Every consultancy wants to be more than its competitors. But most fail to own their position in an oversaturated market. Without the right strategy to guide them in identifying and owning their unique strategic differentiators, the results can be a bit… meh, leaving them looking, sounding and feeling like every other consultancy in their sector.
Clearly, being ‘meh’ just isn’t going to cut the mustard. By carving out — and protecting — your niche, you can stand out from your competitors, weave a story that resonates with potential customers and get prospects talking about you like this:
So, how do you avoid being yet another Spider-Man and have clients go totally gaga for your consultancy?
This guide delves into the intricacies of creating a successful positioning strategy, provides advice tailored for the consultancy sector and explores tools you can begin implementing today.
Before we dive into the good stuff, here are three reasons why you should read this guide:
In the world of consulting, ‘positioning’ refers to the process of devising and marketing a unique and memorable identity that potential clients will perceive as valuable.
Good positioning is essential for consultancies wanting to carve out a clear niche that resonates with and attracts their target clients. There are countless factors consultancies can base their positioning on, including their expertise, services, outcomes and more.
In simple terms, positioning is using everything at a company's disposal to strategically shape a prospect's perception of them. When done correctly, positioning goes above and beyond marketing tactics (though copywriting and design are a critical part of the process), encompassing culture, employee retention and many other factors that influence a company’s perception amongst its target audience.
If you’re well positioned, it doesn’t mean your consultancy is differentiated, and vice versa. So, what’s the difference between positioning and differentiation?
Positioning is how your prospects perceive you. You can think of it as the lens through which your ideal prospects and buyers see your value proposition. If their prescription is correct, you deliver great clarity and understanding, winning high levels of attention, curiosity and intrigue. If you’ve got their prescription wrong or their lens is foggy and scratched, prospects will only see misunderstanding, confusion and… tumbleweeds. But more on all that in a minute.
Differentiation is all about standing out from your competitors by offering better onboarding experiences, performances, results — the list goes on (and on and on and on).
Nail your positioning, and you're not just hitting the bullseye – you're splitting the arrow that's already there, winning your consultancy fantastic commercial impact. And when your positioning is poor? Well, you can spend thousands upon thousands on marketing and lead generation campaigns — and end up with a big, fat nothing in return for your efforts.
You’re probably thinking, ‘wha-what?’ We’re taught that if you chuck money at your campaigns, they have to pay off — this is a lie. A good marketing campaign will direct people to your website, but what then? You need effective positioning that proves your consultancy’s value and resonates with potential clients. And if you don’t? Well, those potential clients have no reason to stay on your website, let alone find out more.
In other words, being well-positioned will get you:
We doubt you need much more convincing on the benefits of positioning, but for the sake of balance, here’s what being poorly positioned will win your consultancy:
Refining your positioning is an investment in your firm's future growth, putting you in your prospects’ line of sight. By crafting a market position that resonates deeply with your ideal customers, you build a foundation for sustained success, credibility and market leadership.
You may be wondering when the right time to refine your positioning strategy is. Most leaders assume that positioning is a start-up phase task, but the best time to position your business is NOT at inception.
It’s not as simple as jotting down a value proposition, waving it into your marketing materials and pressing ‘go’. Instead, you want to start defining your positioning and messaging only once you have a proven business model and an innate ability to sell your expertise. If your market is proven and you’ve experienced success with a few ideal clients, you can ‘retrofit’ your positioning. This will help you consistently and regularly connect with more of your dream clients.
And what happens when your messaging goes stale, leaving your voice lost in the chorus of the competition? Growing a consultancy isn’t easy, with ‘Fix Positioning’ lingering at the bottom of the priority list somewhere between ‘Update Zoom background’ and ‘Revamp capabilities deck’. But when you begin experiencing any of the following signs, it’s time to think about hitting reset:
You wouldn’t run into a deep, dark wood without a map or your glasses. That would be almost as silly as jumping into a new market feet first without researching the market dynamics.
Understanding market dynamics is critical when devising a robust positioning strategy. They provide insights into ever-changing consumer preferences, technologies and competitive forces, which will inform your strategy and make sure your consultancy stands out — rather than fits in.
Without a firm understanding of the competitive landscape, you can kiss effective positioning and powerful differentiation goodbye. By identifying where your consultancy currently exists in relation to the competition, you can uncover untapped niches, note what’s already being done and map out a path to success.
Pull out your spy glasses and stick-on moustache — it’s time to go undercover and assess the competitor landscape. By completing a SWOT analysis that outlines your competitors’ strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats, you’ll identify potential market advantages and areas of differentiation to leverage.
Untapped opportunities, here we come! Market gap analysis can help reveal unmet customer needs, underutilised technologies and more. Your next mission? To seize these opportunities. Here’s how:
That heading might be enough to break you out in a rash, as traditional positioning strategies are typically overly complex and difficult to use. Fortunately, we prefer teaching non-traditional positioning strategies that are simple to understand, easy to implement and proven to create positive perceptions.
This process begins and ends with your positioning proclamation: a written declaration of your consultancy’s value proposition and target market. Think of your positioning proclamation as a single truth source representing your business’s identity and value, ensuring your team sings from the same hymn sheet when engaging in all interactions.
At Total Growth Ownership, we believe there are six (and a half) essential components of a consultancy positioning proclamation. You can weave a unique and captivating narrative by leveraging a different…
Do you have a unique process, tool or approach that sets you apart from your competitors? If not, you need one. We call this the ‘unique mechanism,’ a method or process which showcases what your consultancy has to offer in a unique way.
