Posts Tagged ‘small business’

Authentic Accountability Grows Business

Wednesday, October 20th, 2010

During our 7 Tips Seminars, we ask the participants why they decided to get into business for themselves. Most of them respond that they wanted freedom and they were more talented than their leaders.

As a result of their desire for freedom and autonomy, we have a group of entitled know-it-all small business owners who don’t want to be managed. If you’re offended right now it’s okay. You are one of them, and so am I.

To keep small business owners on the right track, we still need leadership in order to “right” the performance of business in the marketplace. If every business owner was just doing their own thing with no system of checks-and-balances, small business would no longer be the spine of a healthy economy.

Some of the systems of check-and-balance are customer satisfaction scores and repeat buyers. Sometimes a check-and-balance will come from a mastermind group or a business coach.

What business owners really need to do is give each other authentic feedback about how they’re running their business.

A new referral partner of mine came to my referral team meeting last month. After the meeting, I asked him what he thought of the meeting. He said that it was run well, but he was disappointed that there weren’t more people there.

At first I was offended. How dare he come into my team, which is one of the best in the association, and tell me that we weren’t up to snuff! But, he was right. We were slipping, and it took an authentic outside perspective to shine a light on where we needed to grow.

Help the small business community get stronger by giving authentic feedback to your colleagues. Tell them where they’re falling short, and where they’re shining through.

They need it, and you need it too.

Jamar Cobb-Dennard is the Vice-President of Business Development for reachmore, which teaches small business owners how to build a business that runs without them. For more resources on business leadership, please visit http://blog.goreachmore.com.

Tags: accountability, authenticity, autonomy, feedback, growth, Management, small business, success
Posted in Blog, Business, Habits, Life, Sales, Uncategorized |

Practice, Practice, Practice

Monday, August 16th, 2010

A few weeks ago I completed one of the best books I have read this year called “Talent is Overrated” by Geoff Colvin.

Colvin argues (persuasively, I might add) that the difference between the remarkable achievers in the world and everyone else comes down to one thing – practice.

If you want to be the great musician you need to practice several hours a day seven days a week. You want to be the next Tiger Woods (let’s focus on his record in golf, not with the ladies)? It would be helpful for you to have a dad who is an actual drill sergeant start you playing the game when you are 2 years old.

That got me thinking – how does this apply to my work with executives and business owners?

There are a handful of behaviors that will almost always lead to success in business. They include – always exceeding expectations, making more prospecting calls, setting clear expectations for your staff, etc. Unfortunately, most of the clients and prospects I work with always want to focus on something new instead of mastering any of the fundamentals.

For example, I have met tons of salespeople who are in a non-stop quest for a “silver bullet” lead generation strategy that will allow them to eliminate prospecting from their daily schedule. Guess what? It doesn’t exist. If you want to increase your sales you have to prospect – period.

Steven Covey has a great quote – “To know and not to do is really not to know.” In other words, just because you understand the basics for improving your business it doesn’t mean a thing unless you implement these simple tactics.

Before you make an investment in a new marketing, operations or leadership strategy ask yourself the following question – “How am I doing with the basics?” Maybe it’s time for you to practice, practice, practice.

CJ McClanahan is the Founder of reachmore, which provides leadership coaching for small business and executives. Email CJ at cjm@goreachmore.com for the latest on reachmore’s revolutionary executive coaching program, Summit.

Tags: achieve, Business, business coach, business coaching, commitment, exceeding expectations, Life, Sales, silver bullet, small business, success, tiger woods
Posted in Blog, Business, Habits, Life |

Are You Open for Business?

Tuesday, August 10th, 2010

You know what really grinds my gears? A business that supposedly wants to grow and get new clients, but is never “open for business”!

I have been searching for a downtown loft. Last Friday, I ended my workday 2 hours early, so I could view apartments while the leasing offices were still open. To my dismay, 3 out of the 4 places I went to had no one attending their offices! I went back to my first stop, and a leasing agent finally came back to greet me. I called the numbers on the door of another building, only to get two disconnected numbers, and left a voice message on the third, which has yet to be returned.

