How to take control of your business once and for all

January 30, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Who's plotting your course?

Is anyone plotting your course?

It’s easy to be busy.  It’s easy to work from early until late.  It’s satisfying to keep ticking off the items on the “to do” list.

Stop for a moment and think about your approach to how you run your business.

  • Just how satisfying is it to work like this?
  • When you work like this, do you feel as if you’re in control?
  • Do you believe you’re making progress towards your goals?

If you’re not convinced that you’re achieving what you want to achieve with your business, despite all that hard work, try the following. [Read more...]

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Filed Under: Business Skills, Productivity, Sales Skills, Starting Your Business, Starting Your Coaching Business, Starting Your Consulting Business Tagged With: , ,

How to use your blog as a sales tool for your consultancy or coaching practice

January 27, 2012 By 1 Comment
Connections

Connect with your market via your blog

Some consultants, coaches and other expert professionals roll their eyes when I ask them if they blog.

When they answer they are likely to say that:

  • Blogging is a bit down-market for them.
  • Blogging is for youngsters.
  • Blogging is for the “me” generation.

They also often say:

  • Blogging is not for professional people.

They then go on to add that they don’t have time for blogging and social media and the like.

Serious businesses blog well and blog often

It isn’t difficult to bring forward evidence to contradict these assertions. There are lots of business blogs out in the world and many of them are very popular.

I’m a serious businessperson and I blog.  Well, actually, I’m a serious businessperson and I write articles and authority content.

The articles are blogs, of course, but I call them something different.

It’s relatively easy to convince professional people that they need authority content on their websites. They know that authority content positions them as experts in their niche.  They write authority content but don’t realise they are blogging.

Acquiring expert status is important and it helps to make sales.  Therefore, an authority blog is a great sales tool.

Blogging solves customers’ problems

I solve problems for customers via this site.

Lots of my business’s customers struggle to establish the value they deliver to their marketplace.  In fact, many of my customers are good at what they do, but don’t know how they add value in their marketplace. Thus, they don’t know how to promote themselves and their businesses effectively.

Almost eighteen months ago I wrote a series of articles (posts) about establishing the unique selling proposition in businesses selling complex products or services.  Whenever I start work with a new customer I always encourage him or her to read the complete series.

This approach adds value to the person’s learning process. 

I’m also solving a customer’s problem via this website.

Blogging helps you to get quoted, get shared, get tagged and retweeted

It’s not what you say about yourself that matters.  It’s what the movers and shakers in your marketplace say about you that’s important.

I make a point of writing interesting Facebook updates.  I tweet interesting material.  I write articles that get shared.  (Sometimes this is via social media.  Sometimes individuals e-mail links or include links in their newsletters.)

My blog posts are quoted, linked to, tweeted, liked and so on.

As a result, when I go to a business networking event I meet people who say:

“I follow you on Twitter.”

“I have liked your Facebook Page.”

“I liked your article on ……..”

It’s a great endorsement and, of course, other people in the room hear the endorsement.  That means I’m already starting to build a relationship with people even before we have shaken hands.

They’re starting to move along the Know-Like-Trust continuum that leads to business.  They’re doing that because of my blog.

Blogging helps you to make sales

My website (or blog) is a business asset.  It’s worth the time I spend on it.

It helps me to make sales, and that means that my business is more likely to profit, survive and grow.

What do you think?

Do you consider your blog to be a business asset?  Let me know in the comments section or on Facebook at:

Social Media Success Community

If you like this post please tweet about it using the hashtags:

#startup

#smallbiz

#entrepreneur.

You might also like to read:

Your great value proposition

One simple thing consultants can do to grow their business faster

Are you selling a complex product or service?

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Filed Under: Sales Skills, Solo Success In Business, Starting Your Business, Starting Your Coaching Business, Starting Your Consulting Business Tagged With: , , , ,

One simple thing consultants can do to grow their businesses faster

January 24, 2012 By 1 Comment
Sign up

Get them to sign up!

Most consultants are looking to grow their businesses.

Most consultants who have been in business for a while say it’s harder now to get business than it once was.

When consultants start to work with me they often say their problems have nothing to do with them and the way they manage their practices.  They say:

“It’s the economy.”

“It’s the cutbacks.”

“It’s the level of competition.”

Well, I’m not sure I agree.

When I start working with a consultant, one of the questions I ask in our first meeting is:

“How many sales meetings did you have last month?”

I often get blank looks.  Then I get lots of information about the one-to-one meetings and the discussions following on from networking meetings and the lunches and breakfast meetings the consultant has attended.

I take notes. It’s fascinating to listen and to work out how much time and money consultants spend on these activities.

In the end it turns out that quite a few consultants don’t have any sales meetings at all.

They have meetings where they talk about what they do.  They have meetings where they present proposals.  They have meetings where they discuss options and possibilities.  They have exploratory meetings.

They don’t actually have meetings where they say:

“This is what I am offering and this is the price.  Now, when can I start work on your project?”

That’s the main reason why they’re not making sales.  They just never get around to asking for the business.

How to make sales

If you’re going to do business you need to make sales.

We’re now into week four in the Business Start-Up month, which is why I’m writing about sales.  In week four in The Solo Success Start-Up Guide I concentrate on sales and doing one very important thing to get sales.

What is it?

It’s asking for the business.

