“I had personally consulted independently for something like 10 years before joining Appleton Greene. I am a great believer in speculating to accumulate and was spending about $5,000 per month on marketing my practice. This included about $1,000 per month on purchasing database contacts for mass mailing. So, spending $1,225 annually for the opportunity to reach out to 500,000 contacts through Appleton Greene, where there was no cold calling, was a no brainer for me really. What I was not expecting was the level of professional support that I received, assistance with developing a detailed client information guide and this process really helped me to fully understand what it was that I personally had to sell and precisely why clients would buy it. I also liked the fact that I could ease myself into Appleton Greene without giving up my current clients. Approximately 70% of my clients come from Appleton Greene now.”

“I worked in Human resources for 20 years and had always considered consulting but had never taken the plunge. Every self-analysis test that I had undertaken told me that I was ideally suited to being a consultant, but I just did not know how to go about it. I had interviews with some of the big consulting firms but felt that I would just be project managing their own services. It didn’t feel right for me. I also had interviews with several consultancy umbrella organizations, but the problem was that I still did not understand what I was actually going to do if a client employed me. The attraction of Appleton Greene was that I could stick my toe in the water, so to speak. The annual cost was negligible and I was able to continue working with my employer while setting everything up. I learnt how to develop a detailed consulting service brochure for myself and this process helped me to understand what it was that I could do. The support that I received during this process was really excellent. I did not really understand this at the time, but the majority of business at Appleton Greene comes through their learning providers, so there is no need for business development. I am now a full-time consultant and thoroughly enjoy my work now. Appleton Greene gave me the confidence and the support to have a go.”

“I am not one of these people who expects something for nothing and I do not mind paying for good service. The majority of Appleton Greene’s income comes from commissions and service fees on consultancy engagements so I was therefore comfortable paying for the business development service provided by Appleton Greene. I could tell that everything had been really well thought through, just by reading the information guide and this gave me the confidence to give it a try. It took me a while to get started, just because my own commitments prevented me from developing the content for my consulting service guide, but once I had done this, everything started to flow. My expectations have now been raised and I have been itching to become a full certified learning provider or at least a program director at Appleton Greene.”

“Being a lawyer I am a stickler for the detail. I have been on the client side of consulting in the past and always struggled to understand precisely what all of these consultants were actually going to do. I was originally introduced to Appleton Greene by employing the services of one of their consultants. I was really impressed with the quantity and quality of information that was made available to me before we employed the consultant. I knew exactly what they were going to do and their consulting service information guide provided a constant source of reference. These services were then facilitated by qualified learning providers who were implementing business improvement processes. Needless to say, when I got to the stage when I was considering doing some part-time consulting myself, Appleton Greene was my first and only port of call.”

“I did some serious research before joining Appleton Greene. I had meetings with a variety of different consulting firms but felt that all that they were really offering was the opportunity to be registered with them and success would be subject to clients being interested in my profile, much as it is with Linkedin. The more I peeled the onion with Appleton Greene the more I realized that their service was much more than this. I had no idea if it would work, but I felt compelled to give it a try. I completed my profile and had it published. I worked hard on my client service guide and had this published. I wrote several professional articles and had them published. Then the dime dropped! What I was doing here was creating awareness. The client service guide and professional articles are what did the trick for me because they enabled me to really “engage” clients for the first time in my career. I currently earn a six figure income through Appleton Greene and am still only working an average of 25 hours per week, which leaves plenty of time for other things.”

“Everyone told me that if I wanted to succeed as a consultant that I had to network my butt off! So I did, I had a detailed profile on Linkedin and developed over 500 connections and joined I don’t know how many professional groups. I had a profile on I don’t know how many other professional and social networks and I was spending approximately 25% of my time networking and promoting myself. If I had a dollar for every consultancy assignment that I have been promised via professional or social networks, I could have retired by now. What did I achieve from all of this effort, zilch! After becoming somewhat disenchanted, I began looking for something different. I enjoyed consulting, but all of my projects were coming from word of mouth and whatever I tried with marketing and networking wasn’t working. What intrigued me with Appleton Greene, was that they were NOT offering the opportunity to network. Indeed they did not appear to have any real presence on social of professional networks. This was actually a commercial organization that already had a long list of clients worldwide and all that they required of me was to provide detailed content about the consulting services that I would ideally like to offer. All of my clients now come through Appleton Greene and every minute that I have spent with them has been a productive minute.”