Here is a second example. We sell business coaching to business owners of companies with an average of 1-5 employees. Most of the time, the business owner of a company that size is the point-person for business development. It amazes me how many times I have to call a client before they pick up the phone. They have no clue who I am (I typically don’t leave messages), so one would think, “Hey, if I want more business, I should probably pick up the phone – this could be a prospective client calling!”

How easy do you make it for clients to contact and initiate the sales process with you?

Do they have to figure out, work, and guess at how to buy from you?

Are you available and quickly respond to office phone calls, cell phone calls, email, web inquiries, twitter, facebook, tungle? If you don’t have the capacity to instantly respond to each of these methods of engaging you as a provider (or at BARE minimum, give them a same day response), then you need to create a new system to do so; immediately.

If you don’t, your business stands no chance of ever running without you.

Tags: accessability, business coach, business coaching, business owners, communication, Sales, small business, success
Posted in Blog, Business, Habits, Life, Sales, Uncategorized |

Don’t Die With Blockbuster

Tuesday, July 27th, 2010

As I drove past a boarded up Blockbuster Video tonight, I felt sick to my stomach viewing the reality of a once seemingly omnipotent company, brought to its knees by a complacent lack of innovation.

After years of market domination, Blockbuster got fat, drunk, and happy with profits, as they were able to gouge American entertainment lovers with $5 overnight movie rental fees.

Ridiculous.

America and the “market” said, “No more”.

First, Netflix came with their nifty movies by mail platform. Blockbuster returned the gesture by offering movies by mail AND instant in-store exchanges.

Blockbuster = 1
Competitors = 0

Netflix then hit Blockbuster hard with internet-based movie downloads. The movie download feature was lame at first, but now it’s pretty sweet. Blockbuster had no answer.

Blockbuster = 1
Competitors = 1

Next, here comes Redbox with $1 overnight movie rentals, minimal overhead, 24-hour availability, and seemingly limitless brick and mortar distribution channels.

How can ANY big box video store compete with that?

Blockbuster = 1
Competitors = 2

So, not only is Blockbuster getting slammed by competition whose pricing is 80% lower than theirs, they’re available 24-hours a day, in hundreds of thousands of convenient locations, are down-loadable over the internet, and receivable by mail.

Competitors = Innovative champions
Blockbuster = Dead

Here is a news flash that I am certain you have already realized, and probably haven’t done anything about: Every product is going online or being offered in a CRAZY convenient format. Yes, even you with your snazzy B2B product offering, need to find a way to innovate how your long-successful product is delivered.

Find a way to digitize your product offering, make it scalable, make it Über-convenient, and price it so it is easily accessible by your audience. Otherwise, you will die, just like “Goliath” Blockbuster.

Jamar Cobb-Dennard is the Vice-President of Business Development for reachmore, which provides leadership coaching for small business and executives. For more resources on business leadership, please visit http://blog.goreachmore.com.

Tags: Business, business coach, business coaching, growth, innovate, small business, success
Posted in Blog, Business, Habits, Life |

Create Today Anew for Breakthroughs

Tuesday, July 6th, 2010

A couple of weeks ago, I was driving to Berny Martin’s house, and I had a catastrophic imagination. My brain thought, what if my tire blew out, and my convertible rolled into the cement median, crushing my skull. The imagination continued with me months in a coma, and waking up with severe brain damage. After recovering, I was still able to function in life and go back to work.

As a result of the brain damage, my brain now had to function in a different way. I could still think and get things done, but I couldn’t do it the same way I did before the accident.

After the accident, I could also clearly remember how my brain used to function, and that memory paralyzed my ability to create a new way of thinking with my reconfigured brain. I couldn’t move forward with rehabilitation and new success because I was so stuck on how I used to create results.

What if my re-configured post-accident coma brain actually functioned in a way that would bring me bigger breakthroughs in life than my old brain could?

Here’s the point. To achieve breakthroughs in our business, we have to do something different than what got us to where we are. Reproducing activities and thoughts from the past will only produce the results that we got before. You may not have brain damage, and may not be in the process of to re-learning how to function, but if you survived the recession – you have to re-learn how to function.

Do you want 2010 to be a breakthrough year? Analyze what thoughts and activities that may limit your ability to get to the next level, and eliminate them. Be confident in taking risks to run your business in a new and more effective way than ever before.

