When it comes to increasing our sales, we are often compelled to focus on a number of things:
- Refine our business plan
- Improve our product
- Run more ads
- Hire an assistant
- Go back through past clients and survey them, find out how we can improve
- Take on a new lead generation system
There is value in all this, but it all comes second. If we do these things at the exclusion of engaging our customers on a personal level, nothing else matters. You can do this a number of different ways:
- Phone calls
- Social networking
- Responding to comments on your blog
- Interacting with your audience in forums
- Contacting people on your email, mail or phone list
These are obviously just a few examples. Here’s the point: so many of us don’t like selling, but at the end of the day, sales need to be made. If it’s not getting done, it doesn’t matter how many cool systems you have in place. It also doesn’t matter how refined your business plan is. It also does not matter what your past clients say to you or how many great leads they refer to you…if you don’t have a strong sales system in place that is put into action daily, you won’t increase your sales.
What matters is genuine, earnest engagement between YOU and your CUSTOMERS
Make a decision how you will engage and interact with your potential customers daily. Do it with a blog. Do it with a phone. Do it with a pen and paper if you want…it doesn’t matter how you do it. Blogs aren’t magic. They just work. They are an awesome tool. They’re a tool that works really well…if you use it. Same is the case with any sales system. What matters is not the method of engagement. What matters is that there is engagement. You need to get ear to ear, face-to-face, with your customers in whatever way you can.
Do it however you wish, just do it
You may be inclined to argue that not all methods of engagement are equal. Certainly some are better than others. For example, selling vacuum cleaners door to door is certainly not as effective as selling through other means, correct? I’d like to point out that I know more than one person personally that earns a high six-figure income doing just that. It’s not what I consider ideal; it’s not how I roll these days. I feel I’ve found ways to market my business much more effectively. That said, if you can earn $50k+ monthly selling door to door in this day and age, you can do well doing ANYTHING.
Tweak as you go, but get started. Stop trying to figure out the system that will work best for you, and get busy putting something that makes sense to you into action. Figure out the rest as you go. It will be messy, and that’s how real top producers get stuff done. They just do it.
Make a plan, then EXECUTE
Making a plan is crucial. Take 10 minutes. Make a plan. Then put it into action. Action is key, not perfection. I talk with clients all the time that are spending too much time trying to “figure stuff out”, trying to “perfect their systems”. They’re getting ready to get ready. If you ask me, an ounce of action beats a pound of preparation. Go make it happen.