“Why join the Navy if you can be a pirate?” It’s a quote from Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple. Jobs is universally recognized for his brilliant planning, bold statements, and charismatic keynotes unveiling the latest and greatest Apple has. (If you’ve never seen one of his keynotes, Google them; they are pretty entertaining.)

But Jobs is best known for leading Apple from market flunky status to market icon status. His willingness to be a pirate in the marketplace, versus joining the Navy, has led to Apple’s reputation of innovation. What would Apple be if it had gone the path of the PC world…if it had given up and said, “‘Me too’ is a high-enough goal for us?” I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t have had the raving advocacy, the market growth, or the investor return we’ve all witnessed. It would have become one in the masses or, worse yet, gone into extinction. Instead, it’s a household name.

What is the key to Apple’s success? In my opinion, there are several:

1. Apple wasn’t afraid to be different; in fact, it embraced its uniqueness and staked a claim in its market for that uniqueness.

2. The company looked for what made it different – innovation – and used that to its advantage as a differentiator.

3. Apple made a decision to live and breathe its differentiator in every part of its company and customer experience, from its products to its advertising to its stores and employees. Have you ever bought something at the Apple store? You don’t go to a cash register…your card is swiped on a handheld device! You don’t get a mandatory paper receipt…you get an email receipt! Even the normally-mundane purchase process is innovative.

Find out what makes you or your company different. Then determine how it helps your customers. Does your speed to market give your clients a competitive advantage? Does the insight you bring to the table put your customers in a better place to foresee market changes and proactively prepare for them? Whatever your differentiator, find it, determine how it benefits your clients, then use it to your advantage…in your communications, your sales conversations, your customer experience.

Arrgh! Go on, be a pirate!

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Display courage in the face of adversity –  Each person has challenges in their jobs. Meeting those challenges with courage exemplifies not only the type of person you are, but your outlook and perspective, which become important factors in not only overcoming the challenges, but in overall career success. No one gets too excited about pessimism, but most people will choose to work with (or advance) someone who faces adversity directly and optimistically.

Focus is everything – Understand your priorities and get rid of anything that’s diluting those priorities. Focus your ideas, time, talent, and energy to those things that significantly matter in your business. You’ll see results faster.

Simplify – Messages can become too complex. Information overload does not make decisions easier; stating the bottom-line value does. Work to  make your message, your vision, your mission simple. The more you simplify, the bigger impact you’ll have.

Use the Outsider Advantage – When you’re deep into a project or business, you can lose sight of the forest for the trees. Ask an outsider to come in and provide a different perspective. That perspective might change what you’re doing, or it might validate your direction; regardless, it will definitely add value and dimension to your view and help you see things you may not have seen before.

Reward transparency and collaboration – Why are people so often afraid to say what’s really going on with the business or with their project? Being transparent demonstrates integrity; asking for help (or giving it) through collaboration spurs new ideas and a positive environment for teamwork. Let’s stop being scared to admit less-than-stellar situations and start seeking solutions.

Stay inventive during tough times – While most companies hunker down in the tough times, those savvy enough to take that opportunity to reinvent their products or businesses not only typically find better ways to do things, but also stay top of mind with their clients. Studies have shown over and over again that those companies that stay in front of clients during the tough times are more successful – more quickly – when the economy improves.

Though written for CEOs, you can apply these ideas to any position in any company. But don’t stop there, think about how these six lessons can be applied to your life – I think they work perfectly!

Here’s to better business and richer lives. Thanks Mr. Mulally!

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One piece of advice I really like, though, is that true business etiquette isn’t a bunch of rules, but rather a genuine regard for those around us, be they prospects, customers, or colleagues. Don’t you hate it when a provider’s employee bashes another employee or group of employees? I’m thinking about our cable provider at home…when we had a technical problem and had to call someone out multiple times to fix it. Inevitably the person working on the issue would tell us that the previous repair people didn’t know what they were doing. That frustrated me on a multitude of levels! Or how about this one? I read about a guy who had called his bank and asked too many questions; the bank had a policy that a maximum of three questions could be asked per phone call. When he went to the bank and complained, he was told that all could be resolved if he just understood the rules. Apparently it was his fault, not the bank’s. (I wonder whose fault it was when he moved his accounts to a different bank?)

