Twenty Great Tools To Start A Consulting Business

With companies pushing their employees off the plank into the sea of financial and professional uncertainty, one of the best options to take control of one’s career is to start a consulting practice.  Starting a consulting practice is a good way to get back your self-esteem, which is usually very low after being left adrift, and a good way to generate revenue.

I can speak from experience.  One of the companies I ran was bought by another company and I had no immediate options.  I always hated interviewing and preferred to have more control over my life.

Now is a good time to start your own business because companies still need professionals with a variety of skills, but can’t afford to hire full-time people.  You don’t need many tools to start your own practice, especially with software, the Internet, hardware and online services available.  Here are the essentials:

Microsoft Office 2007: You can store your contacts, send your e-mails, make presentations, design Web sites, create newsletters, create financial spreadsheets and send Word documents.

QuickBooks or Peachtree First Accounting: You need to keep track of your income and expenses.  Both products are very good.  I prefer Peachtree because I find it more intuitive, which is ironic since the maker of QuickBooks is called Intuit.  For those not comfortable with accounting software, you can easily do the same functions by using Microsoft Excel.

Tax Planning: Here, Intuit’s Turbo Tax for Home and Business is the best product on the market.  Intuit totally nailed it with this product.  It is the easiest piece of software I have ever used and I can’t believe how they can improve it each year.  You can do your federal and state taxes using this software.  If you use QuickBooks, you can download your information directly into Turbo Tax. The software also allows you to plan for the following year’s taxes.

Marketing Material: There is a variety of inexpensive software packages such as Business Card Designs and MyBusiness Cards.  The software typically costs less than $30 and usually comes with business card, brochure and other types of templates.  You can also go online and get up to 200 free business cards with basic designs from www.freebusinesscardprinter

Business Plan: You have to develop a road map for your business.  There are a few products you should look at, such as Business Plan Pro and Bplans.com.

PDF Converter: If you are e-mailing contracts and other documents you don’t want altered, you want to purchase something like Nuance’s PDF Converter 5 Professional.

Tracking Receipts

Business Cards: There is no question: The best product on the market is NeatDesk by The Neat Company, a Philadelphia-based entrepreneurial company. This product is a digital filing system that allows you to scan receipts, business cards and documents.  The device takes up a small amount of space on your desk and connects with QuickBooks, Turbo Tax and Excel.  This is really a must-have product because of the diversity of tactics it performs.

Traditional Telephone: The best buy for the money is Vonage.  You get unlimited calls nationally and to some countries abroad for less than $30 a month.  One of the things I like about Vonage is that it forwards my calls to my e-mail, which allows me to listen to the calls on my computer and my BlackBerry.  You can try to use Skype, but I have still found it to be inconsistent and not appropriate for business use.

Mobile Phone: Everyone has a mobile phone, but as a business tool, I still prefer the BlackBerry, which allows you to collect and send e-mail.  This falls under the category of invaluable.  I once was in a remote part of Panama and a client had a problem, and I could respond by e-mail through my BlackBerry.

Laptop: I have fallen in love with my Acer Aspire One, which is a mini-laptop that weighs less than 3 lbs and has a 1 gig of Ram and 130 gigs of hard drive.

Printer/Scanner/Fax: There are a variety of good products made by Brother, Lexmark, and Hewlett-Packard.  Any of them will do the job.  As much as we prefer not to print things out, we still need to do it when we are making presentations and providing written documents that need to be shared.

Legal Software: Get an attorney to develop your initial contracts, but if you are looking to save money, use software such as MyAttorney Home and Business by Avanquest.  There are a variety of templates that you can customize for your needs.

Binding Machine: Any business store carries a binding machine, which you need for proposals and other documents with lots of pages.

E-mail Newsletter: You need to stay in contact with prospects, clients and referral sources by sending newsletters, press releases and invitations.  The two most cost-effective services are Constant Contact and IContact.

Linked-In: There practically isn’t a business person that isn’t using www.linkedin.com to make business contacts.  I get at least one request a week to join someone’s network.

Web Site: A low-cost way to develop your own Web site and host it inexpensively is through services such as 1and1.com; but if you are looking to have someone develop a site for you, put in your request for proposal using Craigslist and watch the responses pile up.

