Many of us who work in marketing industry, or marketing of our own businesses have been subtly adjusting the way we do things for a while.  But how many of us have stopped and really “thought about” the enormous shift that has occurred in how to market a services (or even a product) business? 

Two, three, four or five years ago, we used to market a business purely by interrupting people.  We interrupted people by advertising in their path and hoped to disrupt them from what they were doing with a loud enough message that it sunk into their heads.

We advertised in newspapers to interrupt them while they were reading the paper.  We disrupted their TV viewing with advertising promoting a bargain, sale, or call to action.  We dumped junk mail in letterboxes to disrupt people when they read their mail, and we used to cold call and spam email people in the hope that they would suddenly leap to the attention of our business.

This is old marketing, ‘Outbound marketing’ trying to force someone to do something with no real consideration of product or pipeline.  It was marketing focused on finding customers like needles in haystacks.

Today, things are different.   We and our clients’ are working our hardest to do a different kind of marketing:  Marketing that attracts highly qualified clients to our business like a magnet, ‘Inbound Marketing’.  Marketing that does much of the early sales work for us.

Instead of interrupting people with marketing and promotion, our primary tactics are built around making ourselves interesting to our target markets and providing valuable information that people want to see and look forward to interacting with.  We let people choose to interact with us when they need us, and we ensure they know we exist by being an active part of their online and offline communities.

Instead of cold calling we create useful content and tools so a prospect contacts us looking for more information.  Instead of beating people over the head with our advertising, we create articles (blogs,) and videos that people want to read and offer them through our connected social networks.  And we work hard to improve our search engine optimization so that the people in our community can find and validate our capability with a few online clicks when we are referred by our peers or other customers.  Community, content and social media become the key to our success.

Think about how your services business is marketing itself.  Are your primary tactics still built around interrupting people, or are you starting to build community, content and engagement around your business, allowing them to choose you as a service provider for the value you offer? 

Do you find it hard or uncomfortable coming up with things to post on LinkedIn?

You are not alone. Many of our clients and colleagues have been getting more active on LinkedIn of late, and are continually asking us what they should be posting online. So we’ve put together a list of ideas that you can use as a guide for what you should and shouldn’t post on LinkedIn.

Things you should post on or do on LinkedIn include:

Share links (using a URL shortener like bit.ly) to interesting articles, websites or video you have found that some individuals in your network might appreciate. Don’t worry about whether all of your connections will find the information equally valuable. Also, try to use words that grab the readers and encourage them to click the link.

Pose a question that could lead to solving a problem you have, like: “Anyone know any good graphic designers?”

Conduct an informal poll of your network relating to a topic that is of interest to you, such as: “What tools are you using to deliver online content to your clients?“

Mention a person or a situation that might be helpful to some of your connections, like: “I just met with John Jeffrey from ABC Engineers and found out they are saving companies lots of $$ on building services design.“

Talk about an event you are attending or have attended to encourage involvement and/or questions

Use the “Like” feature when you see a helpful update from one of your connections. Doing this shares that update with your entire network. This is a great way to give the writer of the helpful update exposure to your network.

Comment on other people’s posts. Giving your community feedback “engages” with them, which is one of the core purposes for social media usage.

And, just as importantly, following is a list of “No-Nos” and netiquette you should observe on LinkedIn.

Don’t Use LinkedIn Like Facebook and Twitter  – The netiquette on LinkedIn is no more than a couple of updates per week (max one-two per day), whereas on Twitter you are almost expected to tweet twenty times per day.

Please disconnect your Twitter feed from your LinkedIn Updates (or don’t connect them in the first place) – Usage of LinkedIn and Twitter is different… Active Twitter feeds on LinkedIn pollute other’s updates with more personal commentary than might normally be appropriate for LinkedIn.

Don’t mention personal things – like what you had for breakfast or that your cat, dog or child is sick today – this is inappropriate. It suggests to the business professionals in your network that you don’t really respect their time.

Don’t flog – Continually talking about specific products and services make people think you are trying to flog something. This is not the purpose of social media, especially LinkedIn.

