Monday 3 October 2011

Will New Business Consultancy Programmes Translate Into Better Businesses For The Client?


SEARCH FOR THE PERFECT BUSINESS IDEA

So, imagine the situation. Five budding entrepreneurs come together and decide to look for a new business venture.


They create their wish list and send out their researchers to find
  • the perfect industry (growing, immature, without any significant major players) and
  • perfect clients/customers (hungry for the product, insatiable appetite for repeat purchases).
Some other characteristics would be ideal:
  • relatively easy to brand
  • the opportunity to productise and create apparently unique special formulae/recipes
  • a growing national obsession with the topic
  • a few celebrities available to be associated with the brand.
If it were 1970, then the industry would be the diet industry.
If it were 1980 it would be independent record labels or holidays.
If it were 1990 it would be extreme sports or fitness.
If it were 2000 it would be gap year students.
And in 2010, my guess is that it could be business support for small businesses.

COULD IT BE BUSINESS SUPPORT?

The business support industry has been a classic growth industry. The collapse of the existing providers (Business Link etc) who had a variable reputation combines with a growing obsession with entrepreneurship (The Apprentice, Dragons’ Den, Queen of Shops, an entire government pinning its hopes on entrepreneurship and SMEs as the hero of recovery). All this creates the perfect breeding ground for new businesses focusing on selling to the small business.


BUSINESSES UNDER £500k AS A TARGET?

So, some might say that they have small businesses (typically under £500k turnover) as a ripe market for plundering.
  • The numbers stack up: millions of them.
  • The demand is there: they want to know how to grow their businesses, the secrets, the quick-fixes, the short-cuts.
  • They have the spending power: generous redundancy and pension packages to be plundered
  • They have the hurt: poor profit, low sales with the recession as the backdrop. They have the desire.
So, the next step is to satisfy the need. The ‘so-called’ formula is relatively straightforward (whether you are selling accountancy, web design, marketing, business development, or growth services):

  • speak in a voice that the customer/client can relate to, demonstrate your credibility (testimonials, endorsements, case studies, video, website, how tos)
  • have a proven track record
  • have an expertise and an ‘ology’(a proprietary point of view)
  • ideally focus on a niche subject or market

and away you go.

Add to the mix some combination of:

  • money-back-guarantees,
  • Try Before You Buy or free seminar/workbook/ebook
  • an obsession with long copy
  • another obsession with capturing email addresses

and you have the ingredients for your new business development business.

In a nutshell:

  • offer an overt benefit
  • give clients a reason to believe in you
  • be dramatically different!!

I have no beef with how this has panned out. Quite the reverse.

In my humble opinion, the whole industry is about results. What else could it be about?


IT IS ALL ABOUT RESULTS FOR THE CLIENT

The attention of the potential client has to be focused on the (subtle?) difference between what consultancies sell and do as opposed to what clients wish to buy. It is clear that small business clients want to buy more sales and more profits. Most consultancies seem to sell a variation on the theme of more profit/sales for the business owner. What is in dispute is whether the consultancies deliver on the promise.

After several decades in the industry, having taken client businesses literally from zero to hero, from dream to final sale, I understand how the industry can deliver not just for their own share-holders but, more importantly, for the clients.

It is not sustainable (or moral) for the industry to under-deliver on its promises (even if there appears to be a bottomless pit of needy clients in search of the magic silver bullet). Neither is it good enough to make the sale, take the clients’ money, deliver on the promised service… especially if the client doesn’t get the benefits (= results) offered.

SO, WHAT WORKS?

What I have learned from both sides of the business development/growth industry is that books/seminars/tapes/videos/CDs are fantastic at pushing you in the DIY direction: showing you the basics and explaining the mechanics.

However, they still miss out on an essential ingredient: one-to-one support is the point at which you and the expert are able to design the model to fit your own specific circumstances. It is this one-to-one (consultancy) or one-to-few (mastermind/masterclass) interaction which has the massive impact on your business especially when run over a time period of several months.

So, the opportunity is there for the new providers to help/assist the smaller businesses. That is not in dispute. But, will these interventions translate into significantly improved business performance on the part of the clients and delegates? It is as simple as that.

6 comments:

Allison said...

Phew. At last the truth is out.
Allison

David said...

spoken from the heart

Charles said...

As you say
"the opportunity is there for the new providers to help/assist the smaller businesses"
Leave the market alone to do its best.
Charles

Danny said...

As someone in the space you are referring to, selling business development knowledge/info/products to small start-ups, I understand what you are talking about and how this space is getting a bit over-crowded. Thing is a lot of the sales depend on the naivety and innocence and ignorance of the customers, bless em. Not ideal but reality.

Andrew said...

Haven't read your monolgue word for word but I think that we get the core of your argument.

We are currently inundated with pleas to join free bootcamps from people with impeccable credentials (honestly). Have attended some of these jamborees and the content is, on the whole, pretty good. The problem is that these delegates can not put into action the 27-point plan etc. Nor can mpost afford the next step/programme

Craven is guilty of offering 10 ways to do 10 things in the next 10 days but as far as I am aware it is not sold as the universal solution nor is there the big back-of -the-room sale. These guys are masters of salesmanship and the unsuspecting delegates just need to think slowly before putting their hands in their pockets.

I think, on balance that the plethora of people pitching to the smaller businesses is indicative of where the easier kill scan be made.

The irony is that R Craven pops at the big businesses that target the SMEs, he even shares platforms with them, and yet these characters ( small and big) all try to hit the SME market BECAUSE THERE IS AN INSATIABLE DEMAND FOR THE PRODUCT. 

Jim Postini said...

Time for some beta blockers.

Good points however.

Jim