YouTube: A good way to demonstrate your knowledge for free — you take a video camera and have someone film you for one to three minutes providing advice on your expertise.

Blog: You can set up a free blog to demonstrate your expertise by going to

www.blogger.com

Bank Account: Practically every bank provides online banking.  That said, I would suggest using a small bank that will give you more personal service and whose branch managers may be able to make introductions to potential clients.

Credit Card: If you can get a credit card, I would recommend the American Express Plum Card.  Every card comes with points, but not every card can get you an easy cash advance abroad, which I found out the hard way in Italy.

This is a great time to start a consulting practice, which will make you feel better about yourself and more secure.

Top 10 Direct Sales Companies

Direct sales companies have been with us for quite some time now. The way these have generally worked is that a direct sales associate would take their products to home based events where they would demonstrate them to attendees. So what are the most popular direct sales companies currently? This list will give you some direct sales companies to think about if you are interested in starting your own direct sales business.

1) Tupperware, first developed in 1945 had by 1946 moved to a direct sales model. This is the company who invented the party based model of direct sales as we know it. Tupperware now has nearly 2 million associates in nearly 100 countries worldwide.

2) Avon was once the California Perfume Company, back in 1886 when it began; by 1928, however, they had adopted the more familiar name of Avon. This is one of the most well known direct sales companies on Earth now, with almost 5 million representatives in 143 countries worldwide.

3) In 1963, Mary Kay Ash began Mary Kay Inc. in the interests of giving women an opportunity to improve their lives through running their own business. There are now around 1.6 representatives of the company.

4) Discovery Toys, Inc. has been in the educational toys business since 1978. This company only does business in the U.S. and Canada and uses the party model of direct sales.

5) Home Interiors & Gifts, now celebrating its 50th anniversary in business, boasts more than 100,000 associates employing both parties and face-to-face marketing methods to sell their products,

6) Pampered Chef has been around since 1980; this is one of the newest direct sales companies. They have over 60,000 Pampered Chef consultants worldwide and use their own variation on the party plan (the Kitchen Show).

7) Also started in 1980, Arbonne International sells their skin care products via person-to-person marketing instead of the party plan method.
Peter Usborne’s Usborne Books has been around since 1973, selling high quality books for children. They employ person-to-person marketing as well as parties to market their books.

9) Creative Memories, a scrapbooking supply company, has been using the party plan method of marketing their products since 1987 and have tens of thousands of consultants all over the world.

10) Meleleuca, Inc. has been in the business of green products since 1985 and markets their tea tree oil based skin care, personal care and home products worldwide via person-to-person marketing. They are the fastest growing direct sales company in the U.S.

These direct sales companies are just ten out of the multitude of such companies out there which you can become involved with. Before signing on with any company, do some research to determine what their compensation model is, if online marketing is permissible and whether the company’s goals fit in with your own.

Doing this sort of evaluation on each company you are considering will help you to be better informed and thus make a better decision about which direct sales company is right for you.

Start A Recession-Proof Business

It’s no secret that the economy is in trouble. Professionals debate daily as to whether we are in a financial recession, or whether we are just headed in that direction. All of a sudden, we feel insecure about our jobs, our savings, and even our retirements. With so many businesses failing, it’s hard to imagine that starting a business
of your own would be a good idea. The fact is, there has never been a better time to start your own recession proof business at home.

How Can A Business Be Recession Proof?

One characteristic of a recession-proof business is that it provides a product or service that will not go out of demand. Certainly, plenty of people are having to make sacrifices on how much they spend not only on the “extras”, but also on the necessities. Finances for many of us have taught us to set up priorities on how we use our money. That means giving up unnecessary purchases but not the things we need in order to survive. If you provide a necessary product or service, you will have a recession-proof business.

It also depends on your target group for which you provide you product or service. Not everyone is in the market for the same things at the same time. Everyone’s finances aren’t affected in the same way and by having the right target group, you can recession-proof your business.

Some Advantages to Having a Home-Based Recession-Proof Business

Flexibility is always one of the most attractive features to any home-based business. For parents of young children, this could mean not having to pay for child care while getting to spend more time with your children. If a student has classes and needs to work around them, a home-based business will let them work around their own schedule without worrying about someone else’s priorities. Whatever you need to find time for, a home-based business will give you the freedom to spend your time where you need to spend it. A home-based recession-proof business will not only provide flexibility of your time, but will also provide you with financial security.

