Introduction

Consulting firms have huge untapped opportunities in sales. Consulting, done right, can create better futures for companies, improve their results, and make them more competitive. The challenge, however, is that buyers don't often come to consulting firms and ask for these services. These services must be sold proactively. Yet many consultants don't see themselves as salespeople. And until they reach a more senior level in their careers, they don't realize that to advance, make partner, or succeed as leaders in their own firms, a major component of their jobs is selling consulting.

Creative Ways of Attracting Clients

Writing emails introducing your company, creating press releases, developing a web site and of course networking are all critical to the success of any business, but in a competitive market such as the Internet, the challenge is even greater. What that means to the consultant is that he or she must conceive of unique measures for opening doors to their services and that demands different approaches.

Transform Consultants into Rainmakers: Quarterly.ai provides the on-point coaching to teach your team how to succeed with business development and bring in a predictable flow of new business.

Establish a Culture of Business Development: From firm leaders and consultants to business developers and client-facing associates, you need everyone involved in business development. Quarterly.ai can help establish a business development culture across your entire firm.

Grow your Existing Accounts: A huge untapped opportunity in many consulting firms is growing existing accounts. Quarterly.ai’s account-based sales, account-management, and customer success modules allow your consultants to successfully uncover the full set of buyer needs and cross-sell and up-sell your firm’s capabilities.

Relating to and Understanding a Clients Needs

Because a consultant commonly seeks to offer newer and more progressive ideas to an organization, the consultant's challenge is to relate to and understand different client's needs and their overall business agenda. There are always going to be times when a potential or existing client may challenge your suggestions or method of operation, but you have to hear and understand where a client is coming from, even when you don't agree. Your goal as a consultant is to become known as a solution finder, and the only way to do that is to become aware of your client's concerns and help them go beyond those concerns. The challenge, however, is that buyers don't often come to consulting firms and ask for these services. These services must be sold proactively. Yet many consultants don't see themselves as salespeople. And until they reach a more senior level in their careers, they don't realize that to advance, make partner, or succeed as leaders in their own firms, a major component of their jobs is selling consulting.

Many of the skills that make for a great consultant are the same ones that are needed for selling consulting success. When working with clients, consultants ask questions, educate, collaborate, build creative solutions, develop relationships, and help clients envision a better path forward. These are core skills needed to succeed in selling their services. But many consultants stumble when transitioning from applying these skills in client work to applying them in business development.

Quarterly.ai helps unlock the hidden sales skills of your team by:

Unleash the sales potential across all consulting and business development teams by having them follow well-defined processes and daily goals that lead to sales success.

Sell proactively, driving demand for services clients should be taking advantage of but aren't, by monitoring industries, companies and clients in real-time, enabling personalized outreach at the best time in the buyer’s journey.

Increase cross-selling, up-selling, and account penetration so consultants sell the full range of the firm's services, by tracking and monitoring all interactions with the account, whether by sales, support or training.

Improve consulting sales skills—from generating leads and consultative selling to closing and growing accounts. Quarterly.ai provides a single, integrated view into leads, contacts, accounts and sales, so consultants can measure their progress in real-time.

Bridge the gap between consultant and rainmaker, and create a culture of business development across the firm. Quarterly.ai encourages all members of a consulting team to contribute, whether in identifying new leads, outreach via call, email or webinar, meeting notes and follow-up etc.