Episode 48: Karl Saka on Maximizing Your Revenue

Karl Sakas is the president of Sakas & Company which is a consulting company that specializes in helping digital marketing agencies grow. I had an opportunity to chat with Karl today, and I found myself nodding my head the entire time. The meat and potatoes of the interview focused on helping businesses grow in a holistic way not just focusing on the technical aspect of what the business offers. Karl emphasizes using a SIT framework which focuses on strategy, implementation and training. Working with agencies, Karl discovered everything they offer fits in the strategies of the SIT framework. The first part of the framework is strategy where the client is saying tell me what to do. The second part is implementation where the client is saying do it for me. Training is the third part, where the client says teach me how to do it. They want to do the project or maintenance in house and they need to get up to speed. Success is more than just completing the project, it is knowing that what you delivered solved the problem at hand. Strategy, implementation and training is a perfect framework for cross-selling and creating the best long term solutions. Communication and understanding client goals can help avoid client problems. Today’s topics include: Getting paid for offering training as a service Benefits of helping the transition of the product hand-off Pitfalls of hiring technical and business employees Being kept on as a trusted advisor is an ideal client situation Questions to ask potential clients and avoid communication issues