The Monsoon- Making Rain in the Southwest: The Formula for Business Development Magic

The Monsoon- Making Rain in the Southwest: The Formula for Business Development Magic: "I was on the phone with a prospective client and we were discussing her current business. As she was recalling the good ole days she sai..."

The Formula for Business Development Magic

I was on the phone with a prospective client and we were discussing her current business.  As she was recalling the good ole days she said, “Back then I don’t what we did to develop business, clients just kind of happened-as if by magic”  She explained that in the old days clients found her, the phone used to ring, and life was good.  After listening to her for a few minutes, I responded, “I hate to the bearer of bad news, in this case, reality, but those days are over.  It is time to get clear about how business development works and to create our own magic. “

Far too often I hear people talk about business development as if the concept is pure magic. Take some predetermined action, shake twice, twirl the magic wand, and voila-business!    Sounds nice but not reality.  The good news, or the bad news if you have been honing your magic skills, is that business development is not magic.  In fact, I dare say it is much more science than art.  Selling/Business Development requires focus, a little math, and some conscious effort.

Let’s start with focus.  As I explained to my prospective client, it is wonderful when clients call us.  In today’s economy, it is not a good business strategy to hope the phone will ring.  So, instead, if you want to grow your business, you must make sales/business development a focus.  Like any other focus in our business, this means bringing strategic thinking, time, and other resources to business development.  Keep in mind, while it is fantastic to have a brilliant strategy, it is far more important to keep selling top of mind than to spend hours conceiving the world’s best strategy.  To start selling you must take some action.  So decide it is a focus and do something.  Maybe you need to take all of your former clients to coffee, maybe your need to take all of your existing clients to lunch, or maybe you need to pick up the phone and call your prospective clients.  You get to decide.  But, make sure you decide.  Make selling part of your business focus and start doing something.

Next comes the math.  You have decided to give selling your focus.  You may have created a full proof business development plan and, if you been reading my blog, you are now also taking some action.  So, it is time to put some metrics around your actions.  Are you getting the right results from the action you have chosen to take?  If not, spend some time analyzing your efforts.  How many prospective clients do you generally have to call to land one client?  Define that number.  How long does it generally take to move a client from the first introduction to a paying client?  How many clients do you need to reach your business goals?  Once you know those numbers, you have your own personal metric for sales/business development success.  For example, if it takes 10 qualified prospects on average to net 1 paying client, 1 month to move prospects from stranger to paying client, and your business needs 1 new client per month to reach your business goals.  Then your personal metric for business development success is 10 new qualified prospects per month.  Obviously your math will look a little different depending upon your business and you may need to take into account size of client, etc.  However, in the beginning just keep the math as easy as possible.  You can refine and make the calculations more complicated as you progress.

Once you have the math, it is time to add in the conscious effort.  So, returning to my example, you now know you need 10 new prospects each month to reach your goals.  Time to apply conscious effort to finding those prospects.  Maybe you develop strategic partners that can feed you 10 referrals (my preferred method), maybe you cold call, attend networking events, mine visitors from your blog,, etc   Your methods are less important that the persistent application of your efforts and the constant meeting of your metric.  Business Development and sales success depend less on your strategy, or even your skills, and more on the consistent effort to meet 10 new qualified prospects.  Of course in this process, you will naturally be constantly refining your skills and finding ways to leverage existing relationships so that less time is spent looking for qualified prospects.  Yet the key to the entire process is having the metric and hitting the metric.

You also must be conscious with your efforts.  This means making sure you have scheduled the time (yes on your calendar) to meet your 10 new qualified prospects each month (yes-each month).  It means you pay attention to what works, what doesn’t work, and your tweak your approach to continue to meet your metric.  It also means that on those tough days when you feel like you are flailing that you find the resolve to measure yourself not by today’s success or failure but by your consistent ability to meet your metric. 

If this economy has had less then a fabulous effects on your business, then it is time for you to take a hard look at your business development efforts.  Are you relying on magic to bring in new customers?  Even worse, are you relying on someone else’s magic to bring you new work?  If any of this rings true-it is time to make some changes.  If you need a pep-talk, call me, I will cheer you on.  But, don’t leave your professional success to magic.  Follow the formula, meet your metric, and you can leave the white rabbits and black hats at home!

Don’t forget your umbrella, I see rain in your forecast!

