This series has been very popular among the 4,300 readers of this publication. As a result, I have received many phone calls and comments and have been asked to speak at a number of firms on the subject “Improving Cross -Selling Within Your Firm.” Why is there so much interest? Cross -selling is simply the easiest, fastest and most dramatic way to increase a firm’s revenue.

Previous parts of this series have covered the inadequate knowledge of partner expertise, proving competence one partner at a time and the lack of a sales script. In this issue, I will speak about compensating desirable behaviors.

More and more professional firms are adopting an eat what you kill mentality and compensating heavily in that direction. This translates into we will give you more money if you originate work than if you act as a service partner.

Understandably, firms wish to encourage their professionals to go out and market and therefore take this course of action, but a side effect does occur. Partners sometimes choose to focus on their own marketing efforts and not promote cross-selling efforts to someone else’s clients. Why do they choose this course of action? It pays better! This strategy diminishes cross -selling initiatives. Some people might claim that this is desirable, as the firm will gain an additional person who will now be marketing, but the efforts of the novice marketer will rarely match the harvest that can be yielded from cross-selling to existing clients.

There is also the tendency to work more diligently on one’s own originations rather than on the work one has committed to do for other partners in the firm. This can result in the originating partner experiencing significant frustration as his or her clients face frequent delays, missed deadlines and poorly executed work. Why does this occur? It pays better!

Another problem occurs when the service partner ends up doing the lion’s share of the work on ABC client (originated by Peter) and protests, “I am doing all the work for ABC, and I am the one whom the client turns to for everything. Peter has virtually no contact with the client, yet he’s getting all the credit – that simply is not fair. I am killing myself and for what?” Why is there this unhappiness? Peter is getting paid too much and the service partner is being paid too little!

We all understand that compensation issues rank amongst the most challenging problems that firms face. How does one do it fairly? All the same, we need to remember that money is the most powerful motivator and whatever the firm compensates for will evoke a positive response. Conversely, whatever the firm does not compensate for will bring a minor and insignificant response.

The fact that cross -selling is weak is often partially a reflection of inadequately rewarding cross -selling efforts.
Unless we significantly reward cross- selling, we will continue to see paltry results.

Altering the firm’s cross -selling results will require the creation and execution of a professional Cross -Selling Campaign. Requisite components must include these eight units : Partner Education, Partner Selling to Partner, Partner Script Development, Partner Compensation, Partner Recognition, Partner Organization, Partner Report Card and Cross- selling Reinforcement Program.

Every professional firm sits on a gleaming mountain of gold coins. Those gold coins become available by the firm pursuing an active Cross-Selling campaign. In 2008, will your firm take the initiative to put those gold coins in its bank account?


Comedy Corner

The wisdom of the Lakota Indians declares, “When one discovers that one is riding a dead horse, one should dismount.”

In the same situation, too often we yield to those who advise us to buy a stronger whip, change to less demanding riders, decree that from now on dead horses are welcome at staff meetings, reclassify the horse as living-impaired, stop talking about the dead horse already, put several dead horses in the same unit with the hope that they will motivate each other, provide increased compensation to galvanize the dead horse, lower the performance requirements for all horses and – if all else fails – promote the dead horse to a prestigious supervisory position within the company.