Another advantage to having a home-based recession-proof business is that you will never have to pay for the gas to drive back and forth to the office again. Many people commute long distances for their jobs and over the last couple of years, this has gotten to be a financial burden for many. When you work at home, there’s no fuel used, no wear and tear on a vehicle, and you don’t even have to go out to eat lunch!

Of course, one of the biggest advantages you will have from starting your own home-based recession proof business is not having a boss to answer to. You don’t have to worry when the economy worsens that you will go into the office one morning to have your boss tell you that he is “letting you go”. A recession-proof business is one that will give you the security to make your own decisions and to benefit from your efforts.

Technology Business Consulting Industry

Business consulting has grown quickly, with growth rates of the industry exceeding 20% in the 1980s and 1990s. As a business service, providing consulting solutions remains highly cyclical and linked to overall economic conditions. The consulting industry shrank during the 2001-2003 period, but has been experiencing slowly increasing growth since. In 2007, total global revenues for business consulting exceeded the $300 billion mark.

A number of specializations have come into existence, namely information technology consulting, human resource consulting, and others, many of which overlap, and most of which are offered by the large diversified consultancies listed below. So-called “boutique” consultancies, however, are smaller organizations specializing in one or a few of such specializations.

In the current scenario, these types of consulting firms can be divided broadly into four categories:

1. Large, diversified organizations that offer a range of services, including information technology consulting in addition to a strategy consulting practice (e.g. Accenture, Deloitte). Some very large IT service providers have moved into consultancy as well and are also developing strategy practices (e.g. Satyam)
2. Medium-sized information technology consultancies that blend boutique style with some of the same services and technologies bigger players offer their clients.
3. Large management and strategic consulting specialists that offer primarily strategy consulting but are not specialized in any specific industry
4. Boutique firms, often quite small, which have focused areas of consulting expertise in specific industries or technologies. Most of the boutiques were founded by famous business theorists. Small firms with less than ca. 50 employees are often referred to as niche consultancies. If they have a unique concept and market it successfully, they often grow out of this segment very fast or are bought by larger players interested in their know-how.
Business consulting is becoming more prevalent in non-business related fields as well.

As the need for professional and specialized advice grows, other industries such as government, quasi-government and not-for-profit agencies are turning to the same managerial principles that have helped the private sector for years. One important and recent change in the industry has been the spin-off or separation of the consulting and the accounting units of the large diversified firms. For these firms, which began business as accounting firms, management consulting was a new extension to their business. But after a number of highly publicized scandals over accounting practices, such as the Enron scandal, accountancy began divestiture of their management consulting units, to more easily comply with the tighter regulatory scrutiny that followed.

Top 10 Mistakes Technology Companies Make

10. Failure to register a federal copyright for company-developed software
Your company has spent months, and maybe years developing the next-big-thing. You’re out there licensing it to customers, fighting off competitors, and trying to maximize your revenues. What would you do if a customer was misusing your software? What if a competitor was copying parts of it to use in its product? There are various ways to respond to these problems, but one of the easiest to way to strengthen your claims is to register a copyright for the software with the United States Copyright Office. Registration provides you with an enhanced ability to have a court prevent infringing use of your software, and a greater amount of damages that are recoverable. The best part is that registration is relatively easy and inexpensive.
9. Licensing technology too broadly
So you’ve landed that big deal with that big customer. You’ve carefully priced the deal based upon your expectations of how the customer is going to use your technology – by a specific group within the customer’s large organization. You’re hoping that the success of this deal will lead to a greater adoption of your technology within the rest of the company, and ultimately more revenue for you. Unfortunately, you later learn that this one group is sharing your technology throughout the rest of the company, with no additional license fees to you, and there’s nothing you can do about it. Why? By failing to carefully and narrowly draw up the license grant in your agreement, you’ve unwittingly granted the entire company the rights to use your technology, and you’ve left a pile of cash on the table.
8. Failure to provide detailed support and maintenance policies

Too often, once a company’s technology is ready to be licensed, determining how to support the technology becomes an afterthought. General and non-descriptive obligations like “providing telephone and email support” and “providing updates” are invitations for disagreements and missed expectations. When is phone support being offered? How quickly will you respond to problems? What is considered and update and what is a new product for which you would charge the customer separately? Many times, you need your customer to provide you with certain information about the problem before you can diagnose and fix it. Set the appropriate expectations in your support and maintenance policies and avoid these issues in the future.

