Selling In a Tough Economy

Part 3

Although we all want "one" silver bullet solution to address our needs for new business development, we know there is no easy solution - just smart ones.

Once you get over the OMG scenario, the next step is to turn this economic situation into an "opportunity" to improve/reinvent your business or how you promote it. Continuous analysis, review and improvements are the key processes to adopt with the objective of being laser focused and following a philosophy of "If you can't measure it - it won't work".

Adopt the mind set that this is an opportunity (forced) to get back to basics and make the business better than ever. Having that attitude (including staff) will help in embracing change and add a good motivational incentive. There are many people who are not the sharpest knives in the drawer that are very successful because they "out work" most, work smarter and are motivated. Statistically, motivated people achieve at least 10% + greater results and are happier.

Biggest Challenges

One of the biggest challenges is to be able to step away and look at the business, processes and methods independently. Bad habits are hard to break. This is where a 3rd party that is experienced in analyzing & coaching these processes may be helpful.

You should look at everything you do, down to grass roots details. Consistency is critical in this economy and everything you do, promote or say should be basically singing the same song to be repeated time & time again. In some cases this may require some dramatic changes, where in others, simple tweaking of your presentations, web site, literature, etc. may be good enough as a starter.

Setting measurable objectives and reviewing them regularly is the next task. Set yourself up to win initially and then expand or increase the goals accordingly. For example: Start with a goal of actually speaking (phone) to 2-5 people a week, 1 or 2 face-face meetings a week and so on. This will also allow you to see your results and give you a feeling of accomplishment to motivate you to push further.

Practice what you preach! SJK is positioned to double its revenues this year (2009) due to consistently following these practices not for a few weeks or months but consistently for the past 3 years…they do work.