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Friday Mornings in the Dead Zone

Like so many of you, I am an entrepreneur who happens to run a marketing and communications business. So often I find my Fridays drifting into the dead zone, especially this time of year. Phones aren't ringing, E-mails arrive one at a time or not at all (instead of the 10s), and my clients are non-responsive. So what to do?

• Write a blog post (this one, for example).
• Start an e-book (did that last week and awaiting other's contributions).
• Finish client work (all caught up and awaiting feedback and new directions).
• Recommend client's move forward in new ways (see last parenthetical statement).
• Send out a new thought paper (scheduled for next week--Thursdays garner best open rates, according to recent research).
• Read other's work (been doing some of that).
• Recommend other's work (see my Twitter posts).
• Send out a mini-direct mail (not the best time--summer doldrums--but may have to resort to this to keep busy and to continue reaching out to new customers).
• Cold call (not part of my marketing strategies and don't plan to add it).
• Reach out to potential clients who have indicated interest (just did).
• Write a guest post for MarketingProfs (looking for a good subject, see my latest).
• Play an online game (yep, did that).
• Start a new book (one is planned but stay tuned--have some news coming soon regarding my most recent book).

As you can see, I am in a dilemma. And I bet many of you are, as well. So, share your best idea for getting new clients, leads and referrals. My most effective strategy is getting a presentation gig, but not a lot of opportunities between June and September. My second best strategy is mini-direct mail. What do you do that works?

Danger: Big Client Ahead

So, before I even hang the "Open for Business" sign, I have a big client--a six-figure-a-year deal for as long as we work together. Man, I was a dog in fetch heaven. My first consulting start-up was running in NASCAR and winning. A year or so later, I didn't feel quite so good about the fast start.

Any one who runs their own business or works with a small business dreams of that first big client whose billings will solve all our cash flow and profitability problems. Beware of what you dream for: It may come true.

All too often, that same big client that we yearn for means the demise of our business. It nearly happened to me a decade ago, I see it happening to a former client of mine as I write this, and I have heard dozens of horror stories wherein closing the big client was the worse business decision made.

Here are some reasons why:

• We become complacent and stop marketing to and signing up our ideal clients, which usually are small to mid-sized businesses.
• When the big client goes away, and they will, we have no or little business to sustain us. And because we stopped marketing and networking, we have no prospects.
• The big client consumes so much of our resources, especially time, that we either cannot bring on other clients or, if we do, the quality of our work is diminished.
• We are unprepared to meet or exceed our big client's expectations because we lack the resources. Therefore, they are disappointed and frustrated and abruptly walk away from us.
• Our former clients, small to mid-sized businesses, see the new big client and feel they are no longer valued nor do they fit into our future business plans. They find someone else to get their wants and needs met.

These are just a few of the reasons why when we are close to closing that first big deal, we should take a step back, inhale deeply, and ask ourselves if what we are about to do makes sense. If I had when I first launched this consultancy, I would have done things very differently.

A Story of Hope and of Overcoming Personal Tragedy

Charlie Collins is not your typical entrepreneur. He is legally blind as are most of his employees. His story is one of hope and of overcoming personal tragedy.

As a young child, Charlie was diagnosed with Juvenile Macular Degeneration, a rare disease that causes a decline in and eventually the loss of central vision. While Juvenile Macular Degeneration attacks the young, overall, Macular Degeneration is diagnosed every three minutes in the United States. It occurs in about 10% of people over the age of 50, and about 33% of people over 75. Every year 1.2 million people with macular degeneration lose part of their central vision, and 200,000 suffer complete loss of central vision in one or both eyes.

For Charlie at age 10, getting out of school to travel to Boston for all-day tests at Massachusetts Eye and Ear seemed fun. What young boy wouldn't enjoy staying in hotels and spending a great day with the family instead of going to school? Soon the fun stopped, however. At age 13, Charlie was told that he was legally blind and he could no longer be helped. There was no cure. This came as a shock to him, because he always believed he would be "fixed."

Charlie was different from his schoolmates, and they never let him forget it. He was crippled with fear: The fear of being different, stupid, not good enough, never fitting in, being picked last for games in gym class, the fear that nobody would ever like him.

Charlie's self-esteem crashed. He walked around looking at the ground; wished he was never born. He blamed his parents for his disability, hated school and thought he was stupid and would never amount to anything.

In high school things got worse. Charlie did not participate in any of the activities of other students. Suicide seemed the answer to his problems. But he continued on despite the horror within himself. After high school and a brief attempt at college, his life became one of odd jobs, including cutting the grass at a motorcycle dealership to get credit so he could afford oil and spark plugs. He needed the credit because, although he was legally blind, he loved riding his dirt bike in the woods.

And then something incredible happened. At age 21, Charlie returned home one day and told his parents that the silly guy at the motorcycle store offered him a job. His mother encouraged him to take the job, and today he thanks God he has parents who love him and never protected him from the challenges of living his life as a legally blind person. Charlie accepted the job. In less than a year and a half, he grew sales by a million dollars and realized that "I did have a brain that worked." His sales success led him to becoming a Vice President.

