Professionals regularly tell me that they hate to “sell.” They need help finding the right people and learning how to talk to them on the phone and in person, and how to close the sale.
I always ask them one thing, “What is it that you do specifically that will help either solve a problem for them or help them achieve an objective or opportunity?”
Inevitably, they have not thought that through.
A professional should never “sell.”
A professional should know clearly what they are truly expert in and explore whether his or her expertise is the solution to an issue the prospect may have, whether removing a risk or an impediment to a great opportunity.
Clients hire experts for their important work.
They cannot afford not to.
Clients will seek them out and pay them more.
You must therefore become an expert.
You will not spend the time to become an expert unless you are truly passionate about what you are doing.
What did the Three Experts Say?
Over the last three weeks we have heard from three true experts in their fields:
Area of Expertise
Jeff Harfenist: International Fraud and FCPA Investigations.
Tom Murphy: Complex Derivatives.
Jim Woods: IP Litigation Damages.
These are their areas of expertise. These are not what they are deeply passionate about.
What is Jeff passionate about?
Solving complex financial puzzles combined with the study of human nature.
International fraud and FCPA investigations are the canvas upon which he is able to work to bring all of his loves together. It took him years to find this, beginning in audit, small litigation cases, then that one fraud case, then another and more complex litigation matters, then the TYCO case and finally the emergence of FCPA. It took him thirty years of searching and probing the edges of everything he did, identifying what he loved most and what was missing, to find the right path.
What is Dr. Tom Murphy passionate about?
Creating complex financial models to quantify disparate variables that impact strategic business decisions.
Derivatives are the canvas upon which Tom works his magic. Only in the context of analyzing complex derivatives can he exercise his passion to the fullest. Again it took years for him to find this was the service that completely satisfied all his passions, and even more time to develop it into a full-scale international expertise.
What is Dr. Jim Woods passionate about?
How things work and how that effects the economics and financials of a business.
He knew early on that he loved to understand how things worked. He knew he liked numbers and financial relationships. It took some time before he realized that while he could apply some of his passions in many areas, only IP Litigation Damages allows him to encompass all of his passions into one endeavor. It was so important to follow his passion to the development of true and deep expertise that he left a lucrative and successful position as leader of an entire practice to pursue it.
The lesson in the stories of each of these successful rain-makers is the same. Your passion is not in the profession you choose, it is in the tasks and concepts you love. Identify those things first and then find and create a profession that allows you to do these things every day. When you find your passion, you will take the time to immerse yourself in it and will become an expert more naturally. Then you can exploit that to your economic advantage.
Identifying and Pursuing Your Target Market.
It is all well and good to be a passionate expert, but you still have to find someone to pay you, and pay you well, to perform those services.
Early in your career, your services will be broad and your target audience still broader. Network with everyone and anyone. Listen to what they do. Try to determine whether you can or want to help them resolve their issues. Get as much work in the door as you can so that you can see if it lights your fire. Your rates will be low. The cases will be relatively simple.
As a young professional you do not have enough knowledge and experience to even know what tasks you love, though you can begin to figure those out and create a clearer picture of your passion. A simple process is to list everything you do, both at work, at home and in your free time, including what you read and watch. Then list the concepts that are important to you. Be honest. Do not put that you like to help people because you feel you should. Include it if you actually like to help people. No one will see this list but you.
Prioritize both lists from those tasks you love to do down to those you hate to do. Do not rank them in terms of anything else, like “I have to do them” or “I should like to do them” or “I make money doing this.” Rank solely on passion for the task. Stop doing the tasks at the bottom of the list. The book Good to Great refers to this as creating a “Stop Doing” List.
Explore every type of project and career you can find to determine whether it is composed largely of those tasks and concepts that are important to you. Try these out, drive to become an expert, see if it completely satisfies your passion. Explore some more. Most important at this stage though, network like crazy and build strong and lasting relationships so that as you grow in your profession, your contacts will increase their positions and become increasingly valuable to you.
As your experience increases, the clarity of your services will increase. As a result you can narrow the description of your ideal client. The more clearly you define your prospect based on your expertise, the easier it becomes to find them and get in front of them. If you serve attorneys, as many of our FLVS professionals do, your targets will tell you what they do and whether they may be able to use your services. Every attorney has a public bio that lists her practice areas.
If your targets are corporations, identify the prospects as tightly as possible and be realistic. Acquire the tools required to find the prospects you need. Hoovers, Capital IQ and other services provide substantial searchable information on corporations, both private and public, though information on private corporations tends to be more sketchy. Join the associations that your target’s join or at least work hard to get involved in them or speak at their conventions. Write truly thought leading article, meaning that they address topics at very high levels that executives you are targeting will seek out and read. Get them published in prominent Journals your targets read. Secure a co-author who your target market will respect – ordinarily one of their own. Once published, send the article to all your clients and prospects.
Use Your Network:
Use your growing network of contacts and the significant number of close relationships you have cultivated to secure introductions, gather information and otherwise gain an advantage over your competition. Building strong friends who trust you, believe in your abilities and who legitimately want you to succeed is a critical part of the success of any rain-maker. They will do this only if you have consistently made them look like heroes in front of the people who are important to them, whether in projects, for their charities or in front of their spouses and families. Connect them to others you know who can help them.
Focus:
Each of the rain-makers focused his business over time and focused on more a more precise ideal prospect. Early on your projects will be smaller, those that a generalist secures. As your level of expertise increases, so will the size of the projects and the fees you can charge for your services. It is only by focusing that you can build the degree of expertise in an area of passion that will provide the level of value that clients pay big money for.
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