Rays of light in practice development
March 4, 2008
The conversation underway at my post First class or coach? is proving fascinating. Adrian Pearson talks about re-organizing his practice along the lines originally suggested by Ron Baker which is bringing back all kinds of memories. He says in comments:
At our firm we are wrestling with how to split our offering into two internally ring-fenced operations - one for the commodity stuff and one for the customers who want the high value-added service.
I know that one only too well.
While there are many approaches to the problem, there are three critical components:
- Internal marketing
- Competency alignment
- External marketing
Ron Baker has talked about menu pricing as a way of marketing but I wonder if something has been missed. What say clients? How would you approach clients to figure if this is the kind of service they really want?
Internal marketing and competency alignment are the most important elements.
I’m currently reviewing a detailed practice plan where these issues are addressed. It is a surprisingly complex problem. The general difficulty stems from having the skills to step back and objectively review the business, analyze and document processes, work out efficient methods of working and then implement as a comprehensive plan. The firm has been working on this for some months and is about four weeks from go live. From what I’ve seen, they’ve thought it through well. Crucially, they’ve worked hard to both explain and incentivize the practice teams. It means that people want to do what’s required.
So for example, they’re matching offerings to service levels while at the same time choosing the appropriate tools for the job. These include LibertyAccounts and More! Software. They are not making the critical mistake of assuming that ‘one size fits all’ and have understood that different technical solutions meet different client needs.
The marketing plan is comprehensive but with virtually no budget for advertising. Instead, they are concentrating efforts on addressing client needs, articulating them and actively looking for customer stories. This comes back to something I’ve said for a long time - no-one tells your story better than your clients. Like others, they are looking at a referrer scheme but my feeling is that only works well when there is a solid ‘bank’ of client stories to which new clients can relate.
These are the kinds of problem that many practices will face in the coming years. The examples I am now seeing are among the best so far. They’re stretching management to rethink many of their pre-conceived notions about what it means to run a modern practice. That’s good news.
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