Mark 0:19

Hello everyone, and welcome to Breaking Biz Dev. I'm Mark. That's John. Hello John. How are you today?

John 0:27

Hello, mark. I'm doing well. Decided to shake it up. I'm inside this, uh, coworking space and usually I'm on the other side of the room. I'm over here that's got this comfy chair.

Mark 0:35

Yeah, I'm coming to you live. Not really recorded from my lovely basement again, John. So one of these days I'll, I'll find my way outta here.

John 0:47

I thought, you know, it might might be just interesting to shake things up.

Mark 0:49

Yeah. Good, good. I probably should do that. maybe I'll adopt your, you did an episode recently with your Men on the street thing. Maybe I'll grab a microphone and just start wandering around the neighborhood,

John 0:58

There you go.

Mark 0:59

in, in lovely Seattle. really funny. So today is a topic that is near and dear to my heart because it's all about them. It's all about the clients. this is such, such a meaty topic. it's so critical that professional services firms adopt a client-centric mindset in what they do. I think, uh, there's a, there's just a ton of room for improvement with this.

John 1:31

You, this is a topic that we've talked about in the past, on past episodes, the mindset of sales. and I think this is another mindset shift that organizations have to take. It's very similar but a little bit different, and so I'm excited to unpack it today. I.

Mark 1:46

Good, good. Yeah. we're gonna talk a little bit about what this thing is, what the mindset shift is, you know, some of the, pitfalls. We're gonna blow the dust off of our marketing and sales continuum that we've mentioned in the past. That sort of, the ones or the things on the marketing end fives are the things that are kind of on the sales end. And we'll kinda walk through that whole continuum with some, some examples on how throughout all your marketing and selling you can be. More customer centric and hopefully, um, by the end of this we'll wrap it up in a nice little bow so that everyone can take it home and think, oh yeah, now we can, now we can really, truly be a customer centric professional services firm.

John 2:34

Yeah, what I love about this topic is it really kind of flips everything on its head.

Mark 2:40

Yeah, it does.

John 2:41

Instead of focusing on extracting value from your clients in the form of revenue, this shift is, you know, orienting us to look at how are we delivering value to the clients, based on not only their, their professional endeavors, but also like their personal aspirations and their career aspirations as well.

Mark 3:01

yeah, that's right. so many firms, and I've said this before, John, I've said it to you, I've said it to others. Many professional services firms talk about being client centric, but.

John 3:13

Yeah.

Mark 3:13

they lose track of it. ultimately show up in the work that they do. and one of the things that I've kind of done in the past is just take a, take a moment in time with some of the people and organizations I work with and say, you are a professional services firm. You exist. To serve. That is the only reason that your profession, your industry, your organization that you currently in your career exist is to serve your clients. The results that you achieve are theirs. Obviously you have an influence on those results, but they are not yours. You do not own the bridge you engineered. You do not own the building that you designed. You do not own the campaign or the business results that your client achieved from some marketing campaign. The results are not yours. They are owned. By your clients and your job is to help them achieve and maybe even exceed the expected results from the work you do together. So yeah, John, if, if I could just yell that all day long, I would, because so many firms look at, it's like, look at me, me, me, me. It's like, it's never you. It's always them.

John 4:38

your analogy of just writing professional services on the whiteboard and pointing to those two words, uh, it just, it's so, uh, so obvious, but yet so many firms get it wrong. So we're gonna, we're gonna unpack that today, but first, let's talk about this mindset shift and what needs to happen. And then we can talk about why firms, why so many firms have a hard time with it.

Mark 5:01

it all starts with, sort of being too shortsighted in that you are focused on the tasks and the deliverables that you have sitting in front of you, and you're not focused on the results or the ultimate sort of impact that your work, will achieve. it isn't about. You you know, your deliverables to your clients, the work that you do with them is not the ultimate result. That's sure you're getting paid for that, but ultimately, really from your client's perspective, they are paying you to help them achieve these big results and, attain whatever impact that they want to have. So, that's. That's what it's all about. You are simply there to walk alongside them and help them achieve those results.

