I thought you might be interested in a few comments, which my colleagues and I have come across recently in our work within the professional services sector.  Do any of them sound familiar to you or your firm’s experience of winning business?

‘We just don’t seem to have control over the flow of business into the firm.  We seem to be going from exceptionally busy periods where everyone is working flat out and stressed, to times where we have to find the junior members of staff something to do. 

‘Whilst we have a big client base there’s an awful lot of fee haggling and we don’t really receive more than two or three instructions per client.’

‘What we need is to leave less to fate and actively bring in the right kind of work from the right kind of clients.  That way, we could have more control over business peaks and troughs and focus on pursuing beauty parades with a real chance of success’.

With this last comment in mind, how can firms and their fee-earners realistically achieve this with all their other daily commitments?

The PACE Pipeline model has been used successfully by many professional services firms over the years.  It has enabled them to plan and manage the activities that are required to stimulate such a flow.  In doing so, it measures business development in two ways:

• the business development results; and
• the business development activities that are being carried out.

It creates a very focused plan for business development activity, which allows a firm to measure against a benchmark and creates understanding of the different key activities that will produce results.  One of its key features that helps motivate many fee-earners to use it, is that it allows them to focus what business development time is available to really winning and retaining business from different client groups (prospective and existing).  They get a better return for the efforts they put in – and they don’t have to cold call a long list of potential clients in order to do it!  Marketers and business developers also benefit from seeing which clients are being targeted.  This enables them to focus their energies to support the plan and help measure its results.

P1 Defined Prospects Not Yet Marketed To
So, which clients would your firm really love to work with?  Realistically, you cannot go for everything and so P1 of the model selects where best to invest what precious business development time and resource is available.  It enables marketers and business developers to guide fee-earners to create a ‘wish list’ of a manageable number of prospects. 

In formulating this, the likelihood of these prospects actually being interested in the firm is considered.  This is helped by a strong understanding of each target’s business – its key people and the industry issues facing it. Factors, which may make one prospective client easier to approach than another are also examined.  From all this fee-earners can work out who to target and when. We have seen marketers and business developers’ segmentation and research expertise put to great use here.

Prospecting is not something done once, it is a strategy continuously revisited to ensure a steady flow of new prospective clients through the pipeline.

P2 Defined Prospects Marketed To
Having defined the prospective clients we want to work with, now is the time to put the firm on their ‘radar’.  This is not about cold-calling or bombarding them with invites to lunch or seminars. Nor is it about sending all our brochures to them.  Whilst the strategy for this group is indeed ‘Promoting’, the purpose of the marketing is to make the prospective client want to enter in a dialogue with the firm to find out more.  Our research from the prospecting phase gives guidance on the issues the prospective client is facing.  P2 helps fee-earners, marketers and business developers create a very targeted marketing plan or campaign, which over time will offer the client valuable information with direct relevance to their business.

P3 Defined Prospects In Dialogue
From putting ourselves on the client’s radar we now need to start a dialogue with them to discuss business issues.  The strategy here is ‘Projecting’  and focuses energies on finding mutually acceptable ways in which the firm may be able to support the client’s business.

First meetings with the clients should therefore not focus on saying as much about our firm as possible.  Yes, we need to give a brief overview of ourselves, but we should use the bulk of the time to ascertain in detail the prospective client’s situation.  The more insight we can gain, the more suitable and relevant our solution will be.  First meetings shouldn’t necessarily conclude with our presenting solutions, we are unlikely to have enough information at this stage.  Instead we should explain or explore a suitable way forward that the prospect is comfortable with. This could be more fact-finding meetings, or the client preparing a detailed brief, or opportunities to meet with more people on the client’s side.  With the information we gain, we can map out the final steps to win this client.  We can bring in key people from our firm who have experience and knowledge to help the client with the issues they are facing.  Using our combined expertise we can put together solutions that demonstrate a detailed knowledge of the client’s business and a genuine passion and interest to help them.

P4 Key Current Clients
Once won, this is hopefully the start of a long and mutually beneficial client relationship.  To ensure this is the case, we need to adopt our fourth strategy – ‘Protecting’.  This finds us continuing to build trust with the client and keep competitors at bay.  The P4 element of the plan here focuses on all the ways we can further develop the client relationship.

P5 ‘Problem’ Clients
Often fee-earners inherit or acquire clients that prove more hassle than they’re worth.  When faced with clients who continually dispute fees or prove unprofitable, a ‘Pruning’ strategy is best.  This assesses if there are any ways to improve the relationship with the client or if now’s the time to call it a day (in the nicest possible way).

Summary
The PACE Pipeline enables professional services firms to take charge of the business they win.  Of course there will still be those instances where new business proposals land on our desk, but Pipeline can help evaluate whether pursuing these will be the best use of a firm’s time and resources?

Pipeline enables fee-earners to focus their energies on winning clients that are in it for the long-term. If you are looking for a steady flow of business, consider these 8 top tips.

1. Select a small number of prospects to target
2. Develop knowledge of these potential clients and get to grips with the issues affecting them
3. Use the firm’s marketing activities and other material to build a positive image
4. Ensure the marketing activities lead to opportunities for dialogue between you and the prospect
5. Plan and handle first meetings well
6. Follow up meeting with a plan or campaign to convert the prospect into a client
7. Establish key client plans to protect existing clients from competitors and ensure they are able to purchase a wide range of services from your firm if they want
8. Prune those clients that divert valuable time away from the clients you want to work with.
   

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