Most of us have better days than others, whether it’s in your personal life or your business life. Ever lose that big sale at work, draw a blank on creating a new marketing program, can’t seem to “crunch the numbers” to reach a budget target, or forget your laptop when you need to make that big presentation? What about when that TV breaks down the morning before the Superbowl and you’ve got 25 people coming over for the game? How about when the car breaks down on vacation? Ever spill coffee on your dress shirt on the drive to a meeting with an important client? I have….more than once too!
We all had days like this and they’re not enjoyable. But we can find ways to effectively deal with them. I try to live by a simple quote: “Always look up, always get up, and NEVER give up”. This simple quote has helped me through more than 20 years of working in a high pressure corporate sales environment, always under constant pressure from managers and executives pushing for higher performance.
What I’ve found to be helpful in dealing with pressure from our “bad days” is to simply take a short break, whether it’s a 10 minute walk around the building, a 30 minute trip to the driving range to hit a bucket of balls, or something as simple as sitting on a bench at a park by yourself to clear your head. This process is equally effective if you’re at work or at home, but you must remove yourself from the source of the stress and clear your thoughts.
Whatever works for you individually doesn’t really matter. Unfortunately, people who are unable to successfully break from the source can literally be taking years of their life. I’m not a doctor but it’s a well known fact that stress is one of the leading factors to high blood pressure which is known as the “silent killer”.
Take my fellow New Englanders as an example. Undeterred by the ~70” of snow we’ve received in Boston so far this winter, undaunted by the ice dams and leaks in their roofs, unfazed by the high cost of oil and gas heat, and let’s not even talk about the high unemployment rates, the majority of the quotes I heard from people on the news today involved quotes like:
“I love the snow. We’re from New England. Deal with it”
“It was my choice to live here, no one else’s”
“I’ve got a snowblower. It’s not so bad.”
“We’re comfortable driving in this stuff. We do it every year”
Now these people have conquered their stress and learned to live with it. All of these quotes came from people interviewed by newscasters who walked up to them while they were sitting in snarled traffic due to today’s storm.
So remember, when you get off that bad phone call, after you rip your best $100 shirt or blouse getting something out of your car, or go through whatever event in your life that causes stress, try your best to get away from it and clear your thoughts. Remember, it’s “only a job” or it’s “only a shirt” and get over it. You’ll feel better and you’ll probably live a lot longer too.
Tomorrow brings a new day so remember to “Look up, Get up, and NEVER give up!”
Subscribe To
Posts
All Comments
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Thursday, January 6, 2011
2011-- Is Social Media the New Las Vegas for Business?
$50 billion! Too much money to rationalize for most people…..but that’s just what Facebook was recently estimated to be worth (http://tinyurl.com/22qp7p8) by Daily Finance. Groupon worth ~$6 billion! Mind boggling numbers unless you are the Yankees or Red Sox.
The expected boom of social media sites can be compared to the explosion of Las Vegas after World War II in 1945. Lavish resorts and glitzy hotels with casinos begin to dominate the city and tourism takes over as the #1 employer in the valley. In the 1960’s Howard Hughes invests in Las Vegas, buying up numerous casinos and “gambling” turns into a legitimate business called “gaming”.
On May 15th, 2005, Las Vegas celebrated it’s 100th birthday, holding the title as the largest metropolitan city founded in the 20th century. In 2009 the American Gaming Association reports that annual gaming revenues topped $5.5 billion on the Las Vegas Strip properties (http://tinyurl.com/38jjoou).
Jump ahead to 2011……Facebook, with more than 200 million users worldwide, was just valued at ~$50 billion. Groupon valued at ~$6 billion. Linkedin pondering an IPO , looking to raise ~$2.2 billion. All this social media buzz and the wealth associated with it started in 2003 when Mark Zuckerburg, a Harvard University student, started “Facemash”. In 2005, “Facebook” was officially launched with an initial purchase price of $200,000 for the domain name. And the rest is history!
Based on the market capitalization estimates from Daily Finance, since 2003, social media sites have created value in excess of $50 billion! Not bad for a 7+ year old fledging industry. Better than Las Vegas!
We’ve seen many of our gadgets over our lives go awry due to advances in technology. Remember 45’s, 33’s, 78’s, VCR’s, tape recorders, reel to reel movies, adding machines, typewriters, DOSS, TV antennas, wooden shafted golf clubs, “BIG Wheels”, Asteroids…..you get the picture.