John 5:50

And a good spot check on this and how empathetic your culture really is, is to take a look at your case studies, your case stories, and are they very like, first person we did this, we did that, or are they written in a way where you're adopting a more. Client-centric mentality in the form of you're guiding your clients through this process, you're shepherding them and these are the results that they achieved. And, that, that would be a good place to kind of just like spot check it.

Mark 6:21

That's, we, we've talked about that in the past. I've got that, you know that four-part client success story framework where you discuss the client's situation, the needs that arose for them to engage with you. Then you walk alongside them, part three. And then part four is the results, what they achieved from your work together. And hopefully it's all about them. and hopefully you have other clients that you know, or prospective clients that come along and read those client success stories and they say, well, wow, I wanna achieve those results. and it never really sounds like. This is all the stuff that we did as the consultant. It just sounds like the results that the client achieved, which is the best way to tell how you work with clients.

John 7:10

Here's what our clients did, and you can do the same thing that's implied, just, you know, from, from the stories. So it, it shifts from, that mindset can't, you can't have that mindset after you deliver that work. You have to have that mindset while you're doing the work and even before that, while you're developing the business. So it's a shift from like, not how much we can sell, it's what does the client need to win. I thought it was worth bringing back this short one minute clip from Mel Lester, whom we had on a few, a few episodes ago. but I just wanted to bring this in real quick. Here's Mel Lester talking about the servant leadership mindset.

Mel Lester 7:51

So here's my advice to seller doers. Stop selling and start serving. If our business development efforts are primarily for the benefit of our firm and for us, uh, well join the crowd. that's where most folks are. But if you want to distinguish yourself and gain greater trust from clients. Then define business development as seeking more opportunities to serve, namely clients. And so if you, we need to recast this role of seller to not just doing it motivated by our own needs, which is what is natural to fall into. We had the pressure to go out and sell, right? We need the business and I need to be successful as a seller or doer. But what I've found is the greatest, the best path to success as a seller is to focus on those that you are approaching with, uh, offering to help.

John 8:57

And we're back.

Mark 8:58

Yeah, it, that was good. I, I appreciate the reprise on that. I could listen to that stuff all day long. And you can tell when Mel talks about it, whether he is being interviewed, you just know this is kind of part of who he is. This is his identity. He's, you know, it's his, he is, he he is completely embraced and understood throughout his entire career that it is, The role of the professional services consultant or firm to serve the client. So way to go,

John 9:27

That's what changed his whole, whole outlook on his career in sales.

Mark 9:30

Yeah, yeah. Way to go. Yeah. I love it. I love it.

John 9:33

Awesome. So, alright, so I think that that's a great encapsulation of this mindset shift and what needs to happen within firms. mark, let's move on to, where do firms get it wrong? Why don't more firms adopt this mindset if it's, if it leads to so much success.

Mark 9:49

It is hard. This is difficult. It's be because you actually have to be looking beyond, the work to be done, right? the, you know, handing off the, your wh what whatever your, your stuff is, because sometimes it's up to the client ultimately to take that work. Whatever it may be. And then, and then, achieve whatever results they want to achieve. They need to execute on whatever you're doing with them. So it's, it's, uh, difficult and we are then having to change our focus from ourselves to our clients and. observe them, walking along this path, whether it's continuing alongside us or whether they have to take it and run it, run from there. it's, uh, it's a challenge. It's easier for us just to kind of do this in a, transactional way. Just, okay, you need this, we do this. There you go. There's your little package with a nice little bow on it and off you go. It's easier to think about it that way. It's much more difficult to think about it, as this sort of much longer term, more complex, sometimes convoluted process of I. Identifying, focusing and working on this problem or challenge together, and then ultimately seeing it all the way through to these results. Because the results a lot of times, are pretty far down the road. particularly for some of the firms that I work with, from the, the moments of hello to the time the client actually achieves what they want to achieve can be like years, right? Many years.

