How to Get into Conversation with Your Lead Consulting Suspects
Key Business Development Relationships include suspects, prospects, contacts, and clients.
Suspects = people you are interested in working with but have not yet established a relationship. They may know about you, though not much, and they have a need for your services.
Prospects = people you are interested in working with who are potentially interested in working with you.
Contacts = your network – people you know who may be willing and able to connect you with people who need what you have to offer. This is your marketing referral engine.
Clients = people who have engaged you by way of a contract to deliver your services. If the engagement goes well, this can lead to a longer term retainer relationship.
The best way to turn a suspect into a prospect is via a key contact, or a referral.
There are three opening questions that help turn an initial conversation with a suspect into a deeper relationship that may then lead to them becoming a prospect and, later, a client.
- What is going right in your business?
- What are the current challenges?
- What needs to change?
It’s important to ask all three questions to get as full a picture as possible of what is happening in the business.
Asking what’s going right or what has been successful is a question that many consultants don’t ask in that initial conversation, but it helps you to see what’s important to the person you’re talking to and starts things off positively. It also allows people to open up and tell their stories so you when you begin talking about the challenges and what needs to change, there’s appropriate context. It opens up the conversation so it is an actual conversation versus a typical sales call.
The word challenge in the second question is important because they will tell you what’s going wrong or what the organization’s weaknesses are without the connotation that they are doing something wrong or that there are big problems. Framing what’s happening as a challenge opens the door for support and positive, developmental change, which is what we, as consultants, can provide.
Asking what needs to change gives you a clear picture of their needs and where – or if – you might be able to help. It allows you to then to offer to come back to them with a Concept Proposal, which outlines what the challenges are and exactly how you can help, thus moving them from Suspect to Prospect in a seamless, authentic, organic way.
Your future business is in your current relationships.
The focus should always be on trust and relationship building. If you are focused solely on identifying and solving problems, the only reason for you to be around is if there’s another problem.
If you look at it from a challenge point of view, and helping to enhance what’s going right, you’re building a long-term relationship that’s helping something good to become great, and you’ll never be out of a job in that regard.
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