A Compelling Offer?

One consultant offers to:

“…help clients identify, design, implement, and evaluate the business structure and  processes needed to optimize internal efficiencies and leverage external opportunities.”

Most clients would read this phrase and think, "huh?"

Sadly, too many of us fail to create compelling and understandable descriptions of what we actually do for clients.To keep options open for serving a wide range of clients--across industries and business processes--consultants risk a loss of clarity in their marketing. The result: no one knows what they do.

Almost any service offering can be strengthened once it's viewed from a client's perspective. And most clients will respond favorably to services that score high on a list of eight service attributes:

1. Differentiated service
2. Strong value-to-fee ratio
3. Flawless delivery
4. Mitigates risk
5. Creates client capability
6. Demonstrable
7. Results, not process-based
8. Specific

It's not impossible to appeal to many clients, but it's also simple to confuse them all.

Comments

[Abhay Padgaonkar]

Okay, I will let all of you in on a secret. There is a way to generate a buzzword phrase that can be dropped into virtually any report with that ring of decisive knowledgeable authority. Nobody will have the remotest idea of what you're talking about. Examples?
- Operational virtual mobility
- Optional incremental consequences
- Synchronized logistical software

Okay, I admit I found this at: http://www.workjoke.com/projoke55.htm

There are some good jokes on that site as well. So go ahead and generate nonsense worse than "optimize internal efficiencies and leverage external opportunities" to your heart's content.
We as consultants have nobody to blame but ourselves!

[Chet Geschickter]

Amen I say to you, Amen. Too many consultants get caught-up in their own jibberish. Clients want results - that is what they get paid for. No one cares about all the fancy pants work you do to get them, and the jargon you use to describe how you get them. If you can't explain the value you offer, you have no value.

Great post, just found your site and I love it!

[Arun Sadhashivan]

You're right.

I also feel that a consultant needs to focus tremendously on exactly what he has to offer and what his value addition is.

I learnt this from a friendly fellow consultant who told me - Arun, what do you do best? Stick that in your website, pitch and so on.. If you try to appeal to everyone, you will get no one.

Sager words have seldom been spoken.

[Jim Logan]

Great point! It's like company wih a mission statement that says they're a "tier 1, world-class organization that gives 100%"...it doesn't mean anything.

Compelling offers are the key to earning more clients and making more money.

[Barry Welford]

That's excellent advice, Michael. I wonder if you'd lose much by cutting your eight points down to five. I quite like that old acronym, SMART, to remind you of Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely.

I think that may equally well get the clients to commit.