On-demand webinar
Your portfolio gets you shortlisted. Trust wins the work.
What you’ll learn :
- Why a relevant portfolio may get you to the shortlist, but trust is what moves you to the win
- The difference between being liked and being trusted, and why tough, timely questions build the second
- A simple test to find out whether your differentiators actually differentiate you from your top three competitors
- What a proposal looks like when it leads with the client's situation, challenges and top three to five objectives
Speaker :
Maryanne Hewitt
High Performance Coach · AEC
Frank Niekamp
Chief Growth Officer · USA
What's covered
Inside the session. Watch a clip, then get the full recording.
Put yourself in your prospect's shoes: based on your current approach, would you hire you or your competition? A relevant portfolio might get you to the shortlist, but it is not what wins.
Per the AIA figures cited, 75% of US firms have fewer than ten employees, yet large firms own the market and are gaining share while small and mid-sized firms lose it. Clients are more informed and more value-driven than ever.
Great work wins repeat clients, not new ones. Frank shares how Art Gensler, in his book, credited the firm's growth not to design quality but to how well it got to know its clients.
People do business with people they like, but give most of their business to those they trust. Fewer than 20% of design professionals ask thoughtful, timely and tough questions, often for fear of not being liked. Frank's story of an architect who asked a draining client for a monthly retainer, and got it.
Architects often do know better, but only after uncovering what the client is trying to solve. Ask what has to happen for the project to be a success, let them answer, and make sure the whole team knows it.
Excellent design, on time and on budget, principal involvement: important, but rarely differentiating. Share your strengths only once they connect to what the client has told you matters. How a small firm beat a 100-person rival by asking one question.
If you only get four big pursuits a year, you cannot expect to perform without practice. Knowing what to do and being able to do it are two different things, so do not practise on your clients.
A client without a problem is a client without a project. Clients buy certainty. The session closes on the five moments for building trust, from the initial inquiry to the handoff to your delivery team.
Resources
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Frequently asked questions
Common Questions
The presenters argue a relevant portfolio may get you to the shortlist, but what moves you to the win is your ability to build trust. In a competitive pursuit where you are not the incumbent, Frank notes success rates are typically under 10%, meaning ten or more proposals for every project won.
That fear is exactly the blind spot the session addresses. People do business with people they like, but they give most of their business to those they trust. Maryanne frames it as being respected rather than just liked: you would tell your best friend they had something in their teeth.
Write down the differentiators you have told clients in the past, then look up your top three competitors online and see whether they say the same things. Maryanne's bet is that claims like excellent design, on time and on budget, and principal involvement will turn up on their sites too.
Not early. Frank's advice is to wait until you understand the client's priorities, then raise only the qualities that connect to what they said matters. Otherwise, as he puts it, you are throwing darts into the ocean.
One with a section dedicated to the client before anything else: a summary of their current situation, the challenges and problems they want to overcome, the consequences of not overcoming them, and their top three to five objectives. It should be presented and reviewed with the client, not just sent.
Frank shares the case of an architect at a firm of under ten people up against a 100-person rival. He asked the client how many people they thought it would take to deliver the project; they had no idea that two dedicated people would do most of the work. He won the project.
The next step
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Whichever way you work with us, the same proven Revenue OS runs underneath. Book a growth session and we’ll show you where to start.