Marketing consultant Bernie Siben told about 50 members of the Society for Marketing Professional Services (SMPS) Washington DC chapter yesterday (Jan. 27), something they should already know and appreciate — the best way to find new business is to ensure you care, intensively, for your current clients — and that care requires in-person two-way relationships, not form-type e-mail “communications”.
This may be intuitively obvious to most of us, but the challenge occurs when architectural, engineering and construction service providers fail to appreciate the different challenges in client relationships and providing the actual technical service.
Siben says the he learned of the disconnect between AEC industry service providers and their clients when he invited industry participants to tell them what they thought the clients wanted.
The service providers and consultants thought what really counts are providing high quality technical services, completing the work within budget and keeping on schedule. Siben says clients actually take these elements for granted — they are obvious and clients simply assume that any service provider able to make the qualification short list of an RFP will provide these benefits.
Instead, Siben said, clients most clearly value “Providing a high-quality project experience”, keeping promises, “doing what you say you are going to do”, and “providing complete and accurate project communications.”
He emphasised that even in public sector controlled environments, decision-makers have discretionary power. “When you get to the stage of being on the short list at a RFP, when you are making your presentation, your audience knows you have the technical capability to do the job — they want to assess whether they would enjoy working with you.” And, in many cases, they have already made their decision based on previous experience.
Siben cited one example where an airport authority manager had discretionary authority to grant projects under $25,000 (a significant amount in the 1980s), without putting work out for tender. When Siben and one of his colleagues met the manager, they discovered that the airport authority manager had a 14-year-old child who could play competitive tennis at the highest level, but didn’t have anyone to practice with. Siben’s manager realized an employee within their organization had just this ability — and so help set up a weekly practice session with the manager’s child. Both enjoyed the experience “and we won every bit of discretionary work offered by the Airport Authority” while the relationship continued.
Siben also pointed out that once RFPs are posted publicly, pubic agency personnel are restricted in how they can communicate to bidders. Questions seeking clarification of details need to be presented in writing, he said, and everyone including all your competitors can see the results. But if you have a connection with the authority, and can meet and talk with the decision-makers before the bid becomes public, you can discover what really matters, and then frame your proposal accordingly — and your competition won’t have an idea of what is happening.
Siben’s presentation reflects basic points that most people in the industry understand intuitively, but seem to have trouble connecting when they move from their real world of delivering services to marketing for new business (and they think they get it when discovering repeat and referral business, but often leave the essential good vibes of current jobs to chance, rather than systematic practice). The fundamental point here is that your relationships developed during projects are the cornerstones for future business, and your true understanding of your clients’ needs and wants counts far more than your technical knowledge or design expertise (though your business or practice obviously has to have these skills — at a truly high level – to even participate in the marketplace.)
But how do you leverage these insights to find new business, either in new markets, or with entirely new clients.? I’ll offer some observations in tomorrow’s posting, when I explore the underlying reasons for my visit to Washington.