Boutique professional service firms need to listen to their clients intentionally. One effective way to do that is a client advisory board. On this episode, Luke Johnson, CEO & Co-owner at Katalyst shares how he launched a client advisory board recently. Luke shares the early benefits, some mistakes to avoid, and how, exactly, he runs his.
Generating revenue from sources other than the billable hour is a key part of scaling a consulting firm. On this episode, Robin Way, Founder & CEO at Corios, shares how he is generating revenue from training products, licensing tools, and generating reports. He will talk about how he went from a single source of revenue- the billable hour- to four sources of revenue.
Someday you will sell your firm. Afterall, none of us can run our firms from the afterlife. When your time to exit comes, you will need to know what your firm is worth. The tool often used to calculate a purchase price is called a QOE, or the quality of earnings report. On this episode, QOE expert Elliott Holland, Founder & CEO at Guardian Due Diligence, will help founders understand what a QOE is, when it is needed, who creates one, how it gets used, and why founders need to get familiar with it.
Hiring, or promoting, a person into an executive role often requires the Founder to offer an equity incentive to the key employee. This requirement drives a need to understand what the firm is worth today, and how much of the future value should be shared with the key employee. On this episode, Michael Daoud, CEO at Visus LLC, discusses how he valued his firm, and how he structured the equity share with the key employee.
The design of your boutique’s organization can either aid or hurt a successful exit. Any astute buyer will factor this into their decision-making. This is why simple integrations are attractive. They are cheap, quick, and have a high success rate. On this episode, Mike Desjardins, CEO at ViRTUS, shares their firm’s best practices for a successful reorganization, including the much-awaited backstory of how his team redesigned key roles to keep their top individual contributors.
The quality of the fees earned by your firm is a top priority as you scale and exit. All revenue is not good revenue. Poor fee quality leads to poor margins. On this episode, Phil Alves, CEO at DevSquad, shares how he improved margins and fee quality by repositioning his firm.
Acquirers buy the management teams first and the boutique firm second. The due diligence process is heavily weighted to assess the quality of the management team to make a sound investment. On this episode, Amy Pyles, President at Saxum, examines her experience as the person replicating the founder. She will share what has worked and what didn’t work and how they continued to collaborate.
It is harder to sell a service than it is to sell a product. But the more you know about your client, the easier it is to market and sell your service. The better you understand them, the better you can serve them. On this episode, Jay Mitchell, President & Founder of Mereo LLC, shares how his team built their Ideal Client Profile and the results of this highly targeted approach.
When starting a boutique, it is best to begin with the problem you will solve for clients. Why? There are lots of boutiques with solutions that no one is going to buy. On this episode, Kyle Romaniuk, CEO & ECD at Vantage Studios, sheds light on the process of truly understanding the problem he’s solving for clients.
Generating new revenue from existing clients is critical to scaling a boutique professional services firm. This requires developing new services based on the needs of your clients. On this episode, Beth Trejo, CEO + Founder of Chatterkick, takes us on a journey of launching a new service line. Beth shares how she identified the client need, validated the opportunity and launched the new service model.
