The tricky part is often convincing a client that pre-planning is a necessary part if the process and, though it is billable time, will ultimately save money. Many client don't appreciate that programming is not just writing code.
Also you can wind up meeting and planning yourself right out of a gig sometimes - which is fine if the gig wasn't truly necessary. But can be bad for your business if you spend hundreds of hours doing this for no compensation. This is a real situation that happens - you get a client that wants a big project and after many meeting and calls you determine that a Wordpress install will suit them perfectly. Their network guy does the install and for all the money you saved them your reward is that you don't get the gig!
If you're billing time & materials (which might be a good idea for a contract of indefinite scope), you'd still get paid for the time spent doing due diligence. You might even be able to sell a time & materials contract on the basis that it gives you an incentive to point out simpler solutions that require less maintenance even if they involve using competing off-the-shelf products.
The trick then is to get clients who know they just want to "have it taken care of", and have much higher billing suppliers (IP lawyers, pharma experts, etc). In that case, they don't really think twice about paying for process in advance of coding. Pharma is a good example.
Being a contract resource for a software company, where management tends to think everything related to software/IT is "easy", is a guaranteed shitty project. They'll second guess and micromanage everything you do. And then when they burn through their OPM, they'll screw you.
I ran a small software consulting business for about 5 years and I agree 100% with you. Business was stressful for the first few years until I narrowed down my client base to only those in the first category. I never did land a huge, corporate client, but I did have several smaller sized companies with a never-ending list of things to do and around X number of dollars budgeted each month.
Also you can wind up meeting and planning yourself right out of a gig sometimes - which is fine if the gig wasn't truly necessary. But can be bad for your business if you spend hundreds of hours doing this for no compensation. This is a real situation that happens - you get a client that wants a big project and after many meeting and calls you determine that a Wordpress install will suit them perfectly. Their network guy does the install and for all the money you saved them your reward is that you don't get the gig!