John 11:29

and therein lies the power of, you know, consistency in maintaining that relationship over a long period of time. And you mentioned that. Most folks view these relationships as transactional. They're a client. We perform services for them, they pay us, but really the longest lasting client relationships are when it goes beyond just that transactional, whatever the contract is, it's understanding like what's going on in their personal lives. What's going on in their, what's the relationship like between that person and their manager, or what are their career aspirations? These all factor into the value that you're able to deliver if you're able to understand your client and walk a mile in their shoes.

Mark 12:17

Yeah, and obviously we're here to, to beat up and, and break down business development, marketing and selling. And this starts there, right? This starts, the very first few inter interactions are these marketing interactions in these sales interactions. So, if your organization is doing this right. You are approaching these relationships in a client-centric way from a marketing standpoint and from a selling standpoint, which means that, you're gonna stay focused on them and their desired outcomes all the way through. And that sets the precedent for service delivery when you're actually kind of doing the work and sort of post-contract that, you know, you obviously want the client to succeed and then hopefully they come back for more. and you had written here that, you know. One of the key things to focus on, one of the key metrics to focus on is their outcomes. And inevitably, we always just end up focusing on our revenue. That's important. Sure. But we wanna make sure that our revenue is supporting their outcomes because it gets hollow,

John 13:24

That's exactly right. That revenue becomes unsustainable if you're not delivering on the client outcomes. and then I, I guess like another part that could be broken within, you know, where these firms get it wrong, and we talked about this, it's like. Being able to empathize and have those relationships with these, with your clients, and understanding those and uncovering like the points of conflict, the pain points that can't happen if internally your teams are siloed, your delivery team isn't talking with your sales team, with your marketing team. So if all of these teams are interfacing with the client, but they're not sharing information, that's another place where a lot of these firms get it wrong.

Mark 14:03

Very good.

John 14:04

So we've talked about, I think we've beat up firms who get it wrong. Uh, let's, let's, uh, let's

Mark 14:10

Well, it's tough. you know, a actually, one of the thing comes to mind and then let's, let's jump on here. Is that. sometimes, and I mentioned sort of the marketing and selling into things, being client-centric is that one easy thing. And we've touched on this in a previous episode, and I know you're gonna remember the name of the episode better than I Will, John, but it was all about those traps, you know, the

John 14:28

Yeah, your next proposal, it's a trap.

Mark 14:30

Yeah. It's a trap, right? So a lot of times, and it's worth tying this episode to that, that one I think because particularly in the marketing and selling. situation, the client is prompting you, asking, you, requesting, requiring even that you completely focus on yourself and talk about yourself during the whole sort of marketing and selling end of things. So that, and, and they do it without knowing it. because it's kind of just how they're used to, used to doing it. The request for proposal is sent out to these, you know, prospective clients. Prospective consultants, sorry.

John 15:11

And they have to prove to us why we should choose them.

Mark 15:13

they have to prove and they, they talk about, why we're the best and they talk about themselves from page one to page 20 or how whatever the proposal document is, right. And that's a trap because you really have to turn that around and stay focused on the, the client. So if you're able to do that in the marketing and selling end of things, if you're able to. Steer clear of those traps, stay focused on the client. That's a clear indication that you've got at least some of this mindset correct and that when you shift to actually doing the work, you can stay really focused on the, on the client. So that's an easy, that's an easy trap to, to see and then hopefully avoid.

Mark Wainwright 15:55

you're listening to breaking biz dev

John Tyreman 15:57

the podcast that beats up, breaks down, and redefines business development for the professional services firms of tomorrow. Your hosts are John Tyerman, founder of Red Cedar Marketing, the podcast marketing company for experts and professional services firms,

Mark Wainwright 16:11

And Mark Wainwright, principal consultant and founder of Wainwright Insight, the fractional sales manager and sales consultant to professional services firms.

