It is not surprising to read that professional firms that developed and invested in their business development get better results and are generally more successful in attracting new opportunities and new potential clients.
This finding was supported by many research done in the field of business development and marketing in professional firms [see for example the 2014 “Taking the pulse: Benchmarking business development and marketing at Australasian law firms” Research Report done by the Australian Legal Practice Association (ALPMA)].
But here is the interesting thing – this success is regardless of whether you own a small practice or belong to a large professional firm.
Moreover, as you will see in this post It is also not directly linked to the size of business development budget your practice has.
This means that many professionals and professional firms currently do not maximize their business development opportunities.
My aim is disclosed to you specific strategies you can implement in your professional practice as soon as you finish reading this post, to boost your business development success and get you real results to grow your practice.
You need to understand that the way professional gain new business in our days changed.
If you do not switch and decide to understand and implement the right strategies within your practice, your traditional efforts will not get you the right results (or any results at all…only false “hopes”!).
Traditional networking, joining professional networks or asking for referrals by themselves aren’t the most effective nor the most efficient ways to uncover and convert new business opportunities for your practice.
When focusing on growing your practice, by being more productive and less busy, you need to insert other strategies.
Here are seven key measures you, as a professional, should take to ensure the success of your business development activities:
1. Do the research and get to Know your targets
How much do you invest in preparation about your prospects before engaging with prospects?
A significant part of the business development process of your practice is investing time and the right resources to know your target clients.
You need to be aware of their external problems and needs (those they type in google) and their internal needs (what does not let them sleep at night?).
When you know their needs, offer the solution that solves their needs, and you’ll be closer to convert the prospect to become your client.
But the opposite is also very true.
If you do not prepare, if you do not know your target – the prospect will find it out and it actually means you don’t really care about them and their business.
As a direct result, they will not hire you.
They afraid that you will not give them the right and good service.
2. Have a Systematic Approach
Is your practice has a business development strategy, that you have defined and follow thru or you go after sporadic and ad hoc business development opportunities that come your way?
The difference between the two approaches will affect significantly your practice growth success for the long term.
The most successful professionals and professional practices do not rely only on ad hoc business development opportunities.
Mentoring and coaching many successful professionals thought me that all of them have a specific and clearly defined business development plan for the practice and for every professional within the practice.
Thus, every professional within the practice use the same client terminology, tools and better equipped to find the right opportunities.
In other words, using a system in your practice to identify, categorize and build relationships will make the whole difference in the success of your business development process.
When you have a system in place, you can spend more time with the right people and the right business development opportunities.
3. Learn to Ask
When was the last time you approached your business relationships and ask for business?
Do you want to grow your professional practice?
You can easily and quickly grow your practice with the simple act of asking.
This simple act is often overlooked, especially when dealing with business development for your practice.
The simple reason is that we worry that it will make us look weak, desperate or sets us up for rejection.
But the act of asking is such a powerful way to grow your practice!
It gives an opportunity for another person to give you her or his attention and help!
You got to learn to ask the right questions, to enable you to gather the right information to grow your practice, expand your business development opportunities.
When working with many professionals we developed a set of questions, specifically for these specific individuals or for their practice, that can be asked to discover more relevant information and get you closer to relevant opportunities.
Try it and you will be surprised. It works.
4. Consider getting help from a business development expert
Many professional practices find it daunting to decide on whether to solicit the services of a business development expert or wholly rely on their internal teams.
Or worse than that some professionals rely solely on their own “business development” expertise.
Why?
I asked this question to many professionals and the most common answer I got was that because the practice leaders (and sometimes it is only specific professionals) fears that their inadequacy (with regards to taking charge of the practice) may be exposed and an outsider expert may only compound the situation.
I assume that you, my reader, understand that this is a wrong attitude for business development.
After all, the client hires your services for your expertise in a specific area and not for your business development skills.
The fact, that you understand (and even like) the business development angle of your practice is only a plus, but it does not mean that you have to do it yourself.
One of the qualifications of a business development expert is possession of extensive experience and expertise in the specific marketplace where the professional operates.
Business development experts have worked with many practices in the same industry and know the ins and outs of market trends.
