(This posting is adapted from the second edition of my book, Rain Making: the Professionals Guide to Attracting New Clients, which will be published in February of 2008. About 40 % of the content in this edition will be new.)

Thanksgiving is right around the corner. Thanksgiving makes me think of big meals, and when I think of big meals, I think of David’s breakfast.

Opportunities to meet and spend time with senior executives don’t come often. You must take full advantage of them, when they do. David Nadler, the founder of Mercer Delta Consulting and now Vice Chairman of Marsh & McLennan Companies, tells this story:

I was asked to give a speech at a conference for a lot of senior executives at the Homestead resort in Virginia. I went down to breakfast the morning of the speech, went through the buffet line and sat down at a table with other people attending the meeting. We all introduced ourselves, and I found out that I was eating breakfast with six very senior executives. After we finished eating and got up to go, I realized that it would be a long time before such an opportunity came again. So, I went back through the buffet line and sat down at another table. I had three breakfasts that morning and probably put on pounds, but it was worth it.

In his current post in his blog, Trust Matters, Charlie Green argues for listening largely so the client realizes she has been heard. He argues that you should “listen for the sake of listening.”

I am not sure whether we disagree or we use different words to say much the same thing. Your goal, I believe, is to figure what the client wants from you when she talks to you. If she wants to know if you can help her with a problem, tell her yes or no, and if it’s no, try to help her find someone who can. If she is trying to scope out a problem, help her do so. Hold the selling until you both have a clear understanding of the problem. If she simpley wants to vent or brag a little, let her do so.

Clients quickly catch on to the professional who claims to be able to help them with any problem. Saying that you can’t do something and refering the client to someone who can is both the right and professional thing to do and good business. If you have helped a client find someone who can solve Problem A better than you can, the client will trust you when you say you can help with Problem B.

Your first objective should always be to understand the client’s problem as she sees it, rather that as you think she should see it or would like her to see it. And once you do, if you can help her solve it, get on with the selling. That’s why she called you.

(This is part of a series of rainmaker stories. To read the earlier posts, see the category Rainmaker Story.)

Would-be networkers find developing relationships with senior executives challenging. The imbalance in age, wealth and power makes it so. This is the story of one who rose to the challenge.

Each year, our firm coaches many professionals to help them become rainmakers. It is human nature to predict at the start which will succeed and which won’t. Over the years I have found myself to be, charitably, only a middling predictor. But there was never any doubt about Jane.

Jane is a young recruiter at an executive search firm, who specializes in searches for a glamour industry. In this industry where emotions run high and your future may hinge on a sudden change in consumer tastes, she stands out for her integrity, professionalism and a plain speaking manner that she learned growing up in a small western city. She is bedrock reliable, and her clients are loyal.

Like all young professionals she was challenged by the need to develop relationships with senior executives.

She solved this problem when faced with a smaller and more immediate one. One of these loyal clients asked her to buy a table at an association luncheon he was in charge of, and, of course, she did. Needing to fill six seats, she called a client, the CEO of a well-known firm, and invited her. To her surprise the client accepted and asked if she could bring a colleague. The colleague she brought was a dealmaker, who knew everyone in the industry.

With acceptances from two players in the industry, Jane felt more confident at inviting others. In the end she brought two highly visible CEOs, the dealmaker, a person out of work and looking for the next job as a president, the president of a smaller company and the head of human resources at yet another big firm.

This one event had many beneficial consequences. She got to know all of them better. Each one of her guests saw that the others respected her opinion, increasing their own opinion of her. She has become a true trusted advisor to two of them. And everyone at the event was curious about this young woman sitting at the table with so many heavy hitters. Many, who had never heard of her before, knew her by the end of the lunch. When the unemployed president found a job, she relied on Jane to do much of her recruiting. The deal maker has become a source of referrals.

So, what can learn from the story of Jane’s lunch?

First, senior executives find an invitation by a young professional to an association lunch acceptable and appropriate (plus, they might just come!)

Second, if they want to bring a guest, it is likely to be someone worth knowing.

Third, if an executive sees you with other senior people, it will improve his regard for you. If you are sitting with a group of senior executives, total strangers will want to find out who you are.

Fourth, someone who is looking for a job is especially appreciative of this kind of invitation that provides so many opportunities to meet people.

I am sure there are still other things to learn, but will leave it at that. I will conclude with one other piece of information: Jane got promoted the following fall.

After the rainmaking teleseminar I did with Kristina Haynes we received the following question from Jennifer Bell of Placet Dispute Resolution. Jennifer agreed to let us answer it here (and Kristina will probably post additional advice on her blog.)

