Sales and Marketing Newsletter 218 – Prepare yourself, Un-stuck, Washbin
GREG’S BUSINESS GROWTH NEWSLETTER #218
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Quick notes to help you grow your business in less time with less effort. . . sometime next week.
In this issue:
– Techniques for FIT
– Being Human
– Random Stuff
Techniques for FIT
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- Eating well and getting a good night’s rest is a good idea most of the time, and right now it’s a great idea.
- Everyone forced to use web-conferencing tools will do well to look into how to best use video. Have you seen the ratio “7-38-55?” It’s the rough impact of our words, our tone, and our body language in communication. Focus on the 7-38 because online the full 55 isn’t there, it just looks like it.
- The “news” when there isn’t much happening is sensationalist. When things get weird, it’s worse. Now, more than ever, check sources, because some office conversations I am overhearing are head scratching at best.
- Slowdowns happen, but stoppages are rare. I’ve sat in a half dozen “let’s revisit our strategy and plans” meeting in the last few days. It’s happening to your customers too. Reach out to them next week. Practicing safe social distance, of course.
Being Human – It’s stuck
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“My psychiatrist told me I was crazy and I said I want a second opinion. He said okay, you’re ugly too.” Rodney Dangerfield
Most big deals start as small deals and grow over time. Occasionally, your business development person drags a new big deal up to the door and it’s a very exciting time around the office. Everyone pokes and prods and sometimes, before it closes, it gets stuck. Why? Lots of reasons but generally they fall into one of these buckets.
- It’s a big deal to your firm, but not to the prospective client.
- Many stakeholders are identified, but we only talk to the ones that will win, and not enough of the ones who may lose.
- It’s a new kind of deal for your firm, requiring new capabilities which aren’t in place yet.
- It’s a new kind of deal for the prospective client, requiring new decision approvals which aren’t in place yet.
- Everyone agrees the business case is strong, but it’s a low priority for the prospective client.
How do you get these kinds of deals unstuck? Start by taking an honest assessment of which bucket the deal may be stuck in.
Next, bring in a 3rd party. They can be internal, they can be external, but they should not be emotionally invested in getting the deal done. Their job is to go through everything with you and dig in with the client, asking all the same questions again.
It works for the same reasons my wife can find my keys in a fraction of the time I can. No assumptions. She doesn’t tell herself, “I’ve already looked there,” and skim the surface.
Get a new set of eyes in there. Get un-stuck.
Random stuff
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Love in the Time of Covid-19
Last weekend I spent the afternoon with 18,000+ white-clad Creighton fans, and we watched the mighty, mighty Bluejays take down Seton Hall for a share of the Big East college basketball regular season title. It was amazing and left me feeling a little tipsy and delirious.
After watching the confetti fall on students storming the court for a bit, I have to answer nature’s call. There are a few high-fives, fist bumps, and elbow knocks in the queue but I keep to myself. After doing my thing, I head to the wash bins and for the first time I can remember, there is a line at the sink to wash hands. I think, “Good job, humans! Protect the herd!”
As if on cue, the guy at the sink next to me says in his outside voice, “Man, must be a lot of surgeons here! Amiright?!? Har, har!”
I mutter a little too loud, “Well, I don’t want to be the guy who kills all the old people,” feel an instant flush come to my cheeks, and think, shut up, Greg. There’s an awkward pause.
“Me neither,” he mutters back, and we both get back to scrubbing.
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