3 Tasks (+ Tools) Consultants Can Undertake in the Summer Slowdown to Hit the Ground Running in the Fall

Summertime, and while the livin’ may not be easy in these days of political unrest, sun and holidays still work their magic in pulling off the kick back and relax vibe. Even if you are up for the hustle, chances are good that your clients will be checked out to varying degrees through the next two months and decisions that require consensus will be in limbo.

You’ve got three choices.

1. Succumb completely to the languid charms of the season and re-emerge in the Fall
2. Strive against the tide and conduct business as normal, accepting the smaller gains
3. Make hay while the sun shines and take the slow season as an opportunity to enjoy the sun and fun while taking care of some of those pesky, non-client facing tasks that, while non-billable, are critical to your business.

If you’re all in for what’s behind door #3, here are my top three task recommendations.

1. Claim Your Name

Summer is a great time to audit your online presence and lock down your name with a dedicated domain name of your own and name specific account on socials.

A. To see a snapshot of your online presence, do a google incognito search (click on 'file' in upper left hand corner of your browser -> click on 'new incognito window' -> input your name in the search bar and see what comes up). Searching yourself in incognito mode gives you a more accurate view of how your name comes up for other people.

B. Use usernamesearch.com to search your name and see what’s available and what’s been taken and by whom. You can then either go and set up user profiles in your chosen name where available or use an online service to set up your profiles far and wide for a relatively small fee.

If your first/last name isn’t available, consider the following:

• Add your middle initial
• Add a keyword (i.e amandacoopermedtech or amandacooperstrategy)
• If .com isn’t available, try a .co, .us, .ca, or potentially an orientation specific tld (i.e. johnpatterson.online )
• Avoid hyphens
• Avoid numbers - you don’t want to spend the rest of eternity explaining that “it’s the number 4, not ‘for”
• If you’re registering your own domain, use Namecheap. It’s far, far better than godaddy.

2. Stake Your (Digital) Claim

Once you’ve got your domain name squared away, use it to throw up a quick website & switch your generic gmail account name to your new domain name. 

Website

Carrd is your best bet for a quick, simple, modern, and responsive website that costs next to nothing. If you’ve never designed a web page in your whole livelong life, there may be a learning curve but the templates provided do a lot of the work for you and hey, this is the perfect time to spend a few hours learning how to use a tool that showcases you online. 

Email

Google makes it super easy to switch over to a Google Workspace account that enables you to use your own domain name (John@johnpattersonregulatory as opposed to johnpattersonregulatory@gmail.com). It’s inexpensive at ~$7.00 per month and makes a distinct difference in perceived professionalism and email deliverability.

3. Lawyer Up

I can feel your wallet shrivelling from here. Times have changed though and you can now access basic legal services and discrete services like document creation for accessible fees from legaltech sites online. 

Gone are the days when a generic template contract from Consulting for Dummies would suffice as conflicts around indemnity and fee payments are reportedly on the rise. 

It behooves you to protect your business and your livelihood by having a professional, specific-to-you contract drawn up that you can use with new clients. Here are two services that I’ve used and like:

Plainly Legal - a new self-serve, online service created by a Harvard educated business lawyer, Plainly Legal makes it super easy to generate the legal documents you should be using but probably aren’t. 

Things like: 

• Consulting Contracts - yes, they start with templates but their system customizes for you
• Privacy & Confidentiality Policies (that you should link to at the bottom of your emails)
• Website Terms & Conditions
• Liability Waivers
• Photo, Audio, Video releases

The service is US based as are the legal premises and language applied. If you're Canadian, and are looking for legal advice and/or contracts drawn up, read on.

GoodLawyer -  this one is based in Canada and might be exclusive to Canadian consultants/companies although they do have lawyers on board who specialize in cross border contracts. Whether you need advice or a contract drawn up, you’re sure to find a lawyer in your area of expertise and region who participates in their service. It’s quick, efficient, and economical and the lawyers are top notch.

There you have it. Three tasks that you can accomplish in the next couple of months without sacrificing beach days with the kids or sucking up valuable client billable time. Best of all, with your professional identity secured and polished, you can hit the September rush knowing your bases are covered and you're ready for new business.

Clients hire us for beneficial outcomes. Often, most of the time, those outcomes require us to communicate and integrate with members of the corporate team and for that team to accept new ideas and do things differently. So, we not only need to be excel in our areas of expertise but also stick handle entrenched dynamics within client teams in order to actually achieve the desired outcome. There are a multitude of communication and change management books and tutorials out there but if you just want a shortcut to get things done, turn to this behavioural economics cheatsheet. Short, succinct, and easy to reference.

Odds are good that you're guilty of at least one of the 10 Most Annoying Professional Email Habits. I'm guilty of at least three and restraining myself from #5 is a work in progress!!!!

A preference for being presented with options over a single solution is just one of the insights revealed in this study, published in Harvard Business Review, of what those who contract service providers really want. Though the survey focused on 'office' professionals, the takeaways offer some valuable cues for those of us consulting in the medtech industry.

In between family trips and figuring out the best positioning to get the full effect of the air conditioning, we're reaching out to the medtech community to hear their stories and getting our new directory of medtech professionals ready for its debut.

We're also continuing to offer our Glow-Up service for medtech consultants.

Our all-in-one, professional, done for you service includes:

• A positioning and branding strategy to attract your ideal clients
• A Professional Profile PDF (for the love of God, stop using a resumé to promote yourself - you're an entrepreneur, not a job candidate!)
• A custom website with online booking app (get paid when the appointment is scheduled, if you like)
• A profile (for one year) in our soon to be launched medtechexpert.org site that we'll be promoting to your target market
• Custom Linkedin (and any other social) cover images

If you're more of a DIY'er, you can use some of the information and tools in the main article of this newsletter and then use the template I made below to create your own Professional Profile.

The kit includes a how-to guide, which apps are the best to use to produce it, quick tips on how to make it speak to your ideal client, and how you can employ your masterpiece after you've created it.

It's free, it's super useful, and you can download it here.

Have a great weekend and we'll see you again in two weeks!