SESSION 1
MINDSET SHIFT: 4 KEYS TO CREATING A BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT CULTURE IN YOUR FIRM
- Why waiting for the phone to ring doesn’t work anymore
- The typical “elephant trainer model” for bringing in work. And how it can kill your firm!
- How to change your culture to become more sales-driven
- Costs and benefits of full time BD/account reps
- The critical roles of PMs and Principals in bringing in work
- Why PMs must be the deal-closers
- Which markets should you pursue? Which ones should you pull out of?
- How to develop a tailored process to selecting the right clients to pursue
- How to select the right projects to pursue
- The best metrics to measure the effectiveness of your BD investments
- Your personal business development goals
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SESSION 2
UPSELLING AND CROSS-SELLING SECRETS: GRAB A BIGGER SHARE OF CURRENT CLIENT BUDGET
- What are your firm’s Quality Client Criteria?
- What to do with your clients who don’t meet your standards?
- Why your current quality clients must be your highest priority
- Why most firms’ metrics of repeat business are totally wrong
- How to really know what your best clients think of your firm
- The important difference between client satisfaction vs. client loyalty
- The Number 1 reason clients defect – and how to avoid this pitfall
- Upselling: the easiest way to gain wallet share
- Cross-selling: Most A/E/C firms’ biggest missed opportunity
- Staying in touch with clients after the project ends
- Creating a long-term organizational relationship with your clients
- Your personal networking “hot list”
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SESSION 3
EXECUTING THE PERFECT PURSUIT STRATEGY: PULL-THROUGH MARKETING, NETWORKING, AND LEAD-WARMING
- Why most firms spent too much time chasing projects
- How “pull-thru marketing” can make your firm a client magnet
- Deciding which clients to pursue
- What keeps you from networking effectively?
- How to network like an introvert
- How to use social networking effectively
- Differentiating your firm from all the rest
- How to “thaw out” your cold calls
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SESSION 4
ARE YOU IN IT TO WIN IT?
HOW TO DIFFERENTIATE YOUR FIRM AND YOUR PITCH (BECAUSE 2ND PLACE SUCKS!)
- Why chasing more proposals results in fewer sales, and what to do instead
- When and how to make the Go/No Go decision
- Using PSMJ’s Go/No Go app (included in this program) to increase your
chances of winning
- PSMJ’s IFBP process to develop a winning strategy
- How to zero in on your client’s most important issues
- How to differentiate your features vs. those of your competitors
- How to turn your features into client benefits
- How to prove what your proposal claims
- Differentiating your proposal, not your firm
- Identifying and exploiting your competitors’ weaknesses
- Developing a “Win Theme”
- Beating out much larger firms
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SESSION 5
READING THE CLIENT: HOW TO CRAFT YOUR WINNING PROPOSAL
- Why clients don’t read proposals the way you write them
- Why waiting for the RFP guarantees failure
- How to read an RFP between the lines
- 8 steps to writing a winning proposal
- Proposal parts and pieces
- Standardize so you can customize
- How to go about it like a project
- Writing proposals that hit the client’s hot buttons head on
- Making your proposal easy and interesting to read
- Why clients deduct points based on word count
- The “principle of single statement” – great for projects and terrible for
proposals
- Your proposal red team – the single best way to increase your hit rate
- Get a debriefing every time – especially when you win
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SESSION 6
CLOSING THE DEAL: WINNING A/E/C PRESENTATION STRATEGIES FOR NON-SALES PROFESSIONALS
- Self-evaluation quiz: How good are you at making presentations?
- Why it’s so scary for most people to make presentations
- How do clients judge professional services presentations?
- 6 things you should never do during a presentation
- PSMJ’s 10 steps to a winning interview
- PSMJ’s 6-point “choreography” checklist
- How to avoid “Death by PowerPoint”
- Avoiding “B.S. Bingo”
- When and how to use handout materials
- Making great virtual presentations during the Coronavirus crisis (and beyond)
- How to anticipate questions
- The Red Team returns
- Capstone: Putting it all together in a presentation you make to the class
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