A silver bullet does not exist in the consulting sale. Selling consulting services is unique and remarkably different than selling a tangible product.  Products can be physicially held and touched.  Quality and value  can be assessed by mere observation and touch.   Consulting services are intangible and  inherently more complex.  The dynamic of winning a sale require proving trust and demonstrating a high degree of business process competency.  In this post I’ve outlined five elements that I leverage to assess when approaching a consulting opportunity:

1.  Tell a compelling story – paint a vivid picture of what your customer will achieve and articulate how they will get there but.  Focus on what you will do to help achieve that vision.

2. Develop trust -  Prove to the client you are an expert in your field, be honest and dependable. Always ensure your interests in the client are genuine and real.

3. Create a business case for change - use the story you developed to demonstrate why they need to change today by leveraging stories, testimonials and data.

4.  Look for opportunities to leverage value – Listening to your customers needs is critical.  Ask well thought out questions that speak to business problems and  the potential implications those problems can have on both a micro and macro level.

5. Look for every opportunity to help mitigate your clients risk – Put yourself in your clients shoes and think through all the area’s of concern they may have.  Consider talent, finanancial, operational risks.

This is a very highlevel list and I am sure we can collectively create a much larger list of potential elements that contribute to a winning consulting relationship with your customer.  What elements do you consider when developing your sales strategy and approach?

In my current role as Director of Sales & Marketing, I serve as a principle in the various projects that we run and am ultimately responsible if the project succeeds or fails. From my vantage point the biggest reasons for failure is lack of communication which leads to missing the mark on meeting customer expectations.

Managing all of the stakeholder’s expectations is critical and great care should be used in communicating often. This includes listening, asking for feedback and constantly asking each and every stakeholder what their overall goal’s of the software project are so that those expectations are met. The following video is a discussion on what defines an IT failure, perhaps it will give you some ideas on what to do to avoid an IT project failure.

What do you do to avoid IT Project Failures?

I’ve developed a 9 stage framework that I assist my customers with when looking to implement enterprise software.  Depending on the size of the engagement or software investment I often scale up or down on the level of activity I conduct during the selection phase.  I’ve embedded my presentation below for your use and review.

1. Shadowing/Observation – Job shadowing allows an observer to study an end user perform their work in order to understand workflow.  Some business analysts will actually do the work to gain a solid understanding of the work.
2. Use Cases – a method that tells a story about how a system will be used to achieve a goal from the perspective of a user of that system.  The goal should be to help a technical expert and non-technical people alike understand how the behaviour should be.  Use cases should be used to organize and document the functional requirements of an automated system.
3. Storyboards – Stake holders and developers working together by drawing up the elements that are believed to be a part of the application.  By leveraging story boarding along with probing questions you will gain a good thorough review of your customers workflow.
4. Prototyping – capture the look and feel of the user interface by drawing screen shots, screen flows and so on.
5. Structured demonstrations – If your purchasing an application, getting the end users to use the system for normal tasks is a very effective way of finding out what is missing in an application.

Use a variety of these techniques and ask a lot of questions.  Gathering requirements is often tedious work, but is the most important activity that ensures your customer get’s what they want every time!

Nine critical steps in selecting enterprise software that will optimize your business

Every organization that exists is built around processes. Companies that improve processes become more productive, save money and retain customers. One of the most important tools in improving processes with-in the typical company is Enterprise software. As a result the selection and implementation of major enterprise software should never be made in haste. Failure in a major enterprise software implementation can result in low user adoption, lower than expected return on investment, potentially unhappy customers and risk placing themselves at a competitive disadvantage. It is therefore critical to conduct careful analysis that evaluate existing processes, prioritize needs, communicate with all stake holders, seek out multiple alternatives, evaluate top vendors and select a solution that will meet all your needs and accelerate your organizations efficiencies. The purpose of this post is to introduce a 9 step approach that will help guide your software selection process and ensure that the software you select will truly optimize your business. Over the course of the next month we will be expanding on each of these steps to help you optimize your organization for competitive advantage.

To read the entire post head over to the Strategy Lab Blog to read more.