Shoal notes: client offerings, converting warm leads, how to reframe ‘storytelling’ +++

Every other week, we organise a call for the Salmon Crew which we call The Shoal. Simple format: bring a question, answer a question. Here’s the latest one we ran, anonymised to preserve the realness of future conversations.

“How do you convert warm leads from speaking engagements or networking?”

• Assume a 6–12 month sales cycle, and set expectations accordingly

• Offer to buy coffee and learn about their world, and make the follow-up conversation about them, not about you

• Use curiosity-driven outreach, e.g. "I'm really curious how solving tricky problems plays out in your role. Can I get you coffee to chat?"

• Avoid immediately asking for business, focus on building the relationship and being mentally available over a sustained period of time afterwards

• Offer free 20-minute audits or intro sessions as a low-commitment way to show your thinking

• Use discounted or half-price intro sessions to give prospects skin in the game without full commitment

• Always anchor to full price first, then offer the discount as a one-time deal

• Avoid offering ‘cheap’ rates, go either full price or free to avoid anchoring yourself to a low price point

• Build long-term recognisability through industry involvement, e.g. join professional groups, speak at events, judge awards, lecture, write publicly

• Focus on becoming a known entity in your niche so people recognise your name when you reach out, as this tends to increase your response rates

• Stay in touch consistently, monthly or bi-monthly, with light touches, e.g. "Saw this, thought of you"

• Watch for signals that someone has a problem you can solve, then offer to discuss it, but don't force the conversation

• Be flexible in early conversions: address immediate client needs even if they're not your ideal long-term project

“How can we package our offering to clients while being respectful of what they need or can implement?”

• Tier offerings by complexity, time investment, and level of engagement, not just by what's included

• Phase proposals into manageable chunks, so clients can digest and implement gradually

• Break deliverables into separate products (e.g., brand guide and messaging guide as two distinct offerings)

• Use an MVP (minimum viable product) approach: sell a deliberately small first phase, then propose additional stages

• Profile clients by their character and bandwidth, and adjust scope based on how cautious or ambitious they are

• Sell the problem definition phase first as a standalone workshop, which naturally leads to selling the solution phases

• Charge for scoping or discovery workshops, rather than giving them away for free

• When offering discounted intro sessions, clearly frame them as "intro" or "first session" to imply there's more to come

• Establish a transactional relationship early (even if discounted) to maintain power dynamics and avoid being seen as a free resource

“How do you position brand storytelling work in business contexts?”

• Consider using "narrative" instead of "storytelling", it sounds more mature and business-focused

• Avoid the word "brand" with financial or senior business audiences, because they often see it as fluffy

• Reframe brand strategy as "bringing the voice of the customer into the boardroom" or "understanding what customers think and how to talk to them"

• Talk about "generating demand", "building customers", "consistency," and "favourability" instead of abstract brand concepts

• Frame your work not in terms of creative or emotional benefits for customers, but in terms of consequences to the organisation, e.g. integration, clarity, autonomous decision-making, avoiding costly mistakes

• Position strategy as "creating consequence in the business", it’s work that leads to action and decisions, not just decks

• Use commiseration as an icebreaker, for example discuss common industry problems in abstract terms to gauge client interest (a winner for me tends to be talking about how brand, comms and social teams rarely speak the same language and this gets in the way of shipping good work)

• Don't introduce negativity or problems until you know the client better, focus on rapport building first and establishing the right chemistry

• When discussing problems, do it conversationally ("Isn't it frustrating when...") rather than directly accusing the client of having that problem

“What's your best advice for transitioning from creative director to strategist?”

• Recognise that many senior creatives have already learned strategy out of necessity due to poor briefs

• Get better at problem definition, as this is central to all strategy work

• Seek out hybrid roles first, to establish a reputation as a "strategic creative"

• Look for opportunities within your current oranisation to demonstrate strategic thinking

• Use your creative training to your advantage: be selective in what you show, focus on impact, don't feel the need to show all your work or show how smart you are (which us strategists looooooooooove doing)

• Develop conviction in your recommendations: creatives often have strong taste and perspective, which is invaluable at more senior strategy levels

• Be mindful of cognitive load because strategy requires different mental space than creative ideation and execution, or at least give your brain some time to navigate between one and the other

• Remember that strategy should serve creative (in agency contexts), but don't let that diminish the value of strategic thinking, especially when you work with agencies who don’t just do advertising, or more in-house roles

• Build informal strategy experience through your current work, then formalise it through training, reading, and community involvement

See you at the next one?

Salmon Crew members get access to more calls like this every couple of weeks. If you want to join the next one, become a member and look out for the invite.