Today’s business professionals are all chasing the buzz terms we refer to as “ROI’, “EBIDTA”, “margin”, “IPO” as indicators of their success as business entrepreneurs. Problem is in order to achieve these buzz words, they require sales professionals who can convince other executives to purchase their products. The sales industry has suffered over the last decade as yesterdays managers become today’s executives and won’t take “cold calls”. Today’s decision makers typically were promoted or advanced from yesterday’s managers who taught the sales techniques of the 80’s & 90’s. The “assumptive close”, the “affordable close”, the “conditional close”, the “summary close”, all were techniques taught and developed in years past. With the days of successful “cold calling” going the way of 33’s and 45’s, the successful sales professional has had to adapt their efforts to the information age of the 21st century and begin using social media to build, nurture, and grow their professional relationships.
The use of Linkedin, Twitter, Yelp, Groupon, Facebook, blogs (yes, like this one), email, Digg, etc are vital to continued sales success in the 21st century. Sounds simple, right? Wrong!
In order to properly utilize each of these methods (and a successful sales effort requires use of all these sites and more), it would take hours and hours to visit, search, post, reply, tweet, blog, etc. No time is left for the fun part of sales……selling.
The goal here is to become “social”, build a brand awareness for yourself as a sales professional, and have today’s decision makers want to purchase from you, not be sold by you. It’s much better to be a successful order taker than a frustrated sales person.
There are a number of great tools out there to help you manage your brand awareness and on-line reputation. To get additional info, and get a demo on how a social media engagement program can benefit you and your company, contact me for your free demo on how the Social Strategy1 “Engage” system can streamline your daily social efforts and help your profits soar in 2011!
The expected boom of social media sites can be compared to the explosion of Las Vegas after World War II in 1945. Lavish resorts and glitzy hotels with casinos begin to dominate the city and tourism takes over as the #1 employer in the valley. In the 1960’s Howard Hughes invests in Las Vegas, buying up numerous casinos and “gambling” turns into a legitimate business called “gaming”.
On May 15th, 2005, Las Vegas celebrated it’s 100th birthday, holding the title as the largest metropolitan city founded in the 20th century. In 2009 the American Gaming Association reports that annual gaming revenues topped $5.5 billion on the Las Vegas Strip properties (http://tinyurl.com/38jjoou).
Jump ahead to 2011……Facebook, with more than 200 million users worldwide, was just valued at ~$50 billion. Groupon valued at ~$6 billion. Linkedin pondering an IPO , looking to raise ~$2.2 billion. All this social media buzz and the wealth associated with it started in 2003 when Mark Zuckerburg, a Harvard University student, started “Facemash”. In 2005, “Facebook” was officially launched with an initial purchase price of $200,000 for the domain name. And the rest is history!
Based on the market capitalization estimates from Daily Finance, since 2003, social media sites have created value in excess of $50 billion! Not bad for a 7+ year old fledging industry. Better than Las Vegas!
We’ve seen many of our gadgets over our lives go awry due to advances in technology. Remember 45’s, 33’s, 78’s, VCR’s, tape recorders, reel to reel movies, adding machines, typewriters, DOSS, TV antennas, wooden shafted golf clubs, “BIG Wheels”, Asteroids…..you get the picture.
Today’s business professionals are all chasing the buzz terms we refer to as “ROI’, “EBIDTA”, “margin”, “IPO” as indicators of their success as business entrepreneurs. Problem is in order to achieve these buzz words, they require sales professionals who can convince other executives to purchase their products. The sales industry has suffered over the last decade as yesterdays managers become today’s executives and won’t take “cold calls”. Today’s decision makers typically were promoted or advanced from yesterday’s managers who taught the sales techniques of the 80’s & 90’s. The “assumptive close”, the “affordable close”, the “conditional close”, the “summary close”, all were techniques taught and developed in years past. With the days of successful “cold calling” going the way of 33’s and 45’s, the successful sales professional has had to adapt their efforts to the information age of the 21st century and begin using social media to build, nurture, and grow their professional relationships.
The use of Linkedin, Twitter, Yelp, Groupon, Facebook, blogs (yes, like this one), email, Digg, etc are vital to continued sales success in the 21st century. Sounds simple, right? Wrong!