Tags: breakthrough, Business, change, coaching, leadership, recession, small business, success
Posted in Uncategorized |

Use the Right Communication Currency

Monday, June 28th, 2010

Have you ever called, and called, and called a prospect, never to get a return phone call? You’re not alone. I couldn’t even begin to number the amount of prospects that have lost out on a great product because they didn’t pick up their phone.

Wait. Maybe I lost out, because I didn’t find their communication currency. What I mean by communication currency is the medium that someone likes to communicate through.

For prospects, this could mean contacting them through phone, email, or snail mail. This could also mean that you may need to reach them through facebook, text, or twitter. Some people just don’t respond to phone calls, and others never check their email. There are still some clients who refuse to text or use social media. Amazingly enough, there are some people who only respond when I stop by their office!

Everyone has a means that they like to communicate through. Your job as a business owner is to find your clients communication style as quickly as you can, so you can move your prospect through your sales pipeline.

This may mean blasting a client with messages at every outlet that you have from the get-go. Even though you may think you are inundating them with the same content, they are actually only receiving it in 2 out of 6 communication vehicles.

Take reachmore’s founder, CJ McClanahan, for example. You will rarely catch him on social media, and you would almost never get a text response from him. If you stopped by the office, he’s either teaching or off-site with a client. No luck with a cold call. Sending an email will just get you sent to his VP of Business Development or trash folder. If you called him on the telephone before 8am, you might just catch him.

The same philosophy rings true when you are communicating with your employees. Don’t know if you’re communicating with a D, I, S, or C? Ask questions and use key phrases for all 4 styles until you have nailed exactly how someone would like to be communicated with.

The point of this blog is to encourage you to be flexible when communicating with prospects and employees. If you think that everyone receives information the same way that you do, you are sorely wrong, and will have the mediocre success if you continue to act as if they do.

Be flexible, and remember that people aren’t difficult, they’re just different!

Tags: business coaching, communication, executive coaching, leadership, prospecting, Sales, small business
Posted in Blog, Business, Habits, Life, Sales |

Think like a Dog

Monday, June 21st, 2010

When I used to let Jenna’s dog, Sadie, out to the bathroom, she used to doddle on her way back in. I would call her and call her, and she would never come back inside. As soon as I went outside after her, and got close enough to grab her collar, she would shake me off and start running toward the door!

Dogs are special creatures, and I often wonder what they are thinking. I must be a high “I” (for more on what it means to be a high “I”, email me at jamar@goreachmore.com), because I actually care what dogs are thinking about me. Especially Sadie when she was defiant and kind of rude!

Animal cognition researcher, William Roberts, says that dogs only think in the moment. They do not have episodic memory, so they can’t think behind or ahead of what is currently happening. They can perceive and follow a command that you taught them in the past, but can’t remember how they learned it. Basically, dogs live in the moment.

That’s why they are excited every time you come home from work. That’s why they’re always in a good mood. That’s why they always do everything “all out”.

Now, they do have the ability to perceive the meaning of something through circadian oscillators, which are regular fluctuations of hormones, temperature, and neural activity. That’s why they like to eat around the same time, and get a stupid grin on their faces when you bring out that orange ball they love to play with.

I think we should take a page from the book of dog living, and live entirely in the moment. Forget about the mistakes, pain, and successes of the past. Live in the moment. Go all out in what you are doing right now. Don’t worry about the future – lamenting about the stresses or loneliness to come, just focus on your energy and intention on this very moment.

Your dog is always happy and productive. Act like him, and you can be too!

Jamar Cobb-Dennard is the Vice-President of Business Development for Reachmore, which provides leadership coaching for small business and executives. For more resources on business leadership, please visit http://blog.goreachmore.com.

Tags: Business, business coaching, Dogs, focus, intention, leadership, live in the now, small business, Stress, William Roberts
Posted in Uncategorized |

Super Niche Business Success!

Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010

Where is the best place to go for a “freaky fast” sandwich in Indianapolis? Jimmy John’s!

The last time I was at Jimmy John’s, I snapped a picture of the back of an employee’s shirt:

They have crossed out ‘soups’, ‘salads’, and ‘hot’, but left the word sandwiches. To become a success, Jimmy John’s has put their product in a ‘super niche’.

