Marketing

Stop Being So Selfish

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It doesn’t make you a bad person.

You’ve got a job to do.  You’ve got to feed the kids and pay the bills.  And you have to hit your quota.

But, you have to just stop it.

It doesn’t become you and it’s certainly not helping you. 

Stop being so selfish. 

Ask any sales rep just before they dial the phone, or walk in the prospect’s door or start that client webinar, “What’s your objective?” and I’ll guarantee that 99.996% will say something about themselves.

“I’m calling to let her know we have some specials and more to offer on…”

“I’m looking to try and get an appointment with purchasing…”

“I want to discover in this meeting what they are doing next year as far as initiatives go…”

It’s all about you isn’t it.

Don’t lie.  I’ve been there too.   I’ve sold door to door, on the phone and in the C-suite.  You and I both know if we had to answer that question about objectives on the fly, we’d most likely blurt out something about what we want because that is what’s in our head.

Selfish objectives don’t work.   

There is a big difference when you call on a client with the sole objective of making them feel valued vs.  introducing that new sales and service program.  The customer experience is far better and it leads to more sales.    

There is a big difference when you open that door with the objective of taking something off the prospects plate vs. letting them know what you and your company can do.   The customer experience is far better and it leads to more sales.

There is a big difference when your objective is to surprise and delight a prospect vs. to show what you’ve learned about their company.  The customer experience is far better and it leads to more sales.

Today, when I call out to a training client or step out on to the sales floor to coach, my crystal clear conscious objective to “make the customer happy” or “this sales rep will walk away with something they can use today” is a heck of a lot more effective than in the old days when I’d call out to see how we are doing or coached on the floor so I could teach em’ some stuff.

 

So take a stab at being more selfless when you think of your objectives.  Selfish doesn’t make you a bad person; it just makes you a bad sales rep.

 

 

Till next time,

Grow The Business.

Mark

The APG3

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It’s a pretty simple formula.

Elevator Speech = A+PG+3.   Or as I’ll coin it an APG3

An Elevator Speech that leads with a powerful Analogy, offers the removal of some Pain or the addition of some Gain and has Three(3) parts that illustrate how that all happens; is simply the best.

That is if you think the Heath Brothers who wrote the best sellers Switch and Made To Stick, a world renowned writer and speaker Brian Tracey and Apple’s Steve Jobs know exactly what they are talking about. (Hint: they do).

Combine three of these genius’s passions and you’ve got a great recipe for Elevator Speech success.

  • The Heath brothers in their books, exude the power of the analogy (it brings instant vision, a feeling and an understanding to the listener).  Think about the famous Hollywood pitch later made into that blockbuster movie Alien,…  “It is just like Jaws but takes place in space.” Steal from them.
  • Brian Tracey has for years spoken of the power of “pain and/or gain” from a clients perspective.  Love Brian.  Love this perspective.  Steal it.
  • Steve Jobs lives and loves “3’s” in all his presentations.  Watch him on YouTube.  He is the master of getting a compelling message out so steal from him.

Combine the three and you’ve got a killer approach to an elevator speech that is short, sounds like a human could say it (instead of the sound when it belongs in a brochure) is customer focused, attention getting and leaves em’ wanting more.

Let’s try one.  Let’s say you offer marketing to businesses for a living…

“I’m like a smart GPS for how to grow your business with marketing.   I know exactly where to go and make it incredibly fast and easy for a business to get that done right.” 

“And there are three things I do really well to make this happen…”

 “First, I keep my customers because I do what I say I’ll do;  after almost 10 years, I’ve grown to nearly 100 customers that continue to trust me, and trust is a big deal”

 “Two, I “get it“, I know how to bring new business into businesses.  I’ve created new tools and training that frankly impress the heck out of clients when they see it.

“Lastly, I obsess over the service and help after the campaigns.  I know what business needs when it comes to marketing and it isn’t this “one and done” type stuff. Most of my time and development goes into ensuring there is continuous sales improvement.”

“So let’s dig a deeper and let me show you a couple of the tools that impress retailers in particular OK?“…

So that’s a start.   Tenses can easily change to “we”.  Analogies can be changed to different better/ more interesting.  Pain/ Gain can change dependent on what your focus is and the 3 things done exceedingly well are all fair game.  

