It happens to all of us where at some point in your business, your immediate network doesn’t have work for you, or they don’t have work you want to be doing. And you also get to a point where you don’t want to rely on recruiters or agencies or brokers anymore.
You’re then faced with the challenge of creating new consulting client opportunities for yourself. And, you’re ready to take on higher-value consulting work now that you’ve exhausted this low-hanging fruit.
So how do you meet new potential clients? I was once in this position just like you are, and this is where I fell into a powerful (and simple) strategy that I want to share with you today.
I’ve been using this method for over 9 years, and it’s so simple that I didn’t even realize I was marketing. It’s easy to fit into your busy consulting schedule, and it’s an effective strategy to increase your consulting revenue. It came to me so easily and naturally that I didn’t realize it was a thing. I initially called it accidental leads.
I’ve since started transforming my process of uncovering ideal consulting clients into a framework that I now teach my clients. In this episode, I give you an introduction to this IA Method, so you can improve the effectiveness of your business development process and ultimately increase your revenue without needing to spend hours each day on marketing and sales.
In this episode,
[04:27] What is the Influence Adoption (IA) Method and how does it increase your revenue
[12:02] How can this IA Method apply to your business
[13:12] The three steps that you can use to leverage the IA Method
[13:39] Step #1
[14:59] Step #2
[15:29] Step#3
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES —
- Click here to download the 27 WAYS TO LAND YOUR NEXT CONSULTING CLIENT
- Click here to download my CHECKLIST FOR BUILDING YOUR CONSULTING PIPELINE IN 26 MINUTES A DAY
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FULL TRANSCRIPT
**note: This is an automated transcript, so please ignore spelling errors and grammar mistakes*
00:02
Welcome to the Grow Your Independent Consulting Business podcast. I’m Melisa Liberman, a fellow IC and business coach. On this podcast, I teach you to become a consistently booked independent consultant without becoming a pushy salesperson or working 24/7. If I can do it, you can too.
00:23
Listen on to find out how. Welcome back to Episode 19 of the Grow Your Independent Consulting Business podcast. I am so glad you’re here today. And I cannot wait to show the share not show. This is Audio. I cannot wait to share this method of increasing your consulting revenue with you today. So stay tuned, because I’m going to share something that’s been working very well for me over the last several years. And I probably the last nine years actually. And I had no idea it was actually a thing. And so I want to share it with you because it’s something that works so well to increase your consulting revenue. And you can do it very easily and naturally. That’s why I didn’t realize it was a thing because it came so naturally to me. So now that I realized that it’s actually a really powerful technique, I want to share this method of increasing your revenue, and filling your consulting pipeline with you so that you can implement it in your business. So let’s dive in. This is what I call accidental leads. And I’ve created this for so long. But what I do know is that it’s so common as I talk to independent consultants, and I have a feeling you might be in the same boat, where at some point in your business, your immediate network doesn’t have work for you, or they don’t have work you want to be doing. And you also get to a point where you don’t want to rely on recruiters or agencies or brokers anymore. And so now how do you start creating opportunities for yourself, for new consulting clients, and higher-value consulting work once you’ve exhausted kind of that low-hanging fruit? So how do you meet those new potential clients? And so this is where I fell into a strategy that I want to share with you today. As I said, it didn’t even feel like marketing or sales or business development. And so I didn’t even realize it was a thing until recently when I was talking to one of my coaches. And she pointed out to me that this way I’ve been that I had been landing consulting clients in my consulting business before I transitioned into coaching was actually a really unique methodology that could be so beneficial to other consultants as well. And so I don’t know if you can relate to this. But sometimes we do things so naturally. And they you know, they come very easily to us that we don’t even realize that it’s unique, we just kind of think everyone does that. And we don’t realize that this is actually something that is unique that you’ve created, and you don’t even realize it. So I’ll tell you what it is here in a minute is not going to be a secret much longer. But what I’ve done is started transforming my process of uncovering ideal consulting clients, and transforming those into a framework that I’ve started teaching my clients. And I’m going to give you an introduction to it today as well. So I will tell you the name of it first. It’s called Influence adoption. And so let’s dive into this concept of influence adoption, and figure out how we can apply it to your business so today we’re going to cover three main topics. Number one, what is this influence adoption method, a method for short? And how does it increase your revenue? Ultimately, your pipeline, your leads, and ultimately your revenue? That’s the first topic. The second topic is how can this IA method apply to you and your business? And then thirdly, what are the three steps that you can use to leverage this IA method so that you’re saving time and increasing what I call your sought-after furnace? I haven’t googled that to see if it’s actually a word, but let’s just say that it is your sought-after furnace. Okay, so let’s dive into the first part of today’s podcast. What is this influence adaption method? What does it mean? So I’m going to give you a definition and then we’ll break it down. The definition, in short, in which I’ve made up here, is partnering with someone person or an organization who has already accumulated a group of your ideal clients. And then you provide value to that group and to the person who created it, or to the organization who created it. And as a result of The value you’ve been providing, you’ll become known to that audience. And you’ll become the sought-after consultant for what you do.