John Tyreman 16:21

If you find this podcast helpful, please help us by following the show and leaving a review on Apple podcasts

Mark Wainwright 16:27

and now back to the show.

John 16:31

You know, I, I mentioned earlier case studies is a good, dipstick test your proposals and looking at how you approach proposals is a, is a great, test on the other side of the sales side. And I think that's a perfect segue to this next segment where. We're gonna bring it back, mark. We're gonna dust off the old marketing and sales continuum. It's been a while. It's been, it was a mainstay early on in the show. And let's bring it back. So for folks who, uh, who haven't heard of this before, or for folks who, don't remember, the marketing and sales continuum is a scale from one to five, and on the one side it's. More on the marketing end of business development, where on the five end of the spectrum it's focused on sales activities. And so what we're gonna do is we're going to take this client success mindset, and we're gonna give you examples of what that looks like across this marketing sales continuum.

Mark 17:25

Yeah. Good. Yeah. So, and a lot of times we will, you know, the ones are the marketing led stuff, the fives are the sales led stuff. When we start working our way towards the middle, we're talking about, you know, twos or like marketing led, sales supported, all that, sort of stuff. A lot of times we'll call out the threes as sort of the messy middle. In this case, I think we're referring to it as, as more of an opportunity for some really great collaboration between the two. So. that's a good place to start. So why don't you start off with some of the, the examples that would, you know, indicate that you are a client-centric firm at a one, like on, on the marketing end of things.

John 18:03

I teased it earlier, I think case stories and client success stories, adopting that and incorporating. Storytelling that features the client as the hero of this, of the story and your firm as more of a guide or supporting character. that would be an example of what this client success mindset looks like on the marketing side of things. I think another example on that end is when your firm actively promotes your client's work. So not just working them into your, your marketing, but when you are actively promoting your client and, and putting them in the spotlight.

Mark 18:42

Yeah. I love that. I think that's a fantastic example. Just, you know, the, the, there's a clear indicator that, you are there to support, you know, you're their biggest fan, their biggest cheerleader. yeah, that's, and I can just imagine all the examples of, your clients are trying to do hard things out there, and, you're just, you're supporting them in everything you do, including your own marketing, which is fantastic.

John 19:04

So if we move along this marketing and sales continuum, let's, let's go into this two area where we're starting to lead into marketing led, but sales supported activities. And so I think this one, a, a good example would be C sending client feedback surveys. In regular intervals, whether that's, you know, triggered by certain moments in the client journey or if it's time-based. doing that on some sort of interval and collecting that information is a great practice.

Mark 19:35

Fantastic. I love it. And this, this, um, this client interaction survey feedback stuff can be put across a good bit of this continuum you could be doing in a one-to-one fashion or sort of, from a marketing team fashion. But, yeah, it's, this is, this is perfect. Constantly seeking feedback. And this is something, you know, again, that when we touched on it earlier about why this is so difficult is that sometimes. Professional services firms are afraid to go seek honest, genuine feedback on their work. 'cause lo and behold, something, something might come up, but I always think it's best to kind of meet it head on. So this is a, a fantastic one.

John 20:15

and on a related note, and it's because I've sat in this seat at prior stops, it's using that survey information or information you collect from secondary sources to really be intentional and proactive about learning more about common client pain points. So if you're surveying your audience and you're asking about their challenges, you know, what's the proportion of clients that have X as a challenge versus Y, and then what's the relative priority of those challenges? That can really help you kind of understand, where your services slot in, in relation to other kinds of business challenges. Then what other kinds of business challenges does do your services address? So it's, it's a good exercise to go through that and to understand it. Understand client pain points in aggregate.

Mark 21:05

Yeah. Fantastic. I think that's a great one. Alright, we found ourselves to the middle here. John, what do we do with this? This number three?

John 21:14

Yeah. Like you mentioned earlier, mark, I think this is a great place for marketing and sales teams and delivery teams to come together. The people that are delivering on the work, the people that are marketing the firm, the people that are selling and exchange ideas, exchange information, exchange anecdotes from marketing surveys, quotes from interviews between salespeople and prospects, transcripts from meetings between, account managers and clients, people on the delivery team. So this is a place where people can get together and share notes, exchange ideas, and cross-pollinate information.