Avoid talking about topics that might be sensitive or inappropriate to some of your audience. [if your mother would dislike the comment – don’t make it]

Think twice before posting your physical whereabouts. If you must, do it after you return. Burglaries have occurred after location status tweets.

Don’t waste your time reading updates from people who violate all of the above netiquette rules. By using the “Hide” function, you can stop an individual’s status updates from showing up on your home page.

Don’t hold your breath for a lot of feedback but know people ARE watching you, getting to know more about you.

Want to know more about LinkedIn? We have put together a quick and free “Professional Use of LinkedIn” slideshow you can work through at your own pace.

If you like our article, why not share it with your LinkedIn network?  They might find it as useful as you have.  

No matter how much some want to deny it, people are communicating differently, thinking more selfishly and expecting more.  Clients don’t just want a technically capable service provider anymore, they want a professional service that stays at the cusp.  They  want to be the centre of your universe.  And why shouldn’t they… they are your Clients.

All those delivering services in 2012 will be faced with a series of opportunities… keep doing things the way we always have and hope for the best; or understand what our markets require from our services firms as their positioning shifts and find ways to deliver an evolved service that fulfills the “right now” needs of your target clients.

Here are the most important trends I urge you to address in 2012.  Some of them are marketing, and some of them are more important “market positioning” for your firm:

1.  Look at your markets, understand your current USP

2012 is the time to look at your whole market positioning and decide which parts of the new economy are right to embrace in your professional business and which are irrelevant.  For many businesses the opportunity exists to develop a whole new unique selling proposition (USP), tweak their existing one, or perhaps to consider how you can make your service more valuable and in turn more visible than your competition for the very first time.

Marketing is now no longer an option, it is a mandatory task, but simple self-promotory campaign based marketing just makes you mediocre.  To succeed and really drive growth in 2012, you will have to be more than mediocre at marketing, you are going to need to know exactly where your niche is, because if you don’t your customers simply won’t find you there.

2.  Communicate differently on email

Our marketplace is communicating differently to how they communicated last year or the year before.  There is more email in our inboxes than ever before.  So much of it is noise, offering little or no value, selling not giving, pushing not leading.   But with more than 60% of people reading their emails on mobile devices, on the go, over more than 15 hours in the day, the opportunity to provide quality content via email that positions your firm at the forefront of your market is irresistible.  Please don’t waste the opportunity.

3.  Make your Website work harder for you

Three or four years ago your website was something static… a tool to set and forget.  You built a website, wrote the copy and updated it from time to time with self-promotion.  Now, the website is one of the primary gateways to your business.  It is the first place that someone goes when they find out about your firm, and the best opportunity that you have to lure them in, calling them to action right when they are ready to step up as a service-buyer.  Other than your community, it is the most important tool you have in your kitbag… because it is the hub from which all your other marketing activities can happen… email marketing, advertising, Google adwords, direct mail, social media, referral… all of these tactics lead to your website.  If your website doesn’t have honest, convincing hooks to catch those fish, you are mossing the best opportunity available.

4.  Get Social

Did you know that the fastest growing age-group of social media users in 2011 was those between 55-65?  So many of our sensible, professional clients start out resistant to (or mildly curious about) social media when we work on their first strategy, but when we explain the personal and business benefits of being active in their online communities, most quickly step up for a look and like what they see.

Being an appropriate part of your online communities not only helps you to understand the emerging technologies and communications techniques as they ripple through our markets, it also presents your business as being progressive, inquisitive and active in its marketplace.

But what you really need to understand about social media is this:

• In online communities people group themselves by their interests, technical capability and communities, so you can often find your primary target markets more successfully online than you can offline, and with a carefully constructed campaign, showcase your capability without selling gaudily, flogging your soul or spending a cent (you may have to spend a few hours though).
• As a desirable professional people will “check you out” online long before they ever approach you to provide a professional service.  They judge you on your Linkedin page, your online communities, and the depth of your personal brand.
• You should never, ever entrust your business or personal brand to the youngest or most social person in the room.  Your brands are the most important things you have in professional services.  They take years to build to the level where they attract clients organically. Why would you risk them on someone who doesn’t necessarily understand that one inappropriate update, tweet or comment can do inexorable damage?

