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When a client goes all out to spend thousands or even millions of dollars to hire a consultant, they aren’t just doing so because they have so much money to spend or because they don’t have enough employees to assign extra tasks to; consultants are seen as seasoned experts with exceptional skills which are considered rare.

Clients believe that such skills, knowledge and experiences which consultants possess are required to help move their businesses forward or solve some of the challenges they may be facing. Consultants hold very delicate positions; clients rely on the information they provide to make significant business decisions. It is therefore understandable that the average client would be quite picky on their choice of a consultant.

A lot of people parade themselves as consultants these days and it makes it increasingly difficult for potential clients to sieve the wheat from the chaff and separate the seasoned professionals from the want to-be’s. It is even more difficult for new-comers in the consultancy profession to get clients as they haven’t been tested and may not be trusted.

Therefore, to stand out as a consultant, whether as a newbie or as a seasoned professional, it is important to build your credibility. This article would show you some unique strategies you can adopt to build your credibility as a consultant in your field so that instead of running after clients; they’ll be the ones chasing you around with job offers.

Building credibility as a consultant involves establishing your expertise- making people know that you are an expert in your field. Just about anyone can claim to be a consultant but the real questions that your clients would want answered before they hire you are:
• Do you have extensive knowledge of the field/industry/business?
• Have you achieved success consulting for similar businesses in the past?
• Can you be trusted to handle their business i.e. Can they rely on the information you’ll provide?
• How long have you been in business?
You have to position your consultancy business in such a way that these questions are easily answered and your expertise/knowledge is rarely questioned.

According to Larina Kase, credibility can either be:
• Presumed-: This is when people hold assumptions or ideas on your credibility.
• Earned-: When you have established credibility based on your performances overtime.
• Reputed-: In this case, a lot of people can attest to your credibility. There are lots of testimonials and reviews that prove your credibility.
• Surface-: People generally hold a first impression on your credibility as a result of your looks and appearance.

To establish any of these types of credibility, you should-:

Share Information
The fastest way to convince someone that you know much about something is to actually share some of what you know with them. People would easily trust your skills when you are able to proof to them that you have extensive knowledge of the topic. It is quite easy to put out information these days; you can do so through either of the following ways:
Write books on specific subjects/topics within your field.
Create a blog and start sharing valuable information.
Talk to your local newspaper/magazine editor about starting a column in their newspaper to discuss topics related to your field.
Write guest posts for credible, high-traffic blogs and online magazines.

Offer Free Services
To get reviews and testimonials, you actually need to have performed some jobs. But how do you do that when no one is willing to offer you a job without reviews? That’s simple; what you should do is to seek out some non-profit organizations that you can offer your services to for free. In turn, you would get the reviews you need to get bigger, well-paying clients.

Organize Seminars
This is not only a way to build credibility; it is also a very effective marketing strategy. When you organize your own seminars or serve as guest speaker at other people’s events, it gives you a platform to showcase your knowledge and skills and of course, get some clients for your business. It’s even easier to organize seminars using the internet, internet-based seminars known as webinars allows you to speak to thousands of people from all over the world without moving an inch.

Television/Radio Programs and Interviews
One of my clients who was looking for ways to market his newly established auto-mechanic workshop was referred to me and I told him what we were going to do- we were going to start our own 30-minute radio program where we would discuss different car problems and how people can solve them. He actually said I was crazy and wouldn’t accept the idea until I offered to pay for the first two sessions. The conversions were so crazy and let’s just say I got my money back in several multiples.

A whole lot of people watch television and listen to the radio daily. I’m talking about people who don’t even visit the internet regularly. When you share your knowledge using such medium, it’s very easy to gain a reputation quite fast and establish credibility.

Dress Properly
A lot of consultants make the mistake of thinking that their sense of fashion has nothing to do with their professional skills and expertise. This is wrong. It is not uncommon for people to judge you based on the way you appear. This is what is known as perceived credibility. If your wardrobe isn’t screaming ‘professional consultant yet’ then it’s time for a new wardrobe.

