Sell Before You Build: Key Advice for New Consultants and Coaches

In this episode of Girls Make Bank, Jac explores the shifting landscape of women entrepreneurs, with a striking 42% of new businesses now started by women - up from 29% pre-pandemic. She shares invaluable insights for corporate professionals transitioning to entrepreneurship, sparked by a candid conversation with a recently laid-off senior executive.

She talks about the common pitfalls new consultants face when launching their businesses and why focusing on revenue-generating activities should take priority over perfecting your brand. The episode provides a practical, three-step framework for launching your consulting practice without getting caught in the trap of endless preparation.

Topics Discussed in the Episode:

• The three key steps to launching a successful consulting business
• Why revenue generation should come before branding and operations
• How to package your skills and craft an effective market message
• Strategies for conducting effective prospect meetings and gathering market intelligence
• Tips for adapting your service offerings based on real client feedback

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Transcript

  Hello and welcome back to another episode of Girls Make Bank, where we are all about teaching you how to make money, we're all about teaching you how to sell, to own your financial destiny.  Today I am talking to All of my girly listeners who  are starting their businesses, they're the coaches, the consultants, the advisors,  everyone that is new into this world, or who is thinking about  joining the world of consulting.

I read this last week. stat and it's just stuck in my brain. 47 percent of all new businesses are started by women since the pandemic. Before the pandemic, that number was 29%. And since the pandemic, that number is 47%. There are a whole lot of reasons why this is happening, whether by choice or not by choice.

I think the pandemic really just decimated a lot of us. We were taking care of our Children. We were taking care of our parents. We were taking care of our homes. Plus, we were trying to work. It just all became way too much and we needed something else. And so we had to leave the corporate world and start our own companies.

I think With the corporate climate right now, with all of the layoffs, um, you know, there are less and less high paying, really good jobs, um, for professional women. And so we have to start our own companies, our own consulting practices. I feel like ageism and sexism is still a very real thing in corporate America.

And so whether we want to leave, we feel pushed out. Whatever the reason is more and more women, almost half of all new businesses are being started by women.  While the reason that might be happening is not good.  It is an amazing opportunity for us to build really great businesses.

And so I want to talk a little bit because I. have worked with a lot of women who are just starting their consulting practice, who have recently left the corporate world.  And just before, I wasn't planning on talking about this specifically today, or even filming this, but just before this, I had to get on a quick call with a woman that I met at a networking dinner.

It was a small group of us,  And we didn't even sit next to each other, but it was a small enough group that we made a connection. And this woman was fairly senior at a really huge multi brand corporation, and she was recently let go. Her, her, not only her job, but her entire department was eliminated. And it wasn't exactly a surprise to her. 

But if you've ever been in that situation where you've been a part of a layoff or your job has been eliminated, you know that it is still emotionally very bruising, right? Whether, whether it was planned, unplanned, whether you knew about it, whatever it is, it takes a toll on you. thankfully this woman had a little bit of heads up, she has some severance, she has a little bit, a little bit of time to figure out what she's going to do, and she wants to start her own consulting practice.

And so I wanted to set up time to support her, to give her whatever information and encouragement and insights I could.  And It was interesting because I feel like I have had this conversation so many times, which is why I felt it was important to talk about it. She was asking me a lot of questions about how to set up her company legally.

What structure she should put in place. what. Her timeline or order of operation should be for creating  her website, her name, her logo, how her and her business partner should create like a splash in the marketplace.  You know, all of these things that  they wanted to do before they even started pitching to clients, which in their mind was a few weeks down the road. 

And I was sort of listening to all of this and  reminiscing on my own experience of starting my practice, my consulting business. And I let them talk for a while before I stopped them and asked if I could give them some advice because  This is something that I see a lot of new coaches, consultants, especially when you've come from the corporate world and you're starting your own business for the first time.

 I've seen a lot of us make this same mistake,  and it's that you think you need to spend a lot of time standing up your business. before you actually get started selling within your business. and I think this happens for a few reasons. Number one, you feel really comfortable living under a brand.

 That brand is a part of your identity. And, , and so you feel comfortable creating a brand. You think that things feel more legit when you have a brand. They're more real. It feels more secure when you have a logo and a website and all of these things that you think you need to get started.

That's number one. Number two,  quite frankly, a lot of people are just more comfortable in the operations of their business, in the process, in the setup, in the behind the scenes. And so yes, all of that work needs to get done. And that's the comfortable work for people. And so that's where they start. The third reason why you may be spending a lot of time doing this in the very early stages of your business is because you.

