Explore every episode of the podcast How to Sell Advice
| Title | Pub. Date | Duration | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 210. From Freelancer to Marketing Strategist with Jordan Mogck | 18 Feb 2025 | 00:47:56 | |
In this episode, Jordan and I talk about his transition from freelancer to strategist, how he found his niche working with Amish farmers, and more. • Transitioning from freelancer to strategist (and the steps he took in between) Key Links and Resources 00:00 Intro | |||
| 209. Going from employee to consultant with Reza Saeedi | 01 Mar 2024 | 01:03:21 | |
Plus many fun tangents along the way! Whether you currently have a job and are thinking about advising full or part-time, or you’re already independent but looking to get into advisory work, this episode will have a ton of insights to offer you. Key links and mentioned resources:
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| 208. My content publishing and distribution framework | 12 Jan 2024 | 00:17:20 | |
So, you want to publish content to attract clients. Do you start a blog? Hammer out posts on LinkedIn every day? Start a YouTube channel? A podcast? Good question. I get asked it a lot. In fact, someone in Mindshare asked me about it again today, so I thought I'd break out my mental model for how I think about publishing and distributing content. Here is a visual breakdown to look at while you listen to the latest How to Sell Advice podcast episode:
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| 208. Brad Hussey on evolving from web designer to creator/educator | 08 Sep 2023 | 00:59:00 | |
I recently had the privilege of interviewing Brad Hussey—a former web designer turned creator, educator, and community builder. In this episode, we talk about things like:
Resources & Links Mentioned
Listen here or subscribe via your podcast player. —kevin P.S. Like this episode? Share it with another marketer and help them build a more leveraged and profitable marketing practice, too! | |||
| 207. Reuben Swartz on the mindsets and strategies of successful selling | 07 Aug 2023 | 00:47:09 | |
The other week, I chatted with former software consultant turned CRM SaaS owner, Reuben Swartz about how to do sales in a way that doesn't feel like selling and instead sets up your relationships for success. In this episode, we chat about things like:
And a lot more! If selling isn't your jam—or even if it is—you'll get a ton of value out of this episode. The mindsets and mental models he shares make it easy to navigate sales conversations without getting mired in tactical "steps" which can often confuse you and put a barrier between you and your prospects. Resources mentioned:
—kw | |||
| 206. Building an expertise business around a proprietary framework with Billy Broas | 26 May 2023 | 00:56:04 | |
Do you have a proprietary framework or methodology you can build an entire business around? I recently recorded a podcast with Billy Broas, a copywriter, advisor, and educator who has built a business around his proprietary messaging framework, The Five Lightbulbs. In this episode, Billy and I unpack the Five Lightbulbs and then go deep into how his business works, how he gets clients, and a lot more.
Books Mentioned:
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| 205. How to Sell Advice and AdvisoryWork.com—Mindshare is rebranding! | 21 Apr 2023 | 00:15:49 | |
I recently decided to rebrand the Mindshare franchise (can I call it that?). Listen in for all the details! —kw | |||
| 204. Tsavo Neal on how to get more clients through your website with SEO | 24 Mar 2023 | 00:53:41 | |
If you've ever thought you might want to get your website ranking better for search engines, get your pencil ready because this episode will show you how. —k P.S. Want a deeper-dive training on how to do exactly this process? Tsavo shared an over-the-shoulder view for Mindshare members last month on how he does it. Sign up to get access to that plus a library of other training, group coaching, a private Slack community and more. Learn more about Mindshare → | |||
| 203. Mark Evans on the unique challenges and methodologies of fractional CMO and advisory work | 17 Mar 2023 | 01:00:12 | |
A few weeks ago, I invited Mindshare member and long-time marketing consultant, Mark Evans, to talk shop with me about the business of marketing consulting and fractional CMO work.
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| 202. The highest leverage thing you can do in your freelance or consulting practice | 02 Mar 2023 | 00:13:46 | |
The other day, I replied to a Twitter friend's (@RodBurkert) open question: My question: What is the 'right next best thing' you should do to create the biggest leverage and productivity boost for your practice?I replied with the following: Taking the expertise in your head and putting it into writing/audio/video, then organizing it into a system or framework so others can learn from you without having to repeat yourself forever.But then I wanted to expand on this idea further since it's core to everything I teach. That's what this episode is about: how to take your expertise out of your head so you can deploy it without having to repeat yourself forever. Listen in and let me know what you think. —k | |||
| 201. The dichotomy of advice | 19 Jan 2023 | 00:08:57 | |
It's easy to believe that as advisors, we get paid to have all the answers. We feel like to add value, we need to be able to tell people what to do. What if instead, our value came from things like:
As technicians, we like knowing the best tool or tactic to use for any situation. As creatives, we like envisioning new ideas and potential futures.