Jennifer’s question:

What is the best way to follow up on a referral? I am a mediator. I will get calls for service and be asked for my CV. I will then be told by the lawyer that he/she will contact the other side and get back to me. I assume that there are other mediator under consideration. I am not shy to follow up once but am uncomfortable making more than one call on a particular matter. What is the best way to follow-up more than once without seeming pushy?

My answer:

That’s a good question. There are two issues here: 1) there is the practical issue of getting through to the referrer, and 2) there is the feeling you have that calling more than once is being pushy.

Let’s deal with the second one first. I don’t believe you will be or be seen as pushy if you leave a day between your first call and second calls. Rather, I think the lawyer may feel that you aren’t that interested if you don’t call again. I am assuming that you have no further information that your call is somehow unwanted than the man hasn’t returned your calls. In that case what is going on in his head is unknown and therefore irrelevant to perceived pushiness.

What is going on in yours is highly relevant. You are acting as if you can read this lawyer’s mind. Hearing him say “Oh, it’s that pushy Jennifer again!” stops you in your tracks. But, of course, he didn’t say that, at least not to our knowledge. It must be coming from within you. Of all the thousands of possible thoughts he could have when he hears your voice why do you pick out “Pushy?” I will stop there, or risk getting arrested for practicing psychiatry without a license. I will add that I am a real pro at mind reading, myself. If you have any doubts about that see my post entitled Dealing with Unreturned Phone Calls.

It may sound as if I had you in mind when I wrote it, but it’s been up there since April. I also recommend a book, Learned Optimism by Martin Seligman.

Now, let’s go back to Issue One: How do you get through to this lawyer? Here are some things you can do alone of in combination with each other.

a) Call again . . . and again. A second call 24 or more hours after the first, is perfectly reasonable. One more a week out is fine. I would do more, but won’t push you that fast yet.

b) Leave a message explaining why you need an update quickly: “It’s Jennifer. I was calling to see if you had any word on the mediation. I’m juggling a few things and was wondering if that opportunity is still open. I would very much like to work on it and a little information might help ensure that that remains possible.”

c) Try a different medium. Some people respond better to emails.

d) Ask his assistant for advice, stressing the fact that he said he would bet back to you. She may be able to put you through to him, retrieve an answer, or provide an explanation. (This can help validate or not your mind reading. I was sure one guy hated me when he didn’t return my calls for two weeks. When I asked his secretary for advice, she told me he was in the hospital dying of cancer. Poor man, in his final pain he taught me an important message of how, rightly, inconsequential I am in most people’s lives. It helped me get over any musings I had about being important enough that my calls are seen as pushy.)

This is the final post in my three-part series “How a Rainmaker Writes a Letter of Introduction.” The earlier posts are:

• Think from the reader’s perspective
• Remember Your Objective and Write Your Letter Following a Three Part Structure

Step Four: Put Complete Contact Information Below Your Name

Make it easy for the client to contact you, if she wants to. Of course, this should be on all the emails you send for any reason.

Avoid sending too much material attached to this email. Consider including no attachments at all. Fear of viruses may stop some people from ever opening your email if you’re unknown to them and have attached a file. If you must attach something, it should be educational, like an article reprint or white paper. Do not send something that is purely a sales document, like a brochure. You have listed your website under your signature, which the client can visit, if she wants that kind of information.

Step Five: Bite Off Only What You Can Chew

If you can only follow up on five of these emails next week, only send out five today. Don’t raise expectations you can’t deliver on.

These three blog posts sum up how to construct an email or letter of introduction. What comes next? In a future posting, I will describe how to make the phone call that follows it.

This is the second post in my three-part series “How a Rainmaker Writes a Letter of Introduction.” The first post is Think from the reader’s perspective.

Step Two: Remember Your Objective

As I have described elsewhere, people often get confused about the objective of an email of introduction.

The objective of the email is to get the executive to accept your call. If she tells her assistant to book some time with you on the basis of the email alone, you are unusually lucky. If the assistant decides to screen over the phone before passing the email on to its intended recipient . . . . well, at least your talking with someone. That’s an acceptable fallback objective.

It is not your objective to get the client to hire you. No letter can do that. If you forget this, you are likely to so burden the executive with information that she deletes your email unread.

Step Three: Write Your Letter Following a Three-Part Structure

I recommend a three-part structure for your email, discussed in more detail below:

1. Establish credibility
2. Make an offer
3. Discuss next steps

To take your call, the executive or maybe just her assistant must believe you are credible, that what you are asking for is reasonable, and that talking with you may be beneficial.

Your credibility is probably based on the work you have done, though other qualifications, such as having written an article for a prominent journal or a relevant book, will sometimes do. List relevant clients or, if confidentiality prohibits that, describe them in a way that makes your qualifications sound solid.

Trivelmayer Wurms helps its clients find hidden value in their intellectual property. Our clients include three of the five largest pharmaceutical companies.

