Starting a Successful Consulting Business

Consulting Services as New Business

We are no longer living in a world where we are experts! We might not even be living in a world where we have an income!

If you are like me, you might have found ways to pivot your skills to generate income to survive financially.

In this Topic: CONSULTING SERVICES AS PRODUCT we will:

• Explain how a consulting firm generates revenue through the sale of consulting hours
• Explain the difference between billable and non-billable hours and how they are accounted for
• Help you to understand the relation between the consultant’s skills levels and the billable rates.
• Show you how invoicing a client is based on completed time

The following questions/topics will be discussed:

1. How does a consulting firm generate revenue through the sale of consulting hours?

2. What is the difference between billable and non-billable hours and how are they accounted for?

3. What is the relationship between the consultant’s skills levels and the billable rates?

4. When and how do I invoice?

5. How do I create return clients?

As a consultant, the product you are selling includes your insight, creative thinking, and problem-solving skills. Your time is your biggest asset and needs to be the focus of your offering to a client. As you start off with your new business offering your time to clients, it allows you to develop sellable products, templates, and/or processes to put a price tag on for the next client.

I am not suggesting you double dip in client-specific product generation. But with each client, you might generate a generic flowchart for time-saving business processes or you might write up a short guideline on how to use a Ghant-chart to plan out a project. These items might become part of the value-add products you can sell.

When you assist a client with your unique skills, you are selling your time to assist them with specific needs. You become the objective opinion of offering your business analysis insights and support services.

This process normally starts at the initiation of your engagement with the client and is primarily focused on defining requirements, their business processes, and estimations of what support they need to provide support and insight into the organizational impact and cost. You provide a solid investigative process, whether you are looking to evaluate your client’s current systems environment, current business processes, or need help defining requirements that are specific to their business, your skills and services can be offered as billable hours.

You can provide a quick, practical assessment of their business environment. You can work both on a project and organizational level, helping them pinpoint processes and requirements that will bring the most value and consistency across their business.

The customers, the rivals, and a successful business model are the three major focal points that a business needs to analyses, consider, and respond to respectively. Your offering as a Consultant will be valued when you follow a clear focused process.

Here are three questions to think about on each:

1. Three customer-related questions to ask:  Who is buying? What do they buy? Why do they buy?
2. Three competitor-related questions to ask: How big are they? Which customers are they after? What is their strategy?
3. Three ways to win a business owner: Cut costs to the bone. Offer something unique. Focus on one customer group.

We all have something unique to offer. If you need to pivot your skills due to layoffs or prefer to ‘make it on your own’ – whatever your reason and or motivation is to consider starting a Consultancy Service-based business, this training will assist you to make the best decisions and choices to set yourself up for success.