After five years on the job, however, Charlie felt something was missing, and had been missing for the past two years. He no longer loved going to work. He became depressed and knew something had to change.

He walked away at age 29. After some thought about what he would do, he decided to open a store that carried magnifiers to help people with vision Impairments. Something inside Charlie told him that he had something special to offer, but he knew of only three other customers--they were his siblings and they would have wanted a discount. After doing research, Charlie learned that he was among a considerable number of people suffering vision Impairments.

In 1997, he opened Vision Dynamics. The little magnifier store he opened has 10 years later become a business helping people in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island to have hope and to be helped. Celebrating its 10th Anniversary this month, the little store is now a big store that carries everything from Braille equipment, to computer hardware, to scan and read systems, to Learning Disability software, to screen magnification software, to games, to health and beauty and home and office products, to just about everything the visually impaired need to make their lives better, some might say to make their lives much like yours and mine.

Charlie's story and his store prove that we can make a difference and a profit in the world of business. It is an example of shunning "either/or" and saying yes to "and." We do not need to choose either profits or doing good. We can choose both profits and doing good.

Got Retirement on Your Mind?

Not really, but it is in my business plan. And yesterday, Karma Kitaj, PhD, Life Spring Coaching, interviewed my about my retirement thinking. If you are interested at how this one entrepreneur thinks about retiring, check out the interview entitled: Living Life to the Fullest - A Retirement Perspective.

Playing in a Band is More Work Than Play

In my youth, too many years ago, I traveled with a rock band as their road(ie) manager for three years. We opened for name bands in clubs that held anywhere from a few hundred to several thousand stoned fans. This was before arena rock, when even the famous bands played clubs.

In the last few weeks, I have been looking at getting back into the business, using my marketing,  branding, and writing skills, along with my knowledge of the industry to promote bands. This didn't just happen.

My life has been full of serendipity. Last year, a band asked me to manage them. I chose not to but my interest began to rumble up from within. In the past few weeks, two blogger friends have discussed bands they work with or are friends with and have solicited my ideas about helping these bands. The most recent request came just this morning via e-mail from a foreign country. (To be fair, I am maintaining strictest confidentiality.)

The band that I traveled with was extremely talented and was signed to a one-record deal. Unfortunately, they were more interested in consuming drugs and women than in working hard to achieve success, where they were the featured headliner and other bands were warming up for them. But during that time, I learned the business. It is tough, nasty and dirty. It isn't a place for the faint-of-heart.

To be successful, bands have to realize that it takes hard work, incredibly long hours, and dealing with people who sometimes suck the blood right out of your veins. However, the rewards are great, if musicians can handle long hours, being on the road for months at a time, writing discipline to create new original music, and sacrificing control of their lives.

In reality, musicians are entrepreneurs on wheels, with no office and no home. It is a grueling business that requires discipline, hard work, great skill, and the knowhow to market and sell their products and services, from their music to souvenirs. Entrepreneurship requires guts, faith, endless hope and a positive attitude, whether you're an artist or a traditional business.

Starting Your Own Business, Part III

Building Your Business

Building a business requires more than a dream and hard work. Both are necessary ingredients for  achieving success. But without strategic, planned, and disciplined growth, businesses usually fail to achieve their goals—assuming, of course, that they slow down along the way to create those goals.

Some business manage to survive without measurable goals, aligned strategies, strategic planning, and business discipline, but seldom  do they prosper, even when they build their foundation on strong values and lead with a heart.

Happiness is a necessary ingredient if a business is to become great, but even happy employees cannot perform miracles when buffeted by bad planning, poor strategizing, and mediocre execution. Build your business with a heart but practice smart and plan smart.

Plans alone do not guarantee success. And you cannot afford to spend vast amounts of time creating them. You have a business to run. If you do not have the expertise to build business and strategic plans, you should outsource the work. Larger businesses—both start-up and established—likely will hire managers capable of completing the planning, and they will work in teams to accomplish the task.

However the plans are done, execution targeted toward measurable goals equals success. Plans sitting on shelves or in desk drawers collect only dust and are a complete waste of time, effort, and money.
Remember, success does not depend on planning; passion and smart people can manage successfully. But creating a business culture that strives to engage employees and customers and that aims to create great experiences by embracing happiness is served well by planning. As you develop your business and strategic plans, you should:
1. Support the passion inherent within the business.
2. Communicate that passion to every employee and customer and every potential customer.
3. Establish two or three stretch goals that are achievable; communicate those goals to everyone within the business; provide quarterly updates to everyone regarding progress in reaching the goals; and hold every department and every person in the business responsible and accountable for achieving the goals.
4. Engage every department and person by demanding that departmental goals serve to support the overall annual strategic plan.
5. Create a drop-dead deadline of one month for planning to be developed, approved and communicated.
6. Create an integrated process through which the plan is launched, executed and managed.
7. Finally, and perhaps most important, make sure the plans are not written in stone, and that you have allowed for quick left and right turns and new ideas.

