Too many IP professionals conflate branding, relationship building and growth as the same. And for many IP professionals, all three activities are painted with the same brush of disdain. While they are interconnected, they are not interchangeable. All three concepts are discrete elements of a comprehensive business development strategy.
Branding includes any promotional activity that increases marketing awareness. The main goal of these types of activities is to improve visibility either for an individual IP professional or for a firm. This attracts new targets to bring them into the pipeline funnel and retains existing clients by providing continued familiarity with the brand.
Branding is a critical component of any business development strategy. Branding or marketing helps to create awareness and familiarity for a professional or a firm's services. However, it is important to recognize that branding is different and distinct from relationship building or growth. While branding activities can help to attract new leads and retain existing clients, it is only one piece of the puzzle.
Branding includes:
Content: messaging and communication
Visual: graphics and designs
Mediums: digital and traditional
A powerful brand identity may help you stand apart from the competition and help you attract new potential clients value your area of expertise and understand how you can help them. Also, a consistent brand message may aid in building credibility and trust with potential clients.
Relationship building focuses on building and maintaining connections with clients and prospects. It relies on branding initiatives and eventually drives growth. IP professionals work to protect the rights of companies, but the industry runs on person to person relationships. People work with those they trust and like. Thus at its core, building an IP practice is a person-to-person endeavour.
Relationship building is about going beyond brand awareness. This next step is focused on developing strong connections with existing and potential clients. This involves engaging with them on a personable level in order to understand their needs and preferences, and finding ways to provide value. All of this helps to build trust through regular communication and follow-up. Relationship building is key to creating long-term, loyal clients who will continue to work with the firm and provide referrals others to do the same.
Relationship building includes:
Communication and Strategy: identifying and leveraging growth opportunities
Target and Client intelligence: trends and data
Networking and Relationship Management: lead partner and client/target teams
Building and maintaining strong relationships with professional contacts and can help transition them to become new clients. Likewise, building and maintaining relationships with current clients can lead to less attrition and increased referrals to other potential clients. It's important to listen to your contacts', leads' and clients' needs, be personable and maintain open lines of communication.
Growth is the sales channel that provides the flow of clients into the business. Growth of the pipeline comes from branding and relationship building.
Growth refers to the overall expansion of a firm's client base over time. This may involve expanding into new service lines or offering new products and services to existing clients. Growth requires a long-term focus on developing a solid business model, identifying opportunities for expansion, and investing in the resources necessary to achieve that growth.
Growth activities include:
Conversion and Pitching: changing a target to a prospect and convincing them to hire you and the firm
Pricing and Negotiating: setting prices and terms
Expanding existing client services: upselling and cross selling
A focus on various growth initiatives can help you expand your client base and increase revenue. Focusing on growth of new clients as well as growth of current clients has a compounding effect on top line revenue.
While these three concepts are interconnected, they are not interchangeable. A firm that focuses solely on branding, without also investing in relationship building and growth, may struggle to maintain its client base over the long term due to natural attrition. Similarly, a firm that focuses solely on growth, without also investing in branding and relationship building, may struggle to attract new clients or build on existing ones. A comprehensive business development plan should take into account all three of these critical components, and work to develop a cohesive plan that takes into account and balances each one of these components to achieve and maintain long-term success
Comments