5.  Ensure your data is in order

When we communicate with clients in this time poor, message rich world, we want to deliver only the most relevant, valuable information we can, and we want to do it in a timely manner.  So it is important to have living client, target client and influencer lists (or ideally, a well-adopted client relationship management (CRM) system) and the business processes to support it.  You need to have segmented your target clients well, so you can deliver only the most useful information to them, and you can do it fast, while a trend is still a trend, and your news is still news.  Fundamentally, though, the most important thing when building a list, is to build the business processes that ensure people continue to update it and use it.

6.  Understand your pipeline, for next year [not last year]

The winning markets in 2012 may look very different to the winning markets in 2011.  Most experienced business operators understand this.  They know that during an election year Government work will slow for an extended period, and during a global credit crunch only the most capitalized firms will be taking risk.   So where will your active clients come from next year?  Which will be more profitable?  And how many do you need in your pipeline to cover your costs and meet your targets?  How much of this will come from existing clients, and how much from new clients, and now we come back to #1… What is the USP that is going to secure those clients as yours this year?

7.  Evolve your services

Are you providing the services that your target clients need in 2012?  Are you offering them the latest technology, tools and capability, streamlining their spend and driving greater efficiency from their projects?  Are you leveraging and collaborating with your Clients and Partners, using client portals, collaborative project management tools, and communicating as often as they need?  Have you taken the time to look at how you can evolve your services with the changing technology environment and faster web speeds available?  What do your clients need?  What do they want?  How can you ensure you give them everything they need and waste nothing?  2012 is not a year for looking back and considering, it is a year for stepping forward and serving the clients you have, and building the clients you want by giving them want they need and what they want.  2012 is a year of evolution.

If you get on top of all this, you’re ready for a bumper year.   So have have a Merry Christmas and a safe holiday season, and we’ll see you online in 2012.

Warmest Regards, Rebecca and the Stretch Marketing Team. 

I simply booked into similar flights with Virgin and got on with my day on the same route.  But on my trip, I was fortunate to sit next to another inconvenienced traveller, an International Director of one of the world’s larger Engineering firms.  A foreigner, visiting Australia for business, making decisions about where to invest, grow and improve their services firm.   This gentleman said to me…

“They didn’t just hurt their own brand did they… They took another swipe at Brand Australia.” 

At first I curled back in horror and defence of my patriotic Aussie brand,  but when you consider the last twelve months,  from an international perspective he is very, very right.

The Qantas grounding is another blow to the brand of our previously very stable, secure and reliable nation, known for its lack of sovereign risk, stable investment environment, conservative growth-supporting governments, good sports achievements, sunny weather and great beaches, not to mention our previously faultless flying kangaroo.

In the past twelve months our national brand ‘Brand Australia’ has taken a big beating, politically, financially and emotionally.

The Brand Australia website says

“Australia is … well known for its friendly people, spectacular environment, resources and lifestyle. But this is only part of our story. Contemporary Australia is a confident, creative and outward looking nation, with a strong economy and an abundance of talented people.”

And yet, this Qantas grounding caps off a year in which we have had:

• a spate of natural disasters and frightening weather across an enormous percentage of our country,
• a sudden public dumping of our elected Prime Minister,
• a surprise minerals resources rent tax (MRRT) sprung on our strongest and only thriving industry,
• a dollar that has moved so erratically foreigners can no longer afford to contemplate visiting our beaches,
• a hung Parliament,
• a Carbon Tax that was vehemently opposed by some (and that hits that only surviving industry again),
• a loss in the Rugby World Cup
• and now, our national airline, Qantas having to call international grounding to solve their ongoing disputes.

Brand Australia isn’t looking so “friendly” or “outward looking” and we keep trying to take down our “strong economy” from the inside.  Nor is it reflecting the stable, secure, reliable or beautiful values our country has long been known for as we head into 2012.

So, where does Australia’s brand go from here?   Have we lost our mojo?  And what are we going to do to get it back?

