Navigating the Rapids of Business

Navigating the rapids of business

Have you ever been white water rafting? in 1994, my late husband and i decided to be adventurous and give white water rafting a go.

We were on a short holiday. After all, we couldn’t take too much time off as we were  in business for ourselves and there were only  so many days we believed we could be away from the business before things would surely go wrong. This was our little getaway so whilst in the midst of relaxation and “away time” we decided to experience the thrill and excitement of white water rafting.

Now as beginners, our job was to sit in the raft, hold on tight, use the oars when we were instructed to, scream a little, feel terrified and experience a sense of thrill at the same time. Whilst we navigated our way around the rocks, through the rapids, we had one ultimate objective: stay in the raft until we made it to the calmer waters below.

At one point our raft did tip and after those few panicking moments we all eventually managed to get back into the raft, coughing and splattering as we climbed back in. It was terrifying, yet we found ourselves laughing with adrenalin rushing throughout our bodies as we got back in the raft secretly wanting to do it all over again.

As a team we had to work together, aligning our actions and our focus directing the raft and maneuvering it through to the calmer waters below. Every action required quick thinking, clear strategy and zero procrastination. Yes, at times we were uncertain, not knowing what would come next and whether the next move would take us further out of our comfort zone.

At other times we were on top of the world and Masters of white water rafting. Once in calm waters, we wanted to do it again and take our experience to the next level. “Okay, who’s ready for the next level?” the instructor would ask. There was no turning back once we had made the decision to go for it and give the next level a go. We were fearful of what the unknown adventure would be like, but moving to the next level requires a certain type of attitude – ‘Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway!’

Operating a business is a bit like white water rafting. At times it’s scary, hectic, and sometimes unbelievably out of control.

It takes you out of your comfort zone and pushes you into very unknown waters. At other times, it’s exciting, challenging and ultimately rewarding.

The key to navigating your way through business successfully is the same as navigating your raft through the rapids.

Once you know how and what to do, it’s important to be sure you implement that knowledge so that you arrive at calmer waters with confidence and without too many knocks, bumps, cuts and bruises. It’s about making the right moves at the right time and in the right order, so that when you are ready to move to the next level you can do so with confidence.

One of the keys to success in business is how you handle each stage of the journey. In our case, with white water rafting, each stage represented the starting point, the rocky road of the rapids, the free falling down the dips, and the calm waters below. Success was achieved as a result of many things aligning together, the quick maneuvering, the quick decisions and action-taking before arriving at your destination. The destination is not the end of course; it is just the beginning, as you take your experience to new and higher levels. Business is the same. Once you reach a certain goal, milestone, or outcome, it’s not the end; it’s just the beginning of something bigger, better and more exciting.

Doing the right things in the right order is crucial to success. Being sure you take consistent action every day and with a big focus on income generating activities and not just any activity is a key component to building the business of your dreams.

I believe one of the key elements to achieving success is having an open mind and being committed to doing whatever it takes to learn new skills and knowledge, and following through by implementing that new found knowledge and skill set.

What is your motivation? What is your motive for action?

Growth starts to happen when you extend yourself beyond your comfort zone and beyond the edge. You must lean just over the edge every day to achieve exactly what it is you want. Extend yourself. Have the courage to push yourself beyond your own fears, embracing them so that you can make your life and your business phenomenal.

Make a commitment to develop yourself and learn whatever is necessary to be the best. Strengthen every weakness until they become your greatest strength.

Stop Blaming and complaining and Just Get on With it!

Have you ever been in a position where it was easier to blame outside circumstances or someone else for your shortfalls? It is unfortunate that for most of us it is quite a natural habit to blame outside circumstances and events for our lack of results. Because of our past programming and conditioning, many are living a very average way of life because they have chosen to accept that this is just the way life is. If you are someone who is convinced that your circumstances are because of the actions of others or outside circumstances, may I encourage you to open your mind and be prepared to make a decision today to change that level of thinking or to change your current circumstances.

Think about it. How would your life or business change if you knew you were the only one responsible for your success? Not your franchisor, not anyone else, just you.

There would be a lot more doing and a lot less complaining and blaming, wouldn’t there? There would also be a lot more people living the life they truly deserve.

Learn to replace complaining with being proactive and taking action. If you find yourself in a situation that you don’t like, either make it work or simply leave. The worst thing you can do is stay and then complain later about it. Stop missing the pieces of the puzzle! They’re right in front of you.

You are the only one responsible for your success! If you don’t have all of the pieces yet to build whatever it is you want, then it’s your responsibility to acquire them. The world doesn’t owe you anything. You have to create what you want.

Knowing you are responsible for your success and doing what it takes to be a success are two different things. In the past I always knew what I had to be doing to achieve higher levels of success, though

I found myself not always doing those things consistently enough to produce the consistent results I wanted. My results would either be fantastic or just plain average. I started to see a clear pattern forming and it was a pattern I didn’t like. I set out on a path to really make a change in what I was thinking and doing so that my business and my life could progress forward and produce the consistent results I wanted every day. This was the time I truly took ownership of building a new foundation, taking a new direction and committing to taking consistent action towards the success I desired.

What can you do right now to take true ownership of the direction and success of your business? Taking your business to the next level need not be complicated nor does it require excessively long hours or extremely hard work. What it does take is a commitment to your success, a commitment to taking consistent daily action, and doing the right things in the right order.

Don’t Just Set Goals, Achieve Them!!

“Goals give your business and your life direction.
Taking consistent daily action at the right time and in
the right order will then help you achieve your goals
easily and effortlessly.”
Tania Allen, Founder,
Vision Alliance.

We are all familiar with the art of setting goals.  Like most business owners, I’m sure by now you may have set some goals for the next six or 12 months.  You have made a promise to yourself to do things differently, work more efficiently perhaps and of course make more money.  Setting goals is the easy part.  So how do you go from being a goal setter to someone who actually achieves their goals easily and effortlessly?

Achieving your goals comes easier when we know where we are heading.  Goals are like a destination.  They are where you want to go.

Without goals, you simply cannot arrive at a destination, and if you don’t know where you are going then how will you ever know what actions you need to take to achieve higher levels of success and achievement.  It would be fair to say then: Goals give your business and your life direction.  Taking consistent daily action at the right time and in the right order will then help you achieve your goals easily and effortlessly.

