Whether you’re a beginner just starting up a consulting practice, or a veteran looking for ways to invigorate your existing business, An Insider’s Guide to Building a Successful Consulting Practice is an invaluable resource. Featuring real stories from consultants in diverse industries, the book offers simple yet powerful ways to: Identify a market and narrow your focus • Make a smooth transition from employee to independent consultant • Sell effectively even if you’ve never sold before • Establish visibility through speaking, writing, and networking • Build credibility by leveraging the credibility of others • Set prices based on value • Develop a marketing strategy and divide your time between marketing and delivering your services • Keep plenty of work in your pipeline • Adapt and thrive in any market condition • And much more Complete with the results of an original survey of 200 successful independent consultants, this handy guide provides the kind of real-life advice you need to build a thriving business.

This book describes, through a comprehensive approach that unites theory and practice, consulting principles for all those wishing to expand their abilities to initiate and implement organizational change. It lays the groundwork for the perceptive handling of each assignment through the integration of knowledge, experience, and instinct. It thoroughly examines the major aspects of a consulting assignment, along with the required practical skills and techniques. Explanatory graphics and case studies based on real-world examples abound to ensure that ideas can become roadmaps to developing important consulting tools.

How can you take your skills and expertise and package and present it to become a successful consultant? There are proven time-tested principles, strategies, tactics and best-practices the most successful consultants use to start, run and grow their consulting business. Consulting Success teaches you what they are. In this book you'll learn: - How to position yourself as a leading expert and authority in your marketplace - Effective marketing and branding materials that get the attention of your ideal clients - Strategies to increase your fees and earn more with every project - The proposal template that has generated millions of dollars in consulting engagements - How to develop a pipeline of business and attract ideal clients - Productivity secrets for consultants including how to get more done in one week than most people do in a month - And much, much more

Consultants work in all fields. They operate from offices and from home, work for investment firms and as personal trainers, or have expertise as accountants and wedding planners. The independence, flexibility, and potential income it brings make for an exciting and satisfying career. And it’s an increasingly popular one for highly skilled, motivated professionals who’ve been laid off in this unstable economy. This guide features tips and tricks to help beat the competition, including how to: Set—and keep—personal and financial goals Organize important paperwork Price and market specific services Create advertising and publicity plans Grow a business, from finding a partner to managing employees Minimize and eliminate business risks Consultants are paid well for their advice—if they know how to operate a successful business. With advice from experts in a variety of areas, this valuable guide helps you create the business of your dreams!

Leading entrepreneurs into the multi-billion dollar consulting industry, the experts at Entrepreneur show you how to capitalize on your talents to help others achieve their business goals. Coached by experts, learn to define your market, find and keep clients, obtain licenses, set rates, monitor cash flow, hire staff, prepare contracts, agreements, and reports, and more. Includes new interviews with successful consultants, updated answers to frequently asked questions, and a completely refreshed list of the top 20 consulting businesses.

Many consultants are forced to learn the basic principles and techniques of consulting on the job. Even though this lack of preparation can lead to several problems that could be avoided, there are few practical resources available to guide the new consulting professional to an understanding of what is required for a successful consulting practice. In A Guide to Successful Consulting, author Steven C. Stryker presents an essential introduction to the fundamental concepts and tools of the successful consultant. This book describes, through a comprehensive approach that unites theory and practice, consulting principles for all those wishing to expand their abilities to initiate and implement organizational change. It lays the groundwork for the perceptive handling of each assignment through the integration of knowledge, experience, and instinct. It thoroughly examines the major aspects of a consulting assignment, along with the required practical skills and techniques. Explanatory graphics and case studies based on real-world examples abound to ensure that ideas can become roadmaps to developing important consulting tools. Take-away checklists and tables of useful information provide a practical way for consultants to review and apply the necessary knowledge for successful practice. This book enables aspiring consulting professionals to have a better grasp of the environment and challenges of the practice of professional consulting today.

This deeply insightful guide to understanding what clients really want is “an indispensable resource for consultants” (Keith Ferrazzi, #1 New York Times-bestselling author of Never Eat Alone). Independent consulting is a potentially lucrative enterprise—but the reality seldom matches the dream. Most solo consultants and boutique consulting firms are perpetually within six months of bankruptcy due to the sputtering unreliability of their new business engines. The problem, according to international consulting expert David A. Fields, is twofold: 1) lack of a consistent, proven plan, and 2) fundamental misunderstanding about what clients want in a consultant. Fields, who has helped hundreds of consultants and boutique firms worldwide build profitable, sustainable practices, replaces the typical consultant’s mindset of emphasizing expertise and differentiated processes with a focus on building relationships, engendering trust, and solving clients’ existing problems. In The Irresistible Consultant’s Guide to Winning Clients, Fields synthesizes his decades of experience into a step-by-step approach to winning more projects from more clients at higher fees. From nuts-and-bolts business advice and tactics to a deeply insightful breakdown of the human side of a very human profession, Fields, named one of Advertising Age magazine’s “Marketing Top 100,” delivers a comprehensive guidebook that is at once highly approachable and satisfyingly detailed. “If I could have just one book on client strategy, this book would be it.” —Marshall Goldsmith, #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Triggers