Although firms often wonder why their marketing efforts fail, it is usually readily apparent once I spend some time with them. Let's take a look at the most frequent blunders, and how they can be avoided.

1. Lack of Firm's Goals

An established, 150-professional firm was flat in revenue and losing some of
its best associates to competitors. When asked about revenue goals, the firm replied they had none.

Without growth goals for the next three years, any positive change would be accidental. Their result of zero growth was predetermined the day they decided they didn't need goals. And without growth goals communicated to the rest of the firm, how could associates be expected to participate in business development?

I insisted the partners of this firm sit down as a group with me to plot out the next three years. Their goal for the following fiscal year was a stretch: 15 percent growth in quality client revenue after experiencing zero growth for years. They reached their goal in six months.

Does your firm have growth goals for the next three years? Are the firm's goals publicized within the firm so that all who might influence the marketing of the firm are made aware of them regularly?

2. Absence of Personal Goals

Everyone expected to participate in the revenue generation must have personal goals. These goals must exceed the stated group goal for cushioning purposes (for example, the firm goal is $1 million of new revenue, the goals of the individual partners and associates has to be greater than one million to allow for those who are not going to do much of anything).

A California firm conducts a year-end retreat where a speaker is brought in to discuss specific ideas to accomplish marketing objectives. At this retreat, all attendees create their personal goal for new business for the following fiscal year. These personal goals are presented to the group, discussed and agreed upon.

Does every person in your firm have personal goals for their part of reaching the firm's growth goals?

3. No Action Plans

How will your partners and associates reach their goals? If these people are reminded of their goals for new business on a regular basis, this very emphasis will cause them to think about accomplishing their goals. But you also need to help them set their plan based on who they are and what they are selling.

Sale of the professional service comes from individuals, partners and associates; the product does not sell itself. As you will not be able to accomplish action plans with all your professionals, concentrate on the ones willing to be coached and guided. Offer it to them, and set regular appointments to monitor progress towards goals.

The California firm mentioned above has all participants begin the process of creating their personal plan of action for the following year in order to reach their goals. Attendees are separated into groups, and the results of this individual planning are presented, discussed and reinforced. Ideas are offered, and participants are allowed to change their plans based on suggestions offered.

A copy of the finalized personal goal and action plan is forwarded to the managing partner, director of marketing and all of the partners of the firm. The marketing director then contacts each person for whom a plan exists and offers to set an appointment to review their plan and to set bi-monthly meetings to review progress and offer suggestions.

What are you doing to help your partners and associates plan their personal marketing actions and then keep them on track throughout the year?

4. Hampering Personal Motivation

Professional service firms often believe they are exempt from people management issues. People are given tasks to do and are expected to carry them out.

Often, there is little of the positive feedback that managers in real businesses dispense daily.

I did a program for a large firm last year and was approached by a young woman on the first break. She brought in one of the firm's largest clients when she'd joined seven years before, a friend of the family who was the in-house counsel at a Fortune 1000 company.

This resulted in an engagement and billing of over $1 million the first year. This woman also reported that not one partner commented on her helping land this client. She was not compensated, thanked or acknowledged.

"I haven't done any marketing since then," she added.

Although most associates will never be in a position to make this kind of golden introduction, the vast majority of associates, and even partners, who go out of their way to market their firm are rarely acknowledged. Lack of psychological reinforcement leads to lack of participation in the marketing process, and to lack of marketing results.

What does your firm do to encourage, motivate, and reward non-partners for participating in and excelling at the firm's marketing effort?

5. Not Providing Effective Training

The majority of professionals who work for professional service firms possess a technical mentality. To expect professional people to embrace a process that employs sophisticated skills is absurd and unreasonable. Smart firms provide the training necessary for their professionals to succeed at personal marketing, referral network building, face-to-face selling and presentations.

An Ohio firm uses a two-pronged approach to imparting the skills and knowledge necessary to succeed at rainmaking. They bring in a nationally acknowledged professional trainer three times a year for their associate group (young partners and those who are poor at marketing are encouraged to attend). The firm also runs monthly "lunch and learn" meetings, where a speaker is brought in every month over lunch to impart ideas or offer real-life examples of marketing success. These speakers can come from within the firm (a rainmaking partner) or from friends of the firm.

By keeping marketing and selling skill building in front of the associates on a regular basis, building one's referral network and identifying and capitalizing on opportunities at clients (and outside as well) is kept front-of-mind, and marketing activities are tracked, encouraged and reviewed.

6. Failure in Management

Business development is a process. And it is one that needs to be controlled. Control of this process includes: reviewing marketing progress; evaluation of personal involvement of the partners and associates; and realization of goals and marketing successes on a monthly (preferably) or quarterly basis. This management control effort should involve the director of marketing and a partner, most likely the managing partner.