If you look around you, you will notice successful people have very different habits.

They think, and do things differently.  They are however no different to you or I.  We can achieve what they do and more.  They just have particular habits that anyone can apply.

Here are some key essentials to help you build the momentum so that you get closer to realising your full potential and getting  closer to achieving your dreams and goals.

Know your why

Why you want to achieve your goals will always play an important role in whether you will achieve them or not.  When setting your goals the stronger your why, the more committed you will be to doing whatever it takes to achieve them.

Set holistic and balanced goals

Successful people set goals in all areas of their business and life.  When working on your goals be sure you develop goals in six areas of life: relationships, spiritual, contribution, financial, health and business.

By pursuing goals in each area, you will create a more balanced and integrated life.

Be clear about what you want

All goals must be clear and concise, so when setting your goals be specific about what it is you want.

Aim high

Most of the time we are all aiming too low.

It’s time to get out of your comfort zone.  As the now-clichéd saying goes: Shoot for the stars, if you miss you’ll still be on the moon.

Make your goals slightly unreasonable; in other words, don’t allow your (perceived) limitations to get in the way.  Don’t allow your old conditioning to stop you from going after what you really want.

Write your goals in detail

Just the act of writing down goals sets the process in motion, so be specific.  The more information you include the more probable the final result will be.  By being as accurate as possible you invoke some of the natural laws of the universe in your favour as well as getting your brain to work for you in the most efficient way possible.  It’s always a good idea to follow the SMARTA criteria

(Specific Measurable Achievable Realistic Time bound Actionable) when setting goals and be sure you always set a date for achievement.

By writing your goals down you will be much clearer on where you are heading.

Look at it every day, stick it on your fridge, or your computer, it can be a picture, the words, whatever will motivate you to keep striving to achieve your goal.

Make your goals consistent with your values

Most people don’t do what they value first and therefore find themselves stressed and out of alignment.  Create a list of your highest values and then create your goals around them.  This will give you a sense of being on purpose consistently.

Know the consequences

It’s very important to look at the consequences of achieving the goal.  Ask yourself when setting your goals: “How will achieving this goal affect me or others?  Is this outcome good for me and others.”  Not all goals will have positive effects on others so it’s important you understand the positives and possible negatives to achieving your goals.

Review your goals daily

This is an important part of achieving success and must become routine.  Review your list of goals each morning when you wake up.  Visualize your completed goals and how your life looks and feels as a result.

Each night before you go to bed, repeat the process.  This is a great way to train your brain to expect your goals to materialize.

Create a Plan and take Consistent Daily Action

This is in fact the most important element to achieving your goals.  It’s okay to know where you are headed and what you want to achieve however if you don’t get off your backside and take the necessary action to make it happen then nothing will happen at all.  Be sure the action you take is consistent.  Get into a daily habit of knowing what actions you need to take and in what order you need to take them in order to move closer to achieving your goals.

Take some time now to get clear on your goals and create a plan, once you have your goals worked out you need to ‘reverse engineer’ them starting with the end in mind and working back to the starting point.

Check your Progress and Celebrate your Wins

Goals by nature are high achievements in life, and sometimes it can seem too hard to reach them, we lose motivation and give up!

Break your goals into smaller ‘milestones’ so you can celebrate your wins along the way.  It’s important to measure your progress to determine if you have gone off course.  Measuring your progress regularly will enable you to shift back on course quickly with minimum disruption to your momentum.  Keeping a check on your goals is also important as sometimes goals change so you can bend and flex where you need to, moving the goal to meet your changed conditions, requirements or intentions.

Don’t get discouraged

You will either achieve your goal, or you will gain insight into whatever is in the way of its achievement.  This is not a setback; rather, it is part of your forward progress.  Stay focused on what you want to achieve and you will find ways to solve difficulties or break through barriers.  Celebrate every success and before you know it, you’ll have to make a whole new list for ‘next level achievement!’

Finally, be committed!

There’s a big difference between being interested in achieving your goals or being committed to their achievement.  Those who are interested tend to do what is convenient, what is easy and what everyone else does.

Those who are committed will be able to achieve whatever it is they want no matter want, because they will learn what they need to learn, they will rehearse what they need to rehearse, they will practice and they will do whatever is needed to be done.

Committed people don’t have excuses; they relentlessly give up all their excuses and the reasons why they don’t have what they want.  They get rid of their excuses and they stop blaming  their outside circumstances and  put their attention on how they will and how they can achieve their goals.

So the most important question I encourage you to ask yourself today is: Are you Interested or Committed in Achieving Your Goals?

If you need some help and support in gaining clarity around setting and achieving your goals, email tania@vision-alliance.com to receive a Complimentary Goal Achiever Pack valued at $97.

 

Generating Leads

Your aim is to generate leads and opportunities and convert these into increased revenues to your business. This article outlines some of the challenges you may be already facing and highlights some quick simple steps of how you can generate more leads into your business.

In my experience one of the fundamental challenges most business owners face is not being able to generate enough leads into the business. Without a consistent supply of leads into any business, the business is usually faced with poor cash flow and finds it difficult from one month to the next.

You may have already experienced this and you now can be in a position where you have the opportunity to change what’s going on.

If you want to create amazing results in your business, and want to turn your vision into reality, the only way this can happen is if you are fully accountable for your success and are responsible for the actions you take on a daily basis.

Leads are prospects or potential customers.

It’s important though to attract quality leads into the business and not just any lead as this can waste your valuable time and money.

Your marketing efforts will determine the quality of the leads you bring into your business and the challenge businesses face in this area is 80% of all marketing doesn’t meet the expectation of the business owner.

Try not to limit yourself when it comes to advertising and marketing your business.

Traditional marketing methods include local paper advertising and emailing.

Opportunities let outside the square and can include strategies such as, building your referral networks.

Ads and direct mail are only the beginning!

They are important, however they should not be the only source used for generating leads for your business.

Not all lead-generating techniques are created equal either. Some techniques will work well for a certain business, and those same strategies won’t work for another. Much is dependent on your type of business, your location, timing, how well you apply the lead generating strategy, and a host of other variables that tend to make marketing an inexact science. Therefore it’s important to test and measure each strategy to find out what works, and make it work.

