Back in 1963, Bruce Doolin Henderson was asked by the Boston Safe Deposit & Trust Company to set up a management consulting division.

It started off as just Bruce, a small office and a phone. Pretty much like all of us started up our business. Though no fancy Apple Macs in those days.

Within a decade, the renamed Boston Consulting Group were the premier strategy consulting firm in the US. And Henderson had become known as the leading strategy consultant of his generation.

When he died in 1992, the Financial Times said he “did more to change the way business is done in the United States than any other man in American business history”.

Now not everyone agrees with Henderson and BCG's ideas on business. And he was reputedly a rather difficult man to get along with.

But there's no doubt he was a pioneer and an Authority. When he spoke, people listened.

But back in 1963 that was far from the case. BCG's billings for their first month were just USD $500.

Henderson faced the same challenge that most small advisory firms have when they start up: they're unknown. 

Even though he had personal connections from his time at AD Little, and even though his parent company had clients they could introduce him to, he was still an unknown quantity to most.

Other consulting firms such as McKinsey had a 45-year head start on him and had an established reputation, a strong client base, and an alumni network of ex-consultants in high places in industry who regularly hired their old firm to work for them.

But what Henderson had was ideas.

Lots of them. New and interesting ideas about how business should be done.

He knew that BCG would struggle to get hired based on track record because they had none. And their relationships would never stack up against McKinsey and the other established firms.

But his ideas could go toe-to-toe against anyone's and win.

So he started publishing his ideas in a little pamphlet called Perspectives. A pocket-sized booklet that senior business executives could carry around with them.

He didn't wait to get a big publishing deal and spend years writing a book.

He didn't wait to get approved by the editors of the top business publications of the day (who all had relationships with his competitors anyway).

He just published his ideas himself and sent them directly to his target clients: senior executives in large corporations.

And he didn't just write about things he thought would be acceptable to those executives. He called his Perspectives a “Punch Between The Eyes” and decreed that:

“Statements that senior executives would find believable are not supported. Only provocative material is argued. the subject matter is chosen to be deliberately provocative, significant in implication, and relevant to the policy decisions of corporate competition.”

The rest is history.

BCG are of course, huge today. And still known for their thought leadership.

But it all started with Henderson making a decision to get his ideas out directly to his target clients.

And today it's never been easier to connect directly with potential clients.

You can still use direct mail. But you can also advertise on Google, Linkedin or Facebook. Each one can get you directly to a potential client depending on your market.

And with email marketing, you can follow-up consistently to deepen your authority. 

My guess is that if Bruce Henderson had been around today he'd be running a hugely successful online consultancy from that tiny little office :)

If you have great ideas it's something you can do too.