“Anyone interested in authority needs to add this to their podcast playlist right now”

This is episode one of the The Recognized Authority podcast. It contains two segments: A brief introduction to the podcast (first 3-4 minutes) An interview of Alastair McDermott by our guest host, Alistair McBride The The Recognized Authority podcast is for consultants of all types –

Becoming an expert in your field takes a lot of work and effort. But if you want to be recognized as an authority, you need to do more. In this episode, you’ll hear from Jonathan and Alastair as they discuss how to become that recognized authority.

As a business owner, simply getting things done can be difficult, but getting things done successfully while also care-giving is remarkable. In this episode, you’ll hear from Heather and Alastair as they discuss how “superheroes” manage their time.

It can be difficult to figure out how to find your first clients and sell to them at the right price. In this episode of The Recognized Authority you’ll hear Richard Newton share his insights on how to run a successful consulting business, how to find

Sometimes it takes a shock to the system to realize you need to change something about your business. In this episode, Sara Dunn tells us about experiencing that shock and how it motivated her to find her niche. She speaks with Alastair about the importance of

You sometimes hear David vs Goliath stories in business, so when Wolfram Moritz told me how his 7-person firm beat a competitor with over 200,000 employees I wasn’t shocked but I had to know more about how they differentiated their firm. In this episode, Wolfram and

Deciding how to specialize your business, and then actually implementing that decision are the two phases of specialization. In this episode, Philip Morgan and Alastair McDermott discuss the transition from generalist to specialized, and when specialization is less important. They also discuss when to use brand

People use the word “remarkable” quite often in conversation, but I think we don’t give much thought to the literal meaning. Douglas Squirrel has done just that, and made it a deliberate part of growing his solo consulting business to over $1MM in revenue. In this

Building your authority as an independent consultant is key to your success, getting inbound clients, and being able to charge higher fees. In this episode you’ll hear Rochelle Moulton share a framework to build your authority.

[Explicit Language Warning] How can you stand out from the crowd when you are offering the same services as a thousand other consultants? Radical differentiation is the answer. In this episode you’ll hear Louis Grenier describe the steps you need to follow to Stand The F*ck

The world of financial advice is dominated by large financial institutions in Ireland. Yet one independent financial advisor stands out as a trusted source of information. In this episode of you’ll hear Paddy Delaney tell me how he used his podcast to grow his financial advisory

Marketing isn’t often thought of as a joyful activity – in fact, it’s usually quite the opposite, being thought of as stressful,  ineffective, or even worse in the minds of some consultants. In this episode, M. Shannon Hernandez and Alastair McDermott discuss how to approach marketing

Winning large projects as a solo consultant can be difficult. Partnering up with trusted peers allows you to pitch for bigger projects, smooth out the “feast or famine” rollercoaster, and allows you to brainstorm ideas. In this episode, Frank Hannigan and Alastair McDermott discuss how to

It can be difficult to reach out and connect with new people on LinkedIn without coming across like a spammer. In this episode, Dana Lindahl and Alastair McDermott discuss how to use LinkedIn to win more clients through outbound and inbound lead generation. They also discuss

Bonus Episode! Transparency Report: Behind the Scenes Numbers Normally I do interviews, but today I’m doing a solo recording sharing what I call a transparency update. If you’re open to it, think that it’s good idea to share some numbers from your business. It can be

It’s not always obvious what intellectual property assets you have, or their value to you as a business. It could be a signature methodology, an audit process, or something as simple as document templates. In this episode, Erin Austin and Alastair McDermott discuss how intellectual property

When you’re trying to grow your consulting firm, there are a couple of inflection points you can hit that are difficult to push past.  In this episode, Brad Farris and Alastair McDermott discuss how Brad now uses his extensive experience of buying  agencies and creative firms

There’s a thousand different articles and voices telling us how to create buyer personas, or ideal customer avatars, or ICAs, or one of a dozen other names. Often the recommendations of how to use these personas are contradictory. In this episode, Adrienne Barnes and Alastair McDermott

As a consultant, bespoke projects can sometimes get overwhelming as you have to customize the project specification and the delivery for every new project and client. In this episode Alzay Calhoun and Alastair McDermott discuss how to productize your consulting services to leverage your time and

The Final Episode with Alastair McDermott Marketing for Consultants will soon be no more! In this short episode you’ll learn why it’s going away, and what’s going to happen next! We hope you’ll stick around for the next stage of the journey! Alastair & Aiko.  

