6 Ways to Promote Your Authority and Get Consulting Clients

“Michael, what’s the best way to get more clients?” is a question I’m often asked.

While many online ‘gurus’ will try to convince you there is a BEST way to get clients, there isn’t. They want you to believe that whatever they are selling is the only way to grow your business. It isn’t.

The best way to get more clients is to figure out how to get in front of them – effectively and consistently. Ultimately, the ideal scenario is to ensure your ideal client sees you often and wants to talk to you.

Getting the Conversation

You need to take three crucial steps to ensure you get that conversation with your ideal client.

You want your strengths and passion to align well with the way you get in front of your ideal clients. It should work for you, not against you.

Don’t worry about doing these steps perfectly right off the bat; the key is to take action and move forward with them NOW.

Here are the three:

I. Establish Ideal Client Clarity. The most successful consultants understand who their ideal clients are and who they aren’t. They establish clear criteria for identifying who their ideal clients are and focus only on these people.

This is critical, because once you have clarity on your ideal client you can move to the next step.

II. Create a Magnetic Message. You can do all the marketing in the world, but if your message doesn’t resonate with your ideal client your marketing will suffer.

So, after establishing clarity on your ideal client, develop a message that gets the client’s attention. Your message must resonate with them and make them want to speak with you to learn more.

III. Devise a marketing plan to suit your abilities.

Some consultants jump from one shiny object to the next. They ride the latest trend when it comes to marketing. But just because someone says “Facebook ads are the best,” doesn’t mean they are right for you.

The critical issue here it to come up with a marketing strategy compatible with your strengths and passion. If you dislike speaking, creating a marketing plan with a focus on speaking probably isn’t going to get the results you want. You won’t be excited; you will postpone it, which means you won’t take as much action as you should.

Instead, figure out what you are good or great at and build your marketing on that platform.

Second, it’s critical the marketing tactic you choose will work with your ideal clients. Suppose your ideal clients are 70-year-old executives in Japan. Although you might love doing webinars, using them with such seniors could extinguish your clients’ interest.

You want your strengths and passion to align well with the way you get in front of your ideal clients. It should work for you, not against you.

Now, if you’ve worked through these three points, the next thing you’ll want to consider is what type of marketing is going to be most effective for you.

Here are six ways to market professional services that not only will help you to land more clients, but will also build your authority in the marketplace.

1. Write Blog Articles

Writing a blog is a great strategy if you’re willing to make the commitment. It takes time to write and it can take time to see results from doing this.

View it as a long-term investment in your business – one that will pay great dividends if you’re willing to put in the work and give it some time.

This has been great for us at Consulting Success®. We have over 900 articles on this site, and attract almost 50,000 people to the site every month.

Some of these people will become clients and we will work with them, in some cases for many years.

2. Trade Publications

When it comes to marketing, I love using leverage. A great example of this is trade publications.

Almost every industry has multiple trade publications. Some are association newsletters; others are formal magazines, journals, even websites.

The benefit is that many trade publications have hundreds, thousands, and sometimes hundreds of thousands of readers, so a trade publication’s market reach can be phenomenal.

If you enjoy interacting with a room full of ideal clients, speaking can be an amazing approach to win more business.

Even if you don’t have your own list, even if you’re unknown in the greater marketplace, writing for trade publications can put you on the map.

The key here is to identify the publications that have a readership made up of your ideal clients.

I’ve helped many clients in our Clarity Coaching Program develop a plan to get featured in their own industry’s trade publications.

This has quickly led to them being seen as an authority, and has generated many inquiries for their services.

3. Go Live on Webinars

Webinars are a very powerful and effective way to connect with many people at one time.

Your webinar attendees get to learn from you live and are able to interact.

This takes authority building to another level because not only do you have the chance to teach and share your expertise; you form a stronger bond with attendees because they feel closer to you after hearing your voice on the webinar.

Setting up a webinar is easy. There are many great services you can use, such as GoToWebinar, Zoom, even Google Hangouts.

The other benefit of webinars is that you get to do Q&A with attendees. This is a great opportunity to learn what your ideal clients care about and can teach you a lot about adjustments and improvements you may want to make in your marketing and messaging.

Here’s a tip when it comes to webinars. Don’t conduct them only for your own audience or list. Find associations, organizations, bloggers, and others who have an audience comprising your ideal clients and offer to do a webinar for them.

Leverage is created because this approach is one-to-many.

4. Speak and Sell

If you enjoy interacting with a room full of ideal clients, speaking can be an amazing approach to win more business.

Many industry associations, non-profits, and other groups are looking for someone who can come in and speak to their members. Most libraries can provide access to Associations Unlimited, a service that searches and finds local, national, and international associations.

You can speak to make money, but a great approach is to use speaking as a marketing tactic. Even if you don’t get paid to speak right away, speak for free, because as long as your ideal clients are in the room, your talk will power up your chances of winning significant business.

To get started, list all the organizations and groups your ideal clients belong to or in which they participate. Then reach out to each organization and find out the opportunities they offer for you to speak.

5. Go Direct With Outreach

One of the most effective and least used approaches for getting in front of ideal clients is to go direct.

Identify who your ideal clients are, compile a list, then get their contact information.

Once you have that, you can start reaching out.

Your outreach shouldn’t focus on selling. Rather, it should position you so you appear on your ideal clients’ radar. Once they know you exist, they will be more inclined to speak with you. But don’t stop there.

To ensure success with your outreach plan, continue reaching out to your ideal clients and share valuable materials and information with them.

These materials support your expertise and authority. And doing so keeps you top of mind.

With this approach, you don’t have to spend months or years developing content and waiting for your ideal clients to come to you. Reach out to them in a way they appreciate; a way that will attract their interest in hearing from you and seeing what you have to share.

We help clients in our Clarity Coaching Program for Consultants with this approach and have fine-tuned it so the marketing and outreach can be automated to a degree. This will save time and ensure your marketing always works for you, even if you’re busy delivering on a client project.

6. Relationship Capital

One of the best ways to attract more business is to focus on your existing clients and do everything you can to help them achieve great results.

If you focus on serving your clients, they will appreciate you. They will want to continue working with you and will be much more likely to refer others to you.

They will also be more open; in fact, they will be happy to have you ask them for referrals.

How do you develop relationship capital? Start by having a long-term mindset. Recognize that in this (consulting) business, everything is about relationships.

Make your clients your number one priority, and always look for ways to add more value for them. See yourself as a partner in their success.

When you do this sincerely and genuinely, your relationships will become stronger and your business will gain momentum. It will naturally attract more ideal clients like your current clients, and you will receive more referrals.

What’s Right For You?

You don’t have to engage all six of these marketing tactics to have a thriving consulting business. You can use one and be successful.

Whichever one(s) you choose to focus on, commit to them. Choose excellence over mediocrity. Avoid jumping around from one to the next just because you see or hear about something new.

Marketing your consulting business and getting clients doesn’t have to be hard. It certainly doesn’t have to be complex. Keep it simple. Stay focused and implement.

If you’d like help in developing a marketing plan specifically for your consulting business, apply for the Clarity Coaching Program for Consultants. We work with a select group of consultants to help them improve their marketing strategy, attract more clients, increase their fees, and grow their business. Apply Now