7. Not contracting customers to recurring support fees

Customers want and expect that you will be there to support your product, assist with problems, and provide them updates when you add features or fix bugs. Customers also expect that you will regularly charge them for these services, so why do so many technology vendors sell a product to a customer and fail to structure regular and recurring support fees? In general, a technology vendor’s highest profit margins are realized through a support fee stream, and not in the upfront license charge.

6. Inadequate non-disclosure and non-compete agreements with employees and contractors
The technology business is one of the most competitive industries in the market. Why take a chance losing your competitive advantage by not ensuring that your intellectual property, customer lists, trade secrets, and other sensitive information are properly protected through appropriate agreements with your employees, contractors, and vendors? Finding and using some form agreement that you saw floating around on the Internet somewhere may actually make matters worse if you don’t fully understand the terms. Moreover, simple steps can be taken to ensure that anything developed by your employees is, and remains, your company’s property.

5. Giving away intellectual property ownership too liberally

Many technology companies develop customized technology for their customers, or make customized modifications to their existing technology on behalf of a particular customer. And most customers argue that if they’re paying for it, they want to own it. But giving away your company’s intellectual property in these instances can prevent you from reusing it for other customers – effectively shutting down a potential source of revenue in the future. And many times, your customers may not need to actually “own” the developments – a license right can often do the trick.

4. Using overly broad or subjective acceptance testing

It is not uncommon or unreasonable for customers to want to “kick the tires” of your technology before they pay for it. Problems arise when the customer has an unreasonable expectation of what the technology is supposed to achieve, and either want to withhold payment, or force you to provide extra services to meet that unreasonable expectation. This especially manifests itself when a customer includes acceptance testing language in a contract which is not tied to objective and realistic standards. Although it can be a laborious effort, taking the time to objectify these standards with the customer in the contract can save you significant time down the road, and get you paid faster.

3. Offering liberal source code escrow release conditions

For software developers, you know that your source code is the “crown jewels” of your business. It is the core of your technology, representing months or years of your blood, sweat, and tears. Yet many software companies are willing to give it away, for free, to their customers. How? By entering into a source code escrow agreement with a customer and allowing it to be released to them in situations where the code still holds value for you. Many customers will demand the source code be released to them if you stop supporting the software, but the intellectual property in the code may still be used in your other products or technology, effectively giving your customer the tools it needs to duplicate your technology. Creating very narrow and specific source code release conditions can minimize this impact.

2. Undervaluing technology

What is your technology worth? It’s a difficult question, and value can be measured and determined in many ways. Many new technology companies feel compelled to undercharge for their technology in an effort to break into the market. Although there is certainly some merit in that, I see vendors consistently undervaluing what their technology is worth, leaving significant revenue on the table. Understanding the impact and loss to the customer if they DON’T license your technology is the first key to pricing your product. Plus, under-pricing your product can create an impression that the technology is “cheap” – not a label that will build a positive reputation of your company in the long run.

1. Using a form license and/or services agreement that doesn’t fit your business model
Capturing exactly how you want to provide your product or services to your customer, allocating the risks, and creating each party’s obligations and rights, is not a simple or quick process. Replicating some other company’s form agreement not only exposes you to risks that you may not be aware of, but potentially violates the other company’s copyright in their agreement, and raises the risks outlined in the other points of this list. Having a customized agreement created for you that aligns with your business processes, mitigates your risks, and addresses the laws that apply in your jurisdiction for your industry is a key component in running a successful technology business.

Ways to Recession Proof Your Business

First, let’s not panic. True, payrolls shrunk by 17,000 in January. But at the same time, the Labor Department adjusted December’s numbers upward, reporting that 82,000 new jobs were created that month – a far larger figure than the government’s initial estimate of 18,000. Unemployment, now at 4.9%, is just 0.9% higher than the 4% level that economists consider “full employment” (meaning that everyone who wants a job has one).

