I went walking today with a friend of mine who is well known as a tech industry thought leader. Her blogs, tweets and speeches have won awards all over the place. Her brand is well defined, value proposition clear and network is huge and strong. But one thing is holding her back in her consulting practice–she gives too much away.

I am a huge believer in pro-bono work and sit on nonprofit boards, and will spend hours helping a good friend with their business, consulting practice or more general life challenges.

But it's really important to know who gets it for free and who should be a client. When you're in a meeting with a prospective client and they are asking what you might do to help them, focus on the outcomes, and give them a sense of the kind of framework you might use. You don't need to tell them everything. Be succinct. Be Pithy.

For example, if their issue is how to leverage social media to reach their customers, instead of saying, "You should do XYZ–and here are 3 great examples of companies doing what you should do" you might say, we need to benchmark the 3-4 leading companies in your space who are doing it right. It's important to make concrete your approach, but you don't need to solve the problem during the initial prospect meeting.