At least Sam Stosur and Cadel Evans are keeping our dreams alive.

Tell us what you think…

People know what to expect from a commodity-service, don’t want to pay much for it, and they can pretty-much get it from anyone (think tax returns, basic architecture, contract administration, and some types of engineering).   Businesses bang the services out with little care for relationships leaving the barriers to entry and exit of a client fairly low and complain how price driven their firms are.

A “problem solving service” on the other hand is a little different.

People buy a problem solving service because they believe they “need to solve a problem”.  They identify with a problem that they have right now, or a fear of a problem that they think they will have in the future, and they seek out a solution.    They think they are going to buy a business, so they seek strategic business or legal advice to do due diligence.  They want to develop a property so they seek out a Development Adviser to help them get their feasibility to stack up.  They want to build a structurally complicated project on poor ground so they seek out a Structural Engineer to get the footings and structure right and reduce risk on the owners and builder.

In order to sell to them you have to offer a compelling solution to the problem or need they think they have. You have to stand out from the crowd as unique, valuable or most suitable to solve their problem.  And you need to be constantly evolving your knowledge of problems that need solving in your target industries as the industry change with technology, trends and tools.

But how many service providers actually recognize the problems and needs that they service when they see them in their target audience?  And how many are actively looking for them, in the places they are most likely to find them?

Think about it… What are the needs or problems that your business services?

At Stretch Marketing we service a business’s need to grow organically, building their marketing strategy, teaching their staff how to be core to business development, then leading them in the implementation of their tactical marketing, PR and BD programs.

We built our services around the problems our clients have, like keeping up with changing marketing technologies; driving marketing in a deliberate and strategic manner; getting rhythm in their marketing and communications; and building relationships in their local markets, so we find it easy to achieve solid results.

The most successful consultants are the ones that identify the problems their clients’ have and come up with smarter solutions to them.

If I asked your clients what problems you solve for them what would they say?

Would they tell me that you help them identify their most pressing problems and find the solutions to them as your top priority?

Or would they tell me you deliver a largely commoditized service that offers only the mandatory services available in your category?  Are you an Engineer, or a Project Problem Solver?  An Accountant or an Adviser?  A Leader or a Follower?

Do you, as a key person in a services business, keep yourself and your firm on the cutting edge of your industry’s trends, digesting technology changes, Internet forces and opportunities so your clients don’t have to?

People pay a premium for smarter thinkers, more strategic and proactive insights and an ability to see and solve their problems… but are you offering this problem solving service to your clients? Or are you just wheeling out the same-old same-way approach… banging out a service?

Tell us what problems you solve for your clients… we’d love to hear some examples…

In the professional marketplace you now have the opportunity to present your firm and yourself for exactly how competent, experienced and connected you are, way before you are able to stand in front of someone, and long before you have the opportunity to close a sale.  When someone refers you to a lead, the first thing that person will do is Google or LinkedIn search you, and judge you.  Are you ready?

People can judge you by your ability to present yourself online, as individuals and as a company.  This is increasingly important to the business development process for professionals in a search oriented marketplace.

Think about it…

People can Google you and see how you rank, and how many things you have been noticed for doing in your career, community, and companies.   (And we all Google everything readily these days…)

People can find you on LinkedIn, assess your CV and read testimonials from your associates, contacts and clients to judge your professional competence, (and ability to keep up with technology trends).   They can also see who else you are connected to in your community and determine if you move in similar, or appealing circles.

People can look you up on Facebook and understand the way you build and interact with your online communities.  On Facebook they can see conversations, comments and photos that help them to know your personality better (or not!).

People can follow you on Twitter and understand the short, punchy influential thoughts you choose to share with large and often less-personal groups.

And people can check your Youtube contributions to see business videos, personal video clips, and infographics that you choose to, or find uploaded into the public sphere.

All these things people can look at without your permission or knowledge and make a decision about whether they want to do business with you.  If you don’t make the mark, you might not be granted the time, effort or understanding required to sell your services to someone.