Growing a consulting business is not easy, turning it into a business empire is a formidable challenge. In this episode, Peep Laja and Alastair McDermott discuss how Peep grew his SEO consulting firm by niching down and creating high value content. They also discuss how every

This one is a little bit different – it’s a behind the scenes look at the rebrand that we did recently for the podcast where we rebranded from Marketing for Consultants to The Recognized Authority. This episode is a conversation with my friend – and former

Many consultants consider writing a book. It can be an invaluable marketing tool that can generate new business, demonstrate your expertise, and position you as the authority in your field. But from a business perspective, most books are a failure. In this episode Rob Fitzpatrick and

Most consultants love their work – but they don’t love selling their work.  In this episode, Brendan McAdams and Alastair McDermott discuss how to qualify your prospective clients so that you can sell more effectively. We discussed the fundamental principles of sales that are often overlooked,

The world of journalism and PR can feel nebulous to experts and consultants who don’t interface with that world. But it can be a fantastic way to reach new clients and build relationships. In this episode Kate Warwick and Alastair McDermott discuss how to develop your

Consultants are not in the business of selling methodologies – you’re in the business of solving a client’s problem. You need to be laser focused on your client and on solving their problem. In this episode Luk Smeyers and Alastair McDermott discuss why consultants say that

Guesting on podcasts is a fantastic way to get your message in front of a new audience and build your authority. But the majority of pitches received by podcast hosts are terrible! In this episode Mai-kee Tsang and Alastair McDermott discuss why most podcast pitches are

What does it mean to be a thought leader? What is thought leadership content, and how is it created? In this episode Andrew Rogerson and Alastair McDermott walk through the actionable steps that you can take to create thought leadership content, from the strategic overview to

After an initial growth period of several years, it’s quite common for a business to hit an inflection point where they start to level off or even start to struggle.  In this episode Evelyn Starr and Alastair McDermott discuss how this happens and what you can

Being an independent consultant can sometimes be a tough gig – but there are things you can do to make life easier for yourself! In this episode Michael Zipursky and Alastair McDermott discuss how to run a successful consulting business, including details on how to niche,

Marketing and branding are often conflated: the distinction can feel more like semantics. But there’s a very real and easy to understand difference. In this episode, Leo York and I discuss the primitive origins of marketing, how plants were the first marketers, and how and why

“You should raise your prices” is advice you’ll frequently hear on this podcast and elsewhere. But it’s not that easy to implement. In this episode, Ron Baker and Alastair McDermott discuss why pricing by the hour is a bad option, and why value pricing is better

The world is getting louder, more chaotic and it becomes difficult to hear your own voice amidst the noise around us. In this episode, Dr. Carmel Finnan and Alastair McDermott discuss the importance of storytelling in communication, and how it helps in building your brand. They

As authorities and experts in our specialist areas, we want our prospective clients to see us as competent, intelligent experts. But many of us are self-sabotaging and creating the perception of being less competent, less intelligent, having less expertise. In this episode, Norbert Schwarz and Alastair

Most consultants have been told “you should write a book” at some point. But easy as that is to say, where do you start? In this episode, Anne Janzer and Alastair McDermott discuss how to start writing your book, why writer’s block isn’t quite what people

Podcasts are rapidly growing in popularity in the B2C and B2B worlds with Joe Rogan and Spotify leading the drive. There’s a lot of advice about podcasting available online, but much of it is missing an important nuance that applies to experts and consultants who are

There is a direct connection between niching down and earning more money. In this episode, Geraldine Carter and Alastair McDermott discuss positioning and specialization. Geraldine outlines the direct connection between your specialized positioning and your ability to command higher fees. They also discuss pricing new service

The path to authority is one route to creating leverage and value beyond simply billing for your time. Authority allows you to work with clients who energize and inspire you, it allows you to stop pitching and instead have sales conversations with pre-sold clients and buyers.

There are different stages to growing a consulting business: the strategies you adopt when you’re getting established can be different to those you use to scale later. Several weeks ago I attended a marketing conference called The Uprising, an event run by Mark Schaefer. I spoke

When we first start our consulting business, very often we come in with a specific idea of how it’s going to look, what our services are going to be, and how we’re going to sell them. But the great advantage of being independent is the ability

LinkedIn can be a fantastic source of leads for consultants, but there’s a lot of noise on the platform, especially since the start of the pandemic.  In this episode, Louise Brogan and Alastair McDermott discuss how to do lead generation on LinkedIn without spamming people or

In this episode reposted from Philip Morgan’s The Self-Made Expert Podcast, Alastair and Philip discuss what the journey to authority looks like, why you should cultivate expertise, and how publishing develops your thinking. They also discuss when authority matters, how you know if you have authority,

As a consultant, it can often be difficult to be seen as meaningfully different from your competitors. Every consulting firm has  – or claims to have! – smart people, great methodologies and tools, and every website talks about how they can solve complex business problems in

For consultants, traditional marketing can often feel like an inappropriate tool for the job. In fact, sometimes it even feels like we’re screaming into the void. But what’s the alternative? In this episode, Michael F. Schein and Alastair McDermott discuss how to use hype to grab

How do you give yourself the maximum chance of winning your ideal clients? What are the characteristics of clients that you are uniquely able to help? How do you know if your messaging is right? In this episode, Emily Omier and Alastair McDermott discuss the differences

