When one partner brings in 90% of the work
About 90% of this firm's revenue came through one referral partner. The partner was good to them, but it meant someone else decided how fast they grew. We took over their cold calling vendor relationship, rebuilt their proposals and gave the founders a simple way to manage every client relationship. Three months in, they were invoicing twice what they had been and relied far less on the partner.
Professional services firm // Client story
2x
monthly invoiced revenue
Their third month with us, against their monthly average before we started.
3
record months in a row
Their best month ever came in our second month together, and they beat it in each of the next two.
1.8x
target, beaten twice
A quarterly target of 1.8x their old revenue, set above their own plan. They beat it two quarters running.
Where the work started.
Clients kept coming back, and the founders had already hired an agency to cold call for them. The agency booked plenty of meetings, but many didn't show, and few of the rest turned into buyers. The founders still wrote most proposals themselves, and almost every new project came through the one partner.
//cold_calling
Calling people who actually pick up
The agency was working hard, but its targeting and messaging weren't quite right, so no-shows were high and few meetings led to qualified buyers. Cold calling works best on people who still answer numbers they don't know. We took over managing the agency, rewrote every script and pointed the calls at procurement teams and manufacturers that matched the firm's best clients. They didn't have to change agencies or spend more, and far more of the meetings turned into projects.
//proposals
Freeing the founders from proposal writing
The founders wrote most proposals themselves, because they knew the work best. We rebuilt the template so it opens with the risk the buyer wants to avoid and offers three options at different prices, then trained the wider team to write and present it. Buyers now choose between options, and average contract size went up. The team drafts the proposals, the founders review them, and the founders have that time back for clients and new business.
//client_relationships
Keeping every client relationship moving
The founders held most of the client relationships and fitted follow-up around delivery work. We built them one place to see every current and prospective client, with the next step for each. We also added a habit to live projects: sketch the next piece of work a quarter of the way through, raise it at the halfway point and ask for the go-ahead at three quarters. The next project now gets raised while the current one is going well.
What the team was left with.
By the time we stepped back, leads had doubled, more of them were converting and contracts were larger. They kept the improved calling program, a proposal template the team runs without the founders, and one place to track every client relationship. Most of all, they left with a business that's in control of its own growth.
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