If you haven’t already, I suggest you:
1.    Google yourself, and understand the power of your personal and company brands online right now.
2.    Look up your LinkedIn page, and review your connections and recommendations, and look to get your contacts in your network above 150 or 200 – pretty easy now, even in Australia.
3.    Then set about understanding what you don’t know about online… (chances are that is more than you think).  Allocate some time to learning what you should know about building your personal and business brands online.
4.    Talk to your clients and find out what information you could provide that they would value, or that would help them.  (better to give people information and interaction they value than noise they don’t want to hear).
5.    Seek some help from a credible source (and ideally someone who understands your business and professionalism requirements that is reputable and referred in social media).

BE WARNED….  Many businesses move into the online space by asking the youngest and cheapest in their office to manage it as social media and Internet is seen as a young person’s tool.  They barrel forth broadcasting sales-oriented messages and trying to flog services and products, offering nothing but noise.  This is inappropriate for social media and the Internet, where people expect community, interaction and value that aligns with a firm’s brand and quality.  It is a different style of marketing, so be sure you have considered this before you start and place your brand at risk.

If you are an experienced, active professional that is doing business in the modern economy you are being judged by your presence online.  And the Internet isn’t going away.

Doing nothing is costing you plenty more than doing something will.

If you like this article, and want to know more about our marketing services please visit our website.

I want you to imagine two cats, both hunting the same mouse.  One is a wild cat, scrawny, hungry and merciless in his search for food.   He knows he needs that meal to make it through another day, and he is not going to let it out of his sight.  He likes to eat “mouse”, in fact it is one of his favourite meals, being much better than the crusty 4-day-old sandwich  at the bottom of the rubbish bin, so it is the only thing he can focus on.

The other cat is a plump, well-fed and loved house cat that has just finished a big liver and kidney dinner.  He’s comfortable, content and confident that there will be another meal in his bowl tonight.  For him, the mouse is just entertainment.

Which cat works hardest to catch the mouse?  Which one displays the wholehearted concentration required to hunt, corner and consume his prey?

——

Well, surprise, surprise, it is no different in marketing and business development.  In the economic environment we are in in Queensland and throughout Australia, there are many starved cats hunting hard for a meal in property and construction, government services, architecture, engineering and financial services.   There is also a handful of hungry cats, who are not starving, but rather, looking carefully for the most “choice” meal available.  And inevitably, but less commonly there are the fat cats feeding off secure clients.

In fact, there are three different types of businesses that I see regularly at the moment in the professional services industry:

1. Starving Businesses who need help to survive in this market, and aren’t sure of the best way to hunt, or even where to hunt because the mice have left their building and they don’t have a clear strategy to find new mice.  Some of these businesses are not sure that they want to change their business to find new mice, but frankly, most need to.   (If you think you are one of these, I recommend reading or re-reading “Who Moved My Cheese” by Spencer Johnson as soon as possible).
2. Hungry Businesses that are thriving on success, aggressively hunting their target market (mice) and wanting to be more and more proactive about it.  These businesses are not starving, but they sure are hungry for growth, and they are chasing it mercilessly, looking for new ways to find and secure business, challenging the way they care for and communicate with their clients, developing new IP and looking for different ways to deliver their services in a changing technology environment. These firms are a very attractive service provider to their target markets, because their own success and quality of service makes them attractive.   (If you think you are one of these, I recommend reading “Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion and Purpose”, by Tony Hsieh, Zappos CEO)
3. Plump, Comfortable Businesses with a clear growth trajectory, locked-in, high growth clients who need their services to grow their own businesses, a strong staff-base and resilient succession plan.  An urban myth perhaps?  Yes, they do exist, but it is surprisingly easy to slip from plump and comfortable to starving through complacency and the neglect of client relationships.  (If you are one of these… tell us your favourite read in our comments fields below).

Which type of company are you working in?  And as a Staff Member, Manager or Director are you personally behaving like a Hungry Cat, a Starved Cat, or a Plump and Happy Cat within your firm?  Click here to go directly to our blog and leave us your comments.

So, whilst it is downright miserable out there for many outside the mining sector it is not all starvation and misery.  It is important to remember that you don’t need a license to hunt in this market for the clients who have continued activity and business that you really want, you just need to know what they look like and how to reach them, then get on with doing it.

