Why Your Contacts Aren’t Converting: The Five Biggest Relationship Challenges Holding Back Mid-Market Consulting Firms

Founders of mid-market consulting firms often ask me the same question in different ways: 
“Why aren’t more of my contacts becoming clients?”
“Why do I have so many conversations, but so few six- or seven-figure deals?”

The truth is, these aren’t sales problems. They’re relationship problems—or more specifically, relationship strategy problems.

You didn’t build a consulting firm on luck. You’ve gained deep industry expertise, achieved impressive results, and established a strong reputation. However, relationships, especially with economic buyers, don’t develop or grow just because you're smart or visible. They grow when you invest in them strategically and tend to them intentionally.

If you want to turn your everyday connections into trusted relationships that lead to high-value consulting engagements, you must be brutally honest about the friction points in your current relationship-building strategy.

 Here are the five biggest challenges that mid-market consulting founders encounter when trying to convert contacts into economic buyers or strategic influencers.

1. Confusing Activity with Progress

You’re speaking at conferences, attending peer groups, sharing content, and “touching base” with prospects. You’re busy—but being busy doesn’t always mean you’re making progress. The problem? Most relationship activity lacks focus and priority. It’s just moving without a clear goal.

What’s missing is a Relational GPS—a framework I introduced in Relationship Economics®—that helps you focus on three essential drivers:

• Goals of your target buyer

• Passions that influence their decision-making

• Struggles that shape their priorities

 If your outreach doesn’t link to at least one of these, it’s noise—not signal.

2. Targeting the Wrong Side of the Influence Chain

Many consultants find themselves stuck in what I call "comfort conversations." You regularly talk with peers, analysts, or junior executives who intellectually appreciate your work—but lack the budget, authority, or strategic mandate to engage you.

You need to map out the influence chain. Who is the actual economic buyer? Who is the blocker, the gatekeeper, the informal skeptic? Who will look bad—or great—if this project succeeds? Too often, founders assume that proximity equals influence. It doesn’t. The assistant might be closer to the C-suite than the VP you’ve been pitching for six months. If you're not actively charting relationships across business units and decision-making levels, you're flying blind.

3. Underestimating the “Trust Gap” in High-Stakes Deals

Economic buyers don’t spend over $500K on credentials. They base their commitment on risk reduction. They ask:

• “Do I trust this firm to solve my problem?”

• “Can they align with my internal politics?”

• “Will they make me look smart?”

That’s the trust gap—and most consulting firms attempt to bridge it with a flashy pitch deck. Big mistake.

You bridge the gap by demonstrating relational relevance:

• Bring forward-market intelligence they don’t have.

• Introduce them to peers solving similar problems.

• Challenge their assumptions (with data and diplomacy).

Trust isn’t developed in sales meetings. It’s cultivated through mutual value creation moments—long before the contract is signed.

4. Failing to Nurture Non-Linear Journeys

Most consulting buyers don’t follow a straight path. They go quiet for months and then reemerge when urgency hits. Or they download a white paper in January and don’t schedule a call until Q4. Unfortunately, most firms lack the relationship stamina—or systems—to stay top-of-mind during this dormant phase.

Your CRM shouldn’t just manage contacts. It should trigger relational touchpoints tailored to where the prospect is in their decision-making journey.

• Strategic content for early-stage influencers

• Case studies for champions seeking proof

• Business model diagnostics for budget owners

Nurturing is more than just a newsletter. It’s a carefully curated, value-driven momentum.

5. Inconsistent Executive Relationship Ownership

In a founder-led company, most relationships begin—and end—with you. This creates a bottleneck and makes your growth vulnerable.

Worse, when your team tries to engage economic buyers, they often do so transactionally rather than strategically. They follow up on a lead but don’t nurture the relationship. They pitch instead of positioning. They disappear instead of deepening.

What’s missing? A culture of relationship building, where each team member is responsible for co-creating value.

 Here’s how we coach firms to fix this:

• Map relationships across the firm’s leadership bench.

• Assign co-owners to each high-potential account.

• Create shared playbooks for strengthening relationships, from curiosity to credibility to conviction.

Relationship Economics® for the Consulting Growth Curve

You don’t grow a mid-market consulting firm by chasing individual transactions. You grow by building relationship ecosystems that draw you into the right conversations, at the right level, with the right urgency.

The consulting founders I work with aren't seeking more leads. They’re after smart growth:

· Fewer but more strategic clients

· Shorter sales cycles with higher conversion rates

· Building relationships that lead to renewals and referrals, not just revenue

That doesn’t result from improved marketing. It stems from a better relational strategy.

Coming Up in This Series…

In the next few posts, I’ll dive deeper into each of these five challenges, starting with how to escape the trap of confusing activity with relationship progress. We’ll unpack specific tools, stories, and tactics from founder-led consulting firms who’ve grown smarter—not just bigger—through intentional relationships.

You’ll learn:

• How to develop a Relational Scorecard

• How to qualify contacts based on influence, not interest

• Why your economic buyers need a “moment of courage” before they sign—and how to create it 

If you’re ready to rethink how your firm converts high-potential relationships into high-value engagements, now’s the time to move from relational intuition to relational intelligence.

Want a private walkthrough of how we help firms like yours apply these ideas? Join the Avnir Early Access Partner Program at www.avnir.com.

Let’s stop chasing and start orchestrating.