Sales – Page 13 – thoughtLEADERS, LLC: Leadership Training for the Real World

Stop Isolating Your Business: Two Ways You’re Ruining Opportunities

July 6, 2009/3 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Communications, Entrepreneur, Sales, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

This post is dedicated to all the paranoid businesspeople out there who are terrified of their competitors. You know, the people who run businesses centered around “consulting” who view any other “consulting” firm as a competitor. You can insert whatever industry you like in the quotes and this perspective will apply.

Knock it off – you’re limiting your business and isolating yourself from opportunities to grow. You’re effectively placing yourself on a deserted island in the ocean of business opportunities.

Not only are you limiting opportunities, you’re building a brand of naivete, immaturity and narrow thinking. The following also applies whether you’re a one-person shop or a multimillion dollar firm. Unless you’re Coke & Pepsi or some other similar truly competitive pairing of companies, you need to pay attention.

Those of you who know me know I network. A lot. That networking gets me in front of many other business owners and executives who play in a space similar to my firm.

I run a leadership development training firm. We have a specific business model. We focus on a few key knowledge areas where we have deep expertise. We deliver that knowledge through one-day training sessions with some focused coaching support afterward.

Networking gets “interesting” when I meet others who work in the leadership development coaching and training arena. During those meetings I’ve seen two destructive dynamics play out on occasion.

How The Wrong Pricing Approach Is Killing Your Business

June 25, 2009/4 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Entrepreneur, Sales, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

Bob Barker used to point out when the price was right but what happens to your business when the price is wrong? Getting pricing wrong is one of the biggest and costliest mistakes you can make and that applies whether you’re a sole proprietor or a Fortune 500 company.

First, a little pricing math. Let’s say you sell a widget for $100 and your gross profit on said widget is $30. After taking out overhead, you’re down to $10. Then the tax man comes along and takes $4 of that leaving you with a whopping $6 on your $100 sale.

Here’s the critical part – imagine you want to win a new customer over with a teensy weensy little $1 discount. Sure it’s a 1% discount to him but you just blew a 10% hole in your overall profitability (changing pricing doesn’t change your cost of goods or your overhead and, after tax effects, the majority of that price decrease hits your bottom line like a sledge hammer).

Conversely, if you’re in a position where you can increase pricing by $1, you’ve just increased your profits by 10% (and in this economy, that’s huge). Pricing matters. Bigtime.

The mistake we often make is in thinking it’s only a 1% price change. You have to look at it from a profitability standpoint. Knowing how hard it is to keep your pricing intact, here are two thoughts on how to get the pricing right regardless of the business you’re in:

It’s NOT About You: 3 Steps for Avoiding the Sales FAIL

May 18, 2009/5 Comments/in Communications, Entrepreneur, Sales /by Mike Figliuolo

Sales is a difficult job, especially in this economy. It’s easy to forget good sales principles when you get focused on the numbers. The sales goal can become an anvil that knocks the focus on the prospect out of your noggin.

When that happens, you’re at high risk for the sales FAIL. That’s that interaction that not only costs you the sale but leads the prospect to tell other people how bad your organization is (in a blog like this one perhaps…).

This post isn’t just for salespeople. If you’re involved in sales, marketing, strategy, or business development there are some important lessons here. If you’re not involved in those functions, might as well read anyway because I know you’re looking for an excuse not to work on that PowerPoint deck and you can claim you’re doing “professional development” instead.

I recently had a head-scratcher of an interaction with a business-to-business cold caller. First I’ll detail some of the agonizing points of those calls then lay out three principles for not getting a “DON’T ANSWER” entry in my caller ID (yes, I’ll explain that point).

As the Chili Peppers Say – Give It Away Now!

April 20, 2009/15 Comments/in Business Toolkit, Career, Entrepreneur, Sales, Strategy /by Mike Figliuolo

I love the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Great tunes especially at 3AM on a Friday night. They’ve also got an incredibly relevant message for how you can grow your business: Give it away, give it away, give it away now! (I’ll spare you the repeats).

Want to grow your business? Give it away.

No. I haven’t fallen and hit my head again. I routinely give away our stuff. Our services. Our content (ummm… yeah, you’re reading a FREE blog full of our intellectual property and the only price I ask is comments and telling your friends – you are telling your friends, right?). But I give it away deliberately and with purpose.

Have you ever been in that “free seminar” that was nothing more than a disguised sales pitch? Infuriating, huh? Did you buy the speaker’s stuff? Didn’t it grate on you when they’d say “so those are the first two steps in our secret ten step process. Buy the other eight steps for just $999.99!”

Those folks aren’t successful long term. They need to learn how to give it away. So do you. Allow me to explain.

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