Kunci Sukses Mengembangkan Bisnis Franchise

7 Kunci Sukses Mengembangkan Bisnis Franchise Memutuskan untuk mengembangkan maupun membeli sebuah bisnis franchise ternyata tidaklah seinstan yang kita bayangkan selama ini. Banyak kendala dan hambatan yang sering muncul di tengah perjalanan usaha, sehingga satu demi satu pelaku bisnis franchise mulai berguguran sebelum mencapai kesuksesannya. Tentu kondisi seperti ini tidak ingin Anda alami bukan? Karena itu sebelum memutuskan terjun di bisnis franchise, persiapkan mental, modal dan dukungan manajerial secara matang agar bisnis Anda tidak layu sebelum berkembang. Kira-kira faktor apa saja yang mendorong perkembangan bisnis franchise, mari kita simak bersama 7 kunci sukses mengembangkan bisnis franchise yang bisa mengantarkan bisnis Anda menjadi semakin besar dan menguntungkan. 1. Profil dan kinerja franchise Pertama, buatlah visi dan misi besar yang dapat mengantarkan bisnis Anda menuju kesuksesan. Selanjutnya lakukan seleksi calon franchisee secara ketat untuk mencapai visi dan misi tersebut. Sebab, kinerja para franchisee di lapangan menjadi salah satu tolak ukur keberhasilan kinerja Anda sebagai seorang franchisor. Semakin banyak jumlah franchisee Anda yang berhasil menjalankan usahanya, maka semakin besar pula penilaian positif dari masyarakat terhadap profil dan kinerja franchise yang Anda tawarkan. 2. Merek Merek menjadi modal utama seorang pelaku bisnis franchise untuk mengembangkan usahanya dalam bentuk kemitraan. Untuk itu wajib bagi Anda untuk merancang, membangun kualitas merek, dan menjaga citra baik merek tersebut di depan masyarakat luas. Sebab, keberadaan merek menjadi faktor penting bagi bisnis Anda untuk memikat para konsumen maupun calon franchisee yang tertarik bermitra dengan Anda. 3. Sistem franchise Selain keberadaan merek, faktor penting lainnya adalah membangun sebuah sistem. Sebelum menawarkannya kepada calon franchisee, sebaiknya ciptakan sistem kemitraan yang benar-benar solid dan tahan banting terhadap tantangan serta persaingan pasar yang semakin pesat. Sehingga bisnis franchise yang Anda jalankan tidak tumbang di tengah jalan, dan jumlah mitra yang dimiliki juga mengalami peningkatan yang cukup signifikan. 4. Franchise support Setelah sistem mulai berjalan lancar, selanjutnya tugas utama franchisor adalah memberikan dukungan penuh kepada para mitranya. Dukungan yang diberikan kepada para franchisee menjadi salah satu strategi bagi Anda untuk meningkatkan loyalitas mereka terhadap peluang bisnis franchise yang dijalankan. Tidak hanya support awal saja yang wajib diberikan seorang franchisor kepada franchiseenya, namun juga support lanjutan selama kerjasama kemitraan tersebut masih berjalan sesuai dengan jangka waktu yang telah disepakati kedua belah pihak. 5. Konsumen Kepuasan konsumen menjadi fokus utama bagi para franchisor maupun franchisee dalam menjalankan usaha kemitraan. Karena itu, upayakan untuk menjaga kualitas produk atau jasa yang ditawarkan agar tingkat kepuasan yang didapatkan konsumen juga ikut terjaga. Bila tingkat kepuasan konsumen meningkat maka peluang yang Anda ciptakan untuk membawa bisnis tersebut menuju kesuksesan semakin terbuka lebar. 6. Penampilan franchisor Tidak hanya calon franchisee saja yang perlu diseleksi, dalam memilih franchisor pun kita juga butuh kehati-hatian agar tidak salah pilih dalam berinvestasi. Pilihlah franchisor yang benar-benar handal, memiliki dukungan manajerial yang cukup matang, serta memenuhi semua kewajibannya terhadap para mitra dengan baik. 7. Hubungan kerjasama yang baik Terakhir, faktor pendorong yang paling penting adalah terciptanya hubungan kerjasama yang baik antara franchisor dan franchiseenya. Setelah kesepakatan kerjasama franchise telah terjalin, maka secara tidak langsung Anda berada dalam sebuah keluarga besar, dimana antar anggota keluarganya memiliki kewajiban untuk saling membantu agar bisnis yang dijalankan bisa mencapai sukses bersama. Semoga tambahan informasi tentang tips bisnis franchise untuk pekan ini bisa bermanfaat bagi para pembaca yang tertarik dengan investasi bisnis franchise. Mulailah dari yang kecil, mulailah dari yang mudah, mulailah dari sekarang. Salam sukses. Sumber gambar : http://www.e-commercial.info/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/succesful-business.png dan http://www.gaincustomerloyalty.com/images/successful-business.jpg http://bisnisukm.com/7-kunci-sukses-mengembangkan-bisnis-franchise.html