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| 200. Kevan Lee on part-time advisory work, mentorship, equity compensation, and more | 07 Oct 2022 | 00:54:00 | |
I recently interviewed Kevan Lee, the former VP of Marketing at Buffer and currently Senior VP of Marketing at Oyster. Kevan is a wealth of knowledge when it comes to leading tech startups to significant growth. To give you an example, he helped Buffer go from $5m to $20m in annual revenue and 100,000 new customers acquisitions per month. In his first year at Oyster, he helped the company 20x its revenue and build a marketing team comprising over 50 people. He's also involved as an educator and advisor with Reforge, On Deck, as well as a past contributor to ProductLed, and more. In this interview, Kevan and I explore the realm of advisory work. We cover topics like:
This conversation was a fun exploration of the world of advisory work. And like all of us, Kevan is still figuring out what works best for him. You can follow Kevan on Twitter at @kevanlee and subscribe to his Substack at kevanlee.substack.com. Give this a listen and subscribe to get more interviews like this in the future.
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| 199. The three core ways to get more consulting clients | 30 Sep 2022 | 00:18:52 | |
You may be a rock star when it comes to marketing your clients' business. But when it comes to your own, it might be an entirely different story. And you know what? That doesn't make you a bad marketer. It's incredibly hard to market yourself—especially if you don't have a system to follow. In this episode, I break down the three core pillars to attracting more clients:
This might seem simple, and it is. But it's not easy. It takes time, energy, and commitment to build it out and for it to start working for you. But with any luck, this framework (and the details I talk about in the episode) will make attracting clients a lot easier. When you have clarity, you can really lean into your efforts and start seeing traction faster than simply winging it. Listen to this episode for all the nuances and details. —k | |||
| 198. Lowering the barrier for email | 27 Sep 2022 | 00:06:37 | |
What if the way to get your emails read and subscribers to stay subscribed was to lower the bar a little? Not in terms of quality, necessarily. But in terms of format or type. Instead of trying to write a grand theory of mathematics every time you publish, what if we treated email more like social media? What if we aimed for a simple, concise, interesting, and/or fun piece of content? Something light and consumable. Not overthought. Not pre-judged. Just something you found interesting or valuable. Would you be able to be consistent with your publishing habits? Would your readers prefer it? Would it keep you interested? I think yes. But there's nuance, as with all things. So give this a listen. See if it resonates with your headspace. See if it helps you overcome that mental block stopping you from sharing your ideas with your subscribers. And while you're at it, subscribe to Mindshare Radio via your podcast player to get more ideas like this (and interviews coming soon). —k | |||
| 197. How to put your advisory clients at the epicentre of your business | 13 Sep 2022 | 00:19:43 | |
The most successful businesses have a high degree of customer-centricity. Think Amazon or Google—they're absolutely relentless about the customer experience. And in the consulting world, the most successful advisors are the ones who have a high customer-centricity and low self-orientation. Not sure what this all means? In this episode, I break down how to put your client at the epicentre of your business, how to reduce your self-orientation, and the trade-offs needed to do all of this well. | |||
| 196. Iteration and innovation is the only way | 07 Sep 2022 | 00:11:13 | |
The odds of you succeeding with new ventures or ideas out of the gate is low. It’s not fun but it’s true. Even if your idea is good, it might be adjacent to the one the market wants. A small set of tweaks and iterations to the format, offer, or audience might just be what it needs to take off. And that’s empowering! It means you’re not alone. Nobody figures everything out right away. It’s easy to get frustrated when things aren’t clicking for you—especially when you’re trying something new that you feel really passionate about. It can feel like two steps forward and one step back. We look around for answers but get frustrated when nobody offers the magic pill. There is no magic pill, only iteration and innovation. We have to hold our vision strong while simultaneously being loose about our best ideas. It’s a fine line between a steadfast vision and being oblivious to what the market wants. If you are willing to iterate and innovate continually, it’s only a matter of time before your vision and what your audience wants are in complete alignment. Listen in for more on this topic if you’re in this mode or subscribe via your podcast player. | |||
| 195. Selling confidence | 15 Aug 2022 | 00:10:32 | |
