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| Maximize Your Business Development Results |
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Audit Your Existing Resources And Maximize On Business Development Results The US is on the road to recession, and many predict a worldwide slowdown. What’s your plan? It is everywhere. On the radio, TV, Internet. Everyone talks about the economy slowing down. Many businesses experience a slowdown. Is it the economy or, is it time you audit your business and get down to the root cause? You have two main choices in front of you: accept this and develop a helpless attitude, or take initiative and take your company to the next level. The following are effective and proven tools to spark your business development efforts even in a sluggish economy. You have a lot of the information you may need at your fingertips. Use it wisely! 1. Go for a treasure Hunt – Your Databases/CMS. Go through your database and you will discover all kinds of treasures. You will find long forgotten leads and a huge potential for business. These are usually people/companies that you have had contact with in the past, and for some reason they were forgotten. Whose leads are they anyway? These may also be leads of employees that have left the company and there was no one assigned to follow up on them. When times are good most companies are just too busy, and follow-up on the low hanging fruit. It is easy. No need to work hard. You will be amazed at what you will find. Companies are always surprised to realize how much business they have in their own backyard; Don’t just be order takers. It is time to nurture your contacts and practice your relationship building skills. 2. Revisit Past Initiatives – Did anyone ever have the time to follow through? You sat through all these meetings where people came up with brilliant ideas for business development but never had the time to follow up on. Where are the minutes of these meetings? It may be the right time to act on some of these great ideas that were long forgotten since everybody was too busy. 3. History repeats itself, but it doesn’t have to – if you keep doing the same things the same way you will get the same results. How about changing the way you look at your business? How about conducting market research and asking your customers about your product/service, customer service, future needs? Or just get their feedback on how they like doing business with you? Try to look at your business with a new set of eyes, or hire an additional set of eyes. The economy is changing, your business may need to be redefined and your market(s) as well. If you don’t think you can do that by yourself, how about a board of advisors or an outside consultant that can help you redefine your target market and focus your company on the tactics to get there? Sometimes we are so caught up in our daily work that we forget where we were heading in the first place. 4. Take the time to create a roadmap – the ActionPlan that will help you: Bring the discipline of measurement and financial accountability into marketing’s strategic decision process. Capture the incremental impact of marketing. Develop accurate marketing ROI tools that can be used consistently across all marketing initiatives while meeting the standards of your finance people. Improve strategic and tactical planning with marketing ROI techniques and tools. Understand how new approaches require a cultural transition for marketing. Develop a road map for putting marketing ROI techniques into practice. 5. Take a good and honest look at yourself – Are you the one standing in the way? People who dare to be different run successful companies. People who want to break through the glass ceiling and reach new heights, those with the passion to go that extra mile, win in business. But it takes a different set of skills to take a company to the next level. You may be the founder of the company, and/or the CEO, COO, President, etc. However, do you still try to micro manage everything instead of empowering people and delegating? Are you the risk taker, the entrepreneur that is pulling their hair out when it comes to daily operations and maintenance of the company? 6. What People Do You Have Working For You? – You must have hired them for a reason. Are you maximizing their potential? Are they aligned with the company’s vision and contribute to its success? Why not take the opportunity of new markets and expand your business? What you need to know when leading your business into new markets. |