David A. Fields Consulting Group As a consultant who leads a boutique or solo consulting firm, you may not be trained in sales or particularly interested in being a salesperson.
You want to dig into thorny problems with your clients.
Wouldn’t it be better to just hire someone who is a professional at sales to drum up business?
No.
That’s the short answer, and if that’s enough for you, scroll to the end, leave a comment, and proceed on your merry way.
If you want to know why the answer is No, keep reading.
The reason you want a salesperson is probably either…
You’re about as good at generating new business as you are at whipping up a Baked Alaska (i.e., it’s not your forte). So, hiring a salesperson seems like a natural step to augment your business.
…or…
You are very good at signing clients but, frustratingly, no one else in your organization approaches your business development prowess. Therefore, it seems clear a sales professional is required.
In both cases a salesperson is unlikely to deliver the results you’re hoping for.
For small consulting firms, a full-time salesperson is like coffee beans in the roaster. The aroma is sublimely alluring, but the taste is undeniably bitter.
Two hurdles face anyone selling boutique consulting firm services:
Clients Buy People, Not Products
In consulting, buyers conflate the solution and the people who deliver that solution.
That’s particularly true for buyers considering a small consulting firm.
Doris Decisionmaker wants to look in the eyes of the person responsible for developing a valuable result in return for quite a lot of cash.
That’s you or a similarly senior person on your team, not a salesperson.
Consulting Sales Requires Depth of Knowledge
Your path to becoming the obvious choice for a client is deep discovery, followed by careful tailoring of your offering to meet the client’s needs.
A full-time salesperson without a history of delivery responsibilities won’t possess the nuanced understanding required to craft a compelling offering (that the firm can deliver).
This is why founder/owners tend to be the best salespeople for their consulting firms.
They intuitively grasp their firm’s offering at a very deep level and are able to fluidly adapt to the prospect in front of them.
In addition to understanding those two hurdles, recognize that your business—boutique consulting—operates differently from traditional businesses that have salespeople.
Sales, manufacturing and customer service are separated silos in the traditional, product economy. (You wouldn’t expect a plant manager to carry a sales quota.)
However, in the consulting economy, those functions are merged. Consultants generate revenue, create value and service the client.
Yes, as your consulting offering becomes task-oriented, systematized, and repeatable, your consultancy starts to resemble a product company, and a dedicated salesperson is more likely to succeed.
However, a shrink-wrapped product approach is not what most clients are looking for from a small consultancy.
The Reality of Hiring a Salesperson
I have seen scores of consulting firms under $25M/year hire salespeople, and the salesperson is fired or leaves 90-95% of the time. That’s an expensive experiment with terrible ROI.
Appointment-setters (i.e., the most junior of salespeople) wash out slightly less often, but the odds and ROI are still poor.
So, we’re back to the original question: should you hire a dedicated salesperson?
If your firm is under $25 million/year, the answer is, No.
Instead, ramp up your rainmaking by improving the skills of your firm’s consultants and practice leaders. (If you’re a solo consultant, that means burnishing your own abilities.)
Are you replaceable as a salesperson at your firm?
Text and images are © 2026 David A. Fields, all rights reserved.
This is great insight, and I’ve experienced this firsthand. At my prior firm (before launching my own firm last year), we hired a dedicated salesperson. While that individual did bring a few valuable relationships to the table, it quickly became clear that, as you noted, selling consulting services is ultimately about trust and expertise. Because the role lacked deep subject matter expertise, I still needed to participate in nearly every sales call and draft nuanced proposals that required technical knowledge. At some point, we questioned the value of having a dedicated salesperson and ultimately pivoted back to the partners handling business development directly.
At my new firm, I handle all sales myself and have worked hard to build the right team to manage the delivery workload so I can dedicate as much time as possible to business development and client relationships. I would only be open to bringing on a dedicated salesperson again if that individual had both the relationships and subject matter expertise necessary to establish the same level of trust and credibility with prospects that I strive to bring to the process.
Your experience at your prior firm is all too common, Josh, and what you’re doing now makes sense. As you continue to expand your own firm, you’ll find that your next rainmakers live in the ranks of your current delivery people… if you develop them correctly. That combination of subject matter expertise and relationship depth isn’t available outside your firm. (They have their own firms!)
Thank you for sharing your experience in this area, Josh!
Oh, yes, we made that mistake. He could get meetings scheduled, but the conversion on those was poor and it was clear the people he targeted met many consultants. He also didn’t come across as at all consultative. And, when we fired him, he took our full database of Hubspot contacts. One of our worst errors. Avoid!
Ouch, Steve! Well, you’re not alone in that experience. Virtually every boutique consultancy goes through the same experience, usually more than once. It’s a hard lesson to learn, unfortunately. On the good side, that person who left can only do limited damage to your ability to win business. Your relationships trump his database of names.
I appreciate your sharing your journey, Steve. Others will read your story and think twice before following the same path.
Hi David,
I couldn’t agree more. Business is about building win-win relationships, and this is even more important in the consulting business. In my case I have chosen the Artisan/Craftsman entrepreneurial path because I like building relationships (both sales and delivery) and realized I could achieve financial security without scaling up. I hire fractional help in the technology and financial arenas; areas I don’t enjoy and am happy to delegate as much as is practical.
Good on you, Doc! Yes, one way to avoid the salesperson trap is to not expand beyond your own sales appetite. You’d be surprised, though, how many solo consultants think that there must be some magic solution (a program, a service, a person) that will make clients appear for them.
I’m glad you told us about your path, Doc!
I’ve been doing solo consulting for eight years. As I got started, a business coach advised me to “Do your consulting solo, by yourself, for as long as you can.” That’s still my modus operandi. Looking back on my solo march, I met a variety of people who pinged me, in a variety of ways, saying “Let me help you make more sales.” My coaches advice came to mind and stopped me time and again. I saw and still see that “it was and is near impossible for salesy people to both understand my value AND explain it clearly, much less “drum up” paying clients who value my knowledge and skill.
Somehow or other, then, by only drumming up business by myself, I must have been burnishing my business. Burnishing is now a new word in my vocabulary. Whatever that is, somehow I suspect I’ve done that.
What do you mean, David, when you wrote “ramp up your rainmaking” by “burnishing your own abilities.” i got the burn… part down, i’ve been thru many a fire. What is healthy burnishing all about?
Good story, Steve. Whether “stay solo as long as you can” is good advice depends entirely on a consultant’s ambitions. We’ve helped solo consultant become owners of multi-million-dollar firms within a few years of starting their practice. Alternatively, we’ve helped other solo consultants maintain their income while reducing labor intensity. Different goals ➡️ different actions.
For a solo consultant, burnishing (i.e., polishing/improving) your skills includes networking, holding conversations, leveraging relationships, conducting discovery, negotiating and closing.
Thanks for sharing your story and asking the question, Steve!
I am in total agreement with you. As a solo consultant, I have been my best salesperson. The intricacies of the work I have done, in sophisticated medical devices, cannot be accurately represented by a salesperson. The client company is hiring my expertise, for example, designing X-Ray generators for CT scanners. A salesperson, however talented, cannot represent my experience. I know of sister companies, that went that route and were disappointed. Their sales person was only interested in generating leads, regardless of whether these leads were relevant to the job at hand.
Well said, Sreeram. You point out something important: “Full stack” salespeople simply don’t have the depth of knowledge to tackle the later stages of a consulting sale, and “lead generation” salespeople clog up the funnel with low-quality leads, even if they are measured on “qualified” leads.
I appreciate your sharing your experience, Sreeram!