When done effectively, qualification can be the difference between competing for the wrong projects and positioning your firm's expertise as the best to fulfil a project delivery. 

I came across the following analogy reading "Getting to yes: negotiating an agreement without giving in": 

Two kids are arguing over an orange, in search of a satisfactory outcome, they diplomatically decide that it is fairest to split the orange down the middle.

One kid goes home eats the orange and throws away the peel; the other uses the peel to bake a cake and throws away the orange. 

Had they identified their objective interests, (ie qualified) they would have quickly realised that they could have both essentially gone home with a whole orange. 

So what does all this have to do with creating better content? 

In a meeting with a global consultancy firm earlier today, we were discussing how to empower the whole business to create and leverage client-relevant insights. From our experience at Passle, the key to achieving this starts with good qualification. 

When meeting with clients and prospects, qualifying why a set of project requirements have been defined is not only sales best practice, but will also help you identify the underlying needs. Getting to the bottom of the business challenge, why it exists, and whether you have the resource to effectively address this, will ultimately help you to deliver a better service. 

When working on a pitch and project delivery process, showcasing that you have an astute understanding of the challenge will establish/reaffirm your position as the trusted advisor and strengthen your relationship going forward. 

By getting the subject-matter experts in your business to create content that will resonate with specific-client requirements will demonstrate the breadth of expertise you have across the firm and that your whole organisation is taking these concerns seriously. 

The benefit of doing this through the medium of content and not just in an email, is that for each of your team who are working on the same project, or a project with similar requirements, are each able to share the insight across their online networks and using it to nurture their key contacts 1-2-1.