Do you ever stop to wonder what it is we are really selling as consultants? Are we selling a website, strategy, or brand identity? Yes... and no. Those are features of our work. And people don't really buy features. Maybe we are selling new customer growth? Better retention? Ease of use? Those are all great benefits of our work. But let's dig a little deeper. People buy based on how they feel about the purchase. It aligns with logic, yes. But it's driven by emotion. So it makes sense to explore that emotion people are really seeking inside of what we sell. I believe most consultants are selling confidence. Give this a listen to see what I mean. —k | |||
| 194. How to avoid the "employee" trap as a fractional CXO | 05 Aug 2022 | 00:22:13 | |
It's incredibly easy to get sucked into being an employee-like figure when you do fractional leadership work. When I first got started as a fractional CMO, I basically had two part-time jobs. The money was good but I worked HARD. I knew I needed to create better parameters. In this episode of Mindshare Radio, I'll break down the five main ways to avoid turning into a set of employee-like hands when you sell fractional CXO services. We'll talk about things like:
And a ton of nuance in between. Listen in and let me know what you think—did I miss anything important? Hit reply and let me know. —k
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| 193. Two ways to think about positioning | 29 Jul 2022 | 00:07:45 | |
This post originally appeared at https://kevin.me/ways You can think about niching in a lot of ways. In many cases, the tighter you go, the easier it can be to sell what you offer. People are swimming in options, they want specific when they can get it. So there are two angles to consider when deciding on how specific you should go with your business. 1. You can get specific about who you serve The more specific your target market, the broader your focus can be in terms of what you help people with—while still being credible. If I help multi-location coworking spaces do better marketing, that's a specific target market and a fairly broad way of helping them. It can be reasoned that you can have rare knowledge about marketing in a way that is uniquely applied to multi-location coworking spaces. If I said I help anyone do better marketing at scale, you can begin to see where the skepticism may come in. 2. You can get specific about the problem you solve When you're highly specific about the problem you solve, it makes sense that you could solve it credibly for a wide range of industries. For example, I could say I help people sell their expertise through membership programs. And that could be a reasonably credible positioning given the specificity of the problem being solved. I don't need to say "I help faith-based dog groomers sell membership programs." The market would be too small. And the same skills or lessons could be applied to far greater contexts. And this is what strategy is all about. There's no perfect way to position your consulting business. Specificity helps—but how you apply specificity is where the hard choices are made. So what trade-offs are you making? How are you being specific about either what you do or who you do it for? As they say, hard choices, easy life. Easy choices, hard life. | |||
| 192. Why I don't position myself as a fractional CMO | 22 Jul 2022 | 00:14:20 | |
I don't position myself as a fractional CMO. I might have a fractional CMO service. Or in a sales conversation, I may say that I'm like having a part-time CMO on your team. But I don't call myself a fractional CMO as my top-level positioning. I'm a consultant. I'm an advisor. I help companies with their marketing strategy. But I'm not a part-time employee. I don't want to be seen as one. Nor do I want their actual marketing team to be threatened by what may seem like a new boss breathing down their neck. In this episode, I go into:
The topic is nuanced, but I think it's important if you are selling strategic advisory services. | |||
| 191. Noticing your quiet inner voice (and what to do about it) | 14 Jul 2022 | 00:11:18 | |
What is your quiet inner voice telling you? The one that whispers. You barely notice it at first. But when you do hear it, you're inspired. Should you explore it? Maybe you don't take it seriously at first. Maybe it feels like a pipe dream. It's not always rational. Sometimes it's idealistic. Regardless, when you pay attention to it, it feels directionally interesting. Where does it come from? I've noticed that it shows up when I take time away from my business. It shows up on vacations, bike rides, long walks, or while reading a good book. I'm not sure if it's the truth or just a passing random idea, but it feels worth exploring. So what do you do when that voice says something? Do you jump to action or think about it until it no longer inspires you? Is it valuable or random? That's what I cover today. It may just be the very thing that helps you create unique, valuable, and lasting work. Or maybe not. Who knows. —k | |||
| 190. Analyzing where my advisory clients come from (a general vs. niche business comparison) | 01 Jul 2022 | 00:21:57 | |
In this episode, I break down where my advisory clients came from. I also compare my niche (Everspaces) vs. general consulting clients came from to see if there was a difference. And let me tell you, it was enlightening. Do you analyze where your clients come from? Give this a listen and let me know what you find about your own business. —k | |||
| 189. What to do if nobody is buying your productized services | 08 Jun 2022 | 00:12:53 | |