So here’s a brief look at what you can do to start bringing more quality leads into your business.

Firstly start thinking WHO, WHERE, WHAT, HOW & WHY when it comes to marketing your product or service.

Who are my ideal clients / market?

Understand who he/ she is and why.

Where are we going to find our clients?

Why will they buy from me? What makes us unique? Remember people shop on value and emotion.

Now you know who you want to target,

Create a Lead Generation Action Plan for the month

  • Listing at least 2 to 6 different lead generating strategies,
  • What steps you need to take to implement the strategy.
  • Who will complete the task/s required  to complete the strategy, and
  • Be sure you also have a Due date for the activity so you stay on track for the month.

Daily Consistent Action will produce results in your business that you need!

Here is an example of a lead generation action plan. (Click the image for a bigger version)

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Increasing Your Personal Effectiveness and Revenues

If you want to grow your business revenues much faster than you are now, it’s important to start focusing on the right activities in your business.

The key in achieving personal effectiveness is to focus the majority of your time on high- impact, revenue-generating activities that are most essential to your business. To increase your overall effectiveness, it’s important to know and understand how to accurately identify where you spend your time.

The 80:20 Rule

I’m sure you have heard of Vilfredo Pareto or at least Pareto’s Law. Pareto came up with an economic principle that said 20% of the people typically own 80 percent of the wealth. Two decades later, management guru Joseph Juran introduced this “80/20 Rule” to the business world, calling it Pareto’s Principle, or Pareto’s Law. Over the years, Pareto’s Principle has been applied to many areas of business, concluding that 20% of our efforts produce 80% of our results, or 20% of your team produces 80% of your results.

For you, this means that to increase revenues it’s important you focus on the right activities in your business and then hire, barter or outsource people to do everything else.

Multiply your business revenues and personal effectiveness many times over using the 80:20 rule.

Suppose your business has 25 different activities, such as sales, marketing, operations, finance, customer service and more. According to the 80:20 rule, 20% of those activities will generate 80% of your revenues. Conversely, 80% of those activities will generate only 20% of your revenues. Doing the math shows that 5 out of the 25 activities will produce four-fifths of all the income your business generates.

Now, assume that your business takes in $50,000 a month. According to the 80:20 rule, 5 of your 25 activities would account for $40,000 of your monthly revenue, which works out to $8,000 per activity. Conversely, 20 of the activities would produce only $10,000 each month, which works out to be just $500 per activity. Sixteen times 500 equals 8,000 so your top 5 revenue-producing activities are 16 times more effective than the bottom 20.

Suppose you took it even further and moved the 80/20 ratio to 90/10, so that only 10% of your activities produced 90% of your revenues. That would make you 81 times more effective than you currently are now. Merely by focusing your time and attention on the five or ten activities that have the highest impact on your business, you can increase your revenues and income by 16 to 81 times!

Here’s the million-dollar question: what specific activities should you be focusing on?

Here’s a brief three-step process to help you work more effectively in your business.

Step 1. Identify your Passion and Purpose

Passion is a very powerful emotion and is infectious. When you express passion, people are automatically attracted to it. When you’re passionate about what you do, your product or service speaks for itself. So the first big question is: what are you passionate about. What do you love doing?

Next, look at your purpose. Are you in business merely to earn an income, accumulate wealth or do you have a strong desire to help others and be a service to others?

When you can match up your purpose and passion, magic happens. It puts you in front of all the others who have lukewarm enthusiasm for what they do. What is your purpose in business, how does it match up with your passion, and how do you combine the two to make the world a better place?

Step 2. Identify Your Strengths

The biggest mistake business owners make is thinking they have to do everything themselves. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses. In order to succeed in business, you must get very clear about your unique abilities and then focus on them almost to the exclusion of everything else.

You will become a better business person when you identify your strengths and spend most of your time using them to perform the highest-impact activities in your business.

Step 3. Manage Your Time

When you’re a business owner it’s difficult to manage your time. What you can do is manage your activities by tracking where you spend your time on a daily basis and using that information to help you focus on high-impact activities.

One of your most important tasks is identifying the highest income-generating activities in your business and devoting a minimum of 80 percent of your time to those activities. This principle works whether you’re a “solo-preneur” with one product or service or a larger operation with a larger product or service offering and a team to support your daily efforts.

Monitor & Measure Your Activities

You can’t manage what you don’t monitor or measure so your first step is to identify where and how you spend your time. It’s important you identify what you are currently doing and what you should be doing, based on your highest income-producing activities.

For the next two weeks write down every activity you do in all areas of your business and how much time you spend doing it.

High income-producing activities include making a sale or something that leads directly to a sale. High-impact activities include producing a great website or making sure that your ad copy is properly written to make sales for you. These activities don’t directly make a sale, but they play an important role in generating revenue. To determine whether an activity represents one of your unique abilities, ask yourself two questions: What drives me crazy when other people don’t do it as well as me? What do I play at that other people consider work?

Track all your activities over a two-week period, noting how much time you spend on each activity each day. Before the two weeks is up, you will probably begin to see that you need to be spending more time on some activities and less on others. You will also begin to see that there are lots of activities that you should not be doing. This doesn’t mean they don’t need to be done, only that you should not be doing them.

What activities should you be doing? For the entrepreneur and small business owner, the highest income-producing activity is generating revenue. Every day, your primary focus should be on how your company will generate more revenue. If you’re not spending a minimum of 80% of your time on income- generating activities, your business will struggle to grow and increase revenues.

What about all the other activities that are just as crucial to your business? Here’s the challenge: For a small business, generating revenue must come first and management second. Otherwise your business will never grow to the point where management becomes as important as sales.

Revenues are consistently increased when the owner leverages his or her personal strengths through the use of other people’s unique talents and abilities. In other words, successful business owners focus on their highest income-generating activities and then build great teams around them to do all the other important activities they don’t do well.

It’s a fact, you don’t have to do everything yourself. Start focusing your efforts away from working in the business and focus them toward working ON it.

Make a commitment to yourself to spend one hour each day to identify which activities you need to be doing and tracking how you spend your time. Over the course of 365 days, that adds up to the equivalent of nine 40-hour weeks, or two solid months of working on your business rather than in it. Just imagine what you could achieve with that kind of concentrated effort!