Haswort Wooten and Scopes renovates and helps preserve landmarks and other heritage buildings, while making them efficient and comfortable for use today. Our projects include the Oscuttawa County Courthouse, Ranamack Library and the Founders’ Building at Jamieson College

Next, tell the executive what you want and tie it to an offer. The email should evoke peer-to-peer respect. It says, “If you give something to me, I will give something to you,” but the exact nature of the gift is left unclear. It shouldn’t sound too eager or include an offer so generous that the reader would feel indebted by accepting it (I will fly to Boise to meet with you any time that is agreeable to you.)

I am conducting research on energy usage and would like to hear how Rushthroat Foods is reducing energy consumption. In return I can share with you information on what other companies are doing in a form that is consistent with the confidentiality we have promised to all who have provided us data.

Ivarro Executive Search has seen compensation escalate, due to the shortage of experienced hedge fund managers. I would like to hear how your firm is dealing with that shortage. In return I can share what we expect to see happening in the search for hedge-fund talent over the next six months.

Finally, discuss the next step you will take.

I will call your office next week to see if we can arrange a short conversation.

Do you have any time on Thursday or Friday, October 29 and 30, when we could talk? I will call you early next week to see.

Note that in neither of these examples is it clear whether you will be arranging a telephone conversation or a face-to-face one in your call next week. That is left deliberately vague, so that you that you can move right to scheduling a meeting, if the client is ready to.

Stay tuned for the next post in the How a Rainmaker Writes a Letter of Introduction series: Put Complete Contact Information Below Your Name and Bite Off Only What You Can Chew.

I have been trying to get to know you better by analyzing the wisps of data that you leave when you visit this blog. You don’t leave much to go on, but what I do find is intriguing. For example, what country has the second highest number of visitors to this blog. You can find the answer at the end of this post.

Many of you found this blog while looking for information on how to write an email or letter of introduction to a prospective client. My previous postings (Write Before You Call?, Of Water and Buckets, and Open Me, Please) may have been off the mark, because they used letters of introduction as a vehicle to addressing a larger matter.

Today and in the next two posts, the email and letter of introduction take center stage. These posting will show you how to write them in five easy steps. To simplify, from here on I will refer only to emails. You can assume that what we cover applies equally to letters.

Step One: Think from the reader’s perspective

Before you write anything, you should reflect on what you know about the reader. Usually you have never met, but you can make some reasonable assumptions, even so.

For example, if your letter is intended for a high-level executive, it will probably be screened by her assistant, who will decide whether she will ever see it. In that case, you are writing as much for the assistant as you are for the executive.

You can also assume that the executive is so busy that she is predisposed to delete an email lobbed in from someone who almost certainly wants to sell something. Among the assistant’s duties is making sure the boss’s time is used well, meaning the assistant will toss most introductory emails, too.

But not everything is doom and gloom. Most executives are interested in ways to do their jobs better, in staying abreast of changes in their industry or their field, and in ways to improve their own fortunes. The assistant will admit people who offer enough value to the boss.

All this means that you must make a compelling case and make it concisely. It should take no more than three short paragraphs, leaving lots of space on the screen. I have seen effective emails of one paragraph.

Stay tuned for the next post in the How a Rainmaker Writes a Letter of Introduction series: Remember Your Objective and Write Your Letter Following a Three Part Structure

Oh, I almost forgot. The country of origin of the second largest number of visits to this blog is China.

There is a lot of good information about trusted advisor relationships, including the excellent book, entitled Trusted Advisor by David Maister, Charlie Geen and Rob Galford.  Another good book, Clients for Life, by Jagdish Seth and Andrew Sobel, deals with the subject without using that term.  Blogs, such as www.trustedadvisor.com  and www.davidmaister.com/blog/ are devoted to the subject or deal with it frequently and other blogs and ezines mention it sporadically.  It’s a worthwhile subject.
 
All of these sources provide commentary and advice, most of which can be reduced to one sentence, If you want to be a trusted advisor, act in a trustworthy way and know your stuff.  Living our lives by this simple dictum isn’t easy.  It is no wonder that whole books can be written on the subject and should be.  I will call this the behavior model and I don’t reduce all this material to a mere sentence with any desire to disparage it.  Rather, I want to contrast it with another approach to becoming a trusted advisor which doesn’t fall within the broad cover of this sentence.

I am referring to the age model.  The one-sentence reduction of this approach is: If you know your stuff and stay in touch with clients who are clearly rising stars and who are five to ten years younger than you, you have a good chance to become their trusted advisor in five, ten or more years.  I don’t have proof to support this, but I do have lots of anecdotal evidence.  For the past few years I have asked the rainmakers I interviewed their ages and the ages of those who treat them as trusted advisors.  In the greater number of these relationships the advisor is older than the advisee.