My example set aside, these pieces rightly so must be crafted and crafted well.  A very worthy effort for you or any sales groups to be focused on.    A good Elevator Speech makes for darn good voicemail, blog About page, email or Facebook post as well.

So that you can play this game at home;  Here is the APG3 in summary;

  • Analogy:  Be impressive and memorable with this.
  • Pain and/or Gain: not for you, for the prospect!
  • Three(3):  pick the best, leave em’ wanting more!

 

Till next time,

Grow The Business,

Mark

What Gets Your Attention?

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Everyone’s a little smarter now about sales I suspect.

In the old days it used to be all about pounding out phone calls, or having a killer discount or overcoming tough objections.  But we know especially now, what the real challenge is;

It’s about getting attention.  It’s about standing out a wee bit against a worldwide online bevy of competition.  It’s about getting that customer to even notice you’ve changed or have something that might help them.  It’s about grabbing “eye time” with an email or a first page Google ranking or getting one real minute (or maybe two if you are lucky), of a prospect’s face time or phone time. 

That’s the real challenge.   It’s not the “selling” that’s tough once you get attention necessarily; it’s getting the attention (however brief) that you need to even start the sales process.  

So how do you do it?  How do you grab attention?

You don’t have to go far or deep to figure that out.   Look around; your attention is piqued all day.

  • You looked at that hot pastrami sandwich and fries for lunch because yes, you saw the line of people and everyone else was getting it.
  • You noticed the safety poster outside the restroom because it had changed.
  • You made a mental note to dig up that old sales training because you saw someone just like you, using it successfully.
  • You listened and moved closer to that group talking because they were laughing and having a good time.
  • You scribbled a note about getting that book on personal finance cuz heck, the guest on the radio was an expert.

So attention getting isn’t so much about features and benefits and special offers.  It’s talking about, structuring and extending your sales and marketing approaches around simple things that get your attention every day.

Till next time,

Grow The Business.

Mark

4 New Words for 2011

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I heard yesterday that the word “App” was voted as the “Word of the Year” in 2010.  Makes sense.  It’s a nice word.  Not a new word (it’s short for “application”), but it gets the job done. 

Ho Hum.

If you’re going to have a Word of the Year you’d think it should be at least new.  What’s going to win next year, “ping?” or “tablet?” Please.  And I’m thinking we could really use some new words round here.  New words are important when the world just keeps on changing. 

Here are 4.  We need these.  They are in alphabetical order (for my friends at the Oxford English Dictionary), have phonetic spellings (for my linguistic phonology friends) and have a bit about what they mean for the rest of us. 

Authorical ( aw-thor-i-cal):  This is what you want to be.  Way better for sales people and marketers than just being an expert or an “authority” yet has the cool factor of being “historical” too.  When you are so credible for so long as a person (or a business) that people lean forward pen in hand, ready to write down your every wisdom or advice; you are Authorical.   Given the wild untrusting marketplace today that’s a great way to be.

Cryoritize (cry-or-ri-tize):  “Prioritize” the word, has become weak.  Today “Prioritize” unfortunately has come to mean more about “What you should do first” rather than what you should do instead of something else.  Lists get reshuffled but rarely get shorter.  What we need is to cryoritize.   It takes courage to cryoritize; people can get upset and people might even cry as their project, their idea, or their need gets cut.  But business is tough.  And it’s tougher when you only prioritize.

ICrutch: (eye-cruch) It is a terrible affliction.  It’s when one uses the Smartphone, the blackberry or the IPad to keep those eyes low and thus avoid talking to someone and stay tuned out.   It’s when one posts a blog instead of having a needed meeting. It’s weak and it’s selfish.  It’s when someone Texts when they should have picked up the phone or looked you in the eye.  Sufferers of ICrutch here see technology as a way to collapse their scary world instead of confidently expanding it.  

Intervaluepropositionalistically ( in-ter-val-you-propp-pohs-zish-shon-nal-liss-tick-al-lee )  Ah yes, finally a word that reflects when you are speaking about a product or service’s complete set of value propositions!  You can use the word in just about any ol’ meeting using phrases like “Intervaluepropositionalistically speaking, I’d say we have a real advantage here!” or “What a game changer, intervaluepropositionalistically speaking that is!”  AND the best part is, it gives the current longest word in common use (i.e. non-medical) “interdenominationalistically” (meaning across all faiths) a beat down as our new word is 32 letters long versus a measly 28! 

