TRP 244: Tips For Making a Pitch with Scott Love

[00:00:10] You're listening to The Rainmaking Podcast, hosted by high stakes headhunter, author, and professional speaker, Scott Love.

[00:00:23] Hey, this is Scott Love with The Rainmaking Podcast. Thank you for joining me today on this episode. And today's episode is a little bit different. This is what I call a solo cast. This is me sharing ideas and not necessarily having a guest on the show because I've learned some things within the last year or two that I wanted to share with you.

[00:00:41] So about once a quarter, I'm going to come on here and share some ideas. Also, if you're new to the show, this is the only podcast that is focused exclusively on rainmaking, client development, and related topics. It's not geared to any one industry, but it leans towards those in professional services. It means that you're a professional and you have to get work. You have to sell your services and you might not use the word sell.

[00:01:05] You might do what we call client development, which means that you're building thought leadership. You're being visible. You're building a brand, a personal brand, even though you might be in a firm that has a good amount of brand equity in the institution itself. You yourself need to have your own brand so that you get the call. You get invited to pitch work and it enhances your relationships with your existing clients. And it makes it easier for you to get business from existing clients, more of it and new clients as well.

[00:01:32] Anyways, we're going to talk about a model of making a pitch. Now, this show, as always, is sponsored by Leopard Solutions. It's a legal data provider. The offerings that they have are Firmscape and Leopard BI, Business Intelligence. So check it out. The show notes always have the links for their offering. If you're in the legal world, check it out. And I appreciate their long-term sponsorship and my long-term relationship with Leopard Solutions as well.

[00:01:58] By the way, other developments. We have the YouTube channel of the site linked in the show notes as well. We're doing a lot more with video. So you can subscribe on YouTube and you're going to start seeing video of all of our guests. And we're going back in time to put some of the past shows on in video as well. So if that's a modality that you like, check it out. Now, today we're talking about enhancing the pitch.

[00:02:23] When you present yourself to a prospective client, you've got to have a succinct and potent way that you describe what you do. And then you go from there. Now, we're not going to get into asking questions, probing for the need. We're going to talk about actually making that pitch. Now, listen to some of the past shows we've had on making the pitch. Listen to the one with Terry Eisner. He did a fantastic job. It was probably about two months ago.

[00:02:51] But let's say you're in the room and now you have to make that pitch of your organization. And one thing I'll tell you, I spoke at a conference of elite professionals in a very unique niche of professional services. Think of it like the Million Dollar Roundtable. It was two weeks ago in Las Vegas. These are people that have been out there and they've seen it all. And they know exactly what's going on within their niche. And we talked about how it's becoming more increasingly difficult because of all the chatter.

[00:03:19] I think in professional services, it's become hyper competitive. So there's more people getting into it. So you need to be able to show that you're a little bit different than everybody else. And all marketing begins with distinction. In fact, one of my favorite shows is Mad Men. I think I've watched it four or five times. Yes, I know there's people behaving badly in that. But the business lessons are pretty good. And the main character of the show, Don Draper, he's based on a real person whose name was Rosser Reeves.

[00:03:46] Now, Rosser Reeves was an advertising executive decades ago. He's the one that coined the phrase, the unique selling proposition. Our product has something unique and that uniqueness is going to be what we talk about with that. I'm going to propose that you need to go a little bit deeper than that. It's not just what's different about you, what's distinct about you. What can you say about yourself that nobody else can say about themselves?

[00:04:12] Now, this is an interesting concept because I don't think a lot of people have thought of it this way. If you're in a hyper competitive niche, what can you say about yourself that nobody else can say about themselves? Now, I ask my law firm recruiting clients this question when I get to know them. Last week, I was in New York meeting with a new client. I was invited in to meet the recruiting team, the leadership, head of the private equity practice. And I told them, we've got to find some things that are unique and not just unique, but distinct.

[00:04:40] And sometimes you might not even be able to see that distinction until we dig around a little bit. And so I'm going to set it up in terms of one, three and five. One. You need to find one point of distinction. When you make that pitch to your client prospect after you've asked the questions, built rapport, et cetera, et cetera. Here you are. Let me tell you about our firm and how I can solve your problem. Let me tell you about my practice, how I can solve your problem. What's distinct about me is number one.

[00:05:07] What's distinct about me is that I'm the only attorney in the world that is niche within private equity and whatever industry niche that is. And, you know, advertising, whatever it is. Just find something that you can say that nobody else can say about themselves and start with that. Sometimes you can create distinction. That's what I did about a year and a half ago. I've been headhunting for 30 years and I got into legal 15 years ago and I recruit partners. But about a year and a half ago, nobody's calling me back.

[00:05:37] Why is that? Because it got oversaturated. 2021, everybody said, I want to be a legal recruiter. So all the candidates I'm trying to reach out to, they're getting all these calls from all these people and all of a sudden the walls go up. Here's another call from a random headhunter. I'm not interested. Take me off your list. How do I get past that? I'd recommend reading the book Pitch Anything by Oren Clav because he talks about the walls that go up. What does that mean? Why is that? Because we want to be safe.

[00:06:02] Smart, sophisticated, successful people, they become more guarded the more successful they are because everybody's chasing at them to sell them something. So the walls instantly go up. How do we get their attention? How do we quickly have a chance to build trust? And what Oren Clav says is a shiny object, something that's different. Oh, that catches my attention. Now you've got their attention. What's distinct about me is that. So what I did, I created my own distinction. I'm not telling you.