05:09
That was a big mouthful of a definition. So this will be in the show notes. And also we’re going to break it down a little bit more, in case you missed any part of that. All right, so it’s essentially at a very high level, it’s you finding a person or an organization, who has already built an audience of your ideal clients, who your ideal client type is. And then you get building a relationship with that person or with that organization and offer to add value. So they benefit from your expertise, and you benefit by getting access to their, that huge audience that they’ve accumulated. Okay, so let’s break it down the two words, it’s in influence adoption, ay ay ay ay. And we’re gonna break it down backward. So we’ll start with adoption and then influence. So the adoption part is adopting an audience of your ideal clients that someone else has already created or accumulated. So let’s just be clear, I’m not talking about stealing, this isn’t you, any of us going in and somehow undercutting someone that we’re a competitor to, this is about us having some form of mutual consent that we will adopt that audience that the other person or organization has created. So for an example, you may go out and adopt an audience that had been created by an industry organization relevant to your target market. Or you might go out and adopt the audience created by a software vendor who works with your ideal client type. Or perhaps you’ll go and adopt an audience that another service provider who provides complimentary service to yours has created. So those are some examples of what I mean by adoption. Again, we’re not stealing, we’re not doing this under the sly under the covers, this is all upfront and mutually beneficial. Alright, so that’s what adoption means. And then influence, you’re adopting an audience that someone else has already created, that person has influence over that audience. Because they created it, and people are staying and engaging with them. And when you’re working with through that audience, through that other party, through that person or organization who has created the audience, their influence is transferred to you is implied is kind of like an indirectly or even directly, sometimes seal of approval. Not only in this process, do you gain a large audience of your ideal client that’s already been created, but you also gain influence, because it rubs off on you right from the other person who created it. So that gives us a good baseline of what influence adoption means. What Ay ay ay means is what I’m talking about, as we go through this, this episode today on how to increase your revenue using this IA method. So how does the IA method Why is it so effective? The easiest way for me to describe this to you is if we stripped down business development, which means sales and marketing, to its bare essentials, what you need in order to be successful at business development, is people who have a problem, you can solve for them, and are willing to pay for you to solve it, like very, very simple stripped down. And so with this in mind, the key is that you’re getting in front of that target audience. And you can do this one by one, right, a lot of us go out and network and meet people one by one. Sometimes you have it happens by referral, there are a lot of different ways to meet your target audience. But this IA method gives you a way to meet your target audience in batches. So you’re meeting a lot of people that are your ideal client’s type in kind of one big group. And so that’s what makes this so powerful. And so now let’s talk about how the IA method increases your revenue. Because at the end of the day, that’s our goal, right? You meet a lot of people and then ultimately, what is how does it increase your revenue, it increases your revenue because it elevates your value and perception of your value, because you’ve been introduced to that audience, by someone who created it and is cultivating it, and is well known to that audience, as someone that they, you know, appreciate as someone that they engage with as someone that they look to for advice. So as a result is kind of like what do they say that tide lifts all boats? Hopefully, that’s right. I always butcher that. Right? It’s that influence that’s rubbing off on you. The other thing that it does is it helps you To increase your close rate because you’re known and vetted and trusted quantity. So this is the same thing that might be happening to you when you’re working with someone that’s in your network or referred by your network, right? You already have a leg up, because that person essentially is kind of giving the stamp of approval to you, the person who’s referred you, or the person that you already knew that needs some work that you do. In this case, now we’re starting to build more of a, what they call marketing a colder market. These people don’t necessarily know you. But when you enter into this group, this audience that someone else has cultivated, and that person who runs the odd, you know, runs that group or, or facilitates that organization is the one introducing you, that same effect occurs. And as a result, when people come to you, they already trust you at a basic level, and it increases your close rate. And then thirdly, the way that the IA method increases your revenue is that it can cut down the time for you to find people who are interested and ready for what you have to offer. So you’re not spending a lot of time kind of one by one by one, looking for new clients, you are talking to bigger groups of that target market, again, that someone else has already created. So all that time was spent by someone else. And you’re engaging with this new audience. And we’ll talk a little bit more about what that means, later on. You’re engaging with this audience. And so you’re becoming that sought-after consultant. And as a result, it not only cuts down on the amount of time that you spend on business development, but it also cuts down on the gaps that you might have in between projects. So that’s how it in increases your revenue, which at the end of the day is one of our goals, right? increase our revenue, increase our impact, and increase our flexibility, this IA method can help you do all three of those. Okay, so now let’s talk about how this IA method might apply to you. Now that you know what it is and how it works, might be asking, Well, how could I actually do this? How could I apply this in my business?
