Cold calling - there must be a problem!

"I hate cold calling with a passion" was my response to a question about how best to get new business. It got me thinking, why can I say something as strong as "hate" to what is after all a perfectly normal business activity?

Here is the logic and my response.

1. Would I call someone I knew - yes.
2. Would I cold call someone I did not know if I knew that they had a problem - yes
3. Would I call someone I did not know and did not know if they had a problem - no

I had to conclude that I would cold call them only if I knew with certainty that they had a problem.

This was a breakthrough for me. And that is my next move - to wrap up what we do as a solution to a problem that I am convinced that they have.

It might just lower the level of emotion from HATE to dislike, and that I can deal with. After all, I do things all day that I dislike.

Hope this helps. Call me on 0117 230 3166 for more information or just to chat.




(ps - I know there are other ways of generating new business - cold calling is just one of them)

We are not born with maps, we have to make them.

"We are not born with maps - we have to make them, and that requires effort".

According to Scott Peck’s book “the Road Less Travelled” most people do not know where their lives are going. Their lives are directionless with few journey markers to determine progress. Peck argues, whilst they know that a map would enhance their lives, most do not make the effort to draw the map or to scope the direction they want their lives to take.

And if they do create a vision for their lives and draw a map, it is typically lacking in richness and variety. Consequently their boundaries are too small, narrow or even misleading. They have insufficient “detail” which renders their map almost valueless.

Finally, even when the map does have the requisite variety, size and accuracy it can soon become out-dated.  For it to have value it must be current which in turn means continually revising and updating it, as both we and the world in which we are seeking to grow and thrive is constantly changing. These changes impact on many aspects of our lives. The social, economic, legal, environmental and technical frameworks shift daily, sometimes even faster than that.

Creating a map or a vision requires effort. Keeping it current takes effort. Tearing it up and starting afresh takes courage and energy. No wonder people decide to drift.

Not having a vision or drawing a map or setting a direction, whatever you choose to call it, is as relevant for business growth as it is for personal growth. Many organisations leave their growth to chance and then wonder why they fail to achieve success. 

If we cling on to out-dated visions, goals and objectives, or fail to revise them, then we carry the risk of huge disappointment and failure. It creates dis-ease and manifests itself in many ways. Lethargy, demotivation, inefficiency, ineffectiveness, no sense of belonging, boredom, indifference, poor service levels, these are the symptoms of the lack of a compelling vision.

Can this situation be reversed? Absolutely yes!

Where to start?

You start by simply daydreaming. It may be hazy and nebulous at first, but work at it – wafting away the mist to reach the core idea, the spirit of your vision. It may take days, even weeks. The nice thing about this constructive daydreaming is that it you can do it and still do the day job. However, beware of thinking, as you dream your dream: ‘Oh we couldn’t do that! It’s just wishful thinking.’ Don’t be held back by what you think is possible, or you will end up limiting your vision. The moment you catch yourself starting to think of how you will achieve your dream, stop, and go back to the what - the big picture. Right now, you do not need to burden yourself with reality.

Having got some idea of what it might look like, talk to other people to see if they understand it, to see if it is reasonable, practical, do-able.

If you want more information on how to craft a compelling vision, then link here

If you need help, then talk to us. We are experts in accelerating business growth. We know the foundation on which the success of the business is built is the vision. We have a rigorous process that ensures your vision moves from inception to maturity. Call us now on 0117 230 3166.

It's a myth of leadership that when there's change, it requires action.

Here is the final paragraph from a very interesting article by Michael Blastland on the BBC news website. You can read the entire article here 

His argument is quite simple - play the long game to iron out the short run ruffles.

"A wise friend who does run a successful engineering business on the south coast, had this to say about the real ups and downs of recession:

"2010 was a terrible year with most of our customers cutting back or totally stopping spending, but I am so pleased we managed to get through it without any redundancies. It was tough for everyone but they all stuck together.

"It's funny how quickly things change round, just last September I was worrying I'd made the wrong call and we should have made redundancies at the start of the year, and now we have the biggest order backlog the company has ever seen."

It's another victory for managing by doing nothing, he suggests.

"Unfortunately, management generally ignores variability. A great example is the amount of time managers have to spend 'explaining' variance to budget. Woe betide any manager who just ways 'well, sometimes things go up, and sometimes they go down'. We have to pretend to be in control."

It's for this reason that the fashion for corporate dashboards displaying up-to-the-minute information about company performance makes me wonder - will bosses everywhere be staring at the numbers, twitching with every down, feeling the pulse race with every up, on the phone demanding action with every flicker on the dial?