Mark 21:50

Good. I like it.

John 21:52

And so I think another, you know, a byproduct of that would be coming out of that exchange of ideas and information will be inevitably, and it should be a tightening of the qualification criteria and the of the ideal client profile.

Mark 22:09

Yeah.

John 22:10

So who does our best client look like? And then that's constantly evolving. But if you're marketing your sales and your delivery teams, or the people that are in those roles are constantly exchanging ideas, I think you get closer and closer to what your ideal client looks like and you're a better able to proactively anticipate what their challenges are and understand them before, before you even need to go seek it out.

Mark 22:34

Good. Great point. I totally agree.

John 22:37

Alright, so Mark, I want to pass you the speaking stick. So like if we, if we were to wade into the sales end of things, what are some different examples of, you know, how that client success mindset bubbles up in maybe a sales led but marketing supported initiative?

Mark 22:54

This is, you know, again, we can kind of use those client success stories in a, in a hyper personal targeted one-to-one conversation. Where in a selling situation, instead of listing all the bullet points or going off on this monologue about all the services that your firm offers, is that you start to use, examples of previous clients telling stories about their. Success. and that is a, a powerful tool to be used in these, these one-to-one conversations. Plus how I talk about so frequently about this whole sort of understanding thing is that if you really want to be a client centric. Firm you are employing all this. I think you've referred to it as tactical empathy. These like deep listening and active listening skills so that when you get to the point where you're proposing. Solutions approaches to the work to be done that it's really reflective of the client. It's not just your boilerplate stuff. It's not the same old, same old. It's something that's hyper specific to what their needs are. So, yeah, absolutely. And, and, and you're, you're using all of these active listening skills right there, so yeah, so that's a four. And then I have, even more stuff when you go to the five.

John 24:19

Yeah, the, the TI love tactical empathy. and that's, uh, never split the difference. I wanna just give attribution to Chris Voss in that book. Um, mirroring and labeling and applying FBI negotiation tactics to sales. That's, that's really what we're doing here. But, yeah, so what, what are some examples on the, on the fives?

Mark 24:39

So, so the five is, you know, to the nth degree, we are using the, the, the stated, explicit, desired outcomes of our clients to use as sort of the North star for our proposals for our sales conversations. Getting everyone super clear on what, what ultimately they're trying to achieve here. It's, you know, from, if you're an architect out there, it's just not the, it's not the building. It's what's going to, what's going to happen, right? What does the building do for the people who use it, who live there, who work there? who occupy that, that, that place? what does that success look like? And let's use that as our North Star, right? and then I think one other really, full, extreme example of all of this, kind of the ultimate achievement, achievement of client centricity in a sort of sales, perspective. Is incorporating options into your proposals that, use performance based metrics on your compensation. it's actually putting some skin in the game, right? So I think that's an ultimate expression because a lot of times. We're hesitant to do that 'cause we're not really sure the work that we're gonna do is gonna help them achieve, achieve this sort of like future vision that they have. But. If we're good at what we do, if we're confident in it, if we know that we can walk alongside this client through the ups and downs and the, you know, the hiccups and the problems in here and there, and actually get them to this place, this vision that they achieve in the future, why not put some performance based, sort of. compensation incentives or, parameters or metrics into our proposal. So yeah, I think that's the one that really says we're ready to walk alongside you until you've really achieved what you're shooting for, not just handing you the documents or the keys or the, whatever it is, and saying we're done.

John 26:34

Love that. Love that. Performance based pricing, money back guarantees. You know, these are all examples of how you can incorporate that and put a little bit more skin in the game. Love that. Mark. Uh, we've got a couple other, other bullets of just kind of like different ways that you could put these into practice. like for example, like asking really good questions, right? You know, what's changed since we last spoke. You know, just simple things like that. mark, I think you have like, just a client engagement type of meeting, right? Where you just meet with clients

Mark 27:08

yeah. Regularly.