Selling consulting services is often selling the invisible and intangible. How can we better demonstrate the value of our services to prospective clients? In this episode, Kate The Case Study Copywriter and Alastair McDermott discuss how case studies can help convert your prospective buyers. They can

Running a consulting business can be exhausting. How can we make consulting easier to sell, easier to price, and easier to predict? In this episode, David C. Baker and Alastair McDermott discuss the business of consulting, including why research is crucial in positioning and standing out

Last week, David C. Baker talked about the importance of research. In this week’s solo episode, Alastair McDermott speaks about how research fits in with the Journey to Authority, and explains the Authority Maturity Model. If you are interested in growing your expert business and becoming

The business of independent consulting can be challenging, no more so than for a change management consultant in the healthcare industry in the midst of a pandemic! In this episode, Molly Angel and Alastair McDermott discuss what it’s like to run consulting projects in challenging times.

Writing articles for your website or social media is hugely time consuming, and it’s so difficult to find the time when you’re already working long hours on client projects. But you need to make the time. Here’s why. In this episode, bestselling author & renowned speaker

Book publishing has changed dramatically over the past couple of decades. Traditional publishing no longer has a monopoly on distribution, and authors can thrive independently. Hybrid publishing models are springing up. What does it all mean for experts who write a book? In this episode, Melissa

Storytelling has been the topic du jour in marketing over the past couple of years. We all know we should use stories more in business, but what does that actually mean from a practical standpoint? In this episode, Guillaume Wiatr and Alastair McDermott discuss a practical

As experts, we hear the advice that we should have a distinct – maybe even unique – point of view that comes through in our work, when we speak, and when we write. But what does it mean to have a point of view? Do you

Video is the medium of choice for many, and the social platforms encourage and even incentivize us to upload videos directly. But so many consultants and experts are reticent to use video for marketing. Video seems complex, expensive and time consuming to produce, and requires “a

As consultants, we often think about having a single core offer – usually a high ticket offering. But it’s not always a good fit for a lot of our potential clients, and there are some clients who are willing to pay more to get more. So

Building a personal brand is advice we hear a lot, but it’s not always clear what that means, why it’s important, or whether it’s something we can approach in a deliberate way. In this episode, Mark Schaefer and Alastair McDermott discuss why personal branding is overtaking

Special bonus episode: Bland Content and Burnout with Craig Burgess   This is a special bonus episode of the podcast, and it’s very different from our usual interview episodes. It’s a behind the scenes look at an impromptu conversation between Craig Burgess and I. This is

We know that creating and publishing content is a key part of building your authority – you’ve heard it from many guests on this podcast. But yet it’s still difficult to find the time to create that content. And even after we create it, we still

Attention is a currency, something we all spend on those who entertain us, and those who help solve our problems. In a cluttered, noise-filled world, getting your ideal client’s attention focused on your content is difficult, creating content that will hold their attention even more so.

“Embrace what makes you different” “Stand out from the crowd” “Have a distinct point of view” “Find your ‘Blue Ocean’” Everyone is telling us that we need to show how unique we are, how we are different from our competitors. Is that really what we need

Everyone is talking about how we should create more content. Write more blog posts, write more LinkedIn articles, start a podcast, do more video on social. But when we actually start creating this content it seems to be hugely time consuming for very little return on

Growing a consulting business to seven figures seems an impossible goal for many independent consultants, but it is possible, and my guest today is the Million Dollar Consultant himself, Dr. Alan Weiss. Alan is a polarizing character, probably the most polarizing figure in the consulting industry.

Effective marketing is difficult to get right, and independents like us have a lot to juggle when marketing ourselves. Hubspot says that the biggest determinant of effective marketing is your audience. If we’re not properly targeting our ideal clients, we might as well not be marketing

If you’re a consultant who wants to build authority, you need to do that through content creation. That involves writing and speaking. Publishing words, videos, or podcasts. Every consultant who walks this path hits the same problem: lack of time. How do you find the time

Podcasting is a hot topic, and you heard before on this show and others why you should consider both guesting on podcasts, and even starting your own podcast. But where to start? In this episode, Jonathan Baillie Strong and Alastair McDermott discuss how to approach podcasting

As independent consultants, our approach to publishing content is often haphazard and inconsistent: the topic depending on what issues are top of mind, and the schedule based on our client workload. One way to ameliorate that is to create a content marketing plan: some guiderails to

Even just contemplating niching down your business can feel absolutely terrifying. That’s why I think it’s so important to hear from people who have done it successfully, and learn about the massive rewards that they are seeing. In this bonus episode, ReeJade Richmond and Alastair McDermott discuss

We often start out working on execution, implementing projects for clients after they’ve decided on strategy. Our former guest David C. Baker talks about this as “working with your hands”. But we can have more impact, be more profitable, and enjoy our work more if we