The profitable consultant

C K .0 0 0 0 0 7 2 0 9 2 lALL GOLDSMITH

A U T H O R OF ÌHHAJ EÛ T YOU m i ÌNO N’ J B IT YOU i m i

PROFITABLE

GONSUIIANT

STARTING, GROWING, a n d

SELLING YOUR EXPERTISE

Praise for The Profitable Consultant

“The number-one complaint my customers have is, ‘I need more business!’ Why?

They don’t have a great system, best practices, or a methodology for it; or at least

not one specifically designed for consultants and coaches. The Profitable Consultant

provides a system, a methodology to get more business and faster— if you are a

consultant/coach. Most importantly, Jay introduces the powerful psychology every

consultant, coach, and expert needs to break through and become a six-figure

earner or go from six to seven figures! Do yourself a favor and adopt these concepts.

It just might be the best business investment you ever make— period!”

—Mike Koenigs

Founder/CEO, Traffic Geyser

“jay Niblick has cracked the code when it comes to growing your consulting

practice. His method to attract more clients is both simple and amazingly effective.

As I read this book, I had one ‘aha’ moment after another. If you want more clients

and more time to do what you love, study this book and put Jay’s methods to use. It

will change your business— and your life.”

—Noah St. John

Bestselling author of

The Secret Code o f Success

“Having worked with thousands of coaches and consultants, it’s heartbreaking

how many never achieve success because they never figure out how to generate

profits. In The Profitable Consultant, Jay reveals a fascinating but simple strategy to

be yourself, en jo y rbe prnress, and still d om in ate your market- at will T h e first rime

I saw Jay’s work, I immediately realized its sheer power and brilliance. It provides

the missing piece that I’ve never seen anyone else reveal. That's why we now make

his work a mandatory part of all our training programs for coaches, consultants,

professionals, and entrepreneurs. If you’re looking for ways to grow your practice,

stop searching— this book is the answer!”

—Greg Habstritt

Founder and President,

SimpleWealth Inc.

“It’s about time someone stepped up and took on the conventional way consul￾tants have been taught to grow and sell and turned that on its head. The Profitable

Consultant challenges you to be you and simply communicate what you do and

how you do it, making the ‘hard sell’ not required. Instead of teaching you how to

change yourself to become a great salesperson, Jay does not want to change you; he

just wants to enhance you and the way you do business.”

—Philip McKernan,

International bestselling author,

speaker, and President at

Philip McKernan Inc.

THE

PROFITABLE

CONSULTANT

THE

PROFITABLE

CONSULTANT

STARTING, GROWING, m

SELLING YOUR EXPERTISE

JAY NIBLICK

W il e y

C over design: Courtesy o f A rt Direction Book Com pany

C over design: Chris W allace

Copyright © 2013 by Jay N iblick. A ll rights reserved.

Published by Joh n W iley & Sons, Inc., H oboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

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Lim it o f Liability/Disclaimer o f W arranty: W h ile the publisher and author have used their best efforts

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

N iblick, Jay, ¿968-

T h e Profitable Consultant: Starting, Growing, and Selling Your Expertise/Jay N iblick.

pages cm .

Includes index.

ISB N : 9 7 8 -1 -1 1 8 -5 5 3 1 3 -8 (clo th )

IS B N : 9 7 8 -1 -1 1 8 -6 1 6 2 7 -7 (ebk)

IS B N : 9 7 8 -1 -1 1 8 -6 1 6 3 7 -6 (ebk)

ISB N : 9 7 8 -1 -1 1 8 -6 1 6 3 8 -3 (ebk)

1. Consulting firms. 2. New business enterprises. I. T itle.

H D 69.C 6N 53 2013

0 0 1 -d c 2 3 2 0 1 2 0 4 8 2 9 9

Printed in the U nited States o f Am erica

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Contents

Foreword Marshall Goldsmith ix

Acknowledgments xi

Introduction 1

1 Is Consulting Even Right for Me? 5

2 Build a Foundation That Supports Heavy Profits 19

3 Poor Pricing Equals Poor Profits 57

4 How You Charge Is as Important as What You Charge 81

5 Not Just Any Ole Fishing Hole Will Do 97

6 Seek Only to Give— Marketing That Actually Works 111

7 Why Selling Sucks— The Profits from Your Practice 171

8 He Who Identifies the Cause of the Problem Gets to Fix It 177

v ii

y iii C o n t e n t s

9 The Golden Rule Is Just Plain Wrong 209

10 Be Bold and Mighty Forces Will Come to Your Aid 221

Conclusion: Don't Lose Sight o f Your Success 231

Appendix A Putting It All to Work for You— A Review 235

Appendix B The EBM Guide: How to G et Started on an

EBM Campaign 243

Appendix C Press Release Template 247

Appendix D Launch Cheat Sheet 249

About the Author 257

Index 259

Foreword

S a l e s a n d m a r k e t i n g c a n b e uncomfortable for professional business

consultants and executive coaches. I’ve known many coaches who

want to be above promoting or selling their services. They believe that

their work should speak for itself and that marketing and promotion—

selling— is demeaning.

Maybe they don’t want to be associated with those pushy or

annoying people that so often gamer the title salesperson. Perhaps

they don’t want their clients to think of them as one of these distasteful

people. Possibly they see self-promotion as a reflection of professional or

personal deficit.