Be seen in the right circles
Lastly, make sure that you start networking and hanging out with the right people. Imagine that you had the privilege to start hanging out and be seen with someone like Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg; of course, people would generally assume that you are either a billionaire too or you have some unique potential to be able to hang out with such people.

Sometimes in the consultancy profession, you have to fake it until you make it and one of the ways to do that is to start hanging out with credible professionals, not necessarily in the same field as you but people that are known as experts in their own field. That way, some of their credibility would rub off on you and clients would start to feel more comfortable hiring you.

If you’re looking to improve your supply chain, you may have considered using the services of a logistics consultant. You might be worried, though, about whether it will be worth the cost or bring any real benefits to your business. Here are some reasons to seriously consider using a consultant.

Product Knowledge

Working with a logistics consultant who has a broad knowledge base and experience working through similar issues to those you are experiencing brings a number of advantages to your team.

You’ll probably have received loads of literature from sales people, for example, telling how great their products are, but how can you possibly choose between them? An independent logistics consultant is not selling products and does not get any financial incentives from the products they specify, therefore they can give objective advice.

A project run internally can often get sidetracked by everyday management issues. Bringing in a consultant who can focus on delivering results will ensure that the goals are achieved quicker.

Consultancy does not need to take project ownership away from the management. However, as long as management is clear about its objectives and is able to select, direct and manage the consultants carefully, real added value can be seen.

When Should I Use a Consultant?

All organisations at some time reach a point when they are aware that they could be doing things better or differently. It may be one or several areas of the operations that are not achieving their goal or not functioning as efficiently as they might.

The main reasons for using consultants usually focus around:

o Complexity
o Timescales
o Expertise
o Resources

Efficient Staffing

The issue or problem may be short-term. To manage the change effectively and maximise the benefits will require an intense effort, potentially jeopardising the performance of the rest of the operation. Permanently increasing the headcount to handle a short-term project will increase operating expenses. A consultant can assist in managing the change until the introduction is complete and the operation has stabilized.

Often specialist knowledge exists within the company but a secondment cannot be arranged in the required timeframe. Consultants are ideally suited to providing the skills that are not available from permanent staff.

Decisions which result in a large change or financial commitment from the company will frequently involve consultants to review any analysis before a decision is made. An outsider can ensure that an objective approach and attitude are taken and that all potential alternatives are known and explored. Often the consultant will know of additional alternatives which were not even considered previously. At other times just having the consultant confirm competent and thorough analysis can add additional weight to the business case.

If a project has lost momentum or is not delivering the expected results a consultant can quickly provide the input required to get it back on track.

Working With a Logistics Consultant

The use of consultants is unlikely to bring benefits if you dismiss the consultants’ involvement as an expensive distraction from everyday operations. However, if you chose the right consultant or consultancy, clearly define the project objectives, provide the consultants with the information they require and set aside time to review progress and buy into their ideas, the benefits will be seen.

How Do You Close a Consultative Sales Conversation?

I asked that question the other day on LinkedIn.com under the category of small business development.

I was looking for an exchange of ideas about sales skills. Unexpectedly, I heard from a number of consultants (not sales consultants) saying they would never “close” in a consultative conversation at all. Some sounded offended that I would suggest it. To them, “closing” meant proposing that a client purchase a particular brand. The implication was that a consultant stays above brand identification in order to stay independent.

I agree 100% that a consultant should stay independent. That’s exactly how I would consult…recommending a particular brand only if I thought it was the best solution, and offering multiple brands if all other things were equal.

So how, then, does someone sell consultatively?

Selling consultatively resembles consulting in some regards, but ends with presenting a single brand as the best solution. (This is somewhat different from the original Consultative Selling, as coined in the early 1970′s by Mack Hanan–in a book well worth reading.)