If you don’t make sales, your business is doomed. Yet, when you delve into the way lots of consultants work, they never actually ask for the business.  That’s their biggest problem.

Do you ask for business?

Think carefully.

  • Have you asked for a piece of business in the last month?
  • Have you asked a customer for a start date for a project?
  • Have you asked in plain and simple terms that the customer makes a commitment to work with you?
  • Have you asked when you can submit your first invoice?

If you haven’t, then you’re missing out on business.

Often customers are just waiting for you to ask them for their business.  They want you to ask. If you don’t, they won’t offer to put the first meeting in the diary.  They won’t ask you about the best time to run that workshop.  They’ll let you walk away from the meeting empty handed.

You can improve your business if you make a point of asking for the business every time you make a proposal of any sort.

What have you got to lose?

They can only say no.

Over to you . . .

Be honest.  Do you ask your customers for their business?

If you don’t, what gets in the way?  Let me know in the comments.

If you like this post please “like” it on Facebook and tweet about it using the hashtags:

#startup

#smallbiz

#entrepreneur.

You might also like to read:

The real secret of consultancy success

How well are you closing the sale?

The most common mistake new businesses make and how to avoid it.

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Filed Under: Sales Skills, Solo Success In Business, Starting Your Coaching Business, Starting Your Consulting Business Tagged With: , , ,

The Fastest (Legal) Shortcut Ever To Becoming Famous In Your Niche

January 20, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Mountain Peak

Climb faster!

Okay then!  You want to become a successful entrepreneur.  You know this means you must get your name known and you must get people to remember who you are and what you do.

You’re starting a consulting or coaching business and you want to make a success of what you do fast.

Here’s a quick way to succeed.

How to become famous

Make a list of the twenty top people in your market niche.  Just do it.  Don’t agonise.  Just write. You can prune later if you need to.

Now organise your list into:

  • competitors
  • thought leaders
  • potential customers
  • potential strategic partners
  • media (journalists etc)
  • mavericks
  • others – plus a reason for including them in the list.

Make sure you have at least two names under each heading.

Business Success For The Taking

Work out:

  • what you would say to each of these people if you met them
  • how you could add value to their business
  • how building a relationship with each individual will help your business.

Then plan how you’re going to make contact with each person on your list.

You’re in your third week in business, so it is time to start to plan ahead and prepare to succeed.

This action plan will help you to find a place for yourself and your business in your niche.

Over to you

Do you have a better, faster and more effective way of building your fame in your niche quickly?  If you do, please tell us about it in the comments.

If you like this post please “like” it on Facebook and tweet about it using the hashtags:

#startup

#smallbiz

#entrepreneur.

You might also like to read:

The Five-Minute Guide To Managing Your Second Week In Business

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Filed Under: Becoming A Market Leader, Business Skills, Solo Success In Business, Starting Your Business, Starting Your Coaching Business, Starting Your Consulting Business Tagged With: ,

The Top Tip For Starting A Successful Business

January 16, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Open for businessBecoming a successful entrepreneur is your goal and your start-up business is now in its third week of trading.

Thank you for following the Business Start-Up Month posts on this site.  This is becoming a popular series.

In The Solo Success Start-Up Guide the motto for week one is:

Markets Matter Most.

That’s true.  The market will decide your fate. 

The motto for week two is a sobering one:

You’ve nothing to sell until you know what people are willing to buy.

Now it’s week three.  What’s important for this week?

How to become a successful entrepreneur – quickly

The advice I offer to new businesses and fledging entrepreneurs in the guide is the advice I offer to all our customers.  It’s advice that I follow every month, too.

Week three of the month is the time to think about business development.  Each month I work out:

  • how many hands I have shaken
  • how many new hands I have shaken.

It’s a simple metric, but it’s an indication of:

  • how much business I am doing
  • how well I am building relationships
  • how many new prospective clients, prospective strategic alliance marketing partners etc I meet.

I then work out how many business discussions I have had and how much business – new and repeat – I have gained.

There is a relationship between how many new hands I shake in one month with how much new business I gain two or three months later.  Keeping relationships going over time helps with repeat business, too.

The top tip for business success

In the third week of each month I plan out my networking schedule because it’s through business networking that I tend to meet new customers and new business partners.  I decide which events I will attend in the next four weeks.  I work out which seminars or other events I will attend.  I work out how much “virtual networking” I plan to do via social media.

Then for the next four weeks I implement that plan.

So what is the motto for the third week of each month?  It’s:

Get out more.

Business doesn’t come just because you’re there.  You – and I – have to go out and find people and businesses to work with.

The businesses that are going to succeed and continue to succeed are the ones that both understand this point and act on it.

See you out and about.

Over to you

It’s nice to have a metric to think about.

  • How many hands do you shake each month?
  • Do you find there is a link between people you meet and how much business you gain either directly or by referral?

Is this a metric that you use?  Let me know in the comments below.

If you like this post please “like” it on Facebook and tweet about it using the hashtags:

#startup

#smallbiz

#entrepreneur.

You might also like to read:

The Five-Minute Guide To Managing Your Second Week In Business

The Most Common Mistake New Businesses Make – And How to Avoid It

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Filed Under: Solo Success In Business, Starting Your Business, Starting Your Coaching Business, Starting Your Consulting Business, Uncategorized Tagged With: ,
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