Before spending a dime on anything, managers, executives, and owners must make certain that they spend money wisely; that investments in business development and growth offer potential return based on established margins and a targeted bottom line; and that the money works to achieve measurable goals.

In other words, build budgets after you create the business and strategic plans, and make sure that department heads and managers and those responsible for budgets aim every dollar at achieving the business’s specific goals. And then launch the plans.

P.s. Here's a smart take by Seth about hiring good staff.

Starting Your Own Business, Part II

If I had an entrepreneurial mantra it would be: Business isn't about products and services, it is about  people and their experience with your business.

To start and maintain a business, we produce and deliver high-quality products and services; that is a given. Customers and other businesses expect us to have something to sell. But at the end of the day, our products and services won't grow our business to greatness, no matter their quality. At the end of the day, people buy experiences and they differentiate our businesses based on the quality of those experiences.

Here's a good example. Starbucks doesn't sell coffee, it sells the Third Place Experience--not home, not the office, but a place to get away, relax, read, listen to music or converse. That experience is what differentiates Starbucks and fuels its growth. We expect the coffee to be good, whether or not we purchase at Starbucks. But we return to our favorite coffee shop because of our experiences with the place, not the coffee.

My first question to any entrepreneur is "Do you have the capability, the ability, the vision, the personality and the attitude to create and deliver great experiences for every person your business touches, from the cleaning service people, to your employees, to your customers and to your community? If not, you better hire someone who possesses those characteristics and give them free reign to do so, or you risk dumping lots of money into a big hole from which you won't be able to dig yourself out.

Here are some of the necessary elements to create a business that produces and delivers great experiences:

• Leadership that believes good and great businesses place people above products, services and the bottom line.
• Leadership that has a vision to see what those experiences look like.
• Leadership that walks the talk and invests heavily in building the experience from the inside out by hiring for a business culture that places people first and then putting in place the ongoing training and communications to inspire and motivate every employee to take responsibility for creating great experiences.
• Leadership that puts in place a monitoring process to watch over the experience and to ensure it becomes and remains the best it can be.

According to an article in today's Customer Think, written by Simon Kriss, the president and CEO of the Sagatori research that he has gathered from executives reveals that the customer experiences boils down to three things:

1. The expectation (Do we disappoint, meet or exceed customers expectations?)
2. The knowledge (Do we have the knowledge to meet or exceed the customers wants, needs and desires?
3. The person (Does each experience produce a perception that the experience is personalized?)

No matter whether or not you launch a one-person or a tens-of-thousands-of-persons business, the quality of experience will determine your success. How you treat every person your business touches is what makes your business different from your competitors. Do you have what it takes to become great? Or is your business about putting money in your pocket and not about reaching out to others in ways that benefit everyone? Although these are not the only two pictures of a business (experiential vs. bottom line), they are at each end of the spectrum.

I believe that those who choose people first may grow more slowly in the beginning but, like the turtle, will pass the rabbit and benefit from great riches, both personally and monetarily.

P.S. Check out Seth's [More] or (Less), where he talks about how people interact with the world. It's just a different way to discuss putting people, their experiences and how they view them.

Starting Your Own Business, Part I

Do you have what it takes to start and build your own business? This is the first installment of a multi-part posting.

I am on my third startup: The first was successful, the second not so much, and the current growing at  a slower-than-planned pace but growing nevertheless, and with a contract about to be signed to form a partnership with another entrepreneur, L&G Business Solutions stands on the verge of potentially fast growth in additional products and services. These value-added products and services will grow our revenues considerably--if we do it right. And that is what entrepreneurship comes down to--knowing the right things to do at the right time to grow your business (and lots of luck helps, as well).

Most anyone can start a business, with or without lots of cash. Far fewer can grow their business so that revenues result in positive cash flow and livable salaries for the entrepreneur and the staff. What does growing a business require? Here are some of the vital necessities for building a successful business, excluding capital, which is obvious:

• Products and services designed to fulfill the wants and needs of a defined market.
• A bold and innovative marketing plan that gets the right message to the right people (the market) at the right time and the right place.
• A sales strategy that is based on meeting customers' wants and needs, not on selling the company's products and services.
• A budget that is tight on spending and is driven by aggressive but realistic goals.
• A leader (might be the entrepreneur, might be a hire) who understands the founder's vision, builds on that vision, and takes calculated risks to achieve the vision.
• A code of ethics (values) that is never violated.
• A culture in which everyone works to create great customer and employee experiences, is committed to the values, treats everyone with respect and dignity, and is outward (customer) looking not inward (company) looking.

I've barely scratched the surface. My advice to entrepreneurs is simple: Don't sit in your office waiting for the telephone to ring. Get out among your customers and your business peers. Listen, Learn, and Engage. Build long-term relations based on trust.

What did I miss in my list above? If I hired you as a consultant or an executive, what would you bring to the table? How would you grow a business? How would you deliver revenues? How would you sell products and services? What would you do to create great experiences?

P.S. Here's a lesson from Seth entitled No exceptions that is important for all business leaders.