Meet with Luk Smeyers

Meet with Luk

(my story and my 'what I do')

It has never been so easy to get visible but at the same time, it has never been so difficult to convert this visibility into real business development in consulting. Success doesn’t come from sharing a few articles on LinkedIn. The game has changed. Dramatically.

The consulting world is changing fast. The Internet, social media, online marketing technology, and the rise of specialization have transformed the buyer’s journey. Research shows that 90% of professional service buyers always check out a consultant’s and consultancy's expertise online before making a decision.

Today’s buyers expect an ‘easy to find’ 5-star rated expert profile, Amazon-like. Unfortunately, 80% of potential consultants and consultancies immediately put themselves out of the picture because of their poor online visibility and reputation as experts.

80% of potential consultants put themselves out of the picture straight away because of their poor online visibility.

These sobering numbers and this changing world prompted me to change my approach to business development in the past years. It’s a journey that has taken me from one man in a sea of good consultants to having a global online presence that fuelled my People Analytics start-up, iNostix (acquired by Deloitte in 2016).

Over the years my online presence and visibility have grown substantially and – with the risk of coming across as arrogant - I’ve always been surprised that I was able to outperform the visibility of thousands of top consultants at Deloitte globally.

I believe I found my ultimate calling: guiding consultants through the journey of growing their business by helping them transform into visible authorities.

After 5 years as the European CHRO at Nielsen Consulting, 8 years of start-up life at iNostix, and finally 4 years of scale-up life at Deloitte, I believe I found my ultimate calling: guiding consulting firms through the journey of growing their business by helping them transform into visible authorities.

I have bundled all my experiences, expertise, know-how, research, reading, successes, and struggles into my new business. It’s my ambition to become the unmatched go-to source of growth knowledge for consulting firms worldwide and teach them how to build, grow and scale their ideal client base by becoming the go-to experts in their market or industry. See below for specifics about 'what I do'. 

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𝟏. 𝐇𝐞𝐫𝐞'𝐬 𝐰𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐈 𝐝𝐨

Do you have a sinking feeling that your prospects don’t really understand how the expertise of your consulting firm can add value to them? That’s when consulting firms call me: to transform them into the Go-To experts in their markets/industries. Digitally-fuelled.

The ultimate business development goal in consulting? Getting invited for the exceptional expertise of the consultancy. Business development without pitching.

𝟐. 𝐀𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐡𝐲 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐜𝐥𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐭𝐨 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐮𝐥𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐲, 𝐫𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐥𝐲?

- Because it’s not clear what problem gets solved for which target audience and with which expertise, aka positioning
- Because the consultancy firm isn’t widely known and seen as THE go-to experts in its target market, aka visibility
- Because the consulting firm hasn’t built an abundance of expertise demonstration from referenceable clients that validate its expertise, aka trust building
- Because the consultancy doesn’t consistently turn its network and relationships into a business development machine, aka generating demand.

𝟑. 𝐌𝐲 𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐜𝐥𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬

- mid-sized consultancy firms, 10 to 100 consultants and/or 1M to 20M revenue
- large consultancy firm practices of a similar size: 10-100 c's, 1-20M revenue
- individual consultancy owners, leaders, or partners of these mid-sized firms or practices who book an individual guidance package with me

𝟒. 𝐓𝐲𝐩𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐦𝐲 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤

- A crystal clear positioning with a specific value proposition for a well-defined target audience
- A top-of-mind reputation for solving prototypical problems and getting invited as domain authorities
- A substantially higher market/industry visibility, by consistently educating the target audience
- A rock-solid trust-building process through sharing of transformational case studies, validated by former clients
- A much more reliable pipeline of new, premium consulting opportunities, easy to (dis)qualify

Inevitably, these outcomes will deeply impact long-term revenue, margins, and profitability.

𝟓. 𝐇𝐨𝐰 𝐜𝐚𝐧 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐮𝐥𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐦𝐞?

- every collaboration starts with a foundational positioning assessment followed up with my guidance on the implementation of my improvement recommendations
- you can start with a workshop for owners, leaders or partners of a consultancy and start the reflection process within the team
- and finally, consulting owners, leaders or partners can book an individual guidance package

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Interested in an overview of my surprising results in the past iNostix and Deloitte years? Have a look at this overview...