Here’s to hoping these words help you in a changing world and here’s to rooting for one of these guys to win Word of the Year in 2011.  Love it when a Rookie wins.

Till next time,

Grow The Business.

Mark

3 To Listen For In 2011

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Yep.  Listen closely Sellers.  They’re gonna happen. 

Best be ready.

1) Clickety clack clickety clack.  “What’s your name again?” you are asked by the prospect and then you hear the sound repeated: clickety clack, clickety clack.  Yep, she’s typing away and Googling you Mr. Sales Rep checking to see if you are worthy to meet with or even just to listen to anymore.  You best have a very compelling web presence.

2) “When can we see each other?”  It won’t be those 20 lbs you lose creating your sudden irresistibility or even your liberal spraying of Axe that will make this phrase be heard in 2011 but rather, your clients will really just want to see you before they move forward.  What do you look like Ms. Account Manager?  Do you have a professional YouTube video I can see?  Can we Skype our next meeting?  Where can I see your face; on LinkedIn?, Twitter?,  Facebook?   Ironically (yet fittingly), faces will mean more than ever in this increasingly digital but less trusting world.

3) Sploouurgshhthwwppt!  Yes, you guessed it!  That is the sound of a self inflicted needle plunging into the eye of your customer.  Gross yes, but it is often metaphorically a choice people make versus listening or considering us and we just can’t hear it over the sound of the customer sigh.  The stakes are higher now with each and every client impression.   Information is free.  Reviews about you or your company are free.  Products & advice are often free so when we interrupt a customer via marketing or sales in 2011 we had better bring our A game.  .  When you waste client’s time by not bringing value in every contact you just might hear that sound as that crazy busy customer yearns to suffer a different pain.

Till next time,

Grow The Business.

Mark

A Wii Bit of Advice

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It was a blast.  It was nerve wracking.  It was mentally exhausting.  

And there was a lesson to be learned.  

Strike One.        Strike Two.        Strike Three.   

No baseball here, those strikes came in the first three frames of Nintendo’s Wii Bowling.    Cool.

Bowling alone on the Wii gaming system in my basement “Man Room” Saturday, little did I know it would be a night for the history books in the ol’ McCarthy homestead.

Strike Four.       Strike Five. 

Five strikes in a row.   Don’t think I’ve done that before.  If I did, it was never in the first 5 frames out of the gate, that’s for sure.   I’m not going to lie to you and say that I don’t ever bowl with the Wii;- I have.   Not that much though, and not for months now.

Strike Six.      Gulp.

I’m feeling pretty good right now.  I know exactly what I am doing.  I am holding the controller in a special way with my hand held high but slightly cocked to the left.  I know that on my backswing, my hand is brushing within an inch or two of the Christmas tree because I hear the jingle of the ornaments from the breeze my arm swing makes.   I’m taking a perfect and consistent half step forward toward the TV and with a jagged sharp twist of my wrist just at the right time – I am giving the ball a wicked left hook right into the pocket. 

Strike Seven.           Strike Eight.  

Holy Jimoly.      Gulp.  Gulp.   

Strike Nine.

I am standing, just staring at the screen; looking at the 9 strikes in a row.  Wow.   I admit I am perspiring a little as I realize I am on a course with destiny.   Am I going to bowl a perfect game? A perfect 300 game?  There are websites dedicated to bowling the perfect 300 game in a Wii.  It is not at all easy to do.   Is it possible for me to get 12 strikes in a row?

Deep breath…..hold controller up high, angle to the left……press the “B” button…….

WAIT !  I yell to myself silently…..   This is no good……….  I am alone. 

What good is bowling a perfect game without a witness?   What good is playing golf by yourself and getting a hole in one if nobody sees it but you?   What good is making the half court behind the Subaru, off the garage “nothing but net” basketball shot if you don’t have someone there to see you do it?

“Boys!  Boys!”  I yelled upstairs.  “Come downstairs, you have to see this!” 

Both came running.  I showed them what was happening; The 9 strikes in a row; The perfect game in progress.   I knew I was taking a big risk bringing attention to myself.  My timing will certainly be off now.  But at least I have witnesses.  Maybe I can do this and these two 13 year olds will see electronic bowling history made before their eyes.

Strike Ten.

Would you believe it?    I was more shocked than anyone.   I did not lose my touch.  I had the special grip, the swing back, the breeze, the stride, the twist and of course; the 10th strike.

