I help dev shops start generating leads for advisory services
The path to your first advisory services client involves cultivating valuable expertise. The right kind of expertise, cultivated in the right way, creates a "side door" you can enter rather than dealing with the obstacles placed at the "front door".
Very ordinary people can do this with a combination of focus and discipline applied over time. You don't need to be a big 4 consulting firm alumni or have an MBA to create value by selling your thinking rather than your implementation.
The problem though, is that what you need to do to cultivate that expertise is often in direct conflict with what you need to do to serve clients today. I can help you navigate that tension. Part of the solution is what I've observed in interviewing experts for my The Self-Made Expert research: financially successful experts see attracting great clients as a second-order consequence of making something else their #1 priority.
Your transformation
Getting from where you are today to the place where you're generating advisory services leads is a transformation that usually follows this path:
- Specialize
- Learn how to generate better leads
- Cultivate valuable expertise
- Start generating advisory services leads
- Formalize expertise into intellectual property
After you've specialized, you can shorten the path to your first advisory services lead by investing in something other than client work. This often looks like scrappy, self-directed research combined with publishing frequently. This future-focused investment will often be in direct conflict with executing on the client work you need today to generate short-term revenue. Cultivating the right habits is one of the keys to resolving this tension. Getting support with this transformation is another.
Folks who work with me can choose between pure consulting (often ideal for companies with headcount > 10), coaching with a dash of consulting, or group challenges (the latter 2 are best for companies of 1 or those with very hands-on owners/principals). Learn more about my approach and services.
Tools
My work produces both applied insight for my clients -- who tend to be dev shops or digital agencies -- and generalized insight for the broader tribe of self-made experts. I'm regularly formalizing that generalized insight into tools that I hope help you move towards greater success as a self-made expert. I'm regularly sharing the in-progress insight via a weekly and daily email list.
Here are a few of the more popular tools, with a full list available here.
Featured tools
Trust Velocity
Not all lead generation approaches are the same. Some build trust rapidly, other's don't. Some are genre-appropriate for your ideal client, some aren't. Use this tool to determine which ones are best for your business.
Point of View
Your Point of View (PoV) is one of the most valuable marketing assets you have. Learn more about cultivating a PoV here.
Learn more
Recently I put together a 7-part email course that speaks to many of the issues you'll face as you become a self-made expert. A significant theme of this email course is that many of us enter the world of consulting through the side door, meaning we're not handed the credibility we need as a result of parachuting out of a job at a big consulting firm; instead we have to build that credibility (and the underlying expertise) ourselves.
Learn more by signing up below:
"I feel bad not paying you for this email! This is amazingly valuable content that you sent me."
Sasha Jolich, SDA Software Associates