Lisa Boyer | April 12, 2020 | 4 Min Read
Many seasoned professionals have much wisdom and strategic insights to offer to business leaders. The truth is, many seasoned professionals or strategy/business professionals want to become a business consultant and use that as their primary mechanism for complete freedom or as a second career with little to no consulting experience. The current economic slump has provided opportunities for many business owners to seek help from online business consultants who are experts in increasing profitability and efficiency.
Apart from the current economic meltdown, the impact of the coronavirus (Covid-19) which has been declared a ‘Pandemic’, is causing unprecedented change in almost every nation, and is a significant reason why you need to take-up being a business consultant if this has been on your mind. During this period of Covid-19, the best way to stay productive and level up your game is to make the best of a bad situation, and learn to be an Online Business Consultant.
Besides, learning how to become an online business consultant is pretty simple. There are several online training courses that you can subscribe to to learn the core fundamentals on how to become a business consultant, the necessary daily operational knowledge needed in business consulting, and the general ethics in becoming a business consultant.
Even though as a seasoned business professional or strategy professional whom have years of working experience, before assessing or strategising for someone else’s business and providing valuable advice, the fundamentals of business consulting is a pre-requisite to address business consulting gaps in their skill sets. So, learning business consulting processes such as models, methods, and formulas in this current time; that have overtime been proven with many is the first step in learning how to become a professional business consultant successfully. And, there is no better time to become a business consultant than this Covid-19 social distancing period?
Here are the three significant reasons why it has never been a better time to become a business consultant:
1. COVID-19 is causing unprecedented change. Small businesses realize that strategic planning is essential to plan for uncertainty. We doubt, we all understand the rate at which the spread of coronavirus is causing significant unprecedented changes in the world economy. However, small businesses and organizations are understanding the importance of strategic planning, which is a key in planning for the uncertainty, and this can be achieved by having a professional business consultant to help business sustain and be positioned for growth, especially during the pandemic period
2. While in lock-down (working from home), there has never been a better time to transition to a life of freedom and start the consulting business that you always wanted. Besides, everyone needs to utilize this lock-down period to learn one or two skills to level up your finances, and if consulting has been on your mind, what better way to do this is by learning how to become a business consultant now. This Covid-19 period has provided a significant opportunity to work from home, allowing you to transition to a life of freedom, which is a major when you become an online business consultant.
3. The way we will work in the new world will be digitally driven, working from the comfort of your home. Small Business Consultants will be an essential part of every business, and you can work from anywhere in the world with any business in the world.
With the trend of this global pandemic called Covid-19, there is a likelihood that there will be a reduction in the number of the manual labor force, while many organizations will start using robots in the place. This will undoubtedly increase the need to learn new skills, as many will seek a view of what the future holds for the way we do business. Reason being that Covid-19 has given us reasons why we all need to consider a digitally-driven working system, making everyone work from the comfort of their homes and minimizing globalization.
Starting as a small business consultant will make you significant in every business, and the good news is that you can work comfortably from anywhere in the world as the rules of de-globalization do not apply.
Being a consultant, an educator, adviser, or knowledge provider to others, whether large or small businesses in this present Covid-19 period, simply means that you can work on your terms by partnering with businesses and sharing what you know and your expertise to others and get paid for it.
Believe it or not, you don’t have to be a master or expert on your topic before you make money from being online business consultant, but you just need to be very clear on these ten basic things which shall be discussed briefly below:
- Find demand for the service you offer: you can easily do this by talking to other service providers, possibly online who are into the same service with you. Alternatively, you can do this by going online and searching for people who need your help.
- To successfully become a business consultant, you can put out a message of your service to groups of potential buyers and then face the possibility of being rejected. It’s okay if this happens to you, that happens to almost every one of us all, but don’t be afraid of it.
- You must be able to communicate the benefits of the service you provide and not just the features. That simply means the benefit your customers will get as a result of your service or product and not how you will provide the service.
- Be ethical in your networking and get the best word around the service you offer. Do your best to communicate your service in an exciting way to your customers.
- Don’t think that you’ve learned it all by investing in other learning programs on how to get leads, prospects, and sell. Check any expenditure on learning, not as cost this time, but as an investment. The truth is, to become a successful business consultant, you must learn different marketing techniques, both offline and online.
- Do as many marketing tests as possible, not just printing flyers or sending out brochures. Still, network, call people you know, build a list of online prospects, and join different groups and associations.
- Sell products and services – meaning that endeavor to do online seminars or webinars, online workshops, and sell your knowledge rather than selling only your time.
- If you want to be a successful online business consultant, make sure you have an online presence. To do this, you don’t need a full-blown website, and you only need a good squeeze page or something that can naturally capture leads.
- Write articles and contents to drive people to your site.
- Endeavor to build relationships and trust in whatever you do. Be patient with your customers, especially in this period, and take time to listen to them carefully. Try to understand their problems and pains and how to provide solutions for them.
CONCLUSION
There are many things you need to know about becoming an online business consultant, especially this pandemic time. The points above are just a few of the things you need to consider before you can become a successful business consultant in this covid-19 period.
So, use this period to learn how to become a successful online business consultant. Take action today; tomorrow is uncertain.
