Why professional services firms aren't built to sell

Most of the professional and financial services firms I talk to are very good at the work and much less comfortable selling it. I see a lot of sales processes up close, and it is one of the most consistent patterns I come across.

The partners know their subject. They can sit across from a client, understand a complicated problem and give sound advice. But ask how a new prospect becomes a client, and the answer is often much less clear.

I think the way these firms grow explains a lot of it.

Delivery comes first, for good reason

When you start an accounting practice, a law firm or an advisory business, your first responsibility is to do the work properly. Your reputation depends on it, and so does whether the client comes back.

You deliver, someone recommends you, and the next piece of work arrives. As the business grows, you hire people who can help you deliver more of it.

That is a sensible way to build a firm. It also means you can get several years in without ever developing a deliberate sales process.

There may be a CRM and someone with business development in their title. But the partners' diaries, the weekly meetings and the way people are rewarded still revolve around existing clients. Finding the next client fits into whatever time is left.

A referral has already done some of the selling

When someone you trust recommends an adviser, you arrive at the first conversation with a degree of confidence in them. You may already have a clear need and a reason to act.

The adviser gets to start somewhere familiar: understanding the problem and explaining how they can help.

An approach to someone new starts much earlier. They may recognise the issue but have no particular reason to discuss it with you. You have to earn their attention, establish credibility and work out whether there is a useful conversation to have.

A firm that has grown through introductions can underestimate how much work happened before the referred prospect ever picked up the phone.

I think that is why the weakness often becomes visible only when the firm tries to grow beyond its existing network.

What would happen to ten good opportunities?

Imagine giving ten sales-qualified opportunities to two firms with equally strong technical teams.

For illustration, a team with an established sales process might turn those into eight meetings, four proposals, and a signed client. A firm used to receiving referred work might get one or two meetings and no proposals.

Those are hypothetical numbers, but they show why I care about what happens after an opportunity arrives.

Someone needs to decide who will respond. That person needs time in their diary. After the first conversation, there needs to be an agreed next step, and somebody has to follow through when the buyer goes quiet.

Without those habits, a promising conversation can sit untouched while everyone deals with a client deadline. A week becomes a month, and eventually someone concludes that the prospect was never serious.

When that happens repeatedly, the request is usually for more leads. I would want to understand what happened to the previous ones first.

Start while the referrals are still coming

The difficult time to build a sales culture is when the pipeline has already slowed and every conversation carries the pressure of needing to close.

Delivery deserves most of your attention in the early years. Your reputation depends on it. But while the referrals are flowing, you also have room to develop the sales side of the business.

Get a proper CRM and make it part of how the team works. Give every opportunity an owner and an agreed next step. Measure what happens from the first conversation through to a signed client, so you can see where things get stuck.

Review the pipeline every week. A long list of names can look reassuring, but you need to know which conversations are moving and which have quietly gone cold.

A junior business development person can help build that discipline. Give them access to the partners, time to learn the services and a clear path to grow into the role. They can take increasing responsibility as their judgement develops, but the partners need to stay involved.

Five years in, this becomes much harder. By then, people have settled into how they work, delivery fills the diary and growth is something the network has always provided. Introducing a sales culture means changing established habits across the firm.

Start early, while you have the time to learn and the referrals to give you breathing room.

Originally published in Sean Winter's newsletter.

Frequently asked questions

Why do professional services firms struggle with sales?

Many firms grow through good delivery and referrals. Those introductions bring trust and intent before the first meeting, so the firm can grow without developing the habits needed to start and progress conversations with unfamiliar buyers.

When should a professional services firm build a sales culture?

Start while referrals are still healthy. That gives the partners time to establish a CRM, clear opportunity ownership and weekly pipeline reviews before a slowdown adds pressure to close every conversation.

What should partners measure in their sales pipeline?

Track how genuine opportunities move from first conversation to meeting, proposal and signed client. Give each opportunity an owner and an agreed next step, and review where progress stops. The ten-opportunity figures in this article are illustrative, not benchmarks.