Two more to go.   I smiled; nodding my head while simultaneously showing the boys my special grip on the controller.  I then pressed the B button and swung my arm back……

Into the Christmas Tree……..aaahhhhggghhh…………and only…. nine pins fall down……

 

I picked up the spare and ended with a 289. 

Crushed though I was having missed the perfect game of 300, it was the best I’ve ever done and I think it might have been worse if I had rolled a 300 and there was no one there to see it.

So what’s the lesson learned by this story?   It’s simple.   Everyone’s big event is better with someone special there to see.

When the anniversary date comes for your 10 year employee, be there when the gift and the certificate are presented; it makes a difference in the experience.   The “drive by” a week later acknowledging the date just isn’t the same.

When the results come in on the sales contest on the 3rd business day of every month; don’t post the winner on the wall or email the results to all.  Stand by the winner’s desk, wait for her to arrive and share the news aloud for all to hear.  She’ll remember that feeling and that moment far better than the memory of opening a congratulatory email message.

When the promotion is approved, the new program launches, the degree is acquired, the first presentation is given and other big moments in a person’s work life happen perfect or not, having witnesses first hand makes it all that much better.

Till next time,

Grow The Business.

Mark

Lean In

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When you visit a small business, lean in and take a little peek thru that half opened storeroom door.  You just might be able to see a little arm attached to a littler hand holding a bright crayon scribbling away on papers laying about that worktable.  Of course then you realize, that Kristen who is tallying the receipts out front, is this little one’s Mommy. 

When you grab that coveted Hi back stool at the local bar (you know, the chair just opposite the TV but kind of on the corner so you see everything), go ahead and order that Sam Adams and as you wait, lean in a bit and you just might see a purse on the floor overflowing with bills including those yellow “final notice” ones.  For a second you get that sick feeling in your stomach too- you’ve been there.  Of course then you realize, Mary must have just raced here for the closing shift and is praying she makes enough in business and tips tonight to at least get the late late late ones paid.

When you take Max for a walk and see “Mike’s All Pro Painting” truck next door at Dave’s house you’re curious so you step a little closer.  You notice the truck is clean with a nice logo on the side- a real pro.  But lean in a bit and take a look inside the cab and you might just see a catastrophe of burger wrappers and coffee cups.  But as you look even closer you see in the midst of this mess a copy of Entrepreneur magazine and WSJ’s guide to Small Business.   Of course then you realize, Mike has much bigger dreams.

These folks and many other small business owners have kids, bills and dreams.

And many of you have the chance every day in what you do to help these folks grow their business.  You have the advice, the ideas, the products and the services that can do that for them.  

But So what?  Growing their business doesn’t really mean anything.  At least not always to us it doesn’t.

We have to think deeper.

Helping Kristen, Mary and Mike grow their business is way more than just growing their business to them.   Growing helps them pay for that after school program, or for those late late bills or for that seminar to learn how to secure an Angel investor and live that dream.

Growing is often a wonderful means to an end for small business owners.  And those ends aren’t much different than what you and me have in mind.

So lean in.

But lean way in this time and give em’ a hand.

Till next time,

Grow The Business.

Mark

The Wicked Awesome Awards

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If I was in fact, having an actual awards ceremony, I think these four winners would give some inspiring acceptance speeches.   And if they actually knew they were winning a Wicked Awesome Award (they don’t) they would be thrilled.

Until the WAA’s reach that “coveted” status, the awards actually mean more to me (and hopefully you) than anyone else.   Why?  Because each of these winners affected me in some wonderfully wicked awesome way.   And you get the benefit of knowing how.

Each of these people over the last 6 weeks did something simple, yet so helpful they inspired me to stop, grab my red book and write down these moments.  That’s a big deal in my book (literally) and makes them worthy winners.    

Here they are;  

Adolphe at Verizon who called me on his lunch break from his own cell phone to confirm that my cell phone was working properly while I was traveling in Kansas City last month.  He said he would; I didn’t really believe it but by golly, he did.    

Helen at Target who checked left, right and then all around her looking for her boss.  And not having found him, grinned, left her register and helped the elderly woman bag her groceries way down at the end of the checkout lane.  Helen, you’re right; some things just aren’t in the training manual.

