What I Learnt About Selling Consulting
Explicitly reject1 people who are not a fit by saying “Let’s not go ahead.”
Say it with a tone of finality, without an upward inflexion at the end like “let’s not go ahead?”2 Don’t give reasons3.
As a consultant, you develop a process that helps you deliver better results for your clients. Turn down clients who don’t respect that, and instead try to micromanage you, telling you what to do, how to do it, and when to do it. They’re reducing you to an assistant, rather than a guide. Similarly, turn down clients who are rude, dismissive, or who keep interrupting you. Or who pay peanuts, because clients who pay less are the worst — untrusting, dominating and disrespecting your skills. You won’t get much money. Your time with them will suck. Because of their interference, the work won’t be done well, and you won’t have the satisfaction of a job well done. In fact, they’ll blame you for it. So, you won’t earn, nor have fun on the job, nor have satisfaction. When you find such negative behavior, tell them how to behave: “You’re being closed-minded. When I say something, I expect you to take the time to think about it and only then respond, not blindly repeat what you said earlier. Go back and rethink your plans based on what I said. Only then you should respond.” This leaves no room for maneuver. Don’t try to be nice by using mild phrases like “Would you like to… ?” This implies that it’s a choice. If that’s not what you want to convey, then don’t be fake-nice. If they push back against your expectations, hang up.
In the sales process, leads are giving you a preview of how it is to work with them. If they’re treating you as an equal and considering your point of view with an open mind, that’s how they’ll treat you throughout the engagement. On the other hand, if they don’t value you, they won’t suddenly start valuing you once the engagement starts. Don’t take on such people.
Sales is a funnel, and you need to reject leads as early as possible4. My record is rejecting in
4024 minutes.Ask qualifying questions. If they answer wrong, reject.
As you gain experience, you’ll identify more qualifying questions to ask5.
If they reject you, don’t take it personally. They’re not rejecting you; they’re rejecting the engagement. Maybe they’ve decided the problem is not urgent. Or they can’t afford you. Whatever it is, it’s about them, not you. If I told you I don’t want to eat cake, would you be offended? Of course not — it’s about me, not you. Maybe I don’t like cake, or maybe I do but it’s now mealtime, which is not a reflection of the quality of the cake. Likewise when they turn you down, it’s about them and what they need right now, not about the worth of what you’re offering, nor your personal worth. “No” is the second-best answer in sales, much better than them wasting your time and raising your hopes for months, only to let you down.
Silence doesn’t mean agreement. Some of us come from a culture where if you disagree, you speak up, without needing to be asked, and silence means agreement. Others come from a culture where “Yes, I agree” is agreement and silence means disagreement. Or they may not like to be disagreeable. They may have been brought up to believe it’s rude, or they may have been punished in their earlier job for saying no. So you need to pause for 5 seconds to give them an opportunity to speak. When you pause, maintain eye contact to indicate that you’re listening to them. Or ask, “Does this work for you”? And again remain silent. If they say it doesn’t work for them, and you explain why that’s necessary, for example, they say a project needs to be done in a month and you say it needs 3 so that it works properly rather than doing it for the sake of doing it, and they remain silent, it doesn’t mean they’ve bought your explanation. So you could say, “That doesn’t work for you, does it?” That makes them feel safe to say no.
If there’s something awkward, don’t sweep it under the carpet. Grab the bull by the horns and resolve the issue one way or the other. In the above example, if they insist on giving the project insufficient time, say “I won’t be going ahead with this project” and hang up6.
When you put people on the spot like this, treat any answer other than yes as a no.
The purpose of sales is to find out if what they believe in aligns with what you believe in. It’s not to change their mind. People are incredibly rigid7 and hold on tightly to their beliefs no matter what. Make one attempt at changing their beliefs and if it doesn’t work, hang up8.
Some leads are indecisive and never make up their mind. They’ll drag things on for months without regard for your time, only to let you down at the end. When things are dragging on, I ask myself, “Are we making progress in every meeting?” Progress can be refining the scope of work, or clarifying their budget, or anything else. If there’s no progress, I tell them that they’ll have to pay for a discovery project that will enable me to continue discussing with them.
Words can mean different things to your leads from what they mean to you. If you’re an engineer or designer and you say that you’re a craftsman and do high-quality work, they may hear “I’ll take a looooot of time doing things perfectly beyond what’s needed.” This can be frustrating, but you’ll learn to avoid using certain phrases.
Instead of rejecting, I tried to mention some requirements in a black and white manner and expect them to either conform to what I’m saying or reject it from their end. For example, if you’re running a restaurant, and a patron comes by and asks for ravioli, and you say you’re a South Indian restaurant, you expect them to either order a South Indian dish or leave. You don’t expect them to stand there and continue arguing with you. But that’s what leads do. You have to close the door on them by saying “We won’t be going ahead”.
Rejecting people on their face can be uncomfortable for those of us who are not used to it, but you don’t need do to it in a confrontational manner. You can do it using a neutral or even a soft tone.
Because then your non-verbal communication is contradicting your verbal communication, implying that you don’t know what you’re doing.
When you give reasons, it comes across as a justification, that you’re not sure about your decision, or gives an opening for the other second to second-guess you. In the first place, they didn’t ask you why you’re not going ahead, so why explain?
Before I did, I found myself spending a huge amount of time, getting my hopes up every time, only for them to be dashed. After months of this, I became angry, resentful, bitter and cynical. This is unhealthy, and turns off people who may be the ideal client. We often talk about time management, but emotion management is more important.
The earliest in the funnel you can reject people is your website, even before they talk to you. Mine mentions that a project can cost $100K and that I partner with startups seeking trusted guidance. If someone who can’t afford me or who wants an assistant rather than an advisor chooses not to call me, that’s good for me.
It’s better to reject people 30 minutes into the first meeting than at the end of the hour.
For example, there are two types of software projects: many are straightforward and I can guarantee a working app for a certain fee. But others are research-oriented, and I can’t guarantee a working app for a fee. I can guarantee progress, better understanding of the problem and the technology, knowing what doesn’t work, getting a better sense of the time and cost needed, etc, but not the final result. Many leads don’t understand this difference, and it’s the main reason why sales discussions regarding a consulting engagement for a research-oriented software project break down. Now that I have observed it, the next time someone approaches me to talk about a research-oriented project, I’ll flag this as early as possible, before discussing the amount. The problem is not the amount but a guaranteed result. So I’ll discuss the guaranteed result. As you gain more experiences, you’ll be able to pinpoint deal-breakers. For each deal-breaker, you articulate a qualifying question to surface the contentious matter. As you keep doing this, you’ll create a catalog of qualifying questions “If the situation is X, ask a qualifying question of Y”. For example, “If research, ask if they require a guarantee of a working app.”
Sweeping uncomfortable misalignments under the table will torpedo the deal later in the process, after you’ve invested more time.
This is true when selling consulting, when looking for a job as an employee, when hiring an employee or cofounder, and in other contexts… Nobody will change immediately based on what I say.
When I made multiple attempts to convince people, they’d dig in their heels even more and keep parroting “I want this. I want this! I want this!! I want this!!!”.