Time to Take Action

  • Keep an hourly log for two weeks of your business and personal activities during your working hours
  • Determine which are the real high income and high impact producing activities vs. the tedious menial few
  • Take consistent action and maintain focus every day to ensure you are focusing on the high income and high impact producing activities.

To receive an expanded whitepaper on this topic including a full worksheet on increasing effectiveness please email tania@vision-alliance.com or call Tania on 1300 76 49 20.

Smarter Networking

Ten years ago or more there was a well known phrase that was used among business owners and individuals which was: It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.

Today, owning and operating a franchise of any kind requires you to go beyond this, if you are to continue to create and maintain the “top of mind” awareness among peers, associates and the larger local marketplace. Networking today now goes beyond who you know….. 

It’s all about who knows you!

For much of my business life I have known the importance of networking. Although I knew the importance of it, I avoided networking as much as I could in the early days, and back then always described myself as a poor networker. The thought of going to a networking event created more nerves in me than meeting my mother in law, and literally scared me to death. I have always been a very confident person, passionate about what I do and believe 100% in what I and my company stands for, however unsure of how to start conversations, trying to overcome the fear of rejection and not knowing exactly what I was supposed to do once I met someone and got their business card, kick started a journey of learning the secrets to successful networking.

I have been described as a great networker by many of my associates and now with more tools in my toolbox, networking is something I look forward to rather than something I shy away from. The most important thing I focus on is making networking as efficient and effective as possible, ensuring I get maximum results in a short amount of time.

Let me share with you some great tips that have helped me along the way.

Networking is about building relationships.

Networking currently accounts for 87% of business in the marketplace. Yet many people neglect networking and fail to see it as a vital business and career building skill. Networking should be part of your daily, weekly or monthly activities just like any other business development activity you currently undertake.

Anyone can network with the exception of those who just don’t like people at all.

Referral marketing is the best way to build your business.

 

Networking Well

Your approach to networking is just as important as what you actually do. Starting with the right attitude and with minimum expectations will help you start off on the right foot. Like anything the more practice you do, the better you will eventually get.

For networking to work I have learnt that it’s important to do these three things.

  1. Prepare
  2. Connect
  3. Strengthen

If you’re not getting the results you want from networking, first check that you’re really doing all three of these steps properly, then work on ways to maximize your results within each one of them.

Prepare

Before you even shake one hand, it’s important you prepare yourself, both mentally and verbally.

This one is about your attitude about networking, your mindset.  Always be upbeat, positive, enthusiastic and realistic.

Making Connections- Introducing Yourself

Once you’re prepared, you’re ready to start making connections with people and there are multiple ways to do that. It all starts with introducing yourself.

You will have a limited time to get your message across so it’s important to create an introduction that will grab peoples’ attention enough for them to remember you. Not only do you require the skill to accurately describe who you are and what you’re looking for, it’s important to say it in such a way that other people can understand it enough to be able to tell others.

How to Introduce Yourself

Remember, you’re not going to make the sale and close the deal with your introduction. All you can really do is capture enough attention and interest to keep the conversation going. So stick to the basics and keep it short. You can go into much more detail after you’ve gotten someone’s attention, when they ask you for more information. But to get there, you need to get across three things first:

  • Your name (and company name if appropriate)
  • Your specialty and its benefit (how it helps the person hiring you)
  • And your target (who ideally you would like to speak with)

Unless you are a natural networker, networking can seem like alot of work.

Consistent efforts will eventually produce results.

Strengthen

Networking doesn’t stop there. Once you’ve made those initial connections, the next thing you have to work on is strengthening them. The best opportunities come from people who know you, trust you and like you. It’s difficult to get to that point after a 5-minute conversation at an event. You need to follow up and meet with contacts offline, then you have to stay top of mind.

Be sure you collect as many business cards as possible

 as the networking event is just the beginning!

Following Up

Events are good for the initial connection, but you have to build on that. You don’t have to follow up with everyone you meet, but there are three easy categories to focus on:

  1. Follow up with anyone who could be a client. That’s a no brainer.
  2. Follow up with people who are in your target space, maybe they’re in your field, but don’t do what you do. Or they target the same target audience. Perhaps you can help each other out
  3. Third, you may want to follow up with anyone who just plain impresses you. It’s good to know those kinds of people and have them in your network.

Get a business card. The best way to do this is to combine it with a conversation ender like mentioned earlier. Say “By the way, before I go, can I have your card?” Then email them the next day. Say you enjoyed meeting them and wondered if they’d like to get together for a coffee to learn more about each other and explore ways to help each other out. Position meetings this way you will find no one ever says no, because the meeting is about the two of you and not just about you. That’s important to remember when you’re asking for meetings.

Remember, you need to follow up with people if you want to build a relationship with them. Speaking to them for 5 or 10 minutes at an event is not enough time to form a lasting bond. Until you follow up and meet one-on-one, you’ll just be a business card to them and not a real person.

Key elements of a Good Networker

A Good Networker:

  • Has two ears and one mouth.
  • Asks questions and gets to know the other person.
  • Gives without expectation
  • Has an aim to add value
  • Has an abundant mindset- there is plenty of business out there for everyone.
  • Can form meaningful relationships and communicate their ideas.
  • Carries business cards at all times

Tips for Successful Networking

  • Limit your memberships to two or three groups. Don’t spread yourself too thin. Maximize your experience by going for depth of involvement.
  • Attend meetings and events regularly. Build a base of support with regular members and position yourself with new members as someone in the know.
  • Build great bridges! Every day people are missing chances to do business, largely because they don’t take the time to build a relationship with or even get to know the person.
  • Listening and asking more questions.
  • Arrive at meetings and networking events at least 15 minutes before the actual starting time
  • Introduce yourself with your name and the company you are from
  • Ask about the person first and listen intently. Most people want to talk about themselves.
  • Make sure you get as many business cards from all those you meet
  • Speak with one person at a time or at least a small group of no more than three
  • End conversations gracefully
  • Make sure you follow up with the contact soon after the event
  • Do something with the cards you collected…..put them into your database
  • Always thank people for sending referrals
  • Manage your time well

Making Continuous Improvements

When I first started networking to build my business, my efforts were slightly unfocused. I spread my memberships across a numerous organizations, rarely attending more than one or two meetings, if that. I’d attend random networking events because friends had invited me. In hindsight, all of those activities were necessary to help me build my skills and understand how to network smarter today.