“A friend recommended Appleton Greene to me. They were applying to Appleton Greene themselves and provided me with a link to their consultant information guide. I was instantly hooked and contacted them to apply. Unfortunately I had to wait for their next annual intake and I was chomping on the bit by then. What I liked was the emphasis on the consulting service itself. If I was excited by what I could develop, then presumably clients would be too. The support and assistance that I received from Appleton Greene was enlightening, their attention to detail is remarkable and this theme is reflected throughout all of their services. I felt that I was being professionally trained and had support whenever I needed it. The result was that I gained in confidence, established a portfolio of clients and I also outsource work to two other consultants.”

“Like most people I am very busy and have a short attention span. You can therefore imagine how surprised I was when I spent a whole day out of my weekend, reading through all of the ACS Candidate Information Guide. I couldn’t believe how much interesting content there was. My mind was racing and I even had problems sleeping that night. What surprised me even more was when I then read through the whole thing again the day afterwards! This actually taught me a valuable lesson: if you are interested enough in something, you will take the time to read about it, if it is engaging and if it is important enough to you. I have consulted for years and have spent a small fortune developing business, but I had never thought of putting serious time into writing content relating to what I do. This is what I understood Appleton Greene was advocating. You write a detailed client information guide, explaining precisely what you propose to do and how it would work in practice. Then you write articles that relate to your specialist subject and publish them. What does all of this achieve? Well in my case it has eliminated all of the time that I used to spend on sales and business development! The trick is that this approach pre-qualifies your target market. They have effectively made their decision to proceed even before speaking with you and I have the opportunity to amend and improve my service information guide as I gain more experience. What a wonderfully simple and refreshing approach to business development.”

“If you are a practicing independent consultant then Appleton Greene is a must. However, do not think that all you need to do is register with them, publish your profile and then just sit back and watch the money roll in. if you do nothing, you will achieve nothing. I learnt this the hard way. I registered about a year ago and quickly got my professional profile published. I knew that the next step was developing my client information guide, but I was pressed for time and put this on the back burner. I then came to the end of my current project and had a month or so to spare, so I contacted Appleton Greene again who understandably said that they were still waiting for my client information guide. I then had the motivation to spend time on this and once it was approved and published, I achieved my first assignment within a week! Not only that, but I have received service orders from Appleton Greene regularly every month since, not all of which I am able to accept. So, learn from my mistakes. The more that you put into this, the more you will get out of it. I am not alone either. Everyone that I have spoken to who has succeeded at Appleton Greene has had their client information guide approved and published. An additional tip: Appleton Greene’s customer service support guys are really good, if you are not regularly communicating with them then you are missing out.”

“It is rare these days to find an online company that provides good customer service. Appleton Greene provides clear time parameters for responses to support requests and always responds accordingly. More importantly, their communications are detailed, personal and productive. Everything is carefully planned, well thought out and I always knew precisely what I needed to do next. I believe that the same customer service philosophy is implemented with clients too and it is therefore no wonder that they come back to Appleton Greene. They are very well thought of by the clients that I have worked with and by other consultants and learning providers too. Their staff training must be excellent because everyone treats you like a VIP. Very good value for your dollar.”

“I was looking for a job when I came across Appleton Greene. I had never consulted before but when I read through the consultancy information guide there were so many lights that came on for me and I was excited about giving this a try. I had nothing to lose, the annual service fee was not an issue for me, I spent more than this on eating out every month, so I saw this as a low risk opportunity. Appleton Greene takes you through a series of very well thought out stages of self-development and I found that my knowledge, understanding and confidence grew by the day. By the time that I had finished developing all of the content for my client information guide, I knew exactly what I was going to do, how I was going to do it and why companies would employ me. When I then started to receive service orders from companies, there was no trepidation on my part because I knew that they understood what they were employing me for. This is the most credible business development process that I have ever come across.”

“As an employer of consultants, I was used to interviewing candidates who were just trying to sell me their experience and knowledge, there never seemed to be anything tangible. Then I interviewed an Appleton Greene consultant who referred me to her client information guide. I was blown away! I then reviewed the client information guides for other consultants and services and in all cases I was very clear about what I was being asked to buy. What this experience also provided me with, was an acknowledgement of a unique consulting service proposition that I myself could provide. The fact that I could work part time as a consultant with Appleton Greene, without having to give up my day job, really appealed to me because it enabled me to treat consultancy as a hobby. This has provided me with tremendous insight regarding my own core skills and experience and has allowed me to completely re-evaluate my career options for the future.”