Selling consultatively, like consulting, involves diagnosing the prospect’s situation to discover what his problems are, what he’s already tried to do to solve the problems, what is at the root of the problems, what is holding the problems in place, etc. It’s using skilled and intelligent influence to help the prospect view his situation through new eyes. It’s asking the right questions at the right time to move the thought process forward to new insights and inspiration.

Not Selling Consultatively

Selling consultatively does not mean merely “educating” or “giving the prospect information so the prospect can make an informed decision,” or “finding out what the prospect needs so you can pitch your solution using their words.” Good consultative sales DOES all these things, but usually much later in the sales conversation than most salespeople think.

Openhanded Selling

Think of the sale as an hourglass. While the sand is at the top of the hourglass, be a consultant. Spend enough time exploring their situation so that they’ve fully developed the problem and told you how and why the problem exists. Understand the flow of the conversation so you can ask questions that help them think about their problem from your expert perspective. Notice how this process dissolves concerns and objections. Don’t leap on opportunities to present a solution. Mentally catalog such opportunities and set them aside for now.

When the time is right, the sand has dropped to the bottom of the hourglass, and the prospect will discover that he/she wants to hear your solution. You can now present a solution that exactly fits his/her needs (if you have one), and you will have developed a lasting relationship that you can nurture for future business.

Don’t Educate Your Prospect

The approach that captures the consultative sales process and intelligent influence needed to make it work is called Openhanded Selling, and one of the first principles of Openhanded Selling is this: DON’T educate your prospect. As soon as you start talking, you lose control of the conversation. Instead, deliver just enough information to keep the conversation moving forward, but confine yourself to asking questions until either you’ve decided together that you don’t have a solution, or they’re practically begging you to present. Then educate just enough to get to a close.

A consultant is someone who’s an expert, specialist, or has a wealth of experience and knowledge in their field of specialization.

Consultants can be found everywhere and in every field imaginable. Consultants come from all types of backgrounds, such as education, social work, business (corporate, medium, and small) government, politics, law, technology, science, and so on.

Over the years consultants have become more wide spread and more respected. Formerly, consultants were only used amongst the rich and the famous – today that is no longer the case. Consultants are a highly sought after class of professionals, who are quick to be called upon when an individual or a company needs their area of expertise.

The Internet birthed the information super highway. As a result, the knowledge age originated, which requires knowledge workers and lots of them. Just as knowledge has increased, there’s an increased need for knowledge workers, of which consultants fall into that professional category. Knowledge is still power, and those who use knowledge to advance their thoughts, ideas and inventions, know its importance and are willing to pay for it.

Using the services of a consultant is beneficial to all parties. As a consultant, it’s a way to use their knowledge, experience and expertise to expand their business and services. For individuals or companies who need the consultant’s expertise, it’s a way to hire someone temporarily and save on paying a large salary with benefits and retirement packages. It’s a win – win situation for both parties.

With the expanse of knowledge now available to the average person, no one has a monopoly on certain information, but individuals and businesses need specialists who can use knowledge to advance their organizations’ plans and strategies.