John 27:09

on the engagement. I thought that was really cool.

Mark 27:11

Yeah. Yeah. And, and, uh, you know, another one we had written here was the, asking for referrals, right? That really shows that, if you are working towards the referral, that really means that you are focused on the client outcomes so that they're really happy with what, what ultimately came of the work you did together, so that they're. Ready to refer you to other people in their world that you could come and help. So, right. Working towards the referral rather than just the deliverable is it's different. It feels different. It looks different. Yeah. And it's much more client-centric.

John 27:49

That's true. 'cause you gotta prove yourself to the client and that you can deliver the outcomes before that ask becomes more likely.

Mark 27:57

Yeah.

John 27:58

You've got here, I think you listed this one, building client journey maps. So I thought that was a really good, embodiment of client centricity because you're being proactive on what that roadmap looks like.

Mark 28:09

yeah. And, and again, it's, it's not, here's all the stuff that we are going to give to you or do for you or whatever. It's, it's mapping out that whole process from A to Z. So that's a, that's a good one.

John 28:22

It it is because not you're thinking about the client and the journey that they need to take, but it's. Built based on experience. You've been there before. You know what that roadmap looks like, and just being able to lay it out instills confidence in, in, in yourself, through the eyes of your client.

Mark 28:40

Yeah. One of the things I'm really critical of, particularly with the more sort of, technical engineering maybe clients that I work with, is that they often will just lay out sort of, here's the work to be done in a series of fairly technical tasks, and the client has a hard time understanding their role. In all of that, so the client really doesn't understand when they should be intersecting with the consultant. When do I act, when do I let you do your thing? When do we meet? When do we talk? Where are decisions? What are milestones? the client sort of gets lost in that whole, that whole, here's the thing we do first. Here's the thing we do next. Here's the thing that they don't really understand. So. It is my hope that as firms become more and more client centric, that they are making it clearer and clearer for their clients when their clients can and should be interacting with the consultants. You know, here's what we do together. Here's when we do this together at this moment, here's where we make decisions. That sort of thing. So that's a, that's a good one.

John 29:48

So I think this is another great segue into how firms can build a culture internally to kind of support this whole mindset of client centricity. So let's talk about that for a little bit.

Mark 30:00

Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, the, uh, the first one was that, making sure that everybody from the very beginning, from the marketing, excuse me, the marketing end, to the sales end, to delivery end, to, you know, working towards the referrals and, you know, where we, where we're completing that circle coming back around to the marketing and selling thing for future opportunities with those clients. it's everyone's responsibility all the way. throughout that, that, that whole process, and having it be everyone's responsibility needs to be, fueled by. The constant focus on this outcome, right? Everybody knows from the, across the entire organization what this particular client is trying to achieve, right? What ultimate results they want to achieve. Everybody has to know that, not just the, the, maybe the sales folks who heard the client talk about their ultimate vision. Everybody across the entire organization needs to know that stuff.

John 30:58

Yep. And, um, another bullet point here, reward curiosity, not just billable hours. I think we've done a great job in the past, just beating the crap out of the billable hour model. and curiosity bubbles itself, you know, it shows itself in this, in. People that are in different parts of the organization coming together and sharing information and, and asking questions of the sales team, and asking questions of the delivery team and trying to understand the client through the eyes of the other people in the organization. You know, I'll share a story. So I, I worked at an agency called Silverback Strategies. they're outta Washington, DC. And I, they did a, a very good job of doing exactly this. They operated on the EOS entrepreneurial operating system model, and as part of that structure internally, we would have these, these meetings where we would come together and share. Kind of client wins, you know, what worked, how we were able to identify certain opportunities, and I sat in a marketing director's seat, so I wasn't really actively involved in a whole lot of client engagements, but this gave me a window into, some of the challenges, how we're adding value beyond the current scope of engagement. And it was really beneficial because it helped influence the kinds of marketing content that we were creating. The, the positioning, the messaging of the, of the company. So, it can have a really big impact.

