How content amplifies word of mouth and referrals
For most consulting firms, word of mouth and referrals are the lifeblood of their business. They do good work. As a result they are referred to others or hired for repeat business.
While a business built on word of mouth and referrals is a great signal of the quality of your business, it is risky. At some point, you have to recognize that the primary revenue stream of your business is outside of your control.
In this article, I am going to share how content marketing is the perfect next step for a consulting firm who has built their business on referrals and word of mouth.
How word of mouth happens
While word of mouth often seems like a very intangible form of winning new business, it's actually quite systematic.
You build up trust with an individual through either networking or doing great work for them.
That individual encounters someone else facing a similar challenge in their day.
The individual remembers you enough that they choose to refer you when they hear someone who has a problem that you can solve.
While this is simple at the core, the hard part is step 3. It is holding mindshare in an individual’s mind so they remember you and think to refer you.
Content keeps you top of mind
The biggest way the content will help amplify your word of mouth and referrals is by keeping you top of mind. Even a small trickle of content such as one article per month, or 1-2 LinkedIn posts per week is enough to keep you visible in someone’s world.
The key is that people keep seeing you, keep hearing from you, and as a result keep thinking about you.
Then when that situation pops up where they encounter someone else with a problem, they think of you.
Or, when they are suddenly facing a problem you can solve, they turn to you.
Slow and steady is better than nothing at all
A majority of consulting firms we come across are producing zero content. They are not writing articles, publishing on LinkedIn, or producing content.
Yet when many of them think about producing content, they feel like they need to jump into this cadence of publishing weekly.
In reality, for most consulting firms, publishing one article per month is going to be enough to make a drastic impact on your business.
In an industry where most firms publish nothing, even a slow and steady stream of content will put you ahead of the pack.
That one article per month will help keep you top of mind with your network.
In addition, you can then take that single article and repurpose it into LinkedIn posts that will populate your feed on a regular basis. With LinkedIn, you will need a content cadence of at least 2-3 days per week in order to ensure your posts are actually seen by a majority of your network.
But once again, neither of these are huge leaps forward. They are simply a slow and steady drip of content that is meant to keep you top of mind.
Dwindling word of mouth is a silent killer of consulting business
While you can see the impact of word of mouth and referrals on your business, what you can't see is the affects of it dwindling.
What opportunities have you missed out on because people were not thinking of you?
To that question, you can never know the answer.
Yet our clients tell us time and time again how publishing leads to a noticeable uptick in their business. It's not always extremely traceable, but they find themselves entering more sales conversations as long as they are publishing content.
And on the flip side, we have spoke to many consultants who have said:
“Several years ago I was publishing content on a regular basis. It was great and honestly I saw the impact it had on my business. We saw more referrals. We were hired for new projects. And in general saw a lot of opportunities open up as a result. Over the past few years I've been too busy to write. The old content is still fuelling us to an extent but I can feel it starting to wear off. I know we need to get back into creating more content as it was quite impactful.”
Content will amplify your reputation
If your firm already has a great reputation, then content will only amplify that message. It will keep you top of mind with your prospects and increase the word of mouth and referrals. As a result, it will help you grow your business.
