What did 2020 force you to have to do better? 

In speaking with many of my clients, I am reminded how 2020, while poopy on so many levels, forced many of us to rethink how we do business. What worked in the past didn't work so well now. Or, maybe what wasn't working great anyway was absolutely not going to work anymore. We were given little choice but to critically look at the ways were were comfortable doing business and serving our clients and exercise the part of our brain where we innovate and think of new ideas for old business. 

Personally, I was forced to face what I already knew but hadn't acted on yet - I needed to diversify my client and revenue streams. The training work I was travelling to do was put on 'pause' in March and is beginning to start up again virtually. But.....the unwelcomed slow down in work for the past several months provided me with a great opportunity to rethink, rejig and revitalize how I engage with, and add value for, my current and future clients. 

I am often guilty of spending too much time working 'IN' my business relative to the valuable time I need to spend working 'ON' my business. Since March I have spent quite a bit of time working on my business and you know what? It feels pretty good. The ongoing result of the hard work I am putting in, with a little help from my friends, has me now very excited about 2021.

In those quiet moments of walking the dog and convincing myself to get out of bed this past weekend, I started to take a mental inventory of what 2020 motivated me to do differently (better) that I likely would not have started, or even more likely not finished, if not for this past year of challenges.

Here is what I came up with (so far):

• New CRM tool (HubSpot -which is awesome)
• New logo (to be formally launched in January)
• New website (to be formally launched in January)
• New newsletter (starting in January)
• New business cards (even at 54 new business cards are still fun!)
• Developed several sales webinars (with my business partner at Diversified Operations)
• Created a Business Development assessment tool for assessing areas where sales people could use some help (with help from my business partner at Diversified Operations)
• Much clearer concept of the different ways I can add value and I can help my clients
• New and improved diversified business plan
• New (and growing) list of strategic  business partners to help serve my clients better (I now have an even greater appreciation for how important collaboration and partnerships are in this line of work)

Further, as I will be creating and delivering more content from my home office, I have invested in some new technology:

• Web cam
• Ring light
• New tea drinking mug (critical)
• External mic
• Reading chair in my office (I need to use more)

That's a lot right?!

But really, I had to in order to survive/thrive beyond this year. That's what 2020 did - it presented many of us with the opportunity to adapt. To grow. To be even better at what we do.  To be....MORE BETTER!

I would love to hear how 2020 encouraged you to be more better. Let's hear what you did or are working on!

Work with me here:

Think of your favourite (yes Canadian spelling) hockey team (GO Jets Go). You watch all the games and are a huge fan. Let’s say their 5 on 5 game is good, Penalty Killing is near the top of the league, but the Power Play is ineffective and not only doesn’t score, it takes momentum away from your team. The Power Play has sucked for a while now and nothing seems to work. But they keep doing. The same. Dam. Thing. Man that's frustrating, right?
As a fan are you screaming at the TV for the coach to ‘do something’? (I don’t do that by the way). Maybe fire the GM? Or change it up and put so and so in front of the net. 

                                    "If it’s not working, why don’t they do SOMETHING? Anything?"

As the coach, if you knew the PP was hurting your success, wouldn’t you look to update and improve your power play?
Additionally, what if they didn’t track this part of their game (analytics/KPI’s) and don’t even realize the extent the Power Play  and is hurting the team’s success? That would be irresponsible to the players and the fans. Especially the fans.....

Wait a minute - does this maybe, possibly, even a little bit...sound like your sales game plan?

While I have your attention, ask yourself the following questions:

1.      What is your sales strategy?
2.      How do you measure your effectiveness?

• Do you understand what is working?
• What is not?

3.      How often do you review your KPI’s to assess and adapt if/when required?
4.      What does your sales funnel look like? (Does it look like a funnel?)

• Are there stagnant opportunities? (No come on, really?)
• Are there deals that have been ready to close for a while now that haven’t?
• Are there a bunch of accounts in early stages of the sales cycle and only a few that look favourable?

If these questions were difficult to answer, or you didn’t like the answers, should we fire the coach? Of course not. But it does drive home the fact that if we took a page from sports in terms of our approach to sales and sales leadership, we could probably be even more successful.

Here’s another example to hopefully drive this point home: Think about the amount of time sports teams invest preparing and planning for their games. Football for example takes an entire week to review game film, devise a game plan specific to the next opponent, run drills at practice, more drills, pre-game preparation etc.

Why?

To maximize the opportunity for a successful outcome.

​In our case that may be a sale, but it may also be another meeting. It may be an opportunity to get in front of more decision makers to even better understand how you can help them. It may be the opportunity to submit a proposal for the first time with this account. Those are all 'wins' that lead up to the 'championship' – a new client.

How many of us show up to our calls and meetings prepared with a well-defined sales game plan?

No? Ok that’s it! FIRE THE COACH!!!

Kidding again of course.

But, maybe you could hire a Sales Coach to work with your team. One that has the experience to help guide team players and management on developing a sales game plan that will lead to increased success. Someone who could put processes and structure into place that will lead to building that capacity internally so that you can eventually run your own game plan. Someone that could help with practice plans and provide a safe and fun environment to practice your various skills so that when you get into the game - sorry met with a customer - you are prepared to be at your best, help the customer and invariably, make the sale. 

Somebody who is funny, witty and with boyish good looks and charm for days. I know a guy…
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