With networking, I’ve found that it’s not the one big event that changes the course of a business. It’s the small steps that are taken consistently.

Think of all the steps you’ve taken, along many different paths to connect with all the different people now in your network. Some of those paths led to business, to friendships, and some have yet to reach a destination. Take one of these 5 steps listed below, down one of those unfinished paths, and see where it may lead

1) Make that follow up call.

2) Forward an article.

3) Warm up an old connection.

4) Spend more time with one of your networking groups.

5) Find someone in your network to collaborate with.

Strive for continuous improvement in your networking.  One small step for you could mean a giant leap for your business or career.

 

Attracting Your Ideal Customer

If a business isn’t growing, it’s dying. And the only way to make sure your business is growing is to identify and engage a steady stream of new customers.

Identifying your ideal customer & generating more revenue

Let’s begin with the end in mind. As a small-business owner, you want more customers, which translates to more revenue.  However, the only way to attract more customers is through effective and compelling marketing.

Unfortunately, marketing can be expensive, so it’s important you make sure you’re getting the right message out to the prospects who are most likely to buy what you sell. If you get the right message to the “right” prospects, they’ll not only buy from you, they’ll keep coming back, buying from you forever. They’ll tell their family and friends about you and they’ll spend more money with you than your typical customer.

So your number-one priority is to find out exactly who your ideal customer is.

 A massive volume of customers is not nearly as important as serving the right customers. When you match your business with the right customers, you’ll increase customer loyalty, decrease complaints, and have fewer returned items from dis-satisfied customers.

Here are three areas to look at when marketing to your ideal customer:

Wants vs. needs — why they buy

Attracting your ideal customers through marketing requires you to discover the specific wants and needs of these customers. These wants and needs are often referred to as “hot buttons.” Keep in mind that there is a big difference between wants and needs. They may sound similar, but they’re as different as black and white.

As a business owner, it’s important to distinguish between the two in order to attract more customers and grow your business. By learning the specific wants and needs of your customers, you can learn how to better market your product or service in a way that speaks to your ideal customer and leads them to buy from you.

A want is something you would like to have. It is not absolutely necessary, but it would be a good thing to have. A good example is a new car.  You may not need a new car but you when you want a new car you somehow find a way to get it.

A need is something you have to have, something you can’t do without. A good example is food. If you don’t eat, you won’t survive for long. You might not need a whole lot of food, but you do need to eat.

The fact is, wants are much more powerful than needs. When marketing your product or service it’s therefore vital you move away from promoting the need for it and start to identify with why your customers want your product.

There are two primary categories of information that will assist you in determining your customers needs and wants.

The first category is called demographics. These are the characteristics that identify the ability, need and interest of a customer to purchase your product or service. Demographics define those customers who need what you sell.

The second category is called psychographics. These are the factors that identify the motivation or reasons why someone wants to buy your product or service. Psychographics define those customers who want what you sell.

Hot buttons — what they want 

Depending on your industry, customers will have different wants and needs, called “hot buttons. Hot buttons are the problems, frustrations and concerns that most customers consider when they do business with your business. Many business owners feel that price is always the number one hot button that impacts their customers. In reality, price is one of their last considerations. Most customers are more than willing to pay a higher price if you offer enough value to warrant the higher price. Unfortunately, most marketing and advertising looks exactly the same, using common phrases such as, “We’re the best” We offer the lowest prices, the best service and so on. If you market this way, as most businesses do, your customers can’t determine the true value you provide, so they default to lowest price as a differentiator.

Whatever you do, don’t fall for this trap! Fortunately, the idea that price is most important exists only in the mind of the business owner which can be retrained. On an operational level though all you need to do is provide more value than your competition. When you do, you can actually increase the price you charge for your product or service.

Below is a short list of industries and their corresponding hot buttons.

Select the industry category that your business belongs to and then prioritise your customers’ hot buttons in order.

This exercise will help you identify your ideal customers’ wants in order to create the proper messaging that will appeal to them.

 

Common Hot Buttons for:

Service Industries – Fix it right, Fix it fast, Be on time, Provide quick resolution, Be honest

Professional Industries– Expected results, General customer service, Price of affordability, Guarantee results, Trustworthy

Retail Industries– Product options, variety, selection, Product quality, Product results match expectations, Customer service, Advice, Knowledge, Price

Opportunity/ Entrepreneur Industries– Make money (return on investment), Easily transition into ownership, Validation, Proof of support, Resonates with beliefs and values

Wholesale Industries –Make more money and higher margins, less hassle, easy to do business with Low risk, Reliability, Receive it on time

Overall, these hot buttons apply to most businesses in each industry category. Occasionally, other hot buttons may be more appropriate than those listed. If you honestly believe your specific hot buttons need adjusting from those that are listed, make those adjustments now by either rearranging the priority sequence or removing and replacing any hot buttons you feel may be more appropriate for your business.

By using these guidelines, you can create persuasive marketing messages that address your ideal customers’ needs and motivate them to buy from you. If you do this really well, you will find yourself attracting more customers in a short amount of time.

Decision makers, influencers and users — who to target

There’s one more area that needs careful consideration. In most business transactions, there’s a decision maker, an influencer, and a user. Here’s a typical example. When eating McDonalds, the parents are the decision-makers, the kids are influencers and in most cases they’re all users. Think about your business, your users may not be the influencers so it’s important to direct your marketing to the influencers to drive an increase in sales.

A point to consider is the end user of your product or service may not be the only person involved in the buying process. This is especially common in business-to-business transactions, where you may find that there are influencers or decision makers that are not the user.  Once you understand this and identify these three roles you will have better control over your marketing and notice a significant difference in your revenues.

By using these guidelines, you can create persuasive marketing messages that address your ideal customers’ needs and motivate them to buy from you. If you do this really well, you will find yourself attracting more customers in a short amount of time.