Also, the marketing director and the CEO facilitate separate monthly partner marketing meetings. This keeps business development in the front of the mind of the partners, and further involves them with the marketing director, who has the opportunity to explain what the marketing department is doing and what they have accomplished, as well as ask for help on certain marketing projects.

A New Jersey firm has its marketing professional and the managing partner meet once a month over breakfast to discuss exactly what has happened on a firm-wide basis over the previous month and where improvements can be made. The marketing person gets ideas, suggestions and buy-in from the managing partner to help accomplish the growth goals the firm has decided upon.

Because the managing partner probably knows the partners on a personal level, he is able to share insights with the marketing director into the personality and working style of each partner.

Partners and associates hold a monthly, regularly scheduled breakfast meeting to only discuss their successes, activities and requests for assistance with their peers and the marketing director (who facilitates the meeting).

7. Need for Accountability

There is distinct and vital information that partners and associates need to communicate to make marketing work. One problem firms have is they require or ask for too much data. As a result, personal marketing reporting becomes burdensome, and, eventually, ignored. I have found that a one-page report consisting of the following information is easy, fast and effective at helping manage the personal marketing effort.

It should include:

• Referrals received: Track incoming referrals to see who your true friends of the firm are, the ones doing your marketing for you, to acknowledge their assistance and make sure referrals are sent back.
• Referrals given: Build complementary professionals' practices, and then have them do the marketing. This function allows one to develop leverage, and to market simultaneously in many places without being there in person. Only by tracking outgoing referrals can you see where you are investing your referral assets. Referrals given and received must be
  tracked monthly.
• New business won: See what new clients are brought into the firm and additional business sold on a monthly basis to keep partners and associates focused on marketing.
• New business lost: If lost opportunities are not tracked, how can those in charge of overseeing the process note who might need coaching or training?

One client fought us for two years on this specific reporting. They finally gave up when the director of marketing discovered that a thorough, well thought-out and financed marketing effort for one of the partners was producing a closing percentage of five percent after 10 months of effort. The partner went to the management committee to complain about the marketing department, incorrectly blaming them rather than his own lack of selling skills.

If these losses had been tracked monthly, this problem could have been headed off after a couple of months and the partner offered specific sales coaching, or the program could have been ended, saving marketing resources for where they might produce results.

• Events, meetings and organizations attended: There is a direct relationship with the frequency of time invested in front of those people who can refer business and the amount of business referred. These kinds of efforts tend to not be tracked, and the frequency of occurrence then declines over time, leading to fewer quality referrals.

We recommend a simple one-page report that can be filled in online and e-mailed to those watching the business development process. If any additional detail is warranted, those people can go back to the source. These reports should go, at least, to the marketing director and the CEO. Some of our clients smartly have all of these reports disseminated to all of the partners so they can see which of their peers is helping with the marketing process and which are not.

8. Deficient Participation by Leaders

Of all of the sins that cause marketing to fail, this might be the most significant. Entrepreneurs who built the firm and then hired technically excellent people as associates and partners to do the work started many firms.

As these entrepreneurs age, business development declines unless they have luckily hired and nurtured additional rainmakers. Usually, the firm becomes owned and managed by technicians, not businesspeople, who not only don't understand the importance of marketing, but also do not want to participate in it.

Many firms hire outstanding marketing professionals who then fail in the eyes of the partnership, as new quality business doesn't magically appear on the books. The marketing effort fails at all levels, as those inclined to participate actively look to the role models in the firm who do not do much effective personal marketing at all and realize marketing must not be important to their future success in the firm, no matter how much lip service is given to it.

This lack of participation by leaders can be changed if they are willing to kick-start the firm's marketing effectiveness by participating much more in personal marketing and marketing events. Associates and the other partners, who then realize they need to change as well, notice this change in behavior.

9. Agreed-Upon Expectations?

Exactly what do partners expect the marketing director to achieve? Marketing directors and their firms must agree on what is expected from the marketing director, including specific, attainable goals (agreed to in writing). Every accomplishment must be tracked and documented.

The Resulting Payoff

The first step is to recognize your firm is committing one of these nine sins. Once that is done, you can then take corrective action. After a short time, you should see an increase in the quantity of your new client work as well as a revenue jump.

Then marketing will give you the results you always hoped for.

About the Author
Allan Boress, CPA, CFE, is president of Allan S. Boress & Associates in Eustis, Fla., and an international consultant to accounting firms. His latest book is Mastering the Art of Marketing Professional Services: A Best Practice Step-by-Step Guide, published by the AICPA. He is also the developer of the "I-Hate-Selling" course and the "I-Hate-Networking" tapes. His web site is allanboress.com, and he can be reached at 954.345.4666.

Reprinted with permission from the Massachusetts Society of CPAs.

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