Ten ways to know you need a consultant

1. When you have a passion to provide services or products to a targeted group, but don’t know how to file the necessary paperwork to become a licensed for profit or non-profit business, you need a consultant.
2. When you have a passion to provide a service or product to a targeted group of people, but know nothing about starting a business, you need a consultant.
3. When you have a project or business venture requiring a certain level of specialized skills and knowledge that takes your organization to the next level, and you have no one on staff with those skills and experience, you need a consultant.
4. When you have a major project or task, and you have a drop-dead deadline; you’re understaffed, and you need someone temporarily with specialized knowledge and skills to join the team until the project is completed, you need a consultant.
5. When you are working on a major funding campaign; there’s a fundraising goal and deadline to meet, yet you’re short of staff and overworked, you need a consultant.
6. When you are a new start-up (non-profit or for-profit) business with limited knowledge or time to run the day to day operations of your business, and you need to grow the business to succeed, yet you need an administrative system in place to maintain it and keep it growing, you need a consultant.
7. When you are a new or fairly new non-profit or for-profit business and you need to establish an organizational system, which requires extensive business documents, such as business plans, strategic plans, employee manuals, departmental manuals, a cadre of marketing and promotional documents that include brochures, fliers, advertisable business cards and postcards, direct mail/email announcements, website content, etc., you need a consultant.
8. When you have a major business problem to solve and you need someone with great analytical, critical thinking and problem solving skills, you need a consultant.
9. When you or your company are planning to enter into a new market (local, regional, national, or global) to expand your goods and services, and you need a cutting edge, sophisticated or grassroots public relations and marketing strategy to make it happen, you need a consultant.
10. When you need specialized information within a very short span of time, and you want your staff to implement the new knowledge and skills, hire a consultant to come in and train you, your staff, and your board of directors. Based on the level of knowledge needed, the training may consist of a 2 – 4 hour seminar, a 6 – 8 hour (all day) seminar; a 2 -3 day conference, workshop, or staff retreat, or a longer training time. You need a consultant.

When a client goes all out to spend thousands or even millions of dollars to hire a consultant, they aren’t just doing so because they have so much money to spend or because they don’t have enough employees to assign extra tasks to; consultants are seen as seasoned experts with exceptional skills which are considered rare.

Clients believe that such skills, knowledge and experiences which consultants possess are required to help move their businesses forward or solve some of the challenges they may be facing. Consultants hold very delicate positions; clients rely on the information they provide to make significant business decisions. It is therefore understandable that the average client would be quite picky on their choice of a consultant.

A lot of people parade themselves as consultants these days and it makes it increasingly difficult for potential clients to sieve the wheat from the chaff and separate the seasoned professionals from the want to-be’s. It is even more difficult for new-comers in the consultancy profession to get clients as they haven’t been tested and may not be trusted.

Therefore, to stand out as a consultant, whether as a newbie or as a seasoned professional, it is important to build your credibility. This article would show you some unique strategies you can adopt to build your credibility as a consultant in your field so that instead of running after clients; they’ll be the ones chasing you around with job offers.

Building credibility as a consultant involves establishing your expertise- making people know that you are an expert in your field. Just about anyone can claim to be a consultant but the real questions that your clients would want answered before they hire you are:
• Do you have extensive knowledge of the field/industry/business?
• Have you achieved success consulting for similar businesses in the past?
• Can you be trusted to handle their business i.e. Can they rely on the information you’ll provide?
• How long have you been in business?
You have to position your consultancy business in such a way that these questions are easily answered and your expertise/knowledge is rarely questioned.

According to Larina Kase, credibility can either be:
• Presumed-: This is when people hold assumptions or ideas on your credibility.
• Earned-: When you have established credibility based on your performances overtime.
• Reputed-: In this case, a lot of people can attest to your credibility. There are lots of testimonials and reviews that prove your credibility.
• Surface-: People generally hold a first impression on your credibility as a result of your looks and appearance.

To establish any of these types of credibility, you should-:

Share Information
The fastest way to convince someone that you know much about something is to actually share some of what you know with them. People would easily trust your skills when you are able to proof to them that you have extensive knowledge of the topic. It is quite easy to put out information these days; you can do so through either of the following ways:
Write books on specific subjects/topics within your field.
Create a blog and start sharing valuable information.
Talk to your local newspaper/magazine editor about starting a column in their newspaper to discuss topics related to your field.
Write guest posts for credible, high-traffic blogs and online magazines.

Offer Free Services
To get reviews and testimonials, you actually need to have performed some jobs. But how do you do that when no one is willing to offer you a job without reviews? That’s simple; what you should do is to seek out some non-profit organizations that you can offer your services to for free. In turn, you would get the reviews you need to get bigger, well-paying clients.

Organize Seminars
This is not only a way to build credibility; it is also a very effective marketing strategy. When you organize your own seminars or serve as guest speaker at other people’s events, it gives you a platform to showcase your knowledge and skills and of course, get some clients for your business. It’s even easier to organize seminars using the internet, internet-based seminars known as webinars allows you to speak to thousands of people from all over the world without moving an inch.

