Consultants, engineers, accountants, designers and other professionals who make a living by essentially selling their expertise all have a huge problem that effectively chokes their business growth. That problem is time—there are only 168 hours in a week, and no amount of creativity can get around this fact. Professionals are basically in the rental business. They rent the use of their brain for a certain amount of time to solve problems or develop responses to client requests. Even the most highly sought-after professionals can’t get around the fact that the number of hours they can rent each week is capped and can’t be increased, no matter how much they try.
Professionals are basically in the rental business. They rent the use of their brain for a certain amount of time to solve problems or develop responses to client requests.
The typical way to increase your revenue after you’ve maxed out your rental time is to charge more per hour. But even this tactic has a limit: Very few professionals can charge significantly more than the going rate for their industry. In fact, you really have to be among the top 1 percent in your industry to charge a premium for your time that’s large enough that it would significantly increase your revenues. So if you want to grow your professional services practices and increase your small business profits, how can you do it in the face of such powerful constraints? Here are three proven ideas:
Change from renting your time to selling your brand to increase your small business profits
When you rent your brain time, clients want to see your face; part of what they pay for is the handholding and assurance that your presence offers. But this face time restricts your ability to grow even further. If you have a good reputation in your industry, then you have an opportunity to fix this problem. Start promoting your company’s brand more than your personal expertise. Don’t eliminate your role, but instead focus on presenting your company (even if it’s just two of you) as the solution. This allows you to hire salespeople who can work on generating new customers. When you rent your brain time, you may feel awkward at first to have someone else sell it for you, but this is completely acceptable when what’s being offered as the solution is your company and not yourself. Read more…