About Jonelle- Jonelle Vold is a business coach that is passionate about your success.  A mother of twins, former Assistant Dean at a tier-one law school, attorney, and seasoned sales professional, Jonelle understands the challenges of high-level professionals.  Her coaching philosophy is every person has the ability to be a rainmaker by cracking their own personal code and doing business with intention.  You can reach Jonelle at jonelle@jonellevold.com, 520-225-9053, or www.jonellevold.com.   Short-Term-Massive-Action Group Coaching Classes starting on June 1, 2011, jonelle@jonellevold.com for details.

The Monsoon- Making Rain in the Southwest: Top 5 things I love about Linked In

The Monsoon- Making Rain in the Southwest: Top 5 things I love about Linked In: "I was talking to a client recently and she asked me if having a presence on Linked In was really worth her time. My immediate and en..."

Top 5 things I love about Linked In

I was talking to a client recently and she asked me if having a presence on Linked In was really worth her time.   My immediate and enthusiastic response was- YES!  After a quick conversation where I inundated her with all of the fantastic uses for Linked In, she was finally persuaded.  I decided to recap part of our conversation in today’s blog.  The benefits of Linked In require more than one blog.  To get started, I have decided to give you what I see as the top 5 things I love about participating in Linked In.  I know there are many other gems out there and I would love your ideas and feedback.

So, my top five:

5- Searching- You can use the search function to locate former colleagues, classmates, and clients.  It is really easy to use-you can search by city, company, name, Alma Matter-you name it.  I recently used this to track down several members of my law school class for an upcoming reunion.  Don’t sit back and wait for people to find you-search for the folks you want to connect with!

4- Groups-You can locate groups to join on nearly every topic, subtopic, and business issue imaginable.  Savvy users join the groups where they believe their clients, referral sources, and competition are hanging out.  Once you join a group, you can participate in the groups’ discussions and can link to other members of the group.   Go find a group that matches your professional description or better yet, the description of our ideal client.  You can join 50 groups at a time.  It is free.  Go join and try it out.  If you don’t like the group, you can leave.

3- Follow.  You can follow people and companies on Linked In.  When you elect to follow you will receive an email or notification anytime the person/company  posts something new.  Often posts are company press releases, recent news articles, or upcoming events.  Good rainmakers know that they need to stay on top of this information about existing clients anyhow.  Linked In makes it easy.  In addition to staying in touch with existing clients, you can also use this information to build rapport with potential clients.  If you see a status update regarding a recent promotion or successful event, send a congratulatory note.  If you really want to dazzle them send them a hand-written congratulatory note!  Either way, you will appear like the consummate professional staying on top of the little details. Use client updates as a way to start conversations with potential clients, maintain a consistent dialogue with existing clients, and to stay on top of important events. 

2-Status Updates.  Through the status update function you can post new info to groups, individuals, and twitter all at the same time.   Use status updates to establish yourself as an expert on a topic, to promote strategic partners, and to keep your name front and center.  Word of caution- use updates strategically.   Your professional connections do not want to know that you are buying milk, hanging at the local bar, or whether you liked the new hot film.  They do want to do know what you are reading, writing, and even conferences you have attended.

1-Thought Leadership- Without question, the best thing about Linked In is the ability to display thought leadership.  You can do this in multiple ways.  The first way is simply to use Linked In as a method to publish new articles.  Unlike the traditional method of writing an article and shopping for a place to publish, you can now write an article and post it to Linked In.  If the article fits within a group’s discussion thread, you can post it to a specific group.  If it is something brand new with no obvious connections to a group, you can simply post it to your own profile or update and invite others to respond.  No muss, no fuss, just write it and post it.   

The next way is to highlight articles you have published in other mediums.  I recently had a client that was published in a sports journal, when the article ran, she posted a copy on Linked In-exponentially multiplying her readership and showcasing herself as the expert. 

Yet another way is by participating in the group discussions.   You can monitor a group from the safety of your computer and when the topic turns to something you are knowledgeable about, you can jump in and showcase your knowledge.  It is amazing-you don’t even have to wait your turn in line.  As long as your comments are relevant, you can jump right in! 

Finally, you can show thought leadership be re-posting articles you have read with insightful comments about meaning, key take-aways, or proposing counter positions.

Like any other business development method, the key to success on Linked In is consistently.  Resist the temptation to promote your self.  Instead position yourself as an expert through your thought leadership.  Linked In is fantastic medium for you busy Moms that have trouble leaving the office.  It is not a substitute for in-person meetings but it is a great way to prime the pump!  I know there are many additional ways to leverage Linked In-send me your favorites.

Don’t forget your umbrella-I see rain in your forecast!

