Cold is not usually a positive association. Cold coffee. Cold weather. Cold attitudes. Not many people will jump up and down with excitement when you’re describing something cold…unless it’s ice cream. The same goes for cold leads. They’re not the easiest to work with–and you need to find a way to warm them up while prospecting without…
We often see business owners undervalue their services. So we often preach about raising your prices. But we get a lot of hesitancy because many owners are afraid they’ll lose clients, and/or not be able to attract new ones. So we asked Kaleigh Moore who runs We Are Lumen about her first experience raising her prices and…
“In the age of the Internet, caller ID, and email, how do we sell? How do we reach prospects in a way that will convince them to work with our firm? I don’t think we can just go bang on doors anymore, but I’m not sure what to do instead…” On the one hand, the…
I’m not going to mince words here: Request For Proposals (RFPs) are a trap, they are a bad deal and you need to stay away from them. I know, it’s exciting to get an RFP. You are flattered when an organization thinks enough of you that they include you in their RFP process. But you know what is more…
If you own a professional-service business, pricing is probably high on your list of challenges. How can you align the value created by your work with any tangible measure? It’s not easy, but it can be done. With products, it’s easier. Look at the market price for similar or substitute products and compare the features,…
When I was a corporate drone, I hated budgeting. It seemed like a charade, a game where we all had to guess what answers the big boss wanted. We inevitably failed, and the big boss would send back a budget that had nothing to do with what we had just spent hours slaving over and,…
One of the most common representations of the sales process is a funnel. We don’t expect all of the prospects that go into the top of this so-called funnel to turn into sales. In fact, a good sales process has a systematic way to determine early on which prospects will likely to convert into sales…
Many new professional-service or creative-service businesses price their services below market as a way to bring in business. There is some logic to this practice. Since you lack client references and a demonstrated track record, there is more risk for the initial few clients. But pretty soon, as business increases, so too does your overhead. You may want to hire…
In the early days of your business, you probably had the time and motivation to get to know every customer personally. You didn’t just provide exceptional customer service, you “connected” with your customers in a way only small businesses can. But as the head of a growing business, you can’t do it all anymore. Now…
When you get new customers, do you know what happens to them? Are they thrown into a sea of impolite customer service representatives and employees? Are they getting the high-quality product or service you promised them? New sales are but a small part of a successful business. While new customers are important, actually critical, to every business, properly managing and…