Principles of selling for professional practices - what process
works for you?
In this time of seeming constant change, no professional
practices or firms can be complacent about their future. The
threats come from various directions, some obvious and visible
such as larger merged firms or new starts, and some less so,
such as internet services. Unless you take these seriously, what
does your future hold? It is important that, regardless of size,
you look seriously at what you do to generate fees and to find
new clients. This article covers some of the key aspects you
need to think about and gives some ideas for how you can be more
proactive and more effective in generating revenues. We offer
some things to think about for identifying the best ways you can
do this for your practice and the type of market you work in. If
you start to apply these principles you can build a more
sustainable business with more guaranteed revenue flow.
Traditionally, most professional firms have had to grow through
forms of networking, referrals and personal relationships,
because of legal restrictions. However, these constraints have
been removed and, the market dynamics have changed in many
areas. The "New World" requires you to operate differently if
you want to survive. However, the first prejudice to overcome is
your own reaction to the word "sell" and to rethink what it
means. After all, you did not do all of your training to become
a "seller" did you? Why should this thinking be so prevalent? In
our society, one of the biggest barriers is the public
perception of selling and sales people. How are they usually
portrayed in our media? No wonder you do not want to be thought
of like this! Yet, it is a misrepresentation if you think about
how many people are involved in selling jobs every day of the
week. They are working in a very different way, where they are
behaving professionally and, generally, with integrity.
What are your concerns about selling? How people might perceive
you? You do not like the idea of pushing people? The good news
is that effective, professional selling does not have to be
about this! Dictionary definitions will tell you that selling is
about "convincing of value". If you are to do that, you need to
establish the right kind of relationship with clients and
prospects, where you can find what their real issues are and
what they consider as value - and then show them how you can
satisfy that. The fun part of selling is that value is an
individual perception and will change according to the
circumstances too. Rather than think of yourself as a "seller",
what about a "provider of value", "solution provider", "problem
remover" or similar? Do any of these seem better? When we were
working with one accounting practice it made a great difference
when the main players rethought this and saw themselves in
another light. They became much more positive and had success
with approaching existing and potential clients with this
mindset (and some added skills we had developed with them!)
Whatever size your organisation is, there will be threats
happening in your market. As many firms merge and grow, they can
offer wider ranges of services to clients. Others look to
establish relationships with organisations in different, but
synergistic, areas where are opportunities can be generated for
each other. For simple services which can be commoditised, the
internet may be a threat where some clients will think they can
do things for themselves. There is an answer to this - decide to
become proactive in your sales effort. (Or would you prefer "fee
generating"?)
To move from the more traditional, reactive style of your market
to a proactive one, creating your own opportunities, does
require a number of changes. These start with the people being
willing to change their attitudes. For those who will not, ask
them what is stopping them? What do they think they gain by
staying as they are? However, it is better to start with those
who are more positive and happy to move in the direction you
want. We are not suggesting that your practice or firm becomes
like the American law firm (and a few leading City ones) where
future success and promotion is almost totally linked to
billable hours and revenues generated with the mega-hours and
pushy culture that often goes with it!
One early step to take is to identify the sales process which
works best for your organisation and in your market. Whether
people like it or not, consistently good performers will follow
a process, albeit with some flexibility. This means that they
can deliver results consistently. When "modelling" top
performers from an investment bank, this caused something of a
surprise as they thought that their successful people were all
more opportunistic and entrepreneurial! These could be
successful - occasionally!! Good sales organisations are clear
about their process and use it for a number of things. We have
examples we are happy to share.
When you have identified each stage of your process, then it is
possible to break them down into best practice activities. From
these, you can check the competencies needed to be able to work
though them. This allows you to provide any necessary training
or development to ensure that the skills are embedded.
Those who are going to do the revenue generation can now plan
their prospect and client contacts more effectively. They also
can be better prepared for meetings and assess how well they are
progressing.
The other major benefit when you have assessed your process is
that you can see where the critical control points are. From
this, you can create the sales control system to measure how
things are going. This tool is vital to any form of effective
sales management as it puts the focus on the activity leading to
the results, which is where you can take any necessary
corrective action. You can set standards for the various stages
and also work out the ratios needed to ensure that you achieve
the desired results. This enables you to measure the right
things - and will help more accurate forecasting too.
When this is in place, it becomes much easier to assign roles
and responsibilities. Who will manage the process? Who are the
doers? Who are the support staff? Pulling all of this together
has produced some significant improvements in organisations
where we have worked. Where this particular process was
developed (a bank outside the UK) they have seen a considerable
growth in sales, product retention rather than cancellation, and
staff retention in this area.
There is another key element to this. What style or approach to
selling will work best for your firm. In the professional
services sector you will almost certainly want to have some
emphasis on relationships and maybe a relationship selling
model. An alternative to this, which is perhaps even more
applicable especially for new business generation is to
introduce a consultative selling approach. This requires an
emphasis on communication skills, relationship building and
knowledge of your business and the prospect's market place -
plus sales skills. Consultative sellers will help clients and
prospects to identify the real issues they are facing and to
create a sense of partnership in helping to find a solution. In
the short-term, the solution may not be what you offer, or
someone else could be better positioned to supply it. However,
getting into the right "mindspace" of the client or prospect
will pay off in the future.
We have seen many professional services firms make significant
progress when they have changed their attitude to selling and
introduced the processes and skills. It is not about selling
your soul to the devil, it is about becoming more proactive and
effective in "convincing of value". This will enable your firm
to take more control of its destiny and to generate the revenues
you need to achieve the plans you have.