Time to Take Action-

Take some time over the next week or two to consider

  • Who your ideal customer is
  • What are their HOT Buttons
  • What future compelling marketing strategies will you create in order to attract your ideal customer and not just any customer

4 Simple Ways to Build Consistent Success

If you are like most business owners, you are striving to do things better this year. You want to make more money, you want more bottom line profits and I can also probably guess you want all this and more without having to work longer hours, with less overwhelm and zero headaches.

So how do you build a more efficient and consistent business? Well the answer to that question is quite simple. It’s about doing the right things in the right order and taking consistent daily action.

Here are 4 areas you can focus on quite effortlessly to ensure you build more momentum over the next 12 months.

Create your outcomes

Now I’m sure you are all familiar with the tradition of goals setting. We follow the smart criteria we learnt in our management and business training and then we hope that when we review those goals we have achieved them. Well if you want my honest opinion, for the majority, goal setting just doesn’t work. It’s a bold statement but true. Your focus should be on achieving your goals not just setting them, so that’s when I changed the acronym to SMARTA to include that all important element – ACTION. Unless you take the required action, your goals will simply remain your wishes and desires. So how do you CREATE your outcomes so you can move closer to where you want to be? As Peter Druker once said, “The best way to predict your future is to create it.”

The first step is to decide what you want. It may sound simple but most don’t even get this far. I believe success starts with a decision. Regardless of whether you have small or big goals you must decide what you want.

How you write down what you want is very important so as you begin the first step of wiring down your goals, make sure your outcomes meet the CREATE criteria

C- Clear and concise in other words be specific about what you want to achieve

R – Realistic Remember we don’t – get what we want, we get what we expect. So set your outcomes in alignment to what you expect you can achieve. Once you start achieving your goals, stretch your expectations and yourself.

E- Ecological – running an ecology check on your goals is always a good idea. This simply means looking at the consequences of attaining that goal. You may ask yourself, is this outcome good for me and good for others etc.

A- As If Now – it is vitally important you write your goals in the present tense. This is because once the mind has fully imagined something, it makes it far easier to accomplish. So your goal must be written in the present-tense language, as if you are achieving the last step right now in this moment.

T-Timed and Toward What You want – even though you are going to write down your goals in the present tense, you must put a future date or time to your goal to indicate when you wish to achieve this outcome.  The T also stands for toward what you want; this just means it’s important to express your goal positively rather than including negative language about what you don’t want.

E- End Step – evidence Procedure – always include the final step that lets you know you have actually achieved your goal. This is the event, situation or result that would occur in order for you to have attained your outcome. 

Take Consistent Daily Action & Improvement

They say success is in the follow through and therefore Action is an essential element to success, but how do we maintain that action on a daily basis and focus only on the high income and high impact activities that will help us move to achieving higher levels of success.  The average person over estimates what he or she can do in a day, a week or a month, and they under estimate what they can do in a year, five years and a decade.

Most of us associate action to taking big leaps and bounds which is not always possible to maintain every day. So to get started with building more consistency in your efforts, try focusing on achieving consistent daily improvement. We all think we have to improve by 20% or 50% or 100% in one leap. Why not make the decision to commit to improving your business, your sales, how you interact with your customers, your staff etc. in fact everything you do, by only 1% – but do this every day. At the end of every year you will be at least 3665% improved in many areas of your business and your life. Think about how much closer you will be to achieving your goals and outcomes if you are achieving those kind of results consistently.

Develop a prospect mindset & keep them for life

When you develop a “prospect mindset,” you’ll begin to understand what your customers want… specifically. You’ll understand how to clearly identify the problems, frustrations and concerns they typically experience when they buy what you sell. These frustrations, concerns, problems and fears are what we call HOT BUTTONS.

If you can discover what your ideal customer wants, and then provide them with solution to their wants, they will buy from you each and every time.

Once you completely understand how and why human beings make decisions, you can then begin to create persuasive and compelling marketing messages that are so powerful they practically force your prospects to buy what you sell.

Become an Automatic Smart Networker

Though it may be hard to grasp, networking is much easier than you think. Forget the myth that

you need to be an extrovert to network well. You don’t. Or that you must network nonstop.

Absolutely not. Or that networking is all about working the room at a big event with a big fake

grin plastered on your face. Far from it.

You might be waiting for a bolt of confidence to strike before you get up enough courage to put

yourself out there, but confidence doesn’t magically appear. Instead, confidence comes partly through knowledge, being able to see what the process looks like, trusting yourself and taking a deep breath and plunging right in. It also comes from knowing what to say to people when asked …”what do you do”

In short:

AVOID Telling People WHO You Are

  • I’m an accountant
  • I’m a plumber
  • I’m a florist
  • I’m a business coach

Tell People WHAT You DO & Show Them How Your Solutions Matches Their WANTS!

  • I help people become financially successful
  • I help people with all their plumbing needs
  • I bring joy and happiness to peoples day
  • I help business owners get more from their business

Once you have the experience of communicating this well and find that networking is not so daunting after all you will wonder why you ever waited so long to get started

Remember you must network the smart way which will include both face to face networking and online social media. Not enough people view social media as a form of networking, but it’s a must if you want to leverage your opportunities through your connections.

Smart networking

ü  Is driven by purpose. It starts by defining your goals. These goals should then determine whom we ought to have in our network, which in turn, should help us decide where best to meet them. This means you are just not wasting time at the wrong events or in following up when it’s not the right fit.

  •  adds value and removes pressure as it places a deliberate focus on the needs and feelings of other people first.
  •  leverages tools that multiply our productivity. Rather than meeting people and interacting with them one-to-one, smart networking takes advantage of online tools and services that help us reach people on a one-to-many basis.

Time to Take Action

Remember success in in the Follow Through so take some time right now to

  • Decide what you want & create your outcomes for the year.
  • Commit to consistent daily improvement
  • Match your solutions to your customers wants
  • Become an automatic smart networker

Business Insights to Help Optimise Your Potential

Get clear on your WHY

Whether you are just getting started in business or you are a veteran and you have been doing it for a while I have come to realize that most business owner are not experiencing the level of success they truly want. Sure you may be very optimistic and may even come up with some very good reasons why you are not enjoying the level of success you ideally want, you have set your goals and you are taking the action when you can to move you closer to achieving what you want, so why are things taking longer than they should.