Are you having trouble selling your productized service? In this new episode of Mindshare Radio, I break down the four main things to consider when trying to fix the problem. Give it a listen. | |||
| 188. Predicting the future of in-house and outsourced hybrid marketing teams | 03 Jun 2022 | 00:14:48 | |
Companies are hiring in-house and outsourced marketers differently than they did before. I'm seeing less reliance on using a single in-house marketer or even one full-service agency to "do everything" for them. Marketing has gotten too broad with too many specialties to work like that. But there's still a long way to go. In this episode, I share a prediction on how marketing teams will continue to evolve toward a hybrid in-house/outsourced way. I'll get into how I see things evolving and why this presents an opportunity for you. Agree? Got another view? Hit reply and let me know. | |||
| 187. Why you may want to offer multiple price options | 26 May 2022 | 00:09:51 | |
When a client requests your services, it can really help to have multiple options at different prices. You can do this with a product or service ladder at different prices and scope, or you can create multiple options in your custom proposals. In this episode, I break down the reasons why you may want to have multiple options and how to price them based on the value you're delivering. This seemingly simple idea can have a major impact on your average deal value—often increasing your revenue by 30%+.
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| 186. What to do when clients don't take your advice | 17 May 2022 | 00:07:21 | |
What do you do when clients give you advice but then do their own thing anyway? In this episode, I talk about why this happens, how to prevent it from happening, and how to both give and get the best possible advice. —kw | |||
| 185. Twitter growth strategies and memes-as-marketing with Dagobert Renouf | 13 May 2022 | 00:51:56 | |
I interviewed Dagobert Renouf of Logology last week on how he's been so successful on Twitter. Dagobert is extremely active and publishes a meme every day of the week, which is a big hit for his 30k+ audience. But like any successful story, there's an underlying mindset and strategy that makes the tactics more successful. So I wanted to dig into those. And he delivered. We’ll get into the specifics of:
Listen in to hear this episode, it already changed my thinking and approach to Twitter. Mentioned links
—k | |||
| 184. "In order to do this right..." | 11 May 2022 | 00:02:35 | |
It can be nerve-wracking to propose a project that is more expensive or takes longer than a client is asking for. Our first instinct might be to charge the bare minimum to get the job done. Or to promise the most ideal timelines—assuming nothing will go wrong—to win the deal and avoid pushback and rejection. But we know that's not realistic. Something always comes up. The problem is, while you think you're giving the client what they want, you're actually undercutting both you and them. You're reducing the likelihood of achieving the very thing they're hiring you to do, which is to get a business result. In this episode, I talk about one magical phrase that gives you and your clients more confidence to do work that may be more expensive or take longer than they hoped for. And why it's the best thing for them—and you—to take this approach more often than not. —k | |||
| 183. Why I'm allowing myself to stop publishing daily | 10 May 2022 | 00:20:34 | |
I recently decided to switch from daily publishing to a more flexible format. In this episode of Mindshare Radio, I break down the reasons why I started publishing daily in the first place (549 days ago) as well as the reasons for giving myself permission to publish whenever I want. I'm still bullish on daily content. It's an extremely powerful tactic if it aligns with your strategy. But for now, I'm choosing flexibility. Listen to find out more. —k P.S. I'd love your thoughts. Hit reply and tell me what you're doing/thinking related to publishing. | |||
| 182. Customer surplus and price to value ratio | 06 May 2022 | 00:08:03 | |
When you price your services, there's something called customer surplus to consider. Customer surplus, in this case, means the amount of profit your customers gain after deducting your costs. Not all profit is financial, but it's easier to think about it in financial terms. On the one hand, you want to price your services high enough to attract people who need and value the outcome of your services. People with the highest needs want to buy expensive solutions because they need them to work. Higher prices are both a signal of quality and they allow you to invest the resources to do great work. On the other, you don't want to price too high or you risk capturing too much of the customer surplus, making your products and services less compelling. It also makes you less likely to be referred because the price to value ratio after an engagement wasn't high enough to have people rave about you. You also can't drop your prices too low or your ideal customers also won't buy it because, profit aside, they want and need something of quality that will actually solve their problems. So should you price your work? Give this a listen. | |||
| 181. "What if my marketing budget doesn't allow me to implement your advice?" | 29 Apr 2022 | 00:10:27 | |