 About Jonelle- Jonelle Vold is a business coach that is passionate about your success.  A mother of twins, former Assistant Dean at a tier-one law school, attorney, and seasoned sales professional, Jonelle understands the challenges of high-level professionals.  Her coaching philosophy is every person has the ability to be a rainmaker by cracking their own personal code and doing business with intention.  You can reach Jonelle at jonelle@jonellevold.com, 520-225-9053, or www.jonellevold.com.   Short-Term-Massive-Action Group Coaching Classes starting on June 1, 2011, jonelle@jonellevold.com for details.

What savvy networkers know...

Last week I was preparing for an upcoming presentation on networking blunders and how to avoid them.  As I outlined many of the common places that networkers stub their toes, I thought about when and why these blunders occur.  Many of the blunders (trying to meet everyone at the event, aimlessly passing out cards, holding up the wall, etc.) are nothing more than nervous networkers who have forgotten, or neglected to define, their personal reasons for being at the event.  Too often, I see professionals showing up at events and staying in constant motion but never making progress.  Like most things in life and all things in your business, if you want to see results from your activities you must get intentional with your behavior- networking is no different.

When it comes to networking, you are going to get more out of your activities if you have a clear agenda or goal.  When you go to an event whether it is a cocktail party, a kid’s soccer game, or a monthly networking event, think about your reason for attending before you go.  Decide ahead of time, what you want to get out of the event.  Have an explicit objective and a way to measure whether or not you have met your objective.  Having an objective and a metric for the event will allow you to measure your progress, help you enjoy networking, and save you time.

In my early days of sales, I had a fantastic mentor who taught me to have a clear agenda and goal for every meeting.  She taught me that it didn’t matter if the meeting was a casual coffee, a well-planned sales demo, or a cocktail reception with the new associates, to have a successful meeting you had to know up front why you were attending the meeting.  I know, I know, it sounds simple but most of us neglect to explicitly define our objectives unless it is the big daddy meeting that we have spent hours preparing for.  Even fewer of us take the time to determine our purpose for networking events.  Yet, without a clear purpose for the meeting or event, there is no way to have a metric and thus no way to know if your activities were a success or a bust.  Many of us gauge the results of our meetings on gut-feelings rather than off of measurable data.  I know I certainly did.  There was a time when I thought a good networking event was anytime that I walked out of the event feeling great regardless of whether I truly advanced the ball.  By having a pre-set goal and a pre-determined measure for success, you can actually measure your productivity rather than your mood.

Having an objective and a metric for networking events will take the pressure off of you and allow you to enjoy the event.   If you are someone who dislikes traditional networking, I am going to guess the displeasure is probably because you feel like it is waste of your time.  You spend all night chatting with people and passing out cards with no idea whether your efforts put any money in your pocket.  My clients often tell me that networking takes too much time sifting and sorting to find the “right” people and not enough time chatting with the “right” people.   This always makes me chuckle as savvy networkers know that the value of networking is not necessarily in who you meet at the event but in who those people know.   But, I digress, if you dislike networking you can transform the experience by deciding up front that the event is a good use of your time IF you gain an introduction to a specific person, learn a certain piece of knowledge, or perhaps meet 5 new people.  You get to decide for yourself what makes the event a success.  Determining an objective and a metric in advance will keep you personally motivated, keep your actions in line with your objectives, and pull you out of the murky waters of trying to meet every fish that enters the networking pond.  

Finally having a pre-determined objective and metric for the networking event will save you time.  Some networking events are high-energy and a fabulous way to spend an evening.  Others seem to drag by in painful agony.  If you know in advance exactly why you are attending an event you will know when an event doesn’t meet your criteria and you can abort the mission.  The only thing worse than simply being in motion is being in motion at the wrong event.  Save yourself your most precious commodity-YOUR TIME, and avoid activity for the sake of activity.  Take control of your business development and get intentional about where and how you spend your time.  If an event is worthy of your time, it is worthy of your thought before you attend. 

 About Jonelle- Jonelle Vold is a business coach that is passionate about your success.  A mother of twins, former Assistant Dean at a tier-one law school, attorney, and seasoned sales professional, Jonelle understands the challenges of high-level professionals.  Her coaching philosophy is every person has the ability to be a rainmaker by cracking their own personal code and doing business with intention.  You can reach Jonelle at jonelle@jonellevold.com, 520-225-9053, or www.jonellevold.com.   Short-Term-Massive-Action Group Coaching Classes starting on June 1, 2011, jonelle@jonellevold.com for details.