Million Dollar Consulting 3rd Ed.

The Professional's Guide to Growing a Practice

Alan Weiss

Publisher: McGraw-Hill, 2003, 358 pages

ISBN: 0-07-138703-X

Keywords: Consulting

Last modified: Sept. 18, 2007, 7:50 a.m.

Completely updated for today's consultants, this classic how-to handbookgives you the strategies and guidance needed to grow a firm that can brin in $1 million-a-year. Step by step, Million Dollar Consulting explains the ins and outs of:

  • Raising capital
  • Reeling in new clients
  • Setting fees
  • Accelerating Growth
  • Relationship selling
  • Value pricing
  • Self-promotion
  • And much more!
Consultants will find critical new material on how to overcome objections and vital information on internet and e-based marketing and sales. There's also a new chapter on how to work in smaller markets with family owned businesses, non-profits and other "non-traditional" clients. Packed with the most up-to-date information available, Million Dollar Consulting will boost performance and profits for you and the companies you consult.
  • Part 1. Strategy: Establishing Your View of teh Profession
    1. The State of the Art: Most Art Is in the Eye of the Beholder
      • What a Consultant Is and Is Not
      • How Organizations Choose Consulting Help
      • Emphasing Results, Not Tasks
      • Trends and Likelihoods for the Coming Decades
    2. The Rights State of Mind: Rudderless Ships Are Only Good at Drifting
      • How Jobs Get in the Way of Careers
      • Will Growth Cut You Down to Size?
      • Abandoning Clients Gracefully
      • Ten Business Conditions That Cry Out for Abandonment
      • Establishing the Ideal Goals
      • As Iin Show Business, Timing Is Everything
    3. Prerequisites for Growth: Expanding the Envelope
      • The Success Trap
      • Establishing a Firm's Image
      • Abandoning the Past
      • Accepting Prudent Risk
    4. Breaking Paradigms: The Worst Piece of Advice I've Ever received
      • A Surefire Strategy for Growing Your Firm
      • Fine-Tuning the Strategy
      • Ten Ways to Develop Breakthrough Relationships
      • The Core Value of Your Firm's Success
    5. Accelerating in the Turns: Don't Skid But Don't Stop
      • Shifting Gears
      • The Triage System
      • Ten Secrets for Retaining Key Business As You Grow
      • Improving Your Resources
      • The 10 Basic Principles of Million Dollar Consulting
  • Part 2. Tactics: Implementing Your Vision of Your Firm
    1. Creating Opportunities: If You Don't Blow Your Own Horn, There Is No Music
      • The Tentacles of Networking
      • Playing Alluring Music
      • Rebutting Objections
      • Products
      • Integrity and Conduct
      • Sogomi
    2. Acquiring People: Practicing What You Preach Could Save Your Life
      • Options for Participation
      • Where to Find Good People and How to Recognize Them
      • How to Reward Collaboration: The Revenue-Sharing Formula
      • The First Rule of Leverage: Don't Give Up the Ship
    3. Working Outside the Corporate World: How to Make Money Where Most People Can't
      • Nontraditional markets
      • Ten Criteria for Considering Nonraditional Markets
      • Family-Owned Businesses
      • The Profitable World of Nonprofits
      • Business-to-Business Companies
      • All the Other Nontraditional Markets
    4. Establishing Fees: If You're Charging a Per Diem, You're Still Just Practicing
      • Formulaic Methods to Establish Per-Diem Fees
      • Market-Demand Methods for Establishing Fees
      • Perceived Value As a Basis on Which to Establish Fees
      • Establishing the Value of a Client's Investment
      • When to Raise Your Fees and What Will Always Happen
      • Other Reasons for Raising Fees
      • Twenty-Five of My Favorite Ways to Raise Fees (and/or Maximize Profit)
    5. How to Write a Proposal That Closes Business: Don't Trip As You're About to Cross the Finish Line
      • Before You Write It
      • Ten Critical Steps to Proposal Formulation
      • Creating the Proposal
      • The Nine Components of a Dynamite Proposal
      • After Submitting the proposal
    6. Investing in Succes: Absence Doesn't Make the Heart Grow Fonder — It Weakens the Memory
      • Periodic Client Communications
      • Publishing Options
      • When Self-Publishing Makes Sense
      • The Speaking Circuit
      • Pro Bono Work
    7. Turning Change into Opportunity: Bad Times Can Be Good Times If You Play Your Cards Right
      • Early Warning Signs of Business Decline
      • Avoiding Down Times: The Five "Up-Time" Rules
      • Contrarian Consuling: Swimming Against the Current
      • Scrap Consensus, Try Diversity
      • The Myth of Cutting Expenses (Don't Sell the Conference Table)
    8. The Technological Consultant: How to Use Technology and Live to Tell About It
      • Signs of Our Times
      • Ten Tips for Marketing on the Internet
      • Communicating at the Speed of Light
      • Overcoming Drawbacks of the Brave New World
      • Technology and the Client
      • The Value of the Visuals
      • Get the Buyer Involved
      • Managing the Buying Dynamic
  • Part 3. Success: Achieving Self-Realization
    1. Managing Capital: Borrow $1,000 and They Won You, but Borrow $1 Million and …
      • Establishing Credit Lines
      • The Rules of Incoming Cash Flow
      • Collecting Receivables
      • Ten Expense-Management Tactics
    2. Accelerating Growth: Growth Does Not Always Equal Expansion
      • Techniques for Intensifying the Firm's Profile
      • Intensifying Your Personal Profile
      • The Brand Manifesto
      • Ten Techniques to Make Your Brand Indelible and Memorable
      • Becoming a Star: The Camera Calls
    3. The Ultimate Relationships: When Clients Call You
      • Long-Term Contracts
      • Criteria for Successful Retainer Business
      • Client Conferences
      • Client Advisory Groups
      • The Value-Added Discounting Principle of Never Losing Clients
      • And Now a Few Words on Life Balance
      • Ten Techniques for Million Dollar Life Balance
    4. Accelerating renewal and Repeat Business: Thinking of the Fourth Sale First
      • The Velocity Factor
      • How to Handle the Bends in the Road
      • Thinking of the Fourth Sale First
    5. Beyond Success: Money Is Only a Means to an End
      • Ethical Issues
      • Expanding Internationally
      • Designing the Future

Reviews

Million Dollar Consulting

Reviewed by Roland Buresund

Very Good ******** (8 out of 10)

Last modified: March 24, 2008, 12:16 a.m.

How to expand your consulting business after you get it up and running.

It can also be used for tips for the newly started consultant, but it comes into ts own when you look through the glasses of a consultant of a few years that are intent on expanding his/her business.

Anyway, just the chapter on non-traditional markets and owners, makes it worth its price.

Deeply recommended.

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