The risk of playing down change is that you miss the next big thing. But since there's an equal risk of over-reaction, does anyone know of a business bestseller with the mantra: "Calm down?"

The 4 generic sales strategies

Here is an interesting article from Nick Cramp.

When it comes down to it, there are only four ways a business can increase their sales turnover, so a good sales and marketing strategy only needs to ensure these four bases are covered.

These four strategies are:

1.    Get your existing customers to buy more service or products from you each time they purchase.
2.    Get your existing customers to buy from you more frequently.
3.    Get more new customers.
4.    Get your existing customers to refer their friends and colleagues to become customers.

Each sales and marketing activity needs to be directed to achieving one of these four outcomes. Similarly each business needs a strategy or plan for how each of these outcomes will be achieved.

Sales & marketing can get very complicated and confusing with the range of different options and channels now available to each business, but a good sales person or team should be able to simplify and focus on systematically achieving each one of these 4 objectives.

The business owner or executive needs to make sure they have a system in place for monitoring and measuring these numbers so they can judge the effectiveness of their marketing spend. 

As the old business adage states “You can’t improve what you can’t measure”

How are you numbers looking this month?

Never take growth for granted

Focusing on what we do for our customers is short-sighted. Rather than looking at what we do, we should look at what our customers want. This is the core message from a seminal article written in 1960 by Theodore Levitt, a distinguished Harvard Business School professor.

This is as true today as it was 50 years ago. Too often we look at innovating what we can, rather than what is wanted by existing and potential customers. Sustainable business growth requires a particular mind set and focus.

Growth cannot be taken for granted, even in so called growth industries. It is more a management task of spotting where future growth may lie, rather than just exploiting what is already known. It is all about being customer centric and delivering the benefits they want.

Most growth plans are predicated on assumptions about the current status. That profit can be increased by delivering ever lower costs. That their product knowledge is such that their product cannot be surpassed or that growth is commensurate with population trends. These assumptions are short-sighted or myopic, yet they still prevail.

To achieve long term, sustainable and profitable growth focus instead on delivering the fundamental benefits that customers are seeking. Start by doing the research about what it is that your customers actually want from your company.

Can business learn from politics?

Can business learn from politics?

The Lib-Con alliance offers deep insights into how apparently opposing parties can coexist and even deliver credible leadership. It hasn’t been easy. Both parties have a rich heritage in terms of ideals, values and culture. In any other setting, they would be knocking seven bells out of each other. Yet they appear to be working collaboratively. How have they achieved that and what can business learn from their efforts.

To begin with, we can see that there are many similarities between political parties and organisations. Within most businesses there will be opposing views, conflicts of interest, individualist agendas and so on, each acting as a divisive force. Unchecked, this negative energy can lead to stasis or even worse, to decline. How can business leaders harness the energy within the organisation and use it for the good of all stakeholders and not one constituency?

The key must be in having a vision that gets all the individual agendas to fly in formation. That takes clarity of thought and good leadership. The clarity of thought is the heavy lifting that no one likes to do. Taking the time to write a compelling vision does however pay dividends. A great vision transmits who you are, the people that you serve, why they buy from you and how you will deliver that offering. Some consultants push the need for a pithy version to make it memorable and hence “sticky”. We disagree. People like to hear stories, anecdotes and parables. The vision can be in any form. But, a good story, well told, is powerful and this makes it “sticky”.

A meaningful storyboard vision is not enough. Good leaders make the story real. Their telling of the story breathes life into it. They transmit the vision constantly, without hesitation, deviation but with lots of repetition. They energise the story.

Has business anything to learn from politics? The answer is yes. Transmit the vision as if it is a story and keep on telling it.

Online Personality Testing

Understanding DISC Online Personality Testing

Knowing who you are, what motivates you and almost as important what demotivates you, is the foundation of a successful and fulfilled life. It means you can play to your strengths and work around your limitations.

Once you know how you would like to be treated, it gets even better.  Once you have a full grasp of your own self-image, you can then start to discern how others might think, act and feel.

The DISC acronym stands for

• Dominance
• Influence
• Steadiness
• Compliance

Over the coming weeks we will be outlining what each of these mean, the main motivator, the basic fear and other valuable insights that will help you build that successful career and live a life that reflects the real you.

Do keep coming back to see how it all works or call us on 0117 210 32166 for a no obligation discussion.