Small Business Consulting: Overcoming Client Denial

Posted by Nick Niesen on October 28th, 2010

When working in small business consulting, your clients may ask, "Why do I need something as big and powerful as the network you?re recommending? We?re just a seven person company and our network works great, at least most of the time."

"Sell" Fear

In this situation, to overcome denial, you often have to "sell" fear. Be ready to talk about a small business consulting client that trusted their PC-savvy bookkeeper so much, that the bookkeeper was covering her trails daily and able to embezzle $50K before getting caught during an annual audit by their CPA.

Only naïve clients believe in trusting every employee and for that matter every non-employee who has physical access to the building.

Get Clients Thinking about Security

In reality though, small business owners rarely think about IT security until it?s too late. Make sure you get your small business consulting prospects and clients thinking about how much access should be granted.

Get your prospects and clients thinking about sensitive files such as credit card numbers, social security numbers (in the U.S.), trade secrets, payroll data or annual employee reviews.

Determine Client Needs

When small business clients say they think your proposed client/server network is overkill, they might not be thinking of the big picture. That?s all the more reason to take the small business consulting client through a comprehensive initial consultation, needs analysis, IT audit and site survey.

Many times a small business owner might ask just for file sharing or e-mail. If you press further, however, you?ll discover they also really need a contact management system, group scheduling, network faxing, a company Intranet and secure, high-speed Web browsing from each desktop.

The Bottom Line about Small Business Consulting

If small business consulting clients insist they have no need for data security, you probably haven?t probed deeply enough. Find out where the client stores its client lists, proprietary pricing models, payroll forecasts, bonus calculations, credit card data and social security numbers.

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