Mindshare member, Sean, had an interesting objection while selling his advisory services. This is a common question when selling advisory work, so it's worth unpacking this and other follow-up questions Sean had. "What if my marketing budget doesn't allow me to implement your advice?"In this episode, I talk about:
At the end of the day, your job is to get an ROI for your clients in a cash-sustainable manner. If budgets are strict, your job is to work within their constraints. But it's also worth noting that sometimes, the ROI pays dividends over a longer time horizon. The better you can prove a business case, the easier it will be to sell. | |||
| 180. How narrowly should you niche when starting out as a consultant? | 22 Apr 2022 | 00:14:28 | |
Mindshare community member, Jack, had a great question about how narrow to go with your niche when just starting out as a new consultant. Here's the gist of his question: I'm currently in-house at what would probably be classed as a B2B manufacturer.The plan is to step into strategy/advisory within the next 6 months. So with my current experience, I see it as an easy step to niche further into B2B - helping B2B manufacturers grow by transforming their marketing. However, the company I work for is actually a manufacturer/service provider in the fire safety space. As a result a lot of my experience is how to target, position, market etc to a pretty specific ICP. So my options would/could be: 1) General B2B Some of my thoughts on 3 come of the back of going to a big fire safety expo recently—there are a lot of companies with bad websites/branding spending a lot of money on their marketing! I'm just concerned I could narrow myself too much. As always, any thoughts are greatly received. This is a great question that I answered in the community but wanted to give greater nuance to with a long-form audio recording. The question really is: how niche do you go when leaving a job and starting a consulting practice? In this episode, I talk about factors like:
If you're thinking of making the leap from employment to consulting and aren't sure how niche to go, this episode is for you. —k | |||
| 179. How to properly categorize your products and service | 21 Apr 2022 | 00:13:52 | |
Mindshare Pro used to be a premium upgrade to the free Mindshare Community membership. But in my opinion, that was a mistake. It should have been positioned as Group Coaching. And the templates/resources should be categorized separately as knowledge products. In this episode, I talk about categorizing your own products and services, how to break them down, why it matters, and also how to apply it to an industry like web design. Give this a listen and let me know if your products and services have had similar categorization issues. —k | |||
| 178. The relationship between hourly and commodity work | 18 Apr 2022 | 00:07:53 | |
On a long drive today, I re-listened to some of the book, The Passion Economy, by Adam Davidson. It spoke to me the first time I read it. It's about craftsmanship in your business and working on something you're passionate about. It's about the power of building small-scale, high-quality work instead of mass-produced commodity work that can be scaled infinitely. The book has a lot of great rules, quotes, and stories. I'll share one quote that came up because it fits so well into how we price our work. Here's the quote: “I recently hired a lawyer who told me that he would not charge me by the hour but would, instead, agree to a fixed fee for the work we were going to do together. He explained that charging by the hour contradicted his core values of serving his clients; it would create an incentive for him to spend more time even if it wasn’t strictly necessary. Or, on the other hand, he might choose to rush some work to save me some money. He preferred not to think about time at all but, instead, to focus on providing me with the greatest service. I found this comforting.”— The Passion Economy: Nine Rules for Thriving in the Twenty-First Century by Adam DavidsonSelling by the hour often doesn't feel good for either party, nor is it always aligned with the best interests of your clients. The incentive structure is broken. I've noticed hourly is most often the best option when you're doing commodity work, like website support or odd design tasks, for example. I'm not bashing hourly work or these kinds of support roles. They may be necessary to grow and/or sustain your business. They can be profitable. But I am pointing to the fact that hourly work—when it is required—is closest to commodity work and therefore should come with an orange flag. The longer you do commodity work, the harder it will be to do great work. | |||
| 177. The right amount of work | 17 Apr 2022 | 00:07:26 | |
How much work should you take on? When does the quality of your work suffer? What are the ethical implications? I talk about this and more in today's episode. —kw | |||
| 176. The story of the car detailer | 15 Apr 2022 | 00:05:55 | |
A while back, I had my car detailed at a new shop around the corner. When I called to book, the new business owner asked how dirty it was. I said it was decent but it had some dog fur in parts of the back seat. He grumbled and told me (reluctantly) to come in. They were closed a few months later. In this episode, I get into a few lessons we can all learn, including the importance of:
Give this a listen if it feels timely for you. —k | |||