It’s pretty obvious when there’s a genuine regard for someone else…and when there isn’t. For those of us responsible for sales and the customer experience, it could look something like this. Once the agreement is drawn up and sent over, the offering bears no resemblance to what was presented by the salesperson due to a desire to “just get a sale.” Or it could look more like this. The account manager has no idea what the customer purchased because there’s been no handoff of information. Just two scenarios, and there could be many others, but you get the picture. It’s still pretty obvious when there’s a genuine regard for someone else…and when there isn’t.

So in this age of texting, when addressing an envelope is nearly a lost art, when email is often misunderstood as communication, and when automated prompts answer our phone calls more often than people, dare your brand to be different. Dare to have a genuine regard for those around you. Let’s all show a little love to our prospects, customers, and colleagues. Let’s stop worrying so much about business etiquette rules and simply care…a lot!

-jkl

People can sense a lack of authenticity faster than a case of rotten eggs. If you try to put on an artificial show of enthusiasm for your buyers, they will know it immediately and will respond accordingly by walking – or running – away. You’ve seen the ones who don’t believe. The ones who simply talk, talk, and talk – much as if they are trying to convince themselves of what they’re saying. It’s pretty difficult to sell something you don’t believe in…and even more difficult to engage and develop clients after the sale.

If you aren’t excited about what you sell how do you expect to influence others to buy it? And if you don’t believe it in, why in the world would you spend a good part of your waking hours trying to sell it to others? How demotivating that must be!

Are you proud of what you sell? If your honest answer is “no,” it will be difficult to succeed. Instead, first go find something to sell that you do believe in. You’ll immediately put yourself in a better place to succeed.

Here’s to success!

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What are you passionate about? Perhaps you’re passionate about people – family, friends, colleagues. Perhaps causes – education, disability, the environment. Perhaps hobbies – skiing, hiking, model planes, video games. The cool thing about real passion is that you can tell if someone is passionate about something by his or her attitude and actions.

I’m passionate about interior decorating. How would you know that? By my attitude and actions related to interior decorating. I spend discretionary time learning about new decorating concepts, I love the process of picking out paint colors, fabrics, and stonework, and can spend hours finding the perfect thing. I readily help others with decorating projects and give advice when they ask; I don’t consider their questions or requests an intrusion but, rather, a welcome challenge. It might be a chore for others but it’s fun for me!

That’s the same way to approach the 90 Day Sales Makeover. Are you passionate about helping your prospects and customers succeed?  Are you passionate about succeeding yourself? Then spend time learning new sales and customer experience concepts, explore the processes you use to prospect and close and delve into new ways of doing those things, find accountability partners and hold each other to task, practice, and share what works. Approach your makeover with zeal! Improving and succeeding in your chosen profession shouldn’t be a chore…it should be fun!

So whether you’re taking on the 90 Day Sales Makeover – or doing something else that critically matters, dive into it with passion and have fun! You’ll be amazed at the results you get when you truly give yourself to it!

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A major part of the 90 Day Sales Makeover is the daily implementation of new ideas and concepts until hopefully they become long-lasting habits. Brain experts say that for something to become a habit, it takes 45 to 90 days of doing the it over and over and over again.  These experts say our brains build pathways, connections from one piece of the gray matter to another, and when these connections are made we feel certain things, and these things become comfortable or familiar to us and we end up gravitating to doing these things over and over.  Soon the actions and feelings and outcomes are deeply ingrained in our tissues…whether those tissues are in our hands, our feet, our eyes, or our brain.

So what needs to happen to break through all that and create lasting change?  We encourage people to explore what it means to recognize some of their destructive and negative habits in order to build more positive and productive ones.  It may seem hard, or distant, when you first consider a major change, but when you break it down into daily actions, and each day focus only on the task at hand, soon the distant goal comes into view and will eventually become attainable.  It’s all about smashing the old brain pathways, and discovering new ones…then burning those new patters into our minds until they invade our tissues in the same way the negative ones did.

Muscle memory is a good thing when what is memorized is positive and moving us toward our objectives!