You want to, I guess, seem bigger than where you really are at the start and you want to seem legit and you want to be taken seriously.  And all of those things I want you to know are,  like, real and justified and valid. , I have been there at certain points in my business, too, where I have been spending a lot of time,  , doing those kinds of things.

And what I realize  In hindsight, when I have been spending too much time in those areas of my business, is that all I've really been doing is wasting time and energy doing things that are not Generating revenue.  And when you are starting your business, when you are going out  for the first time on your own, whether you have left a big company, a small company, you're coming back into the workforce, maybe you've taken some time off to raise a family or, or do some travel, whatever it might be.

When you are starting your business.  You know, I understand why you feel like those are the things you need to do, but really the only things you should be focusing on in the beginning is revenue generating activities.  I  mean,  this is real life, so most of us have to work to make money to pay for our life.

and in the beginning,  you need to generate revenue. When you are not making money, and I have been here before, so I'm speaking from experience. When you are not making money, And you see every month that money coming out of your savings account.  It can create a level of stress and anxiety and pressure on yourself that  can kill any motivation, productivity. 

and momentum that you may have in your business. And when you are going out to clients or when you are starting your business and meeting people for the first time, the last thing you want them to feel from you is that you're desperate. And when you have this financial burden sitting over you and this, you know, , negative, , money feelings on your back,  That is what you are feeling.

You're feeling desperate. You're feeling like you have to take anything and close every deal that comes in. And so before you spend money hiring people to build a website, before you spend, you know, weeks and weeks and weeks getting your branding perfectly right, the first thing I want you to do is Start focusing on revenue generating opportunities.

Because the reality is, when you are a consultant, or a coach, or an advisor, or a fractional, especially in the beginning,  people are buying you.  They're not buying, like, I'm Honeybee's Group. That's the name of my brand. That's my company.  But really when people work with me, they're buying me and I'm seven years into this, okay?

So they're buying your services. They are buying your expertise. You don't have to have the perfect logo, the perfect website. You don't even have to have the perfect pricing and packaging to get started and to start generating revenue and to start generating sales.   And here's why I don't want you to spend a lot of time doing all of that. 

I have been on my own in my consulting practice for seven years now. This is coming up on my seventh year and I am in the third generation of this business. What does that mean? That means this is the third time I have changed The type of companies that I work with, how I work with my clients and my partners, how I charge has changed over time.

It's been a mix of market conditions because the market has certainly changed in the last couple of years, but mostly it's been a change in how I want to work and the type of work I want to do, which has shifted. And so who I work with, how I work with them, how I charge has also shifted.  So I am more aligned with my business now than I have ever been in the last seven years, but my business looks fundamentally very different than it did seven years ago. 

So I say So all of that to tell you to just get started. Don't get bogged down in making sure that everything is pretty, making sure that all the operations and the website and all of that stuff looks good. You need to start selling and you need to start generating revenue to give yourself the space and the room.

To do all of those other things. Okay.  So the woman that I spoke with, she wanted to build a one and a three day workshop, fully built out all of the programming, all of the templates, and then take it to the market and sell it.  And that sounds like a good idea in theory, right? Because then you have something to sell.

You can show people what it gets. But when I asked her who was going to buy this.  Who is even asking for this? And what she knew about the people that she was going to sell this to, she didn't have an answer.  And so here's why I think you need to sell before you build, is you need to know what the marketplace needs.

Before you can build it. We are long past the days of being able to just sell whatever it is we want to sell and hope people buy it. we've need to really look at the marketplace to understand what the marketplace needs. Where did the needs of the marketplace match your zone of genius? And how can you create a product in the service?

That aligns that you can sell that scalable and repeatable. Okay.  So if I was starting a consulting practice from scratch today, here's what I would do.  Number one, I would write down a list of everything I know how to do. If you're a graphic designer, a health coach, copywriter, whatever it is you do, write down all of your skills, write down all of the frameworks that you use, the processes that you use, any systems that you know, um, write all of that down.

And you can do it on sticky notes, you can do it on paper, you can You know, create something beautiful in Canva. This is just for you. Nobody's looking at this, but just write it all down. So for instance, for me, I come from the media world. I worked in VC backed startups doing strategic planning and business development and partnerships.

I've been an operator because I ran a company. I've run my own company. So some of the things that I know how to do strategic planning, email marketing. business development, lead funnel generation, selling, right? So you can create a list of all of the things that you know how to do, and then  put together a rough idea of how you want to package those product and skills.

Rough, okay? When I say rough, I mean, do you want to do this in a one day workshop? Okay. Okay. Are these, is this something that you could deliver? Can your skills translate into a one day on site workshop? does this work best, the work that you do as a fractional part of a team? Okay. So maybe you want to get more deeper inside a business and you can be a fractional part of your team.