Achieving success in business is about doing the right things in the right order at the right time…I’m sure you have heard me say this time and time again, and I hear you saying back to me….I’m doing that Tania, so why am I not realizing the success I truly desire.

Here are some quick and easy things you can do to support your journey in business and help you achieve more momentum with less effort.

Determine why you are in your business. Sometimes we can lose sight as to why we went into business in the first place. Take the time to reconnect you’re your passion and your purpose and the very reason why you bought into the franchise brand in the first place.

If you focus on what you are doing to earn a living, then you will always be doing stuff just to bring in the money. The passion will fade and all you will be left with is a passionless job in your own business.

By shifting your focus from WHAT you have to do to WHY you are doing it, things will flow and you will attract more customers, more money, more balance and build more momentum that will ultimately support you in achieving your dreams and goals for you and your business.

Knowing Your  L – S – F Gap

If we were to look at business from a simplistic view point every business either has a leads gap, a sales gap or a fulfillment gap. L — S — F  (Leads, Sales & Fulfillment. )  Of course there are many areas of business that require attention and continuous improvement however these three are the primary ones.

Without leads coming into our business, we don’t even come close to the opportunity of closing sales. Without sales there are no revenues therefore there is no business. Fulfillment focuses on the delivery of your products or services and without it there is no follow through in the business itself. I’m sure you have heard this before, success is always in the follow through.

Carrying out a regular gap analysis helps you to define your present and future objectives in both financial and non-financial terms with also a specific focus on the L-S-F areas of your business. The difference between where you are and where you want to be is the gap and becomes the starting point for building your business to the next level.

A gap analysis need not just be about leads, sales, fulfilment or the money, it is however usually where most people start. Your non-financial considerations could include the number of team members, your product or service offering to the marketplace and the number of satisfied customers. Other areas could also include the number of hours you work, the number of recreation days, family days and the holidays you take.

Serving Vs Selling

Gone are the days where we “sell” to others. Today it’s all about serving, not selling. You may need to shift a little in your thinking to get this. To this day customer service is very important to me. You’ve just got to ask my kids. Not only do I expect great service it’s a value in our company that we serve our customers rather than sell to our customers. Sales is the discovery of a match.  If what you have to offer does not match what the customer needs or wants and vise versa, then generally a sale should not take place if you are in the business of serving.

If we are to serve not sell then it’s important to ask ourselves who do we want to serve more of and who do we want to serve less. I liken our ideal client to our favourite toy or teddy bear when we were children. We still played with the others, however we spent more time with our favourite one. It brought more fun and enjoyment into our day so the same can happen in your business. Focus on your ideal client and you will increase your revenues, build more momentum and have more time to do the things you love. Before you can start serving more of your ideal customer you’ve got to know who they are and what they look like and where to find them.

You can get started by asking yourself these simple questions:

  • Describe the type of customer you want to do business with.
  • Describe the type of customer who you believe will give you the greatest return on your marketing investment.
  • Looking at your current business which customers do you believe right now are the easiest to find, easiest to sell to and require the least amount of time spent on them?
  • Describe the type of customer who will stay with you the longest and spend the most with you.

Value – It’s all Perception:

I’m asked this question all the time: “How do I know if I’m providing enough value?” We all have adopted a belief that it’s important to add value when we “sell” our products and services. Unfortunately this in fact causes most people to reduce their effectiveness and growth potential. When we are focused on selling we are always looking at how we can convince the customer of the value of something. If you shift to serving then it is our job to help the customer discover the value that is there for themselves.

Value is perceived. It is a perception, which means the value will be different for every single customer. Value tends to be never about the money. It’s about the relationship you build, it’s about the experience you create.

Rather than setting the expectations around what you are selling that may or may not match those of the customer, you can focus on serving them in alignment to what they are wanting and then they will derive the value out of everything.  Knowing what is important to your ideal customer will assist you in building the perceived value around serving them.

Most business owners believe they have to provide massive value to their clients, and

then they get paralysed by the concern of whether they are doing that or not. As perception is perceived, the customer is always responsible for getting the value out of the relationship! There are some things you can do to raise the perception of the value you provide and they can differ from business to business. Take some time to think about ways you can improve the perceived value wrapped around your product or service. Find out what your customer wants, loves and what’s most important to them.

Now you know your why, you’ve identified your gap and you have worked out how you will add more value without having to work harder we will, in the next issue, move onto learning how to put a revenue plan together and implementing that plan to increase revenues and help you build more momentum in your business.

Closing the Gap

No matter what stage of development your business is presently in, all small business owners want more revenue. That is always priority number one and to be honest, it should be.

As the year starts to pass us by very quickly you may be asking yourself, how can I achieve more as we creep towards the final half of the year and the beginning of a new financial year? Sounds ridiculous doesn’t it? Where have all those months gone?

As fast as the year may go, so does our opportunity to really create the results we want in our business.  So how can we really achieve more? The difference between those just going with the flow and those who grab hold of the steering wheel with two hands and deliberately drive their revenues forward is in how they plan for the achievement of higher revenues and then what strategies and tactics they implement, and the actions they take in order to achieve the desired outcomes listed in that revenue plan.

Identifying Your Gap

Before you get started in putting together your revenue plan, it’s important to know where you are now and of course where you want to be. This is what we call your gap.

A gap analysis defines your present and future objectives in both financial and non-financial terms. The difference between the two is the gap and becomes the starting point for building your business to the next level.

A gap analysis need not just be about money, it is however usually where most people start, including your revenues, profits and cashflow. Your non-financial considerations could include the number of team members, your product or service offering to the marketplace and the number of satisfied customers. Other areas could also include the number of hours you work, the number of recreation days, family days and the holidays you take.

To create your own gap analysis, simply list the goals that are most important to you and your business. List where you are today with each of those measurables, using a number scale system. E.g. on a scale of 1-10, 1 representing little results are being achieved right now and 10 being the ultimate place where you want to be. Write down a number for each goal that represents where you are and then write down a number that represents where you want to be, let’s say, in one years’ time. The distance between those two sets of numbers is your gap. Now you can start working on closing the gap.