Accountability – who threw that one in the rules of life?  It’s easy to get caught up in the moment, whether it’s in a meeting, listening to a motivational presentation, or having a great conversation. The next thing you know, you’ve committed to do something, something you know you really want to do.

The next day, or maybe even hour, reality sets in. Your commitment looms large…seriously, did you really commit…will people truly expect you to come through…how in the world did you get yourself into this? And little by little, you talk yourself out of it. It might take a few minutes, or a few hours, or a few days, but ultimately, you reject accountability.

Accountability – it’s a tough pill to swallow. But what happens when we do hold ourselves accountable. Ask some Olympic athletes, ask some successful business owners, ask some top salespeople. When you hold yourself accountable, things happen. You begin actually doing the things necessary to achieve success. You structure your day, your time, and your efforts. You soon put forth effort where it will give you the best return. You focus on the critical things…on the critical path to success.

All that sounds good, but most of us aren’t that good at holding ourselves accountable. That’s why people who exercise with friends are more likely to stay at it than those who don’t – their friends hold them accountable. I used to walk in the mornings with my neighbor. Even when I didn’t feel like walking, I got up because I knew she’d be waiting for me. I have a sneaking suspicion she got up because she “knew” I’d be waiting for her. We held each other accountable.

You have a much better chance of sticking with your plan if you have an accountability partner or group comprised of people who will proactively ask you if you are on track, who will make you answer for your actions (or lack thereof), and who will be there to encourage you to go on that walk (or pick up the phone) when you least want to.

Go ahead and get caught up in the moment…or plan ahead. Whichever your approach, know what you want to accomplish, and then establish accountability around that goal. The next thing you know, you’ll have achieved that goal without even realizing it!

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The 90-Day Sales Makeover is designed to bring about new habits and attitudes that, once instilled, will become life-long practices.  One of those habits is a core belief of the program and it’s to improve something each day.

The “thing” we improve each day doesn’t have to a big thing, like “Quit smoking”…or “Stop feeling rejection”…those are worthy goals, but they’re pretty big, and who knows if they can completely happen THAT day.   Instead, we encourage people to seek improvement objectives that work toward those bigger goals.  For instance,  an improvement objective around “Stop smoking” might be: “stop going out for the mid-afternoon smoke break”; and for “Stop feeling rejection”, it might be:  “When I get rejection, keep the receiver in my hand, read my affirmations, and make another call.”

The Haitians have a saying that goes something like – “Little by little, the bird builds its nest”.  Every accomplishment, worthy goal, or changed habit comes from steady focus and improvement on little things, day after day.

Measure Your Plan

Have you heard the song “Seasons of Love” from RENT? It’s one of my favorite songs. The lyrics begin with:

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year?

In daylights, in sunsets
In midnights, in cups of coffee
In inches, in miles, in laugher, in strife
In five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, a year in the life?

As Greg and I were developing the 90-Day Makeover, I couldn’t help but think of this song. You have 90 days…how are you going to measure those 90 days?  Or, if you were creating your own song,

One hundred twenty-nine thousand, six hundred minutes
One hundred twenty-nine thousand, six hundred minutes
One hundred twenty-nine thousand, six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure your plan?

In calls made, in confidence,
In prospects, in appointments set
In sales made, in renewals, in referrals, in income
How do you measure, measure your plan?

No matter what improvement plan you start, be it this sales makeover, a fitness program, or a house renovation, you have to determine what you want to accomplish and how you’re going to measure success. What are your goals?  What does success look like for you and this plan?

By setting goals and focusing the things you need to learn and accomplish each day on that day, you’ll be pretty amazed at your success in 90 days. But you can’t just wish success…you have to work for success. And in order to work for success, you have to know what success you’re working for.

So…the question is, how do you measure, measure your plan?

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Over the next several days, I’m going to be posting the core beliefs of this program. You’ll see guests posts from Greg in addition to my posts. If you’re interested in finding more, closing more, and keeping more (prospects and clients, that is), please contact us and we’ll chat with you about the 90 Day Sales Makeover. And now on to the first core belief.

Focus Only on Making Today Excellent