———–

Our next blog will give you a range of tips on how you can hunt more proactively by bringing your marketing and business development activities together in deliberate support of each other.  Sign up for it here, if you aren’t already a subscriber.

If you like this article, and want to know more about our marketing services please visit our website.

I have often been asked what makes a business or team easy to market the services of.  As a marketer of many services firms, far and away, the one value that comes to the top of the list is integrity. A comfortable integrity at the heart of a company, in the people and the business values of a firm distinguishes it immediately, giving it a heart and a soul.  It makes a business alluring and very attractive to clients.  And, it makes them easy to market.

It isn’t new, I know, but integrity in marketing and service provision in an increasingly Internet based economy is more important than ever.  Having integrity, marketing honestly, delivering a reliable service, and caring for your relationships in your community are all incredibly important.    Clients in this day and age have a far greater access to product and service providers than they ever have and have no need to accept false advertising, mediocrity, slack service, a lack of care or a general disinterest in them.  They will just go elsewhere if this is what they get.

What is Integrity?

Integrity in its finest form is a value set of ethical conduct deep-rooted in a company and its team members maintaining steadfast no matter what occurs in an organisation to test it.  People can see through marketing that isnt backed by ethical conduct, care and genuine interest and they certainly understand that integrity is not something that can be switched on and off as it suits a company’s sales pitch.  You must live and breathe integrity for it to be really visible within your organisation.

Getting Integrity in your Marketing

Getting integrity in your marketing is easy if it is already in your organisation.  It just means you have to make your marketing more personal…  more about the real people in the organisation and much more about the values.  How do you do it?

1. Start at the top: Integrity usually starts at the top of an organisation, with a leader who builds high quality client relationships and a strong rapport and respect with their clients and peers.
2. Respect your Clients: It moves down an organisation with all staff engaging in principled practices and honouring their clients with respect, delivering the services that a client needs, without overselling, or dragging out a job just because you can.
3. Communicate Regularly: Businesses with integrity communicate regularly, respect the value of interpersonal communication, and know their role with a client well.   The deliver real, and obvious value.
4. Do what they say they will: Finally, a busines with integrity delivers what they say they will, when they say they are going to and they support others in the achievement of their goals.

These four points alone will market your firm because people refer firms who behave in this way readily and eagerly.  Great ethics, great customer relationships and great service are exactly what people in business want to buy… Don’t they?  I know I do.

How does your perception of integrity affect how you select a service provider?  Have you ever stopped and thought about applying the same rules to your business?

If you like this article, and want to know more about our marketing services please visit our website.

Social Media as a marketing medium got a big thumbs up from a big business this week, when international financial institution, Morgan Stanley Smith Barney announced they would give their 17800 registered advisers access to Linkedin and Twitter to promote themselves.     It is a big move for a multi national company leading the professional industries, and a timely one, considering Linkedin set sail on the NYSE as a public company last week more than doubling in value on day 1.     Will it reap rewards for them?  Does your business need to take another look at how it uses social media?

Professional industries are just starting to tweak to the potential of social media in the marketing mix.   They are working out that there is customers out there who can be found, connected with and maintained using social media (in conjunction with other marketing acitivites) and they are exploring it carefully but quickly.

Up until a year or so ago, the business side of social media was chiefly the haven for recruiters, nimble small and medium businesses, proactive individuals… and marketers pushing messages out on behalf of big firms … but with 100 million users on Linkedin, 47.6 million of whom return to the site monthly; and 200 million users on Twitter, generating 65 million tweets a day, if it helps you connect with your target audience, what are you waiting for?

In the establishment of Stretch Marketing, I have been a selective user of business-oriented social media over the past 2 years, with surprising rewards.  What started as a “test case” that would allow me to speak with wisdom on social media to my professional services and business clients, has become a terrific source of high quality lead generation and customer connection in my target markets of professionals and fast growing businesses.

