Dave,

About four months ago, I started a consulting business auditing commercial telephone bills. My job is to look for errors and unnecessary expenditures, and I’m paid on a percentage of what I save my clients. There’s a lot of cold calling involved in what I’m doing, and even though I’m receiving lots of interest, I’m having trouble closing deals. How can I convince people to sign up without first having established clients?

Brandi

Dear Brandi,

Have you thought about investing in yourself, and doing three or four of these audits free of charge? I’m not talking about doing this for huge companies, just local businesses that are known in your community. Offer to review their billing, at no charge, no matter how much you save them. Then, ask for a referral letter if you save them money. See what I’m talking about? You’re basically trading services for great references. If you do a few of these, it just might go a long way towards building your reputation and drumming up some real business!

Dave