They know what other competing professionals are doing, and so their recommendations will help your practice outsmart competitors easily (especially when it involves international matters).
Furthermore, they help you to see the relevant opportunities and help you nurture, build the relationships with your connections. That leads to get more referrals and help you to continue to be top-of-mind of your connections.
More Importantly, they can pass many of those skills and relevant strategies to you or to the right person within your practice, so it becomes a successful teamwork.
5. Be proactive in building relationships
Let’s take a look critically at your actions in your practice:
Do you take an active or passive role? Do you think in terms of the present situation of your practice or do you look to the future, anticipating outcomes and preparing for the consequences?
Do you react to the business development opportunities happening around you or do you take initiative to prepare for, and approach the relevant prospects to build relationships?
In my experience, the most valuable professionals are the ones who are proactive.
We are all aware, I hope, that the time that a professional can build her or his entire practice only on clients approaching them is gone.
By definition, this means to grow the practice you need to be proactive.
In other words, you need to cause things to happen rather than waiting to respond to things happen and your help is needed.
Professionals who are proactive don’t sit around waiting for answers to appear; they search and find the answers.
They don’t wait for someone to hand them “a box full of referrals”; they’re resourceful.
Remember: the opportunities are with your existing or potential clients. You only need to start paying attention.
Ask yourself: How do you keep in touch with lost clients? How do you continue to connect with clients that have gone quiet?
I always said: building relationships is easy but not so simple.
If you do it in the right way, consistently and genuinely the results will be magical.
I promise.
6. Guard your time
Ask yourself the following question:
How do you know which prospect will become a client?
Do you have a special internal system to measure the predictability that a prospect will become a client or is it based on your feelings (some may call it “experience”)?
You need to have a few pre-defined key elements that every business opportunity that comes your way needs to fulfill before you waste your time on it.
I assume you agree that spending your most valuable commodity – your time – on every prospect, will not guarantee success.
Once you’re aware that a prospect or a business opportunity does not fit with your practice or is stuck, you need to guard your time.
Spending time trying to convert these opportunities that are unlikely to become clients to your practice is a waste!
Now, you can also understand why I claim in my training and teaching that lack of follow up with a potential client, is equal to wasting time with a non-potential client.
In both cases, you unlikely to win the business.
7. Learn to stop ‘being busy’
Most of the professionals that I know are always busy.
I know first hand. I used to be one of them.
But then I asked myself why?
As an international speaker, I met many prominent leaders worldwide. I am sure they are very busy people but I couldn’t notice it.
Each of them had time to meet with me, although short, but they gave me an undivided attention. Almost like they had nothing in their mind in that moment except for speaking to me.
Do you use your time correctly?
Most of us invest our precious time on things that we shouldn’t. And that means we have less valuable time to invest in things that do matter.
That might be pursuing an interesting business development opportunity, investing in yourself by developing your skills or simply spending more time with the people and things that matter to us.
If you learn to stop being so busy and become more productive you will see the business opportunities you miss.
Stop wasting your time and claim “I am busy”.
It almost seems that many professionals believe that if we are busy, we are important and successful…and than we will attract better clients and referrals.
Really?
In fact, it is quite the opposite.
As Ed Baldwin is his great article rightly claim: “Busy isn’t cool. In fact, BUSY IS THE NEW STUPID.”
Key takeaways
Professionals never seem to have enough time for business development.
In this short post, I try to share and help you focus on the individual keyways to increase your practice business development and that are most likely to produce immediate and practical results for your practice, your schedule, and your expertise.
Starting with prioritizing business development activities by applying seven key ways: Doing the research and getting to Know your targets; having a Systematic Approach to business development; learning to Ask and asking the right questions; considering to get help from business development expert; being proactive in building relationships; guard your most valuable commodity – you time & learning to stop ‘being busy’.
As I promised, now it is your turn to implement these ways in your practice.
I am curious…which one are you planning to start with?
“Itzik is an International Speaker, Bestselling Author, Business Mentor & Attorney-at-law. The Global Leading Authority on Business Development, Business Networking, Referrals & Relationship Capital & Founder of THE SWITCH® and THE SWITCH HUB®”
