A Summary Of My Content - April-June 2024

In the last few months, I have shared quite a bit of content with my readers on what truly drives growth for boutique consultancies: from the type of messaging that resonates with prospects to how to reconcile entrepreneurial qualities with the demands of building a high-performance boutique consultancy to how to create revenue stability on top of which consultancies can grow their business.

It always amazes me how much new information and perspectives I continue to learn from my clients and prospects. For example, the spirit of entrepreneurship is in stark contrast with what it takes to start and grow a consulting business at a sustainable, predictable rate. It didn't really cross my mind until I discussed it with a prospect.

It's like a switch flipped in my brain. I returned to the countless interactions with boutique consultancy owners, and a piece of a puzzle fell neatly into place, completing the picture.

There is always something new to learn. That's the ultimate goal of the content I create – my blog articles, LinkedIn posts, guest articles, etc. – to help my audience of boutique consultancy owners and leaders gain a deeper understanding of the foundational elements of success.

I hope you enjoy the reading!

The Visible Authority blog

1. The AI Hype in Consulting: Cutting Through the Fluff to Find True Value

While AI tools have brought amazing opportunities – efficiency gains, writing assistance, etc. – this tech is still in its early stages, which means there are still many associated pitfalls and risks.

Unfortunately, more boutique consultancies are feeling the pressure to integrate ‘AI’ into their messaging to prospects. Many are taking it further, centring their entire value proposition around this buzzword.

And I’m here to plead with these consultancies to stop!

2. Why Repetition Is the Path to Becoming a High-Performance Consultancy

I come across consultancies daily that offer a buffet of services. Their messaging is all about tailored solutions and hyper-customisable services. I get it. These consultancies try to show how customer-centric they are and want to cast as wide a net as possible.

I consider that as a mistake. Variation is a boulder that weighs boutique consultancies down.

Boutique consultancies can employ the superpower of developing a signature methodology—a highly effective way of addressing high-value problems for a narrow audience with high predictability in outcomes.

3. Is The Entrepreneurial Mindset Compatible With Managing a Boutique Consultancy?

About 40-50% of boutique consultancy owners I meet have a strong entrepreneurial profile. These owners are known for their infinite search for new opportunities, high-risk acceptance, relentless pursuit of innovation, and personal investment in almost every aspect of the business.

As much as these entrepreneurial qualities deserve recognition and praise, I’ve also noticed that they are often juxtaposed with the realities of running a successful boutique consulting business and the focus it requires. In this article, I discuss how to reconcile the spirit of entrepreneurship with the demands of building a high-performance boutique consultancy.

4. 10 Lessons Boutique Consultancy Owners Can Take Away from My Newsletter Strategy

According to the Content Marketing Institute, email is the third-highest-owned media platform B2B marketers use to distribute content. Simply put, email marketing is still one of the most effective tools boutique consultancies have at their disposal.

In this article, I share how my newsletter – The Authority – has been one of the drivers of the success of my consulting business and what lessons I’ve learned that boutique consultancy owners can apply in their business development strategy.

5. Dump the Buzzwords: What Actually Persuades Clients to Hire a Boutique Consultancy

I see many consultancies proudly displaying their mission and vision type of content, thinking this will impact prospects. While internally important, this messaging is externally meaningless.

So, if vision and mission statements and table-stakes rhetoric don’t impress prospects, then what does? In this article, I discuss the four foundational elements I’ve observed consultancy buyers give the most weight to in their decision-making process.

6. The One Boutique Consultancy Metric That Tells It All

Many KPIs can uncover insights into various aspects of a boutique consultancy business: proposal win rates, gross margins, revenue growth, cost of acquisition, client retention rate, client lifetime value, and so on. I’m a big proponent of collecting and analysing performance data. It is imperative to clearly understand what a business is doing right and identify weak points.

However, in this article, I focus on the most critical metric I believe every boutique consultancy owner should track diligently – the revenue per full-time employee (Rev/FTE) ratio. In my experience, this ratio tells it all.

7. Moving Beyond One-Off Projects in a Boutique Consultancy

There is a wall that I see many boutique consultancies hit, and this wall is preventing their businesses from growing at a sustainable, organic pace. The wall I’m referring to is the inability – or, often, the lack of strategy and intentional efforts – to move clients past one-off projects into a value-driven long-term relationship.

So, in this article, I discuss what 'The Project Wall' is, why boutique consultancies seem to struggle with overcoming it, and why every consulting business should prioritise it.

My LinkedIn posts

1. When I meet consultancy owners and ask what they excel at, I almost always get served ‘boring table stakes’.
2. Many boutique consultancy owners start with a vision of freedom & control over their work.
3. I carefully document FAQs from my clients. Here's the first list. More to come.
4. Small consultancy, big ambitions. Is excellence in multiple domains possible?
5. Are you looking at consulting revenue the old way? It’s time for a change!
6. It took me several years to understand the concept of 'power in the sale' - in my early consulting years.
7. Industry focus is valuable but not the starting point for a successful consultancy.
8. The turning point in my consulting career? When I was able to achieve REVENUE STABILITY.
9. Marketing in a consultancy is all about helping to build long-term visibility and trust at scale.
10. It’s not a great idea to add ‘we also do coaching’ to a consultancy’s service offering.
11. Ignoring 'Client Lifetime Value' (LTV) is a Missed Opportunity for Boutique Consultancies.
12. The report: I’ve audited the performance of almost 100 consultancies.
13. Too many consultancy owners operate their businesses in an ad hoc way.
14. "Luk, does my consulting team need to become more sales-driven?"
15. What does the consultancy team answer to the question: 'What is it what you do?'
16. How one mistake in my early consulting years taught me the value of stability.
17. Here’s how 2 consultancy clients transformed their fluffy propositions.
18. Are you looking at consulting revenue the old way? It’s time for a change!
19. Lots of new projects but struggling to pay the bills and the team salaries?
20. A consultancy can’t make a difference by explaining that it has an experienced team!
21. Too many boutique consultancies have become heavily commoditised due to under-differentiated propositions.
22. If a boutique consultancy cannot develop existing clients, it will always have an existential struggle.
23. The excitement of growth and client acquisition can quickly turn into a relentless grind.
24. Highly specialized new boutique consultancies pop up DAILY, raising the bar for all the others.
25. The dark side of developing existing clients.
26. Most consultancy websites really suck. Really.
27. Many consultancy owners believe they’re in constant competition with everyone else.
28. I always get this question: what is the key to success in a boutique consultancy?
29. If a boutique consultancy can't cultivate growth from existing clients, they are in for a perpetual struggle for survival.
30. The invisibility of most boutique consultancy owners and leaders is a critical misstep.
31. Will proposals become more outcome-driven in the coming years?
32. The demand for external support is on the rise: 62% expect to use more external support, up from 57% last year.
33. Please REMOVE the ???????????????????? badge from your LinkedIn picture!
34. The statistics are shocking: 84% of the time, trying to convince a hesitant prospect backfires.
35. As the saying goes, many small consulting firms are only a few months away from insolvency.
36. What is a high-performing boutique consultancy (HPBC), a prospect asked.
37. Have you ever wondered how writing 100 newsletters can contribute to your boutique consultancy's growth strategy?
38. The boutique consultancy’s pipeline is weak? Here’s the first thing to do!

Previous 2024 content summaries

If you'd like to catch up on my content from the beginning of the year:

Summary no.1: January till March 2024

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