Still, with the ripple effect of the mortgage mess still spreading, consumer spending in a sulk, and companies like Citigroup, and Sprint Nextel  announcing big layoffs, you’d be smart to start thinking about recession-proofing your job – or, failing that – devising a plan for landing on your feet somewhere else. Here’s how:

Think of ways to generate revenues or cut costs. That brilliant idea you had that would open whole new markets for the company, but require substantial spending to get started? Scrap it for now. Concentrate instead on finding places to pinch pennies, or identifying cheap new sources of revenue. Or both.

Be visible. “This isn’t the moment to take an extended vacation. Your position could be eliminated while you’re gone,” says Dale Winston, CEO of New York City-based executive recruiters Battalia Winston (www.battaliawinston.com). “It’s also not the time to come rolling in at ten o’clock.” If you possibly can, figure out a way to stand out and distinguish yourself. She adds: “If you’re in sales, get your numbers up. Nobody will be laying off star salespeople.”

Talk up your contributions. “Make sure you’re adding value at work by going above and beyond your basic job responsibilities,” says Christine Price, principal at staffing firm Ready to Hire (www.readytohire.com) “Then make sure your boss knows it, without being obnoxious.”

Keep a broad perspective. “Don’t get a reputation as someone who only does what he or she is told to do,” advises Richard Bayer, chief operating officer of career counseling network The Five O’Clock Club (www.fiveoclockclub.com). “Pick your head up, look around, and get in on the action. Volunteer for crucial responsibilities, including tasks for which your boss is responsible.”

Just doing your job well isn’t enough. “The question is,” says Bayer, “when your organization is making a list of who has crucial skills, will you be on it?” If you suspect not, now’s the time to hustle.

Get your skills up to date. “Companies get rid of people whose skills are obsolete and replace them with people who are already trained,” Bayer says. “Take classes, join trade organizations, and prove you’re plugged in.” Christine Price adds: “Consider going back to school, to show your employer you’re serious about your career and your performance.”

No whining allowed. Attitude does count – a lot. “Management wants people who can boost morale during tough times,” observes Dale Winston. Not only that, says Christine Price, but happy workers are less likely to get laid off than people who seem to dislike what they do. After all, the reasoning goes, if you grumble about your job all the time, then maybe giving you the sack would really be doing you a favor. Gulp.

Never stop networking. Of course, the day you get a pink slip is not the day you want to start calling old colleagues, asking former bosses out to lunch, and getting in touch to say hello to all the interesting people you’ve known over the years. No, the time to start doing that is now. Whether or not you move seamlessly (and relatively painlessly) into a new job after a layoff often depends on how consistently you’ve contacted – and maybe even helped – lots of people when you didn’t need them.

Update your resume, return headhunters’ phone calls, and start picturing where else you might like to work – just in case. If you’re mentally prepared for a move, you’ll make a wiser one than if you wait until you’re desperate (read canned).

One more thought: If we really are in, or headed for, a recession – and economists can’t even agree on whether or not we are – it may not be so bad. Every downturn is different. So who knows? If you’re not a mortgage banker or a home builder, maybe your current position is perfectly “safe.” But think about it for a while and you may find yourself wondering: Is “safe” good enough? Maybe it’s time to change jobs anyway — and heed the immortal words of Keith Richards, “I’m gonna leave while it’s still fun/ I’m gonna walk before they make me run.”

Ways to Advertise your Consulting Business

Whether you’re just starting a consulting firm, or looking for more ways to market an existing business, there are probably numerous advertising possibilities you’ve overlooked. Here are a few methods that you might want to look into and consider.

Online Advertising
Considering that most people turn to Google, and not the yellow pages, when looking for goods and services these days, it’s certainly a good idea to consider advertising online.

Google and Yahoo, the two top search engines, both have very reasonable pay per click advertising packages, which can yield great results, as do many smaller search engines.

You could also look for advertising space for sale on popular sites, or on the sites of organizations involved in your niche market.

Another option, depending on your services and target market, is to submit your site to one of the growing numbers of online business directories. Some are free, others charge a nominal fee, but they are becoming a popular marketing choice. Two paid directories that are highly trusted are Business.com and the Yahoo! Directory.