[00:06:30] I mean, I'm kind of like my experience is kind of the lab that I use when I speak to business groups about client development. For example, there's a lot of speakers out there that speak professionally. I'm the only one in the world. That recruits high-level corporate and finance partners but also speaks professionally on that. So anyways, when I make that pitch to candidates, I'm the only one in the world that's deeply niched in finance and corporate. So you can actually change your strategy to create that distinction. Years ago, I was advising a staffing company in Southeast Florida.

[00:07:00] She said, I'm getting beat up on rates from manpower, Kelly Services. She did secretaries, administrative assistants, low-level staff in organizations, important people, but it's kind of commoditized. And it becomes all about price. And when you're competing on price, you know what that story is. It's the race to the bottom. Who can be the lowest? So I advised her to change up her niche a little bit. And I coached her for a series of weeks. And I came up with this.

[00:07:26] Instead of doing 10 or 15 different positions, do just one. Executive assistants. And build in quality. Not just executive assistants, but executive assistants that are bilingual and have a four-year college degree. Now you've got quality. Is price an issue? No. Now you can charge a premium fee because of the value that you deliver. And the fact that you can say, I'm the only one in Southeast Florida that recruits executive assistants who have a four-year degree and are bilingual. Boom.

[00:07:56] You can create the distinction that quickly. So one, three, five. What's distinct about you? What's distinct about us is this. And then three points of uniques. Three uniques. I think I got that from the EOS book. Three uniques. What are three things that are unique about you? It could be internal protocols. It could be stories that you build. It could be metrics.

[00:08:23] What's unique about us is that we have one of the top rankings in terms of metrics associated with culture. Something like that. And then five. What's the five? Those are five storyboards. What's a storyboard? A storyboard is an anecdote. It's literally a story. It's not a physical board that you carry into your meeting. But it's an anecdote about something that you can tell people that relates to what you do, but really what relates to what their problem is.

[00:08:53] And I'd recommend collecting about ten storyboards. But really you want to have five that are kind of your core storyboards that you use in your conversation with your prospective clients. And it doesn't have to be one, two, three, four, five. It can be as you have a discussion and you get a little bit closer to your client prospect. Well, you know what's interesting? We had a client with the exact same issue. This was the concern that they had, but this is what we were able to do. Now, that's built on Robert Cialdini's principle of social proof.

[00:09:22] People make decisions based on decisions that others have made. That's why whenever I make a placement in a firm, I keep in touch with the partner I placed and I get stories. For example, I had a partner that strategically made a decision to join a firm as counsel because the book wasn't there. The firm did exactly what they promised to him and within two years he became a partner. That's a story that I use with a lot of people.

[00:09:48] That's what I try to do with my recruiting firm clients is find several storyboards. It takes work. It takes time. I'm high maintenance. I'm high touch, but I fly out. I meet with people. I meet with their chief marketing officer when I'm working on a retainer basis and I get to know those few firms really, really closely. They become my anchor clients. And these are ideas I'm giving you no matter what niche you work in that you can come up with stories and storyboards by getting closer to your clients.

[00:10:17] Now, what I'd recommend is this. Three action steps I'm going to give you as we bring this to a conclusion. Number one, ask some of your closest clients. People that are friends, but if they're friends and they're clients, there's still more clients than friends. You get that. Ask them. I'm working on my business plan. And I'm trying to find something that's unique and distinct about me. What is it that you see as my value? Why did you hire me?

[00:10:45] If there were three things that you would tell someone that's on the fence about working with me, what would those three things be? By asking questions that way, you get some really good data and you can start building those storyboards that way as well. Number one, what can you say about yourself that nobody else can say about them within your niche? Number two, what are three points of unique? It could be I'm a member of a trade association or it could be authorship. What's distinct about me is I'm this. What's unique about what I do is that this, this, and this.

[00:11:14] It could be a philosophy. It could be a value system. We sometimes what I'll do with some of my clients when I get to understand their core values, that becomes a talking point. Something that's not just unique, but it can also be something I use in my storyboard of potential conversation pieces when I'm pitching their opportunity to prospective candidates. You can take those same ideas no matter what you do. This is what's distinct about me. Three uniques. What's unique about you.

[00:11:43] And then come up with at least five different storyboards. I'd recommend come up with 10 to 15 and take some time. Ask your clients who are your friends. What do you think is distinct about me? What do you think is unique about me? Why did you hire me? And then start working on some of those storyboards. Now, this is planning time. This is what you do on Friday afternoon when, okay, things are kind of winding down. Or maybe Sunday night as you're working on your strategy. Spend some time in the planning room.

[00:12:13] And I promise you that you'll see a difference in how you communicate to people and you will see an increase in how they respond. I remember giving this presentation to a banking group years ago of community banks. Then you would have thought that I gave them the gold scrolls because they'd never heard anything like that. But they were hurting. They were trying to work in a hyper-competitive business with a lot of change. And I gave them some tactical ideas. It doesn't matter what type of service that you work in.

[00:12:41] I've advised people in financial services on this, too, when I've spoken at some financial services conferences as well in the past. Anyways, I want to thank you for taking time to listen to this. I hope these ideas make sense. If there are any guests that you have that you think would be really good on the show, please reach out. You can always reach out to therainmakingpodcast.com and find us there. And if you've got a minute, if there is a guest on this podcast that really said something that made a difference for you,

[00:13:10] please go to Apple Podcasts and give us a nice five-star review and mention that guest by name. I'd certainly appreciate that. And I know my guests would also. Thanks for listening. And I'll see you next week. Take care. Thank you for listening to The Rainmaking Podcast. For more information about our recruiting services for international law firms, visit our website at attorneysearchgroup.com.

[00:13:37] To inquire about having Scott speak at your next convention, conference, sales meeting, or executive retreat, visit therainmakingpodcast.com.