subject: Consulting Firm Business Plan: Beyond Freelancing [print this page] Creating a consulting business is a greater challenge than becoming a self-employed freelance consultant, but the potential rewards in terms of both income and building wealth are greater as well. The need for a business plan is one major difference. This plan can enable you to seek outside investment to launch your company on more stable footing and will increase your companys chances of success because of the thorough, thoughtful development process it requires. A main requirement of a consulting business plan is that it explain what kind of leverage the business will offer you beyond freelancing.
Employees
One method of getting this additional leverage is in hiring employees. At first this may simply be an assistant who can take care of some of the administrative elements of the business or an analyst who can support your work on client engagements. For the hiring of this individual to be successful, you must either be able to bill out their work to clients at a rate that more than covers their salary and the overhead involved, or, better yet, take on more profitable work yourself with your newly freed-up time. Describing one of these paths in your business plan is a start to show how having a business will increase the potential return for you and investors.
Moving Beyond Billing By the Hour
Only by offering services that move beyond an hourly billing system can the consulting business offer the potential for returns that can scale up faster than costs. This can include speaking engagements, where the potential for revenue brought in is determined not by the time you put in, but by the number of attendees. This can be by developing and marketing certain services which can be completed rather simply, but are of such value to clients that they can be billed at a higher service fee than an hourly rate would have allowed. This could be an audit service which, in a short period of time, lets you spot multiple potential problems or opportunities for clients.
Remember the basic concept that a consulting business has the potential to offer impressive returns in these ways and others and be clear in your description of these methods in your business plan.
by: Eric Powers
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