Direct Mail
Desk top publishing has made putting together a professional looking direct mail piece easier than ever. And once that’s taken care of, its easy to either deliver the piece by electronic mail, or by traditional postal service.

Speak to the postal service in your area though – some allow you to choose where you want your pieces delivered, while some will target company post office boxes only.

Traditional Media
If you are targeting a specific area, geographically, the easiest way to use the traditional media is to run advertisements in local newspapers.

If, on the other hand, you are targeting a specific industry, it’s best to look for industry specific or trade publications, which cater to the industry in question.

When shopping for traditional advertising options, remember to find out whether the publication is free, or paid for, and what their circulation is like. Prices vary vastly, but the cheapest option may not always offer the lowest rate per view of your advertisement.

Charity Work
Getting involved in charity or volunteer work can be a great way to get your company’s information into the newspapers, and other media. You don’t necessarily have to devote your time, you could sponsor an event, new equipment or some other item for a worthy cause.

Not only will you be doing something to help your community, you will be getting valuable publicity too.

Press Releases
If you, or your consulting business has done something newsworthy, write a press release. Well written, interesting and informative press releases are usually welcomed by small publications, which are on the lookout for content.

Or, you could submit the press release to one of the many online press release sites.

Join Professional Organizations
There are many professional consulting and business organizations, which host events, list members’ names on their websites, and perform other marketing functions.

Joining these usually costs a nominal annual fee, but you are assured that visitors looking for a professional in your industry could potentially see your name on the members list.

Whichever marketing methods you choose to use, make sure you track results. If it’s not working, figure out why, and change it. If it still doesn’t work, try something else. Marketing is an evolutionary process, not a stagnant one!

Client Testimonials Are Key for Management Consulting Businesses

The financial alchemy of your consulting services could be the deciding factor of whether your consultancy business survives or thrives during tough economic climates. Think about the angle of using a testimonial guideline to build your reputation for excellent customer service and relations. The focus of any business is the customer. When all is said and done, services aren’t sold – they are bought.

Discovering The Needs And Expectations Of Your Consulting Client
To start off the proccess of getting a good testimonial on track ask questions and obtain as much specific information as possible. Keep in mind that your customer is probably a busy professional with a lot on their mind. They may not have spent the time to focus and clarify their own ideas. Ask questions like:

* What are your main reasons/goals/objectives for needing a small business consultant?
* What results do you expect from a consulting service?
* How do you intend to measure the results from a consultancy against your expectations?

Delivering A Fully Communicated Consulting Strategy
The parameters of the consulting role and job have now been defined upfront. The communication strategy between consultant and customer has been established. This means little, or no misunderstanding. Once the work has been completed, you can give the customer an overview of the objectives and an analysis of the results obtained.

As you again ask specific questions, you will receive detailed feedback on your performance. Gently coax the right kind of information from the customer by asking open-ended questions. You could ask the question, “were you pleased with our service?” The busy business professional is probably going to say something like, “yes, of course, otherwise I would’nt pay you”.

Try reframing the question and asking, “why was our service of value to you?” . The customer has the overview and analysis in front of them, so they will probably quote directly from your report. The next question could be something like, “how did the services of a small business consultant help you?” Alternatively you could quote something from the analysis and ask the client to restate what you delivered. Either way you will have more than just a yes or no type answer.

Penetrate Your Consulting Market Niche
The information obtained from these questions can be typed or written up as a feedback report. Clients can be asked to endorse the document in the most relevant way. A testimonial is usually a testimony to past performance. With this kind of strategic approach, you create a current testimonial of your on-going committment to customer service and relations at the beginning, during, and at the end of the project. This becomes your consultancy mission, which in turn leads to a unique advantage over competitors in the same, or similar markets.

As a business consultant you are ensuring that you have testimonials that reflect and add value to your work ethic. These can now easily be used when making new presentations, or to generate referrals to more customers in a specific market.

Testimonials now become a powerful consultants marketing tool, with specific details that customers in your niche market can relate to. The bottom-line result of any business tool is to generate more customers. As a consultancy business you will stand out as a marketing beacon and ensure your own career success in this market arena.

