A personal touch

When it comes to marketing and business in development, the mantra in most professional practices is still 'new business, new business, new business'. That's fine if your practice is clearly defined and commercially driven, but if you're focused on everyday people, drumming up brand new business can be tricky.

Sometimes it's a lot easier to look a little closer to home.

In the most general terms, you can get work from three sources:

1. You can win new business.

2. You can win more work from your professional contacts.

3. You can win more work from the clients you already and have.

In the main, professional service firms will appropriate their marketing activity and expenditure to these areas, and in that order. My argument is if you are to achieve the best return from any investment you make in marketing (time and financial), this needs to be tipped on its head, especially when it comes to marketing private client services.

Here is a simple three-step guide to getting more from what you already have.

1. Look internally

Your firm will (probably) have a number of commercial practice groups. Talk to your colleagues in these areas and find out when and where they meet. Ask for five minutes as an agenda item, to remind them of what you do and that all of the people they deal with (not to mention their employees) are potential clients.

You can even go one step further and work on particular examples, e.g. if someone sells a business, they will need a new will and will probably have cash they want to put into trust for their families or, at the very least, make more tax efficient.

2. Look at your own clients

While many professional advisers still feel that their clients don't want to be bothered outside of the matter at hand, the truth is they do, as long as the communication is relevant and of benefit to them.

When I discuss this with clients, the example I always use is of an old friend from my Lloyd's of London days. He bought a house in Surrey and used a local firm who, in his words, were 'all over him' during the transaction.

However once it was done, that was it. Incommunicado.

The irony was that being the bright chap he was, he recognised his and his wife's lives had moved on and he needed a new will, and probably some tax planning advice as his family was nearing university age.

However as his conveyancers hadn't bothered to keep in touch, he felt they actually weren't interested in him and were only after the fees for his purchase; naturally, he went elsewhere. 'If they'd even bothered to keep me on the mailing list and sent me a Christmas card, they'd have got much more work.' A lesson for us all!

The important question is what do you send your clients and how often.

The answers (respectively) are something which will be both relevant and interesting. Keep it fresh and don't just send out the same invite for a free will review. Do this as often as you are comfortable with, though probably no more than three times a year is best, especially if you're also running client seminars.

The format is also your choice but make sure that you are satisfied that once it arrives, it will stand out from the other marketing material it will share the doormat with, the morning it arrives.

3. Be more disciplined when it comes to referrers

Even if you have never done any marketing you will, just as a natural extension to your day job, know other professionals in your market. Find five minutes to list out those you know and be disciplined enough to ask yourself:

a) Do they actually give you work?

b) Do they give you the type of work you want?

If the answer to both is 'no', it may be time to look for new contacts. If the answer to either is 'they used to', it may be time to have a grown up chat with them.

Once you've 'refined' your current list of contacts, you need to beef it up a little. Choose who you want to work with, who you know is active and who you know has good clients. Run your shortlist past your colleagues to make sure they hit the standards you've set.

If you're a little unsure of who is out there, a quick search on Yell or Google will tell you who the IFAs/tax advisers/wealth managers/accountants in your area are. From there you need to do a bit of research.

There are a couple of short cuts to aid the selection process; if you go past their office and the windows are broken and they're crying out for a lick of paint, they're probably not for you.

Likewise, if there website is outdated or they don't have one at all, they're probably not for you.

Once you have your final list (8-10 is a good target number), get in touch. This can fill some with trepidation but just remember, they have as much to benefit from your meeting as you do, and it's very rare for a fellow professional will turn you down.

If it feels more comfortable, make your initial approach via LinkedIn then follow up by email once they've connected.

Now comes the real discipline.

To stay visible and make sure you're best placed for any future referral opportunities, you need to stay in touch. Have a schedule or diary entries in place to make sure you're seeing them every couple of months.

Once once you win the instruction, you need to provide the highest quality advice wrapped up in the highest level of service. This is the quickest way to achieving your next growth phase; referrals to family and friends.

Douglas McPherson is a director at Size 10 1/2 Boots

He writes a regular blog about marketing for Private Client Adviser