Maybe you want like some sort of retainer arrangements with the companies you work with. Perhaps I spoke to an agency. owner yesterday, and she worked with her clients in these sprints. Okay, so the work that she does, she was a website developer,  and she worked in two week sprints. She got your website up and built, concepted, designed, developed, launched in two weeks.

Okay, so come up with a rough idea, have all of the skills that you do, come up with a rough idea of how you can deliver those skills, That's step number one.  Step number two is to craft a simple message. This can be an email,  a LinkedIn post, Instagram, whatever, however the best form of communication is for you.

Craft a very simple message  that says,  who you are, what your experience has been,  what you want to do in the future. I want to leverage these skills. I want to help clients do X, Y, and Z, and who you are looking to meet. Okay. Now, if you're doing this via email, you can customize this as you send it out to different people.

If you're doing it in a LinkedIn post, you know, you can, you can do something a little more generic, but the idea is to put.  yourself out there and to let people know that you are open to hire as a consultant, as an advisor, as a fractional, if, especially when you're laid off, this was something that this woman, everybody was reaching out to her and wanting to set up connection calls and wanting to check in on her.

And it felt very overwhelming and she felt obligated to take all of these meetings. I think that's a really good indication that. You're somebody people care about, had a great working relationship with, and you can leverage that, okay? But what you need to do is put a message out there that tells people when I'm okay, Two, I'm looking for work.

Here's what I want to do, how I want to do it, and who I want to connect with.  And that lets a lot of people know like, Oh, okay, Jack's okay right now. I, you know, let me see how I can help her. And it gives them a direction to support you in. Okay?  So step number one, what are your skills? How do you want to deliver them? 

Rough, rough. Don't build anything yet. Just have a rough idea. Step number two, craft your message and send it out. Okay, you don't need to name your company, you don't have to have a website, you don't have to have a fancy logo, nothing. Just who you are, what you do, how, who you want to work with and how you want to deliver that.

Step number three is I want you to meet  with as many prospects and leads as you can. Take all of the meetings in the beginning, okay? Ask as many questions as possible  from these people.  Learn about their business. What is working? What is not working? Where are there gaps in their process, in their services, in their products, whatever it is you do?

Where does the company have gaps that you can potentially fill in? Now at this point, you're just in an information collecting session, okay? , you're not pitching yourself during these calls necessarily. You're not, you, you want to get them to hire you. Yes, but you want to collect as much information.

The goal of that meeting isn't necessarily to walk out with a contract. What you want to do is understand how  you can help them and where the gaps are and what it is that they need to do and what they're trying to do this year. Okay,  so then you take that information and you say, I think I can help you. 

I'd like a day to put together some thoughts. Is it okay if I follow up with you with a proposal?  Most of the time they'll say sure, yes.  And then you come home and you put together a proposal and you start working with people. Okay? You don't have to have a signature product right off the bat. You don't have to have one way you work with people right off the bat.

With some companies, it might be a one day workshop. With one company, it might be a retainer, fractional role. With another company, it might be a special role.  Brint type of thing.  The goal is to work with people in a way that aligns with your skills. Don't overreach. Don't try to do things that are outside of your zone of genius,  but, you know, start working with people  because a couple of things will happen once you've worked with a few people or a few companies, you'll be able to start to evaluate.

What you're doing, you can refine how you are working with companies. Maybe the one day workshop actually needs to be a two day workshop. Maybe the sprints aren't working for what you do. Maybe you hate being fractional and you only want to work on sprints. Okay. You will get a sense of how you like working with companies.

You'll get a sense of how you deliver products and services in the most impactful way. And you will be able to refine your products and services. Now this doesn't have to take a ton of time, okay? This isn't like years in the making. You can do this over the course of a few months.  But you need to  start working, start selling, to figure out how it is you want to work with your future clients.

The other thing that will happen is  Is you will start to be able to build up case studies now that you've worked with, you know, one to five people, one to five companies, you can have case studies that you can include in your marketing materials on your website, because now you have some time and some money and some space to do that.

Okay. So really in the beginning of starting your consulting company, before you do all of the busy work, I want you to focus on generating revenue.   

It is so nice spending time with you. I hope that this has inspired you and given you some clarity if you are early in your entrepreneurship journey about where you should be spending your time.

Let me know what you think. If there are topics that you want covered, uh, on the podcast, send me a note. Let me know what you think. Please connect with me on LinkedIn.  Follow me on Instagram. Sign up for our email newsletter. I would love for you to be a part of the Honeybees and the Girls Make Bank family.

Thank you for listening. Until next time, we are in this together. Let's make a bank.