepared an interesting backstory, you will be able to cement their perception of your credbility – while enhancing your personal human relationship with them.

Ian

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