Focus On What You Can Do

If you’ve spent any time splitting your attention between what’s happening in Washington and what’s happening in your business, you’re not alone.  It’s easy to get discouraged about the future of business in this country while watching all the partisan posturing.

But small business owners are the engine of this country’s economy and we have a long history of doing whatever it takes to get over, around or through obstacles—and discovering the opportunities on the other side. You can do the same, even if that obstacle is as daunting as the current economic and political uncertainty.

Here’s my “short list” of strategies you can use to grow your business, even now.

1. Focus on clients that are a good match for the business you already have.

When I talk with business owners they’re often looking to grow their business by offering additional services or programs.  Instead, I recommend focusing on attracting more clients that you can already serve very well, without increased spending on equipment, personnel and learning curves.  You already do some things really well, identify them and grow your business around them.  The weakness most businesses have isn’t in the value of existing products or services, it’s in the ability to effectively communicate that value so that more people can take advantage of it.

2. Focus on listening to your best clients instead of your problem clients, your brother-in-law or the news.

Your best clients can tell you what you’ve done for them, what they value about it and what else they would like from you.  Armed with that information, you can attract more clients like them into your business.  Everyone has a different view of reality.  Make sure that your efforts to reach out and connect with new and existing clients are based on theirs.

3. Focus on service-based marketing instead of advertising and promotion

Your marketing should be an natural extension of the service provided in your business. Clients who are a good match for your business will be naturally attracted to that.  Some business owners are afraid that if they give away information and expertise, they’ll lose business, but the reality is that in any relationship, one person must step forward and “give” first.  Once you reach out, you’ll be seen as a generous expert and that expertise will bring you to a prospect’s mind when they (or a friend or family member) need what you have to offer down the road.

4. Focus on leveraging the Internet and mobile technology

Current technology allows you to connect with past, present and future clients it unexpected ways.  Social media offers you an unprecedented window into your clients lives.  Dynamic websites allow you to have interactive communication with prospective clients as well as provide ongoing value to past ones.  Mobile technology allows people to learn about you from where ever they choose.  When researching solutions to their problems people prefer the immediacy of digital media.  If you want to take part in that conversation, you have to be there.

5. Focus on investing in your business

Even if your budget is tight, you have to make strategic investments to keep your company moving forward.  Get to know your clients better by surveying them, update your Internet presence by making your website dynamic and mobile, improve your customer’s experience by offering unexpected extras.  As business owners, we ask our prospects to take a risk and invest with us.  We can’t be in integrity if we don’t ask the same of ourselves.

Take Good Care.
Do Great Work.
Have a Wonderful Day!

Melissa

P.S. What are you focusing on in 2012?  Please leave a comment so everyone can benefit from your ideas.  TY MG

How To Create Time

Whether I’m talking with a seasoned business owner or the new owner of a one person start up, I often hear the same thing – “I know what I need to do. I just can’t seem to find the time to focus and get it done.”

And here, I’ll tell you something that I know you already know. You’ll never find the time, you have to create it.

But how?

Start by looking at what you’re doing now. For the last 20 years or so, I’ve been using a time management matrix based on the one presented by Stephen R. Covey in his book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (which is an awesome book, if you haven’t read it.)

The matrix looks at the relationship between importance and urgency. It reveals the activities that occur when we’re working in a particular quadrant of the matrix as well as the results we can expect when we devote our time to these activities.

Urgency is easy to identify. Urgent activities are visible and pressing. They “trigger” action. A ringing telephone is urgent.

Importance is a little more challenging. Important activities help you create results in your business. But it may be difficult to differentiate ahead of time whether a telephone call is important or not.

The goal is to spend as much time as possible working in quadrant II (important/not urgent), with an understanding that sometimes you’ll have to work in quadrant I (important/urgent). Successful business owners have processes in place that help them avoid quadrant III (unimportant/urgent) and IV (unimportant/not urgent) activities. You just don’t have time for them.

Putting it into Action:
For the next three days, keep track of how you spend your time. If you’re like most owners, you’re spending most of your time (apart from direct value delivery) in quadrant I, though you’re probably inadvertently spending time in quadrants III and IV, particularly when you’re tired or stressed. This is a waste of your most precious resource – your time.

Once you’ve identified where you’re wasting your time, put processes in place that free you to pursue quadrant II activities instead.  Voila – Time Created.

If you’re not sure exactly how to spend all the time you’ve found, I’ll be sharing my recommendations for exactly what to do in your newly available quadrant II time in future posts.

Take Good Care.
Do Great Work.
Have a Wonderful Day!

Melissa

P.S. Do you have an insight into this process that could help others? A question that came up for you but isn’t answered in this post? Please leave a comment so we can chat and others can benefit from your thoughts. TY M