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Can you imagine waking up every day, and feeling successful regardless of what’s happening in your small business? That would be a nice place to be – especially with the myriad of details constantly on your mind. Your marketing plan, cash flow, managing time and deadlines. It’s normal to sometimes wonder if you’ll ultimately be successful, or if you’ll have to eventually throw in the towel and go back to being employed.
Everyone knows how important it is to take care of you while building a business. It’s almost become a cliché – the expression coined by financial expert David Bach, “pay yourself first”, has come to represent across all disciplines, the notion of taking care of number one before turning your focus to the rest of a very needing world.
“Success isn’t a result of spontaneous combustion, you must set yourself on fire” Arnold H. Glasgow
If you’re like me, and most business owners I work with, you started your business because you have a particular talent, skill, or passion; not because you like, or want to sell. Although some sales people do start companies (I believe it’s the exception), most business owners have no experience or training in sales. From this perspective, it’s easy to see why resistance to selling quickly becomes a stumbling block to success and more immediately, the cause of much day-to-day stress and worry.
Whether you’re in the early stages of creating a business or have been in business for a decade, it’s a good idea to revisit the basics and make sure you have a strong personal foundation for your business to thrive upon. It doesn’t matter how good your products or services are if you don’t stay in good shape, mentally, emotionally and physically eventually, you’re out of business.
I hear it all the time. “I hate selling”. It seems most small business owners would rather clean the toilet than focus on selling for their own business. While it’s an understandable resistance it’s not acceptable IF you want to make money. Chances are you didn’t start your business to become a sales person, but – as reality dictates, this is a skill you must develop in order to be successful.
“If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.” Tony Robbins
Stop for a moment and think about what type of energy is driving you to put another day into your business. Would you say your motivation’s coming from a painful thought – “I better make this sale so I can make payroll”, or based a pleasurable thought, “I can’t wait to satisfy my next customer. Be honest with yourself.
“It is not how much you do, but how much love you put in the doing.” Mother Teresa
Business owners are trained to gauge the success of their business according to the health of their “bottom line” – that is – the last line on a profit and loss statement that tells you what remains (if anything) after all your costs of doing business. This makes perfect sense – if you don’t show a profit, you don’t stay in business.
Whether you consider yourself a occasional procrastinator, or a terminal one, getting stuck in the mud occasionally – paralyzing your ability to act sometimes happens. While it’s certainly useful to explore the reasons behind persistent procrastination patterns and resolve them, this article is intended to offer you 8 smart reminders, to free you up, and get you moving again. Here they are:
I’ve seen it over and over – small business owners who get nervous and uncomfortable when it’s time to assume the role of salesperson. Sales are the backbone of your company’s health and most entrepreneurs are not trained sales professionals. In fact, most business owners are reluctant, resistant sales people, worried about being perceived as pushy, or worse yet, sleazy and as a result, they don’t get out and sell.
It bothers me that most conversations I have at this time of year contain some level of stress and anxiety about the upcoming holiday season. I’m not immune myself – every year I swing on a pendulum between being caught up in a frenzy of materialism or feeling the urge to back away and becoming cynical about the entire season. What is up with that? Shouldn’t this time of year be about peace, joy and celebration?
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