Coaching

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Why Second Best May Be Better Than Trying To Be Superstar

trophy

Want to be successful in your career and life? Just follow the example of the superstars of business, celebrities, professional athletes and entertainers. Emulate the habits of Tiger Woods (before his personal crisis), Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, Lance Armstrong or Sir Richard Branson. Or at the organizational level, just follow the examples of Apple, GE or Google. That’s what we are told by thousands of books, movies, seminars, consultants and self-help gurus, exhorting people to follow the same steps, habits and secrets of the super successful, and they too will achieve the same outstanding results. The problem with this kind…

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3 Tips for Better Cold Calling

cold calling

As a sales force development consultant, I have worked with sales teams of all shapes, sizes and industries. Every team thinks they are “different” when it comes to their product and how it should be sold. And while I often hear “our industry is unique. We rely solely on referrals”, I can tell you that every company in every industry relies on word of mouth—yours is no different.

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Don’t Be Afraid To Imitate Others

Leader

You’ve heard it said before: imitation is the most sincere form of flattery.  It’s true, so go ahead and look to businesses that you respect. What do they do well? For example, do they have strong operations, great pricing, quality products, strong customer support or inventive marketing strategies?  Identify what you admire about them and try to imitate, or better yet, where possible, even improve upon those aspects that strike you favorably. A good way to step ahead of your competition is to be vigilant about looking closely at what they are doing.  Likewise, some of your best ideas may…

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Idea-itis

Ideas

The truth is that there is no way that you can do it all, even if you have a team of people helping you. The only way to create a thriving and sustainable business is to first, evaluate your options, second, decide which things you will do and which you won’t and finally, getting into action and doing!

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Why Phone Calls Are Better Sales Techniques Than Handshakes

sales technique phone

They attend an event with 100 people, where there may be 10 good candidates. From this event, they usually walk away with zero meetings and maybe a few people to call about future meetings. From all those handshakes, one might be a real prospect. In those three hours, all they accomplished was marketing the organization and possibly setting one future meeting.

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Are you where you want to be in life?

life

During the end of each year, many of us start to look forward to next year. What will we set as goals for the next year? What do we want to accomplish? What do we want to change to get what we want next year? What challenges might we expect and how do we overcome them to achieve what we want next year? Some people might even be saying that it is time to change jobs, careers, industries, and try something else. Maybe some feel like they just need to change what they are doing for some reason so it makes it more fun and exciting to do something new and different.

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Procrastination

Procrastinate

The phenomena of procrastination is what separates outstanding performance from mediocre performance. A business associate of mine recently conducted a series of interviews with 15 of their most successful clients. In answer to the question, “If you knew then what you know now, what would you have done differently,” she encountered a recurring theme, which can be paraphrased as follows:

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Create Procedures

referrals

Make it as easy as possible for people to provide you with referrals. Send or give them a sheet to complete with the information you need along with a self addressed stamped envelope to mail it back to you. If they prefer to fax something, give them tools to do this. If they like to type and would prefer to provide referrals to you via the internet, provide them with an electronic form that is easy for them to complete and email to you.

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Customer Retention is a Business Strategy

loyal customers

Retaining customers is vital to your business development efforts, and has far more impact to your bottom line than getting new ones. Companies with a great new business funnel don’t necessarily outperform those who keep clients long-term. I’ve seen companies that effectively use marketing materials to tout how different they are from the competition. They focus on how they add value to justify their price point and close a lot of new business. These companies however, tend to turn over their clients every 2 to 3 years.

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Creating Pros Verses Cons List

Pros vs. Cons List

When you aren’t sure about doing something, you might want to consider the old fashion Pros and Cons list. List the things you are considering. Then, prioritize each item. Then, give each item a value of importance. Everything you are doing is subjective so you just have to do the best you can to list every pro and every con for the things you are comparing.

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The Benefits of Creating Procedures and Manuals for Every Position in Your Firm

manual

Every position in your firm should have a procedures manual at their desk. One benefit is that they don’t have to ever ask you how to do something since it is in the manual. You don’t have to tell them a second or third time because it is in the manual. When someone is out sick or on vacation and someone else needs to know how to do something that person is responsible for, it is in the manual. If you have to terminate someone, the learning curve is greatly reduced because you have a manual for that position.

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7 Ideas to Engage and Motivate Your Staff Part 2

employee of the month

While it was noted that rewards are seen as more motivational when given in the presence of other team members, bringing a staff member to account for an oversight or error is best performed in private. Further, as a leader it is important to check for improvement in a timely manner and compliment employees if a positive change is evident. Otherwise, staff may be left wondering why they should bother if changes are not acknowledged.

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How to Get Past Yesterday!

dailyblogma

One of the biggest problems we, as humans face in our lives is the ability to let go of the past. Every year at this time the word resolutions pops up and yet most people will be able to come up with something about themselves they would like to change. It may be their weight, their hairstyle, eating habits, sleep habits, spending habits…and the list goes on. Having measurable and attainable goals is a much healthier way to go and you are less likely to stop trying 3 weeks into January!

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It’s Okay To Be Late

dailyblogma

I messed up. I went to an event, made lots of connections and collected many business cards. When I got home I divided the cards into two piles. One large pile of people who would simply be added into my database and get an email that was already set up. The second pile was smaller and was the people who I had connected with personally during the event and needed to follow up with either a phone call or other specific information

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