Whatever the case may be, it holds them back. One of the things

iliai I frequently cell people when they ask me for advice about how to

get a job in consulting is: “You have to sell yourself. You have to

develop the [You] Brand.” Most people aren’t really salespeople. You

still must sell; the trick is to do it in such a way that you are not seen as a

salesperson— and that’s where people need significant help.

The Profitable Consultant will give you that help. Taking traditional

beliefs about how best to grow a practice and generate revenue, and

turning them completely upside down, Jay Niblick rewrites the business

development playbook for the consulting and coaching industry.

W e’re in a different field than most other professions. What we

need isn’t conventional business development techniques; it’s a new

ix

x F o r e w o r d

methodology specifically designed for us— independent business con￾sultants and coaches— and that’s exactly what Jay gives us in The

Profitable Consultant!

So, stop struggling to grow your practice and pick up this book—

you will be glad you did!

— Marshall Goldsmith

New York Times and million-copy bestselling author of MOJO

and What Got You Here W on’t Get You There

Acknowledgments

T H IS BO O K IS D ED IC A TE D T O all those consultants around the globe who

have so graciously and generously shared their best practices with me,

who have put their faith in me, and who have contributed so much

more than just professionally to my life. Thank you!

And to my parents, who inspired the courage to “Go boldly in the

direction of my dreams”; my sisters, who supported me; and to my

wonderful Melanie, Zach, Baker, and Joe, who so bravely suffered the

pains of living with an entrepreneur— bless you!

x i

Introduction

W e l c o m e t o t h e g r e a t e s t p r o f e s s i o n in the world. I’m talking about

being an independent management consultant, an incredibly exciting

and rewarding career that can also be an exceptionally lucrative one, if

done correctly.

It’s what I call a brain job. Peter Drucker would call it a knowledge

worker’s profession, in line with his description of a world changing

from an economy of laborers to one of thinkers. Consider it becoming a

free agent in an entire economy of free agents. In this career you get to

take all that wonderful knowledge and experience you’ve developed in

your professional management career and turn them into a dream job.

What other career allows you to incur almost zero overhead, work a

majority ot your time from home (yes, even in pajamas), spend all the

time you want with your loved ones, and control exactly what work you

do, and for whom?

It’s no wonder that the occupation of management consultant is the

single fastest'growing job in the entire country right now. According

to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, this occupation is growing at

84 percent, nearly double that of the next closest job title. From those

who have been laid off to those who no longer wish to allow someone else

to control their entire lives, people around the world are taking this leap.

Don’t let this statistic scare you, however. There is still plenty of

room to grow. What statistics like these do mean, though, is that this

1

2 In t r o d u c t io n

isn’t the same industry it was 20 years ago. Gone are the early prospector

days where all one had to do was hang out a shingle, call himself or

herself a consultant, and take an ad hoc approach to building their

practice. Those who plan on succeeding today and staying for the long

haul must differentiate themselves and step up their game.

My job in these pages is to help you do just that. I will help you

reduce the number of mistakes you will make (I said reduce, mind you)

and give you the wisdom and experience of thousands of other

consultants who have gone before you and thrived. I know a little

bit about doing that myself.

In 1998 I founded a consulting firm called Innermetrix Incorpo￾rated with my partner Damon Kohler. Originally it was just me doing

consulting, with Damon handling all the technology. Today Innerme￾trix is an international firm with over 750 consultants in 23 countries

helping tens of thousands of companies and hundreds of thousands of

their employees.

The biggest benefit of working with all of these consultants and

corporations has been the learning. Far more than thoughts from a

single consultant, this book holds the wisdom of the very best in our

profession. You will learn at the feet of many hypersuccessful consultant

brothers and sisters who made their mistakes so you don’t have to.

If you want to build a profitable business today, you can’t just sit

back and wait for business to come to you. And you can’t just read this

book and gain understanding of the practice of consulting. You must

learn to apply these lessons. The effort you put into practicing the

understanding I will give you in these pages is the key.

As the subtitle states, you have the expertise. That is not something

I’m going to be able to help you with. If you’re considering becoming a

consultant, the presumption is that you’ve spent a good portion of your

lifetime honing your business expertise in whatever industry or field

you’re in. While you bring that expertise, my job is to make you an

expert in how to grow a profitable consulting practice.

These solutions have been field-tested and battle-proven. They work

for all types of consultants and in all the different business cultures I’ve

worked in as well. Through my training and certification programs I’ve

conducted from New York to Johannesburg, Sydney to Hong Kong, and

all over Europe and the United States, I’ve taught over 1,750 indepen￾dent management consultants the same lessons contained in this book.

Introduction 3

Even though, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics,

65 percent of all new start-ups fail to survive past the five-year

mark, of those 1,750 consultants I’ve trained, 95 percent of them

have survived past that same five-year mark and are profitable. Some of

these consultants consistently achieve seven-figure revenue year after

year, and the majority maintains healthy six-figure incomes steadily—

even in the current economy! I know these lessons work, and I’m

excited about helping you add your name to this list!

Welcome aboard— and now let’s go build your profitable practice!

For additional learning and resources on all of the lessons in this book,

visit www.TheProfitableConsultant.com.

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Is Consulting Even Right for Me?

5