Great news, your AI Consulting persona is…

The Inventor

You’re a tech whiz, so we’ll help you focus your attention as you rapidly level up your business, sales and client-service skills for your new consultancy.

As an inventor, you’ve spent years learning all things tech – and odds are you’re a quick learner and very good at lots of different software, and perhaps even a few different programming languages. You build stuff for yourself, you tinker with tools (online and offline) in your free time, and you’re always engaged in a new learning and building experience. Lucky for you, your personality makes you the perfect early adopter of AI, and you’ve likely been in the thick of trying new tech since shortly after ChatGPT hit the scene.

Your biggest challenge is building the business, marketing and sales skills to turn all those passions and skills into a thriving business that allows you to earn an enviable income while also protecting your free time. That means you’ll start your journey by focusing on the business-building track, which will be fun and exciting (you’ll learn lots of new techniques) and also sometimes will (gently) push you out of your comfort zone.

You’ll score your first gig quickly by leveraging your personal network, then you’ll tighten up your online presence and start reaching out to prospective clients who aren’t already in your personal network. Importantly, we’ll help you stay focused on key business metrics and not take a detour every time a new tool comes along (they’re fun, but trying every single one isn’t the best use of your limited time). And since you likely haven’t had much experience making sales or signing clients, we’ll make sure you have the guides and templates you need to make fast, efficient work of the sales process (which, we know, is not the part that’s most fun for you) so you can sink your teeth into exciting projects – and get paid handsomely by your new clients.

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Where to Start:

[ Note: When you enroll, you’ll get access to all the lessons we mention below. For now, we’ve removed the links from this section to avoid confusion for folks who haven’t yet enrolled. ]

Because you’re coming in with excellent tech skills, we recommend diving right into Launching Fast. If you experience Imposter Syndrome, it will likely be on the “business” side of things rather than the tech side – however, keep in mind that you’ll need to consciously rein in your desire to try a million tools and new coding languages so you can really focus on the business side of growing your consultancy. (There will be time to play with new tech toys after we build a rockin’ business together!)

To see what other consultants are doing (with far less tech skill than you already have), start with our lesson on Real-World AI Consulting Businesses (that you can build right now). Then work through the lessons in the “Launch in 7 Days” projects until you get to Score Your First Gig.

If you struggle with your Exclusivity Statement, that’s OK. Start with something very general (just use location rather than industry and qualifier, for example) and try to make the early, low-cost sales to prove you can do it, as described in Score Your First Gig. We even have detailed example videos, slides and a proposal template for what your “First Gig” – usually an AI 101 training – will look like.

Keep in mind that you will naturally want to jump right into building complex AI solutions for clients. That is coming soon, but your first clients most likely want, need or even be ready for that. Keep it simple at first, even if it seems “too elementary” sometimes. Remember that you are an extreme early adopter, and your job it to help clients who are not.

Once you’ve scored a small first gig, you’re off to the races. We recommend creating a first draft of your AI Consulting Service Menu, with the understanding that it will evolve as you gain more experience.

Then, it’s time to start reaching out to people outside your “warm” network. Follow the Meet 100 Solid Leads project to learn how to build a super-simple website, update your online reputation, build a prospect list and reach out to them with gentle, powerful, human “cold outreach” that gets their attention and gets them excited to hop on Zoom with you to talk about how you can help them enhance their businesses with AI.

What to Focus On:

  • Stay focused on the business side for your first few weeks, at least – otherwise, you may fall into the common trap of playing with every new tool and not really making progress on the actual financial + sales side of your consultancy

Common Challenges: 

  • Sales is often very difficult for Inventors like you. It’s not just the actual act of selling, but the barrier of feeling like you don’t want to reach out to people until you have the perfect, gigantic project to sell them. Most clients don’t want a super-expensive custom build yet – they want to get to know you, learn the basics, and grow the relationship from there. So don’t wait – just reach out and know that you can actually provide a ton of value to a client today, just because you are a techie and they’re not.

How to Win Big:

  • Set aside the long list of tools and programming languages you want to try – and just focus as much of your time on possible on getting good at business, marketing and sales.
  • If you improve your business skills even to a B+ level, your creativity and tech skills will propel you to a profitable and enjoyable consultancy business.

Complementary Personas

  • Coming Soon ✨ — Learn which personas are a great complement to yours

Recommended Tech Stack

  • Coming Soon ✨ — Learn which tools are the ideal fit for your persona

Not an Inventor? 

You might also be a Bootstrapper (less advanced tech skills) or an Engineer (more advanced business skills). Or, you can retake the quiz.