I talk a lot about the need to nurture client relationships: to build credibility and trust over time – you may well have noticed ;)

But if you're anything like me, every now and then you've probably found yourself thinking “great, but isn't there a shortcut? I need clients now”.

Well, there is – sometimes.

Normally, so-called shortcuts don't work. They usually involve you getting more aggressive with your marketing and pushing your stuff at people when they're not ready.

Exactly the opposite of what I advocate. And frankly, it rarely works.

But there is an approach to getting clients fast that can work for some people.

It's dependent on the sort of business you're in. But if it works for you it can help you bypass a ton of time and effort and get straight through to clients open to talking to you and open to hiring you.

The approach is to look for “trigger events”.

A trigger event is something that happens to a business or individual that precedes them needing your help.

So, for example, after two businesses have merged, they often need support from HR consultants, change management consultants and IT specialists to make the merger work.

In this case the news of the merger is a trigger event for the people who supply those sorts of services. Businesses undergoing a merger are far more likely to need their support than typical businesses.

By focusing their marketing on businesses undergoing a merger, they're far more likely to hit people who are interested than if they try to market to everyone.

And those people are going to be closer to a buying decision (and with a real motivation to buy) than people who are just interested generally.

Now the strategy doesn't work for everyone. In the merger case, by the time the merger is announced it's too late for consultants, lawyers and financiers who work on the deal itself to get involved – that'll already be sorted out.

But for people like HR, change and IT consultants who get involved downstream it's a great time to approach a business.

So what are the trigger events for clients getting interested in hiring someone like you?

It could be news about the business (overseas expansion, rapid growth, a profit warning, a new facility being built). Or it could be news about individuals (a promotion, a new senior hire, a new project being taken on).

Make sure you're watching for the relevant news. Set up google alerts for your target clients. Watch Linkedin profile changes and status updates. Keep up to date with the trade news in your sector and stay in touch with the grapevine.

And have something useful to share for when the event happens. Don't just contact a merging business to say “hey, we can help you with your IT”. Have an executive briefing on the “5 big pitfalls of IT systems that can derail mergers – and how to avoid them”.

Offer them the briefing as a way of building your credibility and starting a relationship quickly.

Trigger events can be a real shortcut to finding high potential clients – make sure you're watching out for them.