“I was in a pretty desperate financial position when I first joined Appleton Greene. I had just lost my job and was not in anything like a strong financial position. I had also recently gone through an expensive divorce and had no funds to invest in anything. Getting a decent job was proving difficult during the recession and I turned to consultancy as an interim option. I looked at several consultancy companies but they all required a significant investment either to purchase a franchise or to purchase training and support. Appleton Greene were the only company that offered me a viable option that I could afford at the time. My relationship with Appleton Greene has always been self-financing since then. Appleton Greene provided me with the opportunity to pick myself back up off the floor and I will always be eternally grateful to them for that. I also feel like I belong at Appleton Greene. The assignments are all really interesting and there is always plenty of support available. I can no longer imagine doing anything else.”

“I love the fact that Appleton Greene is not location sensitive. What I mean by this is that it does not seem to matter where you are located internationally, you still receive regular client service orders. I tend to have to move a lot because of my husband’s job and I did not want to have to change jobs myself every time we moved. When I first registered with Appleton Greene, we were based in Zurich in Switzerland, then we moved to New York for a short period of time before moving to Vienna in Austria. We are now back in the United States in San Francisco. I have always received a steady flow of service orders and the fact that the majority of consultancy assignments are outsourced by Appleton Greene Learning Providers is really great because all of the work can be done online. The Learning Providers provide the face of Appleton Greene to their clients and I can just focus upon working in the background. Everything is always really well organized.”

“I had no prior consulting experience when I first joined Appleton Greene, so I registered as an Associate. The support that I have received from Appleton Greene has been excellent, but the real value for me personally has been the practical opportunity to work under Certified Learning Providers. In most cases you are always directly responsible to a Learning Provider, which enables you to gain valuable experience. I have learnt such a lot about a variety of different consulting services and about the various corporate training programs that are being implemented with clients. This experience has helped me to shape my own unique consulting service offering and gain the confidence to implement it. I did complete a business/consultancy degree in university but I found the content much too theoretical. I learnt more in my first month at Appleton Greene.”

“Appleton Greene’s primary focus is upon the consultancy service that you are offering. Get this right and the business development process is easy. It is refreshing after 20 years in consulting to finally identify a consultancy business model that really works. To develop your skills and experience into a tangible consulting service is a difficult but very rewarding process. It is all common sense really, no client would be willing to engage the services of a consultant unless they understood precisely what they were being asked to buy and how the service would work in practice. The process certainly helped me to focus and by the time that I had finished my client information guide, I knew exactly why clients would employ me.”

“I have consulted for about 10 years on and off and have always enjoyed the projects that I have worked on. What I did not enjoy was that I could only work for one client at a time, because all of my work was project-orientated. Then, when the project finished, I had to start looking for the next client. On average over 10 years I was spending approximately 8 months of every year earning income and four months of the year spending money looking for new business. It is what is typically referred to as the feast famine scenario within the consultancy industry. Joining Appleton Greene has resulted in me being able to spend all of my time consulting and earning income and I don’t have to worry about business development any more. In addition to this, I am working with a number of different clients at the same time, which reduces risk and increases my earning potential.”

“I worked as a consultant for KPMG for around 8 years, but I had been thinking of setting up independently in order to have more control over the work that I did and to increase my income. I was not however prepared to take the proverbial leap without having the support structure that I was used to. This is why Appleton Greene appealed to me. It also afforded me the opportunity to carry on working at KPMG while I established my own clients with Appleton Greene. The transition was therefore made seamlessly over a period of about 6-12 months, eliminating any financial risk for me personally. The support that I have received from everyone at Appleton Greene has been very much appreciated, including all of the Learning Providers, but I must give a special mention to Elizabeth Johnson, who has worked tirelessly on my behalf and is always friendly, courteous and professional. She has the patience of a saint and has always managed to keep me on track.”

“What appealed to me about Appleton Greene was the opportunity of doing work online. I love working from home as much as possible and the majority of consultancy assignments allow you to do that, because the learning providers visit with clients and then outsource the work to you. I have personally preferred to decline the consultancy assignments that required me to visit the client’s premises and yet have still managed to keep busy with online assignments. It also allows you to work with learning providers in different parts of the world, which has proven to be very interesting and enlightening. It has also allowed be to focus upon what I do best, which is Business Performance Optimization and I have now developed a reputation for being a specialist in this area.”

