It’s Not the Report. It’s the Tool. Raising the Barr Weekly Memo: Issue 721

A report can explain a problem brilliantly and recommend the right action, yet still leave the client to translate your expertise into practice. Helping clients make that transition deserves as much attention as the quality of the report.

A report may be exactly what an assignment requires. When the same need keeps returning, ask another question: could part of your expertise become a tool the client can use whenever that need arises?

I have been exploring that question in my own business. Solving a problem for myself changed how I think about serving others.

A personal problem became something others could use

ProPromptGenius began with a challenge I wanted to solve for myself. I wanted stronger prompts to start my work with AI. A weak request could produce something superficially useful while sending me in a direction that was too narrow, poorly defined, or different from what I actually needed.

ProPromptGenius helped me develop a stronger starting prompt before taking it into an AI platform. I still had to judge the direction and evaluate the output, but I had a practical way to strengthen the instructions guiding the work.

Then I recognized that the same tool could help members of my AI Insider Lab. I could teach the principles of better prompting during a session and also give members something they could use when developing their next request. The teaching and the tool could reinforce each other.

Members have used ProPromptGenius to develop prompts for business analysis, content creation, client communication, and shaping new offerings. Those uses share a practical need: turning an intention into clearer instructions.

That is the shift that interests me. A tool can turn the advice you give or the report you deliver into something clients can put to work again and again. 

Extend the service beyond the session

Over the past several months, we have built many apps, web portals, and AI skills, including our AI Insider Lab portal. It houses our prompt and workflow libraries and archives our recorded sessions. Members can revisit an idea, review a process, or watch a session they missed when they need it, extending access to the material beyond our time together.

The portal and ProPromptGenius serve different purposes. One makes our teaching available for continued reference; the other helps members work on a new request. Both extend the value of our expertise: the portal supports Lab members between sessions, while ProPromptGenius is designed for anyone who wants to develop clearer, stronger, more effective prompts.

I see a similar progression in photography. My search for worthwhile places and events to photograph developed into my Cleveland Photo Radar skill, a repeatable resource for researching and ranking opportunities and planning what to photograph. I have shared that information with members of our camera club, and the idea is to take it further to enable them to use the same tool to explore their photography preferences.

The starting point in each case was a real need. The technology gave that need a practical form.

For a consultant or advisor, opportunities may lie in the questions clients ask repeatedly, the preparation they struggle to complete, or the decisions they face between meetings. Examine those needs before deciding to build anything.

Consider four questions:

• Which part of your advice does a client need to apply more than once?
• Where could a guided process help them take the next step?
• What still requires your personal judgment, even if a tool handles part of the work?
• Could you create a tool that helps clients put your recommendations into practice, rather than leaving them to work out how from your report?

Those answers help define what to create and where its usefulness ends. A tool earns its place by helping with a specific need. Some needs will still be better served by a conversation, a report, or your direct involvement.

A different way to think about your offerings

In You Built a Career. You Did Not Build an Asset., I explored making expertise transferable. This takes that idea into the client’s hands: how can they apply what you know when the need arises?

A useful tool could strengthen an existing service, introduce prospective clients to your approach, or become a product in its own right. It could also reveal demand for additional guidance or a more specialized service. Those possibilities deserve consideration alongside the work of making the tool useful.

Here is where I am with ProPromptGenius. We have completed the payment structure, and I am still considering the price that will make it valuable, accessible, and attractive. We have not formally launched the marketing campaign. I see potential for both attracting new people to our work and generating revenue. The next step is to test that commercial opportunity.

The lesson for me is to look more closely in two directions: at what I have already developed to solve my own recurring problems, and at what my clients are saying, asking, or struggling with. Something I built for myself may help the people I serve, while a client’s challenge may reveal a tool I have not yet thought to create. Both can point to opportunities to deliver greater value. And something that helps those clients may deserve a wider audience.

Your next offering could be a tool that helps clients solve a recurring problem. It could guide them through steps you have already developed, giving them a way to move forward on their own and turn to you when they need further guidance.

What are you still explaining to clients that you could turn into a valuable tool they can use?

Explore the possibility yourself. Take one real business challenge to ProPromptGenius, try the free option, and compare the revised prompt with the one you started with. Notice what you hadn’t thought to ask.

This Week’s Carousel

It’s Not the Report. It’s the Tool.