“I can’t be a sales manager! I’m a solo consultant, it’s right there in the name! I barely sell myself! I get almost all my business from referrals!”
That’s the paradox.
Those referral partners are your sales team.
Do you manage and nurture them the way an active sales manager would? Or are you sitting back waiting (and hoping, and perhaps praying) that a good referral comes in?
Make sure you:
- Arm your referral partners with powerful messaging so that you come to mind instantly in the appropriate situations, and the partners can provide the right information to make those ideal future clients eager to connect. (The Mission & Positioning screen in Mimiran is a big help here.)
- Regularly talk to your power partners, champions, whatever you want to call them, on a regular basis. (Email newsletters are great, but they are not a substitute for actual conversations.) (Want to know who your best referral partners are?)
- Regularly talk to current and past clients so they become great referral partners.
If you’re using Mimiran, it’s easy to set up time in your calendar to have these conversations, and the combination of Call Mode and Tags with default conversation frequencies makes it easy to have Flawless Follow-up without stress. Here’s how:
Now what about your website?
So many consultants say that their websites don’t get them business, they’re just “shingles” to demonstrate that the business exists. But this a huge missed opportunity.
While it’s true that people don’t buy high-trust, high-tickets services from a website, that doesn’t mean the website should be like a sales rep who is paid to be on permanent vacation.
Here’s the typical consulting website:
The website is the front-line sales rep who turns an anonymous visitor into a lead, that you then get to turn into a conversation and perhaps a prospect or a client.
You still need to have conversations, but if you manage your sales team well, those conversations will be much more fun (and productive) than when you’re trying to do all the selling yourself.
So how are you managing your sales team? Are you an active, supportive, intentional sales manager?