In order to properly utilize each of these methods (and a successful sales effort requires use of all these sites and more), it would take hours and hours to visit, search, post, reply, tweet, blog, etc. No time is left for the fun part of sales……selling.
The goal here is to become “social”, build a brand awareness for yourself as a sales professional, and have today’s decision makers want to purchase from you, not be sold by you. It’s much better to be a successful order taker than a frustrated sales person.
There are a number of great tools out there to help you manage your brand awareness and on-line reputation. To get additional info, and get a demo on how a social media engagement program can benefit you and your company, contact me for your free demo on how the Social Strategy1 “Engage” system can streamline your daily social efforts and help your profits soar in 2011!
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Social Sites Drive Business Purchases by Young Adults and Teens
I’m seeing an interesting social trend developing over the last couple of years……consumers are moving from the age old habit of impulse shopping and buying, where a catchy advertising campaign or display might drive additional sales, to focused buying driven by the internet.
Nice opening statement, right? But what does it really mean? Let me give you a personal example.
So what’s the moral here? To be successful in today’s information age, retailers need to be focused on providing an easy way for a consumer to get the product they want. The best way to do this is via social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, Digg, and hundreds more. A recent Pew survey ( http://tinyurl.com/ya9mmzv ) indicates that nearly three quarters of teens and nearly the same number of young adults use social media sites. Today’s consumers are no longer visiting corporate websites, but rather social sites to see where others are getting great deals, and avoiding the places where people are having bad experiences. Some retailers have already embraced the social media craze, added their own social sites, and created “followers” by providing coupons, discounts, or special announcements of sales via their social sites. Other businesses have sat back wondering why their sales are down….?
A good social media strategy is a necessity if you want to keep your business growing and attract the consumers you need to do this. We must remember, there’s a lot of competition for the consumers’ purchases these days. If you remain in your old ways, thinking ”I didn’t need social media to get to this point, I don’t need it now”, then you most likely have peaked your business’ revenues and should settle in for a period of declining revenues and, the ultimate reality of asking yourself “ What happened to my business?”. Remember my “1990's Sales vs 2010 Sales?” post a couple months ago?
If you’re interested in growing your business and realize it’s time to learn more about how a social strategy business plan can help grow your business and increase revenues and profits, then please click on the form below and I’ll be happy to provide you with more information….
http://www.emailmeform.com/builder/form/tmfddb55Ql
Nice opening statement, right? But what does it really mean? Let me give you a personal example.
This year’s “Black Friday” shopping event was highly anticipated by retailers across the country. Typically, the day after Thanksgiving kicks off the holiday shopping season in a BIG way. After the Thanksgiving meal has ended, the kids run to the playroom to hit the video games, the men typically retire to the den or “Man Cave” to watch football, while the women frantically browse through the fliers in the living room, making note of the stores they want to visit when they open. Some stores open as early as 12:01am on Friday morning and there are hundreds’ if not thousands, of shoppers anxiously waiting to be one of the first “250” in the door to get the “Great Deal” advertised in the flier. More often than not, stories of how “I can’t believe I got there at 3:30am and there were no X-Box 3 games left. It’s ridiculous! I’m never doing that again” are heard later in the day when the Mom gets home, frustrated from the crowds and lack of product availability.
Well, in my home, my wife followed tradition and looked through the fliers with her sister, mother, and sisters-in-laws, planning the next day’s shopping excursion. The difference was they were intent on hitting the stores quick and getting out. My wife left at 6:00am and was home with everything she went for by 9:00am. Now that’s a successful, focused shopping spree.
Take a look at this example of a social media deal listed on Twitter by BestBuy......BestBuy is considered a leader in their social media strategy plan:
A good social media strategy is a necessity if you want to keep your business growing and attract the consumers you need to do this. We must remember, there’s a lot of competition for the consumers’ purchases these days. If you remain in your old ways, thinking ”I didn’t need social media to get to this point, I don’t need it now”, then you most likely have peaked your business’ revenues and should settle in for a period of declining revenues and, the ultimate reality of asking yourself “ What happened to my business?”. Remember my “1990's Sales vs 2010 Sales?” post a couple months ago?If you’re interested in growing your business and realize it’s time to learn more about how a social strategy business plan can help grow your business and increase revenues and profits, then please click on the form below and I’ll be happy to provide you with more information….
http://www.emailmeform.com/builder/form/tmfddb55Ql
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)