Rev. Dean who sat next to me on the plane last month, each of us sharing stories about work and life, stopped mid sentence and sincerely asked if there was someone in my life he could pray for over the next month.   There was Rev. Dean, thank you, thank you very much.

Tim and Jimmy at Hannaford, who insisted on loading my wife’s groceries in the pouring rain saying “Just get in the car- we got it!”.  Tim is a made up name (and so is Jimmy) but this complete stranger and his son totally made my day and I wasn’t even there.

Congratulations all.  No lives saved or Herculean efforts here but Wicked Awesome for sure.

Till next time,

Grow The Business.

Mark

I Sent My Wife Roses For No Reason. What Did You Do?

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Yesterday, I sent a dozen red roses (in a beautiful vase I might add) to my wife at her place of work. 

I sent them just because I love her; no other reason.

In fact,  the card read….“Just because I Love You.”   

Upon receiving such a thoughtful delivery and reading the attached note, my lovely wife apparently teared up in front of all her co-workers, which of course made said co-workers tear up, and they in turn even got visitors to tear up.   Love all around and tissues for everyone.

Ahem.  🙂

I know.  All you guys are looking real bad right now.  

Some other guys are looking bad right now too but they don’t even know it.  They will of course when they get home and see this blog post taped to the fridge like a sentry guarding the bottles of beer that lie within. 

Fun.

But my friends, I’ll take the heat because here’s my point; you can’t be boring or predictable, you gotta keep it fresh.  You gotta surprise.

  •  Are you the sales rep that sent the Thanksgiving card out to the client to say thank you for their business?  Probably not, but some other partner/ supplier somewhere else, probably did.  You go ahead and send out just one card like everyone else.
  • Are you the sales leader who suddenly sat down and called out on behalf of your sales person to set up 5 appointments just for her, so she had a chance to knock em’ dead with her presentation?  Probably not, but some other sales leader, somewhere else, probably did.   You go ahead and keep coaching her on her presentation.
  • Are you the sales rep who called looking to hit voicemail  (cause you knew if you got your customer live for this, it would be interrupting) and left a message about the link you sent to help them deal with a problem totally unrelated to what you sell?  Probably not, but some other sales rep, somewhere else, probably did.   You go ahead and call only when you are looking to hit your quota.

You love your significant other.  You love your customers.  Keep it fresh.  Surprise the hell out of em’ now and then.   You know it’s good.  And yeah, you beat back the dreaded “boring” and the competition every time. 

Till next time,

Grow The Business.

Mark

What’s Easy

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image from hockeyindependent.com

I write a lot about easy.  But this one’s a little different.

I write often about how important it is to small business customers and prospects that your products are easy, that your website is easy, that your billing is easy, that your ordering is easy, or that your customer service is easy.    Basically easy is what small business needs.  

Here’s the rub though.  What’s easy for small business isn’t necessarily easy for you.

What’s easy for small business is:

  • To Keep Who They Got:   Dislodging a vendor in a small business is not easy.  Last I checked SB’s don’t have a team of sales or process strategists charged with looking at the value of bringing something or somebody in brand new.  Nope it’s more like, “I’ve been with them forever”, or “I know his family”, or “It’s too much work to change mid year”, or “This thing is like 1/100th of my budget why do I care?” etc. etc.     You have got to make it easier to switch.

 

  • To Blow You Off:   Heck, they themselves are or were, sales reps or account managers in one way or another for their own business-most of em’ anyway.  And they have staff trained to get rid of sales reps and marketers like you and some personally make it an art to avoid everybody but customers, family, their accountant or their banker.  It’s not that they don’t think you have a good product, it’s just that there’s no darn time to spare.    You have got to make it easier to see why just a little time with you might be valuable.

 

  • To Not Believe You:  The Small Business owner who has that type A personality, and is the wearer of all hats, and with the ego through the roof and the work ethic like nobody else;– Is she going to flat out just believe you when you say you can help grow her business?  Heck no.  You have to make it easier for her to trust you. 

 

 

I usually end all my posts with real applications, real ways to get it done.  I usually give you a few things you can just run with right now and tackle the problem and grow the business. 

That would be too easy. 

And there’s a better way.  Though this blog is only 6 months old, type in the search box the word “easy” (10 posts) or “value” (13 posts) or “credibility” (7 posts) or any darn word you think might be make sense.  Therein is a lot more help to make it easier for you and your customers.

Till next time,

Grow The Business.

Mark