| 175. The problem with generalist positioning | 14 Apr 2022 | 00:15:03 | |
There are a lot of problems with having purely generalist positioning. The main one, though, is that potential clients don't know what you're actually good at. So they're left to figure that out for themselves—and there's no way to tell what you're actually good at until they work with you. And by then it's too late. The best clients will go to someone who looks the most qualified on paper. They will spend top dollar with them to do things right. And that means you'll be left with the less-than-ideal clients. The ones who don't understand just how nuanced the work is to do right—which means they won't value your work enough to pay you well. They'll be price shopping and have unrealistic expectations based on naive perceptions that things are easy. Yes, I think you can be a generalist and specialist at the same time. You can build around your best skills and ideal niche until you don't need to take on other clients. But having purely generalist positioning is a recipe for having a business you don't want to run. | |||
| 174. Cleaning up | 08 Apr 2022 | 00:07:32 | |
I cleaned my office today and I felt a lot better. More clear-thinking. Strange how your environment can affect your mental state. And to me, this is analogous to all areas of your business. For example, cleaning out expenses you no longer use. Or services that are not profitable enough. Or clients who are not the right fit for you. Or emails that are left unanswered for too long. Or tasks that you have neglected and need to be either dealt with or deleted. Or decisions you have been putting off until today. I’m a big believer in creating space to think. I took today off calls to give myself time to clean things up and work on the things that mattered. Without space, there’s no time to clean up. And if you don’t clean things up, your mind and your business will eventually be overrun. This is your reminder to reserve time, clean up, and work on the things that excite you most in your business. Or, just take a nap. Either way. | |||
| 173. Are your prices negotiable? | 01 Apr 2022 | 00:07:31 | |
I had a window installer come by recently to quote new windows on my house. When I asked how the process works, he told me he'd educate me on the products, size the windows, give me a quote, then I'd "beat him up" on price, and then we'd make a deal when we figured out the details. The throwaway line about haggling over price had me feeling uneasy. I don't know anything about windows let alone how to haggle over their prices. There are lots of lessons here to unpack. Should you negotiate? If so, when and how? What do you do when price is a factor? We'll get into that and more. —kevin | |||
| 172. How to publish more consistently | 30 Mar 2022 | 00:03:41 | |
One of the things I've noticed about myself is that when I don't have a fixed publishing schedule, it's easy to push it off for long periods without publishing anything. Just like exercising, the longer you don't publish content, the harder it is to get going again. I noticed this recently with Mindshare Radio, too. I used to publish episodes 3 times per week—every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Then, I decided to record something once per week. But, I didn't set a strict publishing date or really commit to anything publicly. And that resulted in inconsistent publishing—and worse, some over-thinking and even occasional anxiety about what to create. In this episode, I talk about why committing publicly to your publishing schedule can not only make you more consistent, it can reduce the anxiety you face each time you stare at a blank page. | |||
| 171. Time for yourself | 25 Mar 2022 | 00:10:52 | |
Could you take one day off client work per week to work on your business (and yourself)? I've been doing that for the past five weeks and it's been incredible. In this Mindshare Radio episode, I talk about how and why it might just be the best thing for you, too. Listen on the web or subscribe on your favourite podcast player. Have a great weekend! | |||
| 170. Building around your super-consumers | 18 Mar 2022 | 00:14:54 | |
Super-consumers are the 10% of your customers who account for upwards of 50% of your profit. All industries have them. All of us are super-consumers of at least something. It's true. And for very logical reasons. In this episode, I break down the concept as coined by Eddie Yoon in his book, Superconsumers—and why it matters to your both business and the clients you serve at a strategic level. Give it a listen and let me know what you think. —kevin | |||
| 169. Thinking like an agency | 15 Mar 2022 | 00:07:31 | |
There's a common misconception that marketing advisors don't execute. The reality is, we do execute. We just don't use our hands nor manage the minutia. In this episode, I talk about how to think like an agency (even if you're doing advisory work). At the end of the day, you're responsible for execution. You just do it differently than a typical agency. Listen in and use this way of thinking in your own business—and during sales conversations when delivering this idea matters most. —kevin | |||
| 168. Marketing from a standstill | 09 Mar 2022 | 00:10:22 | |