Once you define the gap that exists in all areas relevant to your business you can then create a revenue plan that will map out the exact process required so you can eliminate that your gap, reach every one of your goals and objectives and do so within a very specific time frame.

Creating a Simple Revenue Plan

Your revenue plan need not be too complicated. It is an outline of how you intend to close the gap between where you are and where you want to be. Your Revenue Plan actually begins the process of generating leads for your business by knowing specifically the product and/or service your business will offer, the number you want to sell, the price you will charge and when you project these sales will take place.

Once these objectives are clearly and specifically defined you will have an excellent idea of the number of leads your business needs to generate in order to accomplish every one of those objectives.

Putting together your revenue plan is relatively simple. Start by listing on a piece of paper all the products and services your business provides. Your next step is to then multiply each product or service by the prices you charge and then multiply that by how many units you expect to sell for the specific period (quarter, six month or one year period). Setting your revenue plan out in a table is all you need. What’s important is you set your plan in stone so that you can get to work moving closer to your desired outcome. I like to work with a simple table to begin with that gives you a snapshot of the year then using a more detailed spread-sheet I then break that revenue plan into a month view plan which enables you to be more specific when planning what strategies and tactics you will take action on in order to achieve your plan.

If the results on your revenue plan do not match the objectives on your gap analysis then simply make adjustments until they do. This may mean increasing your prices, increasing the number of times a customer buys from you or it may mean increasing the average amount a customer spends with you at any one time. It’s a simple road map for reaching your targets.
If you haven’t yet drafted an outline of a revenue plan, get started today and see the difference it makes in such a short period of time.

Example Revenue Plan Snapshot

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Now you are ready for the next step. Creating your sales process. A Sales Process will help you maximise your potential and achieve your revenue goals.

The sales process includes choosing the most appropriate channels for getting your message directly to your ideal customers, choosing the right marketing strategies and associated activities. I see this especially in retail, when usually the business owner relies on the most obvious channel – foot traffic. They hope for the best that the customer chooses them today. It’s like playing a game of chance. You have an equal chance that you will win, and an equal chance of not winning the customer. Put simply it is essential you understand your sales process. If your franchisor hasn’t a solid sales process in place then create your own.

Remember your success is dependent on you, not your franchisor. So what would your sales process consist of?

Typically your sales process would include these steps:

  • Identify your ideal client / customer
  • Generate leads
  • Qualify your prospects
  • Present your product or service to your prospect
  • Convert your prospect into a customer / client  (remember to upsell, cross-sell and down-sell)
  • Lead nurturing – Following up leads that have not yet converted
  • Delivery – Servicing your customers including following up

Defining your ideal client is the first step to attracting the kind of people you want to do business with and will greatly increase your revenues.

Without sales and marketing you would have no business at all. It would therefore be fair to say that sales and marketing are the lifeblood of every business. As Peter Druker once said a business has only two functions – marketing and innovation.

The key to dramatically increasing your sales and marketing results is very dependent on your ability to attract not just more clients, but more ideal clients.

So before you dive straight into your sales and marketing activities in order ot increase your revenues, it’s important to understand who your ideal client it. I liken the ideal client to a favourite toy you used to play with as a child. You may still play with the other toys however the bulk of your time is spent with your favourite one, in otherwords the one your prefer to spend more time with. This is the same for your ideal client. Sure you may have other client types but your ideal client is the one you want to focus the bulk of your time. The ideal client is the one who not only buys your product or service, they love your product and service. They literally share your passion for what you do. These are the clients who really want what you have to offer instead of just needing what you offer. Ideal clients mean fewer headaches, returns and complaints. They’re a pleasure to deal with and they’ll not only buy from you once, they’ll keep buying from you forever. Or if you offer a one-off product or service, your ideal client will be willing to tell their friends and family to buy from you. These are the type of clients who will spend more money with you than the average client ever would.

They will send you great referrals and give you unsolicited testimonials. When you properly and specifically identify your ideal client you will soon find you are working less and earning more, which is what your ultimate aim in business should be.

Knowing who your ideal client is will enable you to craft a message that speaks directly to them which will help. This can have a massive impact on your business allowing you to increase revenues, and have more time, more money and more freedom to do the things you love.

Time to Take Action

Before we move onto the next step and key area in your business take some time now to

  1. Complete a GAP Analysis on your business. Where are you now? Where you you want to be?
  2. Prepare your Simple Snapshot Revenue Plan and your Detailed Monthly Revenue Plan listing all your products and services and what you want to achieve
  3. Describe the type of customer you want to do business with.
  4. Describe the type of customer who you believe will give you the greatest return on your marketing investment.
  5. Looking at your current business which customers do you believe right now are the easiest to find, easiest to sell to and require the least amount of time spent on them?
  6. Describe the type of customer who will stay with you the longest and spend the most with you.
  7. Review your past marketing strategies. What have worked? What havnt? What else could be done to maximize your potential?

What Do You Really Want To Achieve This Year?

Now we are in the New Year, it’s really important to start the new year on the right foot.

A good way to start is by reviewing the past year, what you achieved, what you didnt, and where the gaps and obstacles were.

I put together this short video message for you – alternatively keep reading this post below!!

 

Moving into the new year it’s then extremely important to decide on what it is you really want for the year. Be sure you are clear on each area of your life including some of the following:

  • Health & Fitness
  • Money & Finances
  • Business & Career
  • Relationships
  • Spirituality
  • Community and
  • Contribution

Once you know what it is you want, it’s easier to put a plan of action in place to go about achieving it.

Be sure you follow the SMARTA™ system when setting your goals.

  • Specific  – be sure you are specific when defining what it is you want
  • Measurable – it’s important to be able to measure your progress to ensure you are moving closer to your goal and not further away
  • Achievable  & As If Now-  your goal has to be achievable – don’t let yourself down if it’s not.  Be sure you also state your goal in the present tense – as if it’s in the NOW.
  • Realistic –  now this is a huge one. sure we all want to double or triple our income, but if you never have then perhaps it’s best to start off with a small goal. once you have achieved it, then raise the bar.
  • Time Bound –  be sure you place a deadline on the goal. Look how fast the year has gone, put a time frame on what you want to achieve.
  • Action –  This one is the most important by far. You must take the necessary action in order to achieve all that you want and more.