There are three different types of unique mechanisms:
With the help of compelling branded graphics, you can transform your unique pathway to results into a visually digestible format by creating compelling branded graphics. Here's The Win Academy's unique mechanism. We supported our client in helping them to map out their E³volve System™, showcasing their value proposition in a unique, digestible, neatly packaged way.
Everyone loves data! And if they don’t, they should. Because numbers speak louder than words when it comes to building trust, you should back your consultancy’s claims with hard data. For example, reveal what quantifiable improvements you can promise within 90 days.
Here’s how using evidence-backed claims can look in practice. By encouraging Singularitee, which offers managed IT solutions, to lay all their cards on the table, we helped prove their value to prospective clients through quantifiable results.
Claim your turf by creating your own niche. By positioning yourself as ‘the world’s only…’ in this new category, you provide a distinct benefit and dominate the space. And because there are no competitors to compare yourself to, this strategy is all about positioning and not about differentiation.
Here are three of our favourite examples:
The world’s only win rate optimisation consultancy
The world’s only corporate innovation engineers
The world’s only consultancy MEHscalpologists
When prospects think of this niche, they think of you — and only you. In other words, you get the whole pie to yourself!
Brilliant, right? Just make sure to run a quick Google check to make sure it’s unclaimed, or it’ll all come crashing down.
Rather than blending in with industry jargon and overused buzzwords, why not stand out by crafting your own terminology? By combining a pinch of creativity and a touch of strategic thinking, you can create a new language of sorts that uniquely describes:
Devising new terminology aligned with your values will help your consultancy stand out and pique your target audience’s interests. When compiled, these terms form ‘bible’ used to create cohesion across your communications.
For example, our Capacitas no longer promises to deliver ‘confidence’ but ‘Cloud Confidence’.
This is a great opportunity to be creative and leave prospects simply needing to know more about your proposition.
Invalidate your competitors’ marketing plans. Seriously. By challenging common notions, you present your prospective clients with a clear choice — you!
What does this look like in practice? We helped Clarity connect with their ideal client by allowing prospects to disqualify themselves before booking a call. A simple invalidation statement outlined Clarity’s values and ways of working, helping potential clients determine their own compatibility and ensuring their team only spent time nurturing qualified prospects. A prospect deciding ‘this isn’t for me’ is just as valuable as a ‘this is for me’ response.
Go the extra mile and align your consultancy with its clients’ needs. Prospects love it when consultancies offer guarantees that minimise (or eradicate) the perceived risk of partnering with them.
Get ready to be inspired by how Waymark had fun with risk removal. They created the Millenium Moonwalk Guarantee, offering to refund their workshop fee IN FULL if their clients aren’t 100% happy with their prototype or — in their words — if they wouldn’t ‘moonwalk the entire span of the Millenium Bridge’ to keep hold of it.’
Finally, our bonus .5: an addition inspired by sales guru Jeffrey Gitomer.
We believe every brand has something they ardently stand for or against. Clients want to know what you stand for, so speak up about your causes. Just make sure to mirror your target prospects’ values, as a mismatch between your consultancy’s ideals and your clients’ can lead to cognitive dissonance. Such dissonance destroys trust and can erode your strategy's efficacy, rendering your efforts wasted.
The time has come to stop the strategising and put your plan into action. Breathing life into your new positioning is all about communicating and embodying the values, personality and offerings you’ve identified throughout this process in every facet of your consultancy. Here’s how:
Your messaging brings your positioning to life. But it’s just window-dressing if it has no depth behind it. Your brand must represent your positioning by aligning in a way that makes sense to clients. For example, if your consultancy’s core value is innovation, your brand must embody an open-minded attitude.
Written elements, such as taglines, website copy and tone of voice — a crucial element for consultancies — mirror the nuances of your audience’s specific challenges.
Taking steps to unify your brand’s messaging will create a consistent experience for all clients interacting with your consultancy.
From your team’s LinkedIn profiles to your email signatures, every marketing asset must reflect your updated positioning. By creating a consistent verbal identity, you can ensure your consultancy’s unique value proposition is immediately recognisable and memorable, establishing true differentiation in the market.
Embodying your positioning goes beyond the service you offer. Remember that massive neon sign we mentioned earlier? Leveraging your highly resonant, consistent messaging across platforms will create an unshakeable prospect perception and help guide the right people to your door.
This covers:
You can’t ‘set it and forget it’ when it comes to positioning — especially in the fast-moving consultancy world. Feedback loops hold you accountable for fixing inconsistencies or refreshing your positioning when it no longer serves its purpose. Take your finger off the pulse, and you might as well hand your best clients over to your competitors and thank them for the privilege.
As it’s easy to become complacent about your messaging, feedback loops shouldn’t rely on internal perspectives. It’s crucial you talk to clients and third-party experts, as they will be brutally honest with you.
Internal feedback loops:
Your clients’ honest feedback:
Taking the time to understand what's working for your clients and what's not can provide invaluable insights into potential positioning refinements. Then, internal reviews allow you to dig deeper, checking if your positioning aligns with the market’s needs and your consultancy's evolving capabilities.
Remember: positioning isn’t static. Use this feedback to evolve your messaging as your consultancy grows and markets shift.
Now that we’ve gone through the whole process of planning and executing your positioning strategy, let’s summarise the anatomy of an effective positioning strategy.
Three pitfalls to avoid:
Before you get stuck into defining your new position, why not get prepared with our super-handy, super-valuable and easy-to-access list of resources for consultancies? From free training to in-depth books, these resources will help you on your way.