Mark 32:29

Yeah, that's a, that, that's a good one. I think that a lot of firms of any size, even small ones, frankly, but particularly, you know, mid-size, larger firms in the professional services firms who, find themselves, you know, use the term siloed, right? That they're, that they're different sort of business functions are not working well together or, or functioning well together. This is a fantastic way for all of those different. business functional areas, service delivery, marketing, selling, heck, even your, you know, finance and accounting, all that stuff. This is a fantastic way to organize yourself if you simply organize yourself around your clients. Your clients don't see silos, your clients don't see your clients see across your organization, and they're, they're this really powerful thread that reaches across all functions in your organization. So if you simply start to build a culture and then start to embrace this mindset shift that it's a fantastic way to break down organizational silos.

John 33:28

And then what are the outcomes? what happens if firms adopt this mindset? What can they expect?

Mark 33:35

Yeah, well, we, we, we touched on it before, right? it's that if we're staying, staying in touch with the clients throughout this whole process, till they achieve their ultimate results, they're gonna be overjoyed. So they're going to come back to you likely for more work. And they're probably also going to connect you with others out there in the world that you can help. And they're gonna say, these guys were fantastic. Yeah, from, from the first moment I spoke to them. Until, you know, we finally achieved what we wanted to achieve. You know, some oftentimes a, a long time later, they were constantly focused on us.

John 34:09

So higher retention rates. Increased client lifetime value. I'm just, since for, for all the people who focus on the bottom line, this, these are the kinds of tangible results you can

Mark 34:20

Absolutely. Absolutely.

John 34:21

Increased opportunities from referrals like you, you mentioned before, we've got another bullet point here. Easier cross sell and upsell. So account expansion.

Mark 34:31

Yeah.

John 34:32

So let's, let's unpack that one a little bit. So why is that, you know, a little bit easier. I know that we've got another whole other episode around cross-sell and upsell, but let's dip our toe in that real quick.

Mark 34:40

Yeah. It, it's just, you know, reduces the friction, it's, it's, uh, if you are able to, show that you've maintained, I. Focus on the client and you know, their initial needs, your proposed solutions, and then the ultimate client results. If you've done that really, really well, it's easier for maybe others inside of that organization. If you're dealing with a client of any size, it's easier for them to see that. They're like, oh yeah, fantastic. These guys were focused on us. And they, they hear the stories that were told that are client-centric stories. so there's just lower friction. With this cross sell and upsell thing because that's really what you're dealing with here. You're dealing with, you know, just, just friction and, if you really stay focused on them, it lowers that.

John 35:28

Okay, so more revenue, higher retention, higher client lifetime value. There's a lot to like by adopting this client Success Client First Mindset. it's really, I mean, it's not a department. I know a lot of firms like to like create this client success department and try to force it upon people, in my opinion. I think that's a broken philosophy. This is a mindset that needs to be instilled at every level of the organization. I.

Mark 35:52

Yeah, and we often say, you know, simple, not easy. I think that people who are listening to this podcast, regardless of what functional area they are, and likely you're on the front end of things in the marketing and selling end of things, you can start to really just reflect on, you know. What does your marketing face look like? Is the, is it the face of the client or is it always the face of your organization? Right. Or what stories are you telling? Are you telling your stories? Are you telling their stories? Right. When you are selling, you know, are you constantly, seeking deeper and deeper understanding? You know, kind of reaching that, that, that sort of point of sort of extreme empathy. And then when you're proposing stuff, are you, are you focused on these big, huge outcomes that the client wants to achieve? And then, heck, are you willing to put some skin in the game?

John 36:38

Yep. And at the end, end of it all, you're growing with your clients, not just because of them.

Mark 36:43

love it. good. John, this is, this is fun. We could talk about this for another, another six hours, but, I think it was a good episode. Until next time.

John 36:51

Until next time.