What do you do when a client comes along looking for your help, but until now, they haven't been doing much (or any) of their own marketing? Do you take on the work, turn it away, or do you use this as a chance to educate them on what to expect? Personally, I prefer the latter. And if it seems like they are bought-in to reality, I'll consider working with them. In this episode, I talk about how to be fully conscious when clients like this come along, how to educate them about how long things should take, and ultimately to manage expectations. Slow results are the cost of marketing from a standstill. Like an engine, it takes time to rev up. They either get it or they don't. Better to know up front before you start working together. —kw | |||
| 167. Permission to change your mind | 03 Mar 2022 | 00:09:58 | |
> Click here to join the conversation on this episode in the Mindshare community. Your thinking will get updated. You will try things that don't work. You will pivot your advice based on what works. In this episode, I give you permission to change your mind and update your thinking—regardless of any sunk costs. Listen in to hear more. —k | |||
| 166. The 5 major problems with doing execution work as a marketing consultant | 15 Feb 2022 | 00:23:54 | |
> Click here to join the conversation on this episode in the Mindshare community. One of the biggest challenges I hear from marketing consultants is getting stuck doing execution work. Managed advisory services/fractional CMO is a great way to ease into advisory work. In the short-term, it can be an exciting and profitable line of work. But if you don't manage to shift into pure advisory work, it will create a lot of unnecessary stress and it will hold you back from growing your business. In this episode, I break down the five biggest problems (and the sub-variations thereof) with doing execution work as a marketing consultant. These include:
This was a longer episode, so I'll talk about how to break free from execution in a future episode—plus the significant upside that creates for both you and your clients. Execution is by far the most time and energy intensive thing you do, but is much lower value than you may think. I'll get into all that and more in future episodes. —k P.S. Are you experiencing any or all of these pains? Hit reply and let me know! | |||
| 165. Ditching execution revenue to sell advisory services | 01 Feb 2022 | 00:20:46 | |
> Click here to join the conversation on this episode in the Mindshare community. Are you a freelancer or agency owner looking to sell advisory services in addition to or instead of execution services? If so, are you willing to stop earning money on execution so you can become a "trusted advisor" to a fiduciary standard? Do you need to? Should you create a new website/business or add advisory services to your list of existing execution services? While there's no right answer, I have some thoughts on all this and more. —k | |||
| 164. The constraints being a fractional CMO | 25 Jan 2022 | 00:23:15 | |
> Click here to join the conversation on this episode in the Mindshare community. If you've done any fractional CMO/freelance head of growth/managed advisory work (as I like to call it), you'll quickly notice how much it limits your time to work with multiple clients and do your own marketing. In this episode, I unpack a few topics, questions, and constraints brought up by member Rob Denton-Ross in a private discussion (with his permission to respond via podcast). Rob currently does some execution work and is getting opportunities to do more involved fractional CMO work. As a result, it's difficult to find time (and justify spending it) to market himself. I talk about things like:
Give this a listen and let me know what you think! —k | |||
| 162. Three ways to get clients to take your advice | 21 Jan 2022 | 00:17:27 | |
In order to be successful as an advisor, you need to be able to:
If you have difficulty selling advisory services, or if clients stop listening to your advice during your engagements, it might be due to one of the three things I talk about in this episode. Give it a listen and share with a friend who might benefit! —k | |||
| 161. Why you should have (and stick to) a core process | 19 Jan 2022 | 00:19:37 | |
> Click here to join the conversation on this episode in the Mindshare community. It can be tempting to ignore all or parts of your core process with a new client. You might find yourself jumping into an engagement head first, reacting to demands and/or responding to tactical projects already in motion. Things may be under tight timelines and the client feels like they know what they need to do, they just need a little guidance. But the problem is, when you skip some or all of your core process, things quickly begin to fall apart. Instead of deciding what to do, you're reacting to things the client wants you to do. Instead of diagnosing the real problems and developing a strategic plan, you're working within the parameters of their thinking, not yours. But you're hired to be the expert and you've been doing this a long time. Which means you need to be true to the process that has gotten results time and time again. In this episode, I talk about the three big reasons why you should have a formal process and stick to it during all of your client engagements. Every time I skip some or all of it, I always regret it. At very least, I prefer to check the boxes so I know no stone is unturned. Listen in for more. —k | |||