Books

Books on Professional Services Business Development

Core Rainmaker Reading

David Maister’s Managing the Professional Services Firm is foundation reading for all professional services business developers. it covers all elements of running a professional firm: from strategy to client development & marketing to people management to partner compensation to firm culture. If I was to recommend one book as a “must read” this would be it.

 

Growing Your Client Base from the UK based PACE Partnership is a fantastic look at business development for a professional services firm. It covers pipeline management, prospecting, marketing, sales meetings, cross-selling, pruning the portfolio, and the emerging business development manager role. It makes a very interesting and appropriate application of military ‘Lanchester Strategy’ to professional services business development.

Rain Making by Ford Harding is the classic, in-depth text on business development for professional servcies. It covers writing, publishing and speaking; sales calls and networking; selling techniques and closing; and sales strategy. If you’ve progressed beyond the overviews of Managing the Professional Service Firm and Growing Your Client Base – this is the place to go. The second edition, published in 2008, has been substantially updated to cover recent industry developments and, of course, the internet.

Trust-Based Selling, by Charles Green, is a thorough exploration of the role of trust in sales – from how clients buy to building trust through the sales process. The insights apply across sectors – but are particularly appropriate for sellers of complex, high value intangible products – such as professional services.

 
 

Let’s Get Real or Let’s Not Play, by Mahan Khalsa and Randy Illig, is the definitive guide to handling sales meetings in an open, consultative manner for professionals. The authors provide detailed techniques – but more importantly, the correct mindset – to get to the root of a client’s problem and design a solution that perfectly meets their needs. The recent update of the book extends its coverage beyond sales into attracting clients – with a focus on referrals.

How to Win a Pitch, by Joey Asher, is a no-nonsense guide to the key fundamentals needed to win sales pitches. It covers 5 topics – ensuring that the pitch is: focused on a business solution, simply organised, delivered with passion, Interactive, and well-rehearsed. Asher delivers rock-solid techniques and methods to excel in each area – with detailed and crystal clear explanations.

 

 

Sole Practitioner Reading

CJ Hayden’s Get Clients Now is a great “how to” book featuring a 28-day plan to win new clients and grow your business. It covers the key aspects of the business development pipeline: filling the pipeline, following-up, getting presentations, closing sales and getting referrals. For each stage it identifies effective tactics and when it’s appropriate to use them. The philosophy of [em]Get Clients Now[/em] is very practical: “focus where you’re stuck” and for many sole practitioners this could be the only book they ever need.

In addition to having a fantastic title, and a fantastically long subtitle, Michael Port’s Book Yourself Solid is another excellent book for the sole practitioner. The book has more of an “internet entrepreneur” feel than Get Clients Now and has more of a focus on topics like internet marketing and the use of Information Products for passive income. It has a refreshing “new age philosophy” side to it and a focus on self-fulfilment as a professional.

When I took time off over in Hong Kong before setting up my own consulting practice, Alan Weiss’s Million Dollar Consulting was the book I read day-in, day-out (and made a huge pile of notes on index cards from). Weiss has a clear voice and a clear point of view. I don’t always agree with quite everything he says – but I learnt immensely from this book. It’s also a good introduction to the concepts of value based fees which he discusses in more detail in other works too and which is such a vital topic for consultants but not really covered by other authors. If you’re a consultant and you just want to read one book about setting up a practice and winning business, then this is probably the one.

Robert Middleton’s Infoguru Manual is, for me, the best pound-for-pound guide to marketing and selling your services for Independent Professionals/Sole Practitioners. It’s far more pricey than the others – but worth every penny. The package includes the manual and workbooks, a number of audio resources, and membership of the Infoguru forum. Listening to Robert’s audios has given me more “damn it, you’re right” and thumping-the-steering-wheel moments than anything else I’ve listened to. If you thoroughly digest this material and work throught all the exercises and recommendations you absolutely will put yourself into the top 5% of professional service marketers. In fact the only thing I don’t like about this package is the “Infoguru” name – I feel it has connotations of someone whose primary business is information products – whereas it’s far, far more than that.

General Sales Reading
Most general sales books tend to be “airport potboilers”. Strong on claims and hyperbole – but weak on evidence and insight. And most tend to focus on traditional low-value product sales to end-consumers. But a small number of books contain solid findings based on in-depth experience and research – and are applicable to the type of large, complex sales found in professional services. These books have helped form the foundation sales education for many successful rainmakers.

SPIN Selling by Neil Rackham: based on decades of research and observation of sales meetings for major sales. SPIN Selling lays out a sophisticated process for understanding client needs, exploring the full impact of issues and helping clients see the benefits of working with you to solve their problems.

 

 

Strategic Selling - by Miller, Heimann & Tujela – shows how to analyse complex decision process with multiple influencers. It provides a detailed analytical approach for understanding a buying decision and planning a strategy to influence the key stakeholders.

 

 

Jim Holden’s Power Base Selling brings an understanding of organisation politics and a more aggressive approach to competition into the selling process.

 

 

 

 

Miscellaneous

A personal favourite. If there’s a challenge I’ve found that bright professionals all seem to have it’s too much to do and too little time. Finding David Allen’s Getting Things Done was an absolute godsend for me – and it’s been helping me get much more done with my time ever since.