One of the reasons why so many people love Jimmy Johns is because they know that they will get a tasty and filling sandwich that is well priced, and delivered quickly. That’s it.

You don’t go to Jimmy Johns for a hot dog, ice cream cone, hot Panini, or iceberg wedge. You go there for a sandwich – that’s it. The best part of their product offering, is that Jimmy Johns is completely comfortable with being a ‘super niche’ player.

As a small business owner reading this, here is my advice to you. Stop trying to be everything to everyone. It won’t work. That’s why you’re struggling right now. Pick a product offering that you’re an expert in delivering, and offer that to a specifically targeted market.

Could reachmore train individual salespeople? Yes, and we do offer sales process training for large sales teams. But, if an individual comes to me and wants sales training, I immediately send them to our “competition” at Lushin & Associates, who are experts at training salespeople. As a result, the client stays happy because they get the product that fits their needs, and our product offering and time aren’t cluttered with a bunch of junk that weighs us down, which prevents us from being perceived as experts in coaching for business owners.

Here are some reasons to immediately adjust your product offering and marketing message into a ‘super niche’:

You will make more money – Would you rather serve ¼ % of a 60,000 person market, or 20% of a 1,000 person market? Sure, saying that you serve everyone in Indianapolis sounds cool, but I’m sure you would rather have more clients and a greater perception of expertise within a smaller market.
Clients know what to expect – When people can pigeon hole your business offering into a super niche, they know what to expect from you. As a result, the frequency of purchase and long-term value of that customer increases.
The message becomes easily transferrable – My first client at reachmore taught me our slogan – we help business owners build a business that can run without them. He knew the slogan before I did, because someone else told him. The only reason I got that meeting and sale was because our ‘super niche’ was easy to communicate.

When your product offering is a ‘super niche’, it becomes easier to market your business, easier to retain clients, and easier to make money. Take the plunge today and put your product in a ‘super niche’!

Jamar Cobb-Dennard is the Vice-President of Business Development for Reachmore, which provides leadership coaching for small business and executives. Email Jamar at jamar@goreachmore.com for the latest on Reachmore’s newest seminar, Launch.

Tags: Business, business coaching, Indianapolis, jimmy john’s, Marketing, niche, small business, target market
Posted in Blog, Business, Habits, Life, Sales |

Asking Hard Questions Causes Business Growth

Tuesday, May 18th, 2010

If you are having trouble getting your business to grow, start asking your team harder questions.

I recently spoke to a group of 3^rd graders in Indianapolis for Career Day. At the end of my immaculate presentation, I opened up the floor to the students to ask questions.

A tiny African American girl with braids quickly raised her hand and said, “Mister, how much do you make?”

Woah. I wasn’t expecting that one. I mean, couldn’t we start with, “what time do you get up in the morning”? Or, “What’s the hardest part of your job?”

Nope, she went straight for the jugular and asked a brotha’ the money question. I answered her in the most tactful way possible without giving her an exact number. She approved.

This little girl taught me a lesson; it is okay to ask hard questions. Questions challenge people to grow and force them to come up with creative solutions.

Reachmore’s founder, CJ McClanahan, always asks his small business coaching clients why they don’t hold their people accountable by asking hard questions. The answer is always the same – asking hard questions is, well, hard.

Here are a few strategies to use to make growing your people and asking hard questions easier:

It’s not about you – The purpose of asking hard questions is not about stroking your ego or to make you seem bigger. When you make the reason for asking questions about growing your business or your people, the pressure is taken off of you.
People like to be challenged – Why do you think board games, skydiving, and AP English are so popular? People like to grow. Growth is one of the main motivators of your employees. Capitalize on that fact by asking them hard questions.
Use a qualifier – If you really need to make yourself feel okay about what you are saying, use a softening statement such as, “out of curiosity” or “I may be wrong”, before you ask the question.

Asking hard questions that challenge your staff is one of the best ways to take your people and your business to the next level!

Tags: accountability, coaching, delegation, Development, employees, growth, Indianapolis, small business, staff
Posted in Business, Habits, Life |

Blog

Events