12:15
So imagine this today, just think about it, like how many ideal client buyers, do you know, how many are already in your network or somehow in your sphere? Usually, I find the answers like 20, or maybe 50, even a lot of times is closer to a handful. How many of those ideal client buyers, a lot of times, it’s a handful that we rely on, right? That’s why we end up relying on our network or on recruiters to land the next consulting job. But with this IA method, you could literally hit 5000 ideal buyers, and 10,000 ideal buyers, one of the organizations I work with has over 100,000 ideal buyers. So this gives you a very quick existing path to that existing audience. And so it’s a no-brainer on how it could apply to you and your business. And so now I want to give you the three steps. So you can put this into action for yourself. And a very simple, they just require some upfront and time investment, right to start getting this process working for you, the relationships built. And ultimately they’ll pay off in spades if you can put in that upfront time and thought process into it. So there are literally three steps to put this into action. Number one, you find an audience that someone else has already cultivated, right? To find an industry organization or go find a software vendor that works with your ideal target market that doesn’t do the same thing that you do. Or go find some other service provider that provides ancillary services or complementary services to what you do, who has already created an audience of those ideal clients. And the audience, you know, I just gave you some really big numbers, right? Doesn’t even have to be huge. It could be an audience of 50. It could be a group of 25, ideal client types, right? When I use the word audience, I’m using it very broadly, right? Another way to think about it as a customer base could be a customer base of just a handful of your ideal client, it doesn’t have to the huge. They do have to be people who have the problem that you solve, or problems that you solve, who are willing to pay for them. That’s it. And not all of them, obviously, finding that audience that someone else has already created or cultivated, that has you know, at least some handful of individuals who at this moment have a challenge that you could solve. That’s it. So you’re out there finding those individuals, those audiences. And the second step is that you develop a relationship with the person who created that audience, or with the organization that created that audience. Let them see how capable and what a thought leader you are offered to help that organization before you start offering to help their people. So what can you do to help that organization? Provide content, for example, to that audience? What can you do to help make their life easier. And then thirdly, which I’ve already touched on here, you’re offering them that value right to their audience. So you’re finding someone who has cultivated an audience number one, you’re developing a relationship with the person or organization that created that audience. And then thirdly, you’re offering value to them to that organization, and then ultimately, to their audience. So when I say value, I’m talking about things like anything from writing an article for their audience, to speaking to their audience, maybe giving a masterclass to their audience, you could present at their next conference, you could speak on their podcast, you know, so many different ways to add value, whether at a big scale, like speaking at a conference, or very small scale, like doing some small intimate workshops. Again, your goal is to get in front of those ideal client types and help them to see what you can offer and create the reputation that you’re the sought-after consultant for whatever it is that you do. And that’s it. Those are the three steps, I can tell you that they’re very straightforward and simple. I’ve been doing them for probably the last eight or nine years, kind of on autopilot without realizing it was actually a really effective tool and process. And so that’s why I want to share this with you today. It can feel so natural and easy to do for those of us who are not salespeople by nature or trade, right. So hopefully this is will be a really powerful tool for you to implement in your business. If you want help figuring out if this strategy would work for you, how to apply it to yourself and your business. Book, the strategy call with me, and then in that call, we’ll dive into your business, we’ll get clear on your goals and challenges, and determine if this is a method or something else is the best fit for you to build a thriving pipeline of quality consulting leads. Want to make sure that you are achieving all of your business goals as I have been in mind. So that is it for today. And we will talk with you again next week.
17:41
Have a good one. Thanks for joining me this week on the Grow Your Independent Consulting Business podcast. If you like today’s episode, I have three quick next steps for you. First, click Subscribe on Apple podcasts or wherever you listen to make sure you don’t miss future episodes. Next, leave me a review in your podcast app so other independent consultants can find a benefit, and finally put the ideas from today’s episode into action. Head over to Melisaliberman.com for the show notes and more resources to help you grow your consulting practice from your first few projects into a full-fledged business. See you next week.
