We spend a lot of time working out how the professional service we work with can grow their fee income and typically this conversation will focus on 3 things:
1. Winning new clients
2. Growing fees from existing clients
3. Improving cross-selling internally
All worthy business development objectives but …
… Maybe you should start giving more attention to doing the things that will help you grow fee income?
Here are some areas to look closer at that will all increase your profitability and reduce your sole dependence on improving the top-line:
– Time record more accurately
– Increase recovery of the time recorded
– Bill promptly when work is delivered
– Tighten up your credit control processes (and what you’re willing to write-off)
– Use your BD time more wisely; instead of going to the same old events, be more focused with your networking
– Respond to enquiries and referrals from colleagues and intermediaries more quickly
– Invest in improving the quality of service to increase client retention and client referrals
– Have a system for monitoring your sales pipeline and review this regularly (at least weekly)
– Have another system to plan and track your 1on1 contact with key clients, contacts and targets
– Match BD activity to the personalities, interests and skill-set of each individual fee earner, i.e. writing, speaking, networking and research/analysis.
If you’d like to discuss how we could help you grow your fee income, please email us and we can find a time to chat. Or, if you’d like more practical BD tips why not catch up with our CoffeeCast?