Should you’re specializing in the numbers, you’re specializing in the improper factor
I used to be an account govt a few years in the past — that’s a fancy-sounding phrase for an outdoor gross sales rep — and my course of for soliciting purchasers and sustaining present purchasers was easy:
- Publish a yellow sticky be aware with the names of 5 purchasers or prospects on my dashboard.
- Go to all 5 purchasers or prospects.
- Reply each telephone name.
- If a consumer requested me to cease by, I’d do it — even when they weren’t on my checklist and I needed to drive throughout city.
It won’t have been essentially the most environment friendly technique to work as a result of I drove throughout Houston and burned loads of gasoline, nevertheless it labored for me.
I wouldn’t let administration ship me my weekly gross sales numbers as they did for all different account executives.
All through the month, my fellow AEs would name to share their numbers, and they’d be irritated as a result of I by no means knew mine. They’d say, “come on, Lisa, you know the way many offers you closed!”
I didn’t. I knew I used to be closing offers, however I by no means centered on the quantity of every deal or what number of I acquired.
I stored specializing in my course of. I continued to observe my system day after day, week after week, and month after month.
The consequence: I used to be the top-selling account govt within the firm at the very least 95% of the time.
That’s proper. It does sound loopy, and the CEO of the corporate thought it was — at first. I didn’t know my numbers till the top of the month after I acquired paid.
I attempted it the opposite approach at first.
However all I did was obsess over the numbers. I spent an excessive amount of time and vitality determining how far more I wanted to get to $1 million or $3 million or extra in gross sales.
It’s the identical if you monitor your content material, articles and social media accounts.
What number of reads did my article get? What number of followers did I get at the moment? What number of extra do I have to get to succeed in 1,000? Did I get damaging feedback?
As soon as I finished specializing in my numbers day-after-day and week, my gross sales quadrupled.
Should you’re doing no matter it’s you’re doing merely for the cash, you would possibly as properly cease proper now. You would possibly make some house runs, however I can let you know it gained’t final.
And it positive gained’t deliver you a lot pleasure. The individuals who make it do it as a result of they love what they’re doing and observe a course of.
They concentrate on what their purchasers need.
They discover ways to serve their purchasers or their readers.
What they don’t concentrate on is the cash.
Should you suppose I’m selling the philosophy, “observe your ardour, and the cash will come,” you’re improper. In fact, it’s vital to be enthusiastic about what you do. I hope you like what you’ve chosen to do. Ardour is just not sufficient to maintain you should you don’t have a course of or system.
If you wish to see what occurs should you don’t have a course of, I wrote about it right here. The lengthy story quick is that I got here inside a nanosecond of dying as a result of somebody didn’t have a course of.
You have already got numerous programs and processes in your private life, so why not put them into place for your enterprise, writing or freelance gigs?
Even one thing so simple as the place you place your keys at night time if you come house is a system. Having a key system saves you time and nervousness. I all the time know the place my keys are — in the identical place, hanging up on the magnet on the fridge. So I don’t waste time, vitality, and emotion looking for them every morning.
What does it price you — by way of time, emotion, and cash — should you don’t have processes? The reply is rather a lot.
What easy processes are you able to create at the moment that can deliver you nearer to your required enterprise or entrepreneurial outcomes?
Listed here are six easy steps to create a course of in your enterprise:
- Work backward — what would you like your consequence to be? Make it a selected quantity. It could possibly be so simple as wanting to depart your home on time every workday. Or, I wish to publish two articles per week.
- What number of calls/emails/visits/posts/movies/articles do you could make to get to the end result? Specify a quantity.
- Set a selected time to work on IT every day — block it out in your calendar.
- Create templates so that you’ve acquired your product/service data useful to pop into an e-mail. Should you’re making a enterprise improvement course of, write scripts to your gross sales calls. That’s a course of.
- Comply with up — Mark dates and occasions to observe up in your calendar.
- Maintain working your system, day after day.
When you begin following a writing or enterprise improvement system, your gross sales might not quadruple as mine did, however I guarantee you they are going to enhance considerably. You’ll expertise much less nervousness and extra pleasure. And isn’t that what all of us need?