I have learned to enjoy giving away my ideas freely, and receiving commentary and input to strengthen them.  And I know it works, because people often say to me, “I read your articles on Linkedin”, or “I’ve been following your blog for a while”, or even “I went on to check out what you do on Linkedin and realised we know a few of the same people” <the implication of this is that they trust me by association>.

And, now that I understand social media properly, it is rarely a waste of time, in fact, I am remiss when I don’t make time for it, because it carries so much value to me.

But lets go back to Morgan Stanley’s announcement.  It sounds relatively groundbreaking, but, when you look deeper into the statement, some of their expectations about the tools and their restrictions on uses permitted means the power of social media as a two-way channel will be lost.  In this case, Twitter and Linkedin will be offered to Advisers only as a medium for pre-approved status updates and “insights”.

It is sad to say, but Morgan Stanley appear to have missed the point… offering Advisers little more than product flogging opportunity and a way to circulate company brochures.  Not unusual in financial services, but a pity nontheless considering where the “financial services” industry could go using Social Media to build the personality, conversation and visibility of their Advisers.  I come back to that important old adage “people buy services from people”…

When used correctly,  social media offers a very powerful and immediate tool  that allows you to:

• build an interactive relationship with your client (using 2 way communication)
• network with people who are active or influential in your community and business networks
• build your personal brand within a larger high quality firm’s brand, and
• keep yourself (and your business) front of mind
• demonstrate your proactive nature.

Think it might offer some value for you?

In the professional services firms that I work prevalently with, most of the time you wouldn’t know that the world was changing.  It is a fairly traditional space.  Staff and Directors still go about their daily jobs in much the same way they always have, billing hours and bidding new work.  But the times are not easy, especially in those industries outside the mining sector.  So some firms are stepping up to differentiate themselves, in the attempt to build a business that stands out.

They are putting effort in in one of three ways, and they are being rewarded with voluminous referrals for their efforts:

• They are working longer (giving you more time for your money)
• They are working smarter (giving you more smarts and more clever processes for your money)
• They are giving you better service (communicating with you more effectively – and I don’t mean by group spam enewsletter)

In Accounting firms, staff are still doing tax returns, structuring companies and creating trusts on a daily basis, billing their hours to their clients.

But in the Accounting firms that are winning the race, minimised customer service is no more.   Some of the most nimble, cutting edge Accountants that I know are winning because of their process and systems leadership and high quality of service.  They are automating their clients accounting processes with the latest and greatest cloud-based technology and providing regular points of interaction and review to assist their clients in growing their revenue and profitability.  They are becoming more than a tax agent they are becoming a financial partner to businesses. And businesses are reaping the rewards of having one point of contact for all elements of their financial services.

In Architecture, Engineering, Project Management and Quantity Surveying firms, staff are still designing and delivering projects, administering contracts, creating bills of quantity and you guessed it, billing hours to their clients.

But progressive Architects, Engineers and QSs are training on and introducing systems that take design and delivery of projects to the next level and allow each of the key players in a design process (Architects, Engineers and QSs) to interact seamlessly with the one design “building” it together.  They are changing the silo-ed approach to design, collaborating seamlessly every step of the way through the design and drafting process for the clients’ benefit.

Time will tell, but the savings a Property Developer client can make on a design that is developed with more transparent collaboration is already driving them to seek out these proactive service providers over those who refuse to change their traditional ways.

In Financial Planning firms, Planners are still writing plans, guiding investments and brokering insurances day in and day out.  But dynamic Financial Planners are getting to know specific target markets well, and seeking out and negotiating with insurers to support the specific trends and risks in an industry.  They are building close connections with their clients’ and using dynamic new technologies to communicate regularly with information that can help them to make clever financial decisions in a timelier manner.  They are becoming the trusted, go-to Advisers for specific industry groups, and armed with clever web-based technology, they are truly proactive.

Whilst every one of these businesses is changing their business in a different way… the one thing they have in common is that fact that they are tackling their marketability head-on.  They are making their businesses stand out by staying at the forefront.

Have you thought about how you could take an industry-leading step and give yourself an edge over your competition?  Tell us how you are transforming your traditional business or personal capability with proactive steps.  We’d love to hear about it.