There are a number of reasons for this to be the case. It is obvious if you ask a 65 year old rainmaker about the trusted advisor relationships he has today, he will cite more people younger than he is.  But, I don’t believe the bias toward older advisors is solely based on an age ceiling for advisees.

Several other beliefs I have support the age model.  For example, I believe that most people find it easier to accept advice from someone older than they are.  The five to ten year spread between advisor and advisee seems about right for the advisor to be able to understand the advisee’s world.

This is all supposition.  But there is also the nature of networks.  Most networks form a power curve.  To understand what that means, think of the distribution of income in any country.  A few people have wealth beyond imagination, a few more are very rich and a few more are just rich.  Then come the broad middle class and the poor.  The difference in income between the wealthy beyond imagination and the very rich is immense compared spread of income between the middle class and the poor.  A few get most the goodies in a power curve.

There a two ways to end up on have-it-all end of the curve.  The first is to be in the network longer than others.  Our old rainmakers meet that criterion.  The second is to be fitter at the job, meaning know your stuff.  The comfort of confiding in older mentors and other explanations are, then, just the behavior mechanism that creates the power curve.

None of this takes anything away from the behavior model and all the good work that Maister and Green and others have done.  It does provide another path for research that I hope someone follows.

For the professional seeking to develop more business it is an explanation of why rain making gets easier every year you do it.  Older rainmakers know this, but younger professionals either don’t know or don’t quite believe it.  I spend a lot of energy trying convince young professionals that it is true.  In any event, you can’t win if you don’t play.  So, get out there and learn your stuff and build your network, focusing a part of your attention on the up-and-comers in the client companies.

Oh, and one other thing . . . while you’re at it, grow old! 

Do you think you can handle this last part?   If you can, you may well end up a trusted advisor to some important clients.

Whether you are a solo professional or an associate or partner in a big firm, the fate of your career depends in large part on your ability to generate business.

When you have the rainmaking know-how and tools and implement a consistent action plan and make it rain clients you will truly own your destiny.

Now, for the first time ever, Ford Harding a rainmaking consultant who has written the books on rainmaking, including “Creating Rainmakers” and “Rain Making” will be joining me, Kristina Haymes, (attorney and mediator) for a free teleseminar where we will discuss how one attorney went from no business to a sizeable book of business and how you, too can become a rainmaker.

Ready to make it rain clients? Sign up now at MediationMarketingTips.com/rainmaker.html

We sure hope to “see” you on the call.

Your rainmaking partner,

Kristina Haynes

The answer is a definitive maybe.  It depends on whom you are calling, why you are calling, and how many calls you have made previously over what time frame and on the reason for your call.  With this many variables to combine in different ways, there are thousands of different situations, each one requiring decision on whether or not to leave a call.  Let’s try some simplifying guidelines:

1. The bias is to leave a message. If you leave a messages, you remind the contacts that you are still out there thinking about them.  They see you in their minds eye, however briefly.  That is one thing you are trying accomplish by calling in the first place.  Within limits, people are not troubled by periodic messages, even if they don’t return them.  When you do finally reach them, most people apologize for not returning your call.  (The appropriate reply to such an apology is, “Oh, please don’t apologize.  I just hope my calls haven’t been a nuisance.”  Listen carefully to the response to this statement.)
2. When leaving a message, make clear how urgent the call is.Here are three sample messages: a) It’s not at all urgent, but if you . . . b) It’s not desperate urgent, but it would be a huge help if you can . . . c) If at all possible I would like to talk with you today. . . . Declaring the level of urgency helps avoid the discomfort of the contact seriously inconveniencing herself to return your call, only to find it was for some matter of little importance.
3. Leave a message which states clearly not to call you back if you know she won’t be able to reach you. This reduces her frustration and your discomfort, but still wins you a brief moment of connection.  (“It’s Ford Harding.  I do have something I would like to talk with you about, but I am traveling, so you won’t be able to reach me.  I will call again when I get a break to see if I can catch you.)  This allows you to call back again later, and if your contact still doesn’t answer, you can leave another brief message again.  (It’s Ford Harding again.  I have a break, so I am trying to catch.  You won’t be able to reach me, so I will try again when I get another break.)
4. Assume that many contacts will know who called, even if you don’t leave a message.  Caller identification lets the contact know who is calling, whether you leave a message or not.
5. Do not leave a message when you have called several times over a short period and left messages already.
6. Leave no message when there is a clear probability that the call may be misinterpreted.Clear probability is a high standard.  Better than leaving no message is a statement that you are calling for some other reason.  (“This is Ford Harding.  I am not calling about the proposal.  We are hiring at an entry level and was hoping that with your university contacts, you might be able to suggest a candidate.”)