Marketing and networking go hand-in-hand for consultants: Jobs - News Trends

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This story was printed from ZDNet Australia.
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Marketing and networking go hand-in-hand for consultants

By Lisa Gill, Techrepublic
March 31, 2003
URL: http://www.zdnet.com.au/jobs/news_trends/soa/Marketing-and-networking-go-hand-in-hand-for-consultants/0,130056653,120273281,00.htm

Consultants sometimes don't spend enough time developing their marketing and networking skills, but these two talents can have significant career and monetary benefits.

Anthony Stark hit the jackpot when he started his own networking group. Stark, a 20-year-old IT consultant says he knew he needed to start marketing and networking efforts to grow his consulting business. So he formed the Four Rivers Computer Users Group and attracted consultants and programmers from the area.

One consultant in particular became Stark's mentor and friend. Within a year, the mentor had taken a job at Microsoft, leaving Stark 40 client contacts and 10 ongoing projects.

"That has helped me to get a good start," Stark said. "A couple have actually paid the bills, and those are really my core clients."

While Stark's networking results are not typical, his experience underscores how marketing and networking efforts can pay off, even in a strained economy amid slashed IT budgets.

For many, though, such work can be a burden. As Portland, OR, consultant Michael McGee put it: "To me 'networking' means LAN, 'industry groups' refer to chips and fabs, and 'classes' are an attribute of Object Oriented Programming."

Even as marketing-challenged as some may be, several marketing experts and consultants suggested the following five steps to create a marketing plan of action.

Describe your market position
One of the most important steps in any marketing effort is determining a clear, concise message that describes your service, according to Karen Chakmakian, a veteran IT marketing consultant focused on guiding startup firms in Silicon Valley.

This "message" is really what Chakmakian calls a positioning statement and helps to differentiate you and your service from competitors. Such a statement answers the following questions:

Who is the target customer? Who is the service for?
What kind of customer would need this service?
What is the product or service name? What is the service category?
What is the statement of key benefit? What is the compelling reason for a client to buy?
What is the primary competitive alternative? What is the service unlike?
Make a statement of primary differentiation. What is truly unique or different about what you do?

Chakmakian stresses that answers to the questions should be straightforward and simple. And the statements should be used in written and verbal communications.

One example of part of a positioning statement focused on the differentiation aspect is the company motto Stark created for his company: "Internet and Microsoft Windows Application Development and Consulting."

The company's primary differentiator—what it can offer customers that competitors cannot—is its direct link to Microsoft via Stark's mentor, who provides Stark with research and direct access to top-notch programmers when needed.

"If I ask him for a professional ASP.NET person, he is able to weed through all the bureaucracy and find me a person with a name and telephone number," said Stark. "It's proved to be a great asset to my company. It's been the number one thing that has set us apart."

Establish business goals
Once you've created a positioning statement, the next step is to devise a marketing plan for the next three, six, or 12 months, Chakmakian said. The plan should support your top three business goals, the most common of which involve:

The amount of revenue you wish to generate in a time period.
The number of clients you would like to add.
The type of clients you wish to work with.
How much you would like to improve margins per client.

The goals should be measurable, Chakmakian said. For example, one goal for the coming year for Stark and his firm is to add 10 clients and to work on multiple projects for each of those clients.

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