Why You SHOULDN'T Target Organisations Who Most Need Your Help
Don't make this fatal mistake that will cost you a huge amount of time, revenue, and the ability to do the work you really want to do.
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The Wrong Kind Of Messaging
When I began consulting, I figured I could add the most value to organisations that were struggling. And, believe me, there was no shortage of organisations who were struggling.
I spent a lot of time trying to connect with these organisations on various platforms, finding out who the key person was, and trying to make contact with them.
A crude summation of my messaging at the time was:
You’re doing it badly, I can help you do it better.
And the messaging largely failed to attract clients.
The Problem With Targeting Organisations Who Most Need Your Help
There’s a reason they’re struggling which you might not be able to fix
It turns out that the organisations that are struggling at something are generally struggling for reasons which are very difficult for a consultant to solve - and often prevent them from bringing a consultant in to help!
For almost any initiative an organisation is struggling with, you can usually identify one of four causes. Typically means the organisation:
Don’t know they’re not doing it well. Often the organisation simply doesn’t know they’re not doing something well. They are executing an initiative but either measuring it properly or they don’t know what good looks like. And if they don’t know they’re not doing it well, they’re far less likely to bring a consultant in to improve it.
Don’t care they’re not doing it well. This is when the organisation is aware it’s not going well, but they don’t really care. You can think of customer support experiences at many organisations in this category. It’s simply not a priority for them to improve. Again, these folks don’t tend to hire consultants.
Don’t have the resources to do it better. This is when the organisation cares (or at least key people within the organisation do), but they don’t have the budget to improve this. Often the very reason the initiative isn’t successful is that it hasn’t been properly funded. And if they don’t have the resources to fund the initiative, they’re less likely to have the resources to bring in a consultant.
Don’t have the knowledge to do it better. This is when the organisation wants to do better, but they don’t know how. This is obviously where a consultant can help. The funny thing here though is it rarely gets this far. I can think of some examples, but it’s nowhere near as common as you might imagine.
Fortunately, there’s a simple way around this which most consultants will discover at some point in their careers - ideally sooner rather than later.
Focus On Organisations Who Want To Be Better
Think about anyone who hires coaches. It’s not typically the people performing in the bottom 50% in any field. You don’t see many casual tennis players with their own coach. In the vast majority of situations, it’s the people who are already doing it well and want to be better.
That’s the message.
“You’re doing good, I can help you do it great”
When you focus on organisations that are already doing better than most, you’re targeting organisations which:
Know what good and bad look like.
Care about being better.
Are properly resourcing projects.
It shouldn’t take long to realise this is a far more fertile hunting ground for great clients. You’re targeting organisations which are most likely to hire consultants in the first place.
This Isn’t Just About The Messaging
You probably already realise this isn’t just about the messaging, it’s a mindset which should infuse your entire approach.
Most of the projects which you could help with and are going badly are going to be cancelled. It’s just not worth your time and resources to target those.
Instead, ensure the ‘good to great’ mindset (no, not the book) is infused in all your marketing materials.
This is why it makes sense to create benchmarks. You’re not trying to show the difference between good and bad. You’re trying to show the difference between good and great. Zero in on organisations you know want to be better.
Don’t focus on the organisations doing it badly, focus on the organisations who are doing well and want to do it better.
This is something I've been struggling with frequently: I have found myself in lots of situations where I was stuck with my own client in the midst of the very same problems that I was supposed to help them with.
Sometimes I underestimated the complexity of the problems, sometimes I wasn't patient enough, sometimes I didn't took enough care to understand how onboard they were into REALLY solving those problems.
You are right: for every given problem there's only a fraction of organizations really invested into becoming better, and you should only work with them.
For some companies it took years for them to realize how hard the problem was and I had the chance to stop, let them think about it and work together again only when they were ready.