Best Website Development for Business Consulting

When prospective clients go to your consulting business’s website, they have some expectations. Their eyes are open. There is an air of anticipation and hope. Chances are they have been disappointed by other business websites before. When those prospects enter your site, they begin to shape an opinion about your consulting services. Like it or not, your web site can increase or decrease the number of leads you get.

Serious prospective clients study your site with interest. They are performing due diligence and assessing your viability as a consulting company. Persons that walk through your internet doors are analyzing you just as you scrutinize that new retail outlet.

The first thing your consulting business blog or website needs to accomplish is extend the “Welcome Sign.” Make sure the site loads quickly. Clients have no patience for sites that are slow to open. When the site opens, capture the client’s attention with representative design and strong content. Know what they want to see and put it on the first page.

What Clients Do Not Want To See
Most clients are internet savvy and have used the internet for research before. They know what they like. They also know what they do not like. Prospective clients look skeptically at sites that have the following attributes:

• Flashy Storefronts – Site developers like the glitzy, new tech flashiness more than actual buyers. Clients for consulting services want to get to the product and the value and shy away from distractions.
• Meaningless Graphics – Generic images that do not relate to your specific product or value are a waste of everyone’s time. If images do not represent your consulting practice, do not use them.
• Poor or Outdated Design – Clients have expectations. They know what content they will read and they skip the fluff. They expect speed and they expect professionalism. Your design must not detract from your product, your value or your message.
• Overkill – The most common error of web sites is over promotion. Deliver your attributes in well scripted, concise posts. Avoid repetition. Be sure to post content that is client-oriented, relevant and current. Build a resource for the client and they will come.
• Poor navigation – Make sure your site is easy to navigate and that all pages are appropriately titled.
• Poor Grammar – Bad grammar, poor spelling and poor writing eliminate consultancy candidacies quickly. If you need a writer or an editor, outsource these services. Retain final draft approval, but your web presence must exhibit effective communication skills.

Business Consulting and Search Engine Optimization SEO

When you are starting up a consulting business, one of the first places you should be doing research is on the internet. You should first make up a list of strategic keywords and then you’ll want to start looking into your competition. By doing this the you’ll have a clear picture of the challenge of being listed for your chosen keywords near the top of  internet search engines like Google, MSN or ASK.

As we all know the internet is the preferred venue for business research. The consequences of your internet rankings are significant. As a new consulting practice you don’t have much choice … you need to understand search engine optimization and marketing techniques to compete with other tech savvy consultants.

Having a website, blog, or facebook account is just one part of the Internet marketing pie. The SEO game will take time, energy, creativity and will cost some money. Creating a stunning informational site and obtaining an Internet listing is not a stand-alone marketing or advertising solution. These are merely steps along the Internet pathway.

Committing to SEO
To boost your ranking and maximize the return on your consulting firm’s online presence, you will need to, understand the sometimes daunting process called Search Engine Optimization or SEO. There are many great blogs and websites on SEO out there for you to start learning and applying.

If you don’t want to learn it all yourself don’t fret, you’ll be able to find lots of firms that offer SEO services. Like all advertising decisions, you will need to proceed with caution. With Internet providers, it is easy to be misled, but making the smart, informed decision can reap huge results. Again, your consultancy’s marketing plan and advertising strategy calls for lead generation. The web should be a very cost-effective way to accomplish that goal.

Search Engine Optimization firms use keywords, back links, and a host of other strategies to boost your internet rankings. Some SEO companies will submit your consulting site to many search engine sites for a small fee. Usually these providers reap small returns. Like all forms of advertising, consistency is paramount to success. One-time gimmick promotions generally do not work.

You should consider approaching reputable SEO business consulting firms with credentials and references. Inquire as to their services and strategies and ask them to show you specific results they’ve achieved. I’d also recommend that you get the names and contact information of some of their past clients and call them up to get first hand information.

Get specific pricing for all services. Keep in mind that there are effective and ineffective SEO firms out there. When starting your consulting business, you will need internet leads, while SEO is one way to do this, Google Adwords, and other PPC options are a great way to do this.

There are many search marketing consultants, but treat them the same way you would a larger firm and demand all information and view their past results before going forward. You can take on handing your consulting business’ search engine optimization effort yourself – but be sure, SEO takes a lot of time on a continual basis. It may likely make more sense for you to get someone else to do this for you while you work on other aspects of your business.

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