Television/Radio Programs and Interviews
One of my clients who was looking for ways to market his newly established auto-mechanic workshop was referred to me and I told him what we were going to do- we were going to start our own 30-minute radio program where we would discuss different car problems and how people can solve them. He actually said I was crazy and wouldn’t accept the idea until I offered to pay for the first two sessions. The conversions were so crazy and let’s just say I got my money back in several multiples.

A whole lot of people watch television and listen to the radio daily. I’m talking about people who don’t even visit the internet regularly. When you share your knowledge using such medium, it’s very easy to gain a reputation quite fast and establish credibility.

Dress Properly
A lot of consultants make the mistake of thinking that their sense of fashion has nothing to do with their professional skills and expertise. This is wrong. It is not uncommon for people to judge you based on the way you appear. This is what is known as perceived credibility. If your wardrobe isn’t screaming ‘professional consultant yet’ then it’s time for a new wardrobe.

Be seen in the right circles
Lastly, make sure that you start networking and hanging out with the right people. Imagine that you had the privilege to start hanging out and be seen with someone like Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg; of course, people would generally assume that you are either a billionaire too or you have some unique potential to be able to hang out with such people.

Sometimes in the consultancy profession, you have to fake it until you make it and one of the ways to do that is to start hanging out with credible professionals, not necessarily in the same field as you but people that are known as experts in their own field. That way, some of their credibility would rub off on you and clients would start to feel more comfortable hiring you.

If you’re looking to improve your supply chain, you may have considered using the services of a logistics consultant. You might be worried, though, about whether it will be worth the cost or bring any real benefits to your business. Here are some reasons to seriously consider using a consultant.

Product Knowledge

Working with a logistics consultant who has a broad knowledge base and experience working through similar issues to those you are experiencing brings a number of advantages to your team.

You’ll probably have received loads of literature from sales people, for example, telling how great their products are, but how can you possibly choose between them? An independent logistics consultant is not selling products and does not get any financial incentives from the products they specify, therefore they can give objective advice.

A project run internally can often get sidetracked by everyday management issues. Bringing in a consultant who can focus on delivering results will ensure that the goals are achieved quicker.

Consultancy does not need to take project ownership away from the management. However, as long as management is clear about its objectives and is able to select, direct and manage the consultants carefully, real added value can be seen.

When Should I Use a Consultant?

All organisations at some time reach a point when they are aware that they could be doing things better or differently. It may be one or several areas of the operations that are not achieving their goal or not functioning as efficiently as they might.

The main reasons for using consultants usually focus around:

o Complexity
o Timescales
o Expertise
o Resources

Efficient Staffing

The issue or problem may be short-term. To manage the change effectively and maximise the benefits will require an intense effort, potentially jeopardising the performance of the rest of the operation. Permanently increasing the headcount to handle a short-term project will increase operating expenses. A consultant can assist in managing the change until the introduction is complete and the operation has stabilized.

Often specialist knowledge exists within the company but a secondment cannot be arranged in the required timeframe. Consultants are ideally suited to providing the skills that are not available from permanent staff.

Decisions which result in a large change or financial commitment from the company will frequently involve consultants to review any analysis before a decision is made. An outsider can ensure that an objective approach and attitude are taken and that all potential alternatives are known and explored. Often the consultant will know of additional alternatives which were not even considered previously. At other times just having the consultant confirm competent and thorough analysis can add additional weight to the business case.

If a project has lost momentum or is not delivering the expected results a consultant can quickly provide the input required to get it back on track.

Working With a Logistics Consultant

The use of consultants is unlikely to bring benefits if you dismiss the consultants’ involvement as an expensive distraction from everyday operations. However, if you chose the right consultant or consultancy, clearly define the project objectives, provide the consultants with the information they require and set aside time to review progress and buy into their ideas, the benefits will be seen.