“I have consulted both internally and independently for probably 20 years, but I first started earning a 6 figure salary when I joined Appleton Greene around 12 years ago. Since then I have continuously improved both my service skills and income. I currently earn around $200k-$250k and manage between 5-10 clients at any one time. In my case I am usually involved with one or two projects at a time and then have a number of other clients on advisory or support services. By the time I am about to end a project there is always one of the other clients getting ready to upgrade. It has been pretty consistent over the years. Appleton Greene have always been there when I have needed them and it has really helped me having other consultants to call upon as and when needed.”

“When I was first thinking about joining Appleton Greene, I had been mulling over consulting for some time. I had good experience at board level and felt that I had something to offer clients as a consultant, but I was just not sure about how to package what I was going to do. The fact that Appleton Greene was going to help me to develop my own client information guide really helped, but the clincher for me was seeing the Bronze Client Service, Silver Client Service, Gold Client Service and Platinum Client Service options that were already being made available to clients by Appleton Greene. This helped me to understand precisely how to package my services in such a way that clients would understand them. It also helped me to plan how many clients with each service that I could manage and how much I could potentially earn. It enabled me to put together a realistic time and financial plan that I was both comfortable with and confident in.”

“I was introduced to Appleton Greene by another consultant. When I understood what Appleton Greene actually does for you, I couldn’t believe that there was nothing more to pay than the annual service fee, which at $825 in my case would hardly cover the cost of one of my monthly adverts. Then I realized that Appleton Greene makes its money from service fees payable as a percentage of client service orders achieved through Appleton Greene and this made more sense to me. The annual service fee merely covers the cost of content development for your consultant profile and client information guide and the cost of publishing and distributing this information. It still enables you to reach out to 500k active client contacts, so this represents extremely good value for money in my book. What I would also recommend to all Accredited Consultants is the Knowledge Sharing Publication service. It is a terrific way to put yourself out there on a regular basis and I have achieved many clients directly from the articles that I have written. It only takes me about an hour to write an article and I try to do one every month. Well worthwhile.”

“I had worked as an IT project manager for about 7 years but wanted to transition from pure IT into more business related areas as a Business Consultant. The problem was that my resume was all IT. Appleton Greene gave me the perfect opportunity to try and make this change. With the Client Information Guide, I could focus upon what I wanted to do, rather than what I had been doing and I could also try different industry sectors and geographical locations as well. I could also continue with the IT projects that I was doing until I was doing enough business with Appleton Greene. It proved to be a great way of making this career change without risking what I already had. I now focus upon Business-IT integration strategy and while my technical background is a useful asset to have, I am perceived as a more rounded business professional with Appleton Greene clients and this has helped me to take a significant step up in my career.”

“I was attracted by the combination of having a tangible service offering, focusing on specific industry sectors and specific geographical locations. This triangular approach to business development as a consultant made perfect sense to me because companies are always looking for business specialists rather than business generalists. As an American Citizen, it also gave me the opportunity to widen my horizons and to travel to different parts of the world on business. You can elect to work online if you do not want to travel, but I prefer being there in order to experience the company first hand. I have work experience in 5 different countries and 14 different cities worldwide now, which has really enhanced the international flavor of my resume. I also had experience in just one industry sector before joining Appleton Greene. I have now worked in 6 different sectors. The more experience that I have obtained, the more consultancy service offers I have received.”

“I decided to try my hand at consulting about 3 years ago. During that time I have tried advertising, networking, tele-marketing, mass mailing and also canvassing old employers and colleagues. Nothing worked. When I joined Appleton Greene, it took me about an hour to realize what I had been doing wrong all of this time, about a week to develop my consulting profile and about a month to develop my client information guide. Within 2 months I was already working on my first consultancy projects. Within a year I had an established and viable consulting practice. I am now scaling up my business by managing 4 portfolios of clients (Bronze/Silver/Gold/Platinum). So, after all of this time and money, what was it that I was doing wrong before Appleton Greene I hear you ask? The answer is that I did not have a recognizable consulting service to offer clients, one which they could engage with and one which satisfied their key corporate objectives. I was just trying to sell me, that is to say my experience, skills and knowledge. You won’t get anywhere by trying to sell your resume as a consultant. If you understand the difference here, then you may be able to benefit from my mistakes and save all of that time and money. Otherwise I suggest that you need Appleton Greene.”