iPoD acrostic = ILMU Power of Delala

ILMU =

I NQUISITIVE, INISIATIVE
L EARNING CONTINUOUSLY
M AD (Make A Difference) Mentality
U ndeterred Determination, Unstoppable

Power of Delala ( A Javanese word meaning serendipity).....

ser·en·dip·i·ty (srn-dp-t)
n. pl. ser·en·dip·i·ties
1. The faculty of making fortunate discoveries by accident.
2. The fact or occurrence of such discoveries.
3. An instance of making such a discovery.

[From the characters in the Persian fairy tale The Three Princes of Serendip, who made such discoveries, from Persian Sarandp, Sri Lanka, from Arabic sarandb.]
seren·dipi·tous adj.

seren·dipi·tous·ly adv.

Word History: We are indebted to the English author Horace Walpole for the word serendipity, which he coined in one of the 3,000 or more letters on which his literary reputation primarily rests. In a letter of January 28, 1754, Walpole says that "this discovery, indeed, is almost of that kind which I call Serendipity, a very expressive word." Walpole formed the word on an old name for Sri Lanka, Serendip. He explained that this name was part of the title of "a silly fairy tale, called The Three Princes of Serendip: as their highnesses traveled, they were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things which they were not in quest of...."

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition copyright ©2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.


After so many years languishing and not making a profit, suddenly we received an order from Malaysia for a container of our lapis legit product. WOW!

HOW?

Delala....

What do you mean?

Well, we didn't exactly go high and low in search of a buyer from any whatsoever country, but it just came .... an answer or an evidence of Psalm 109:27 - the "golden verse of 2012" for me.

So here's the "delala" story:

A friend called out of the blue (we seldom had any contact) and asked would you like to meet a Malaysian guy who's interested in your lapis legit...

OK, sure... where & when?
Right now... at Indische?

Oke...will see U then.

THat was how it started.

What transpired was ...we gave the Malaysian some samples of our products...and that was that..

Then he called and said he'd like to come again and discussed about the possibility of 1 container of 1500 cartons of 24 pieces each... WOW!

that would be 1500 x 24 = 36000...NO kidding! 36k - An order that was beyond our imagination

He came on the appointed day...after the day earlier Martha wrongly thought he was coming on a Friday, which after she went to the airport, and couldn't find him among the passengers of Air Asia, that she realized her mistake.

We discussed on the 6 different kinds of taste that he'd like to order, each for 250 cartons.. and arranged that he'd come again to bring the stickers and also tasted the samples.

He came with his friend from Batam, and after tasting the samples, gave the OK to go ahead.

Then problems started to surface...

The First Law of Success is Concentration

The First Law of Success is Concentration

The first law of success is concentration.

Concentration is your magic key that opens the door
to accomplishing anything.When your physical and mental resources are focused,
your power to resolve problems multiples tremendously.
To do two things at once is to do neither.

Bend all of your energies to one point, and go directly to that point,
looking neither to the right nor to the left.

Nothing can add more power to your life as much as concentrating
all your energies on a limited set of targets.

The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus.
Success is the result of well directed energy.

The 12 Keys To Success

The 12 Keys To Success

William Arthur Ward Came Up With These 12 Keys To Success:

1. Believe while others are doubting

2. Plan while others are playing

3. Study while others are sleeping

4. Decide while others are delaying

5. Prepare while others are daydreaming

6. Begin while others are procrastinating

7. Work while others are wishing

8. Save while others are wasting

9. Listen while others are talking

10. Smile while others are frowning

11. Commend while others are criticizing

12. Persist while others are quitting

Make Winning Your Best Habit

Make Winning Your Best Habit

You may know me.
I’m your constant companion.
I’m your greatest helper; I’m your heaviest burden.
I will push you onward or drag you down to failure.
I am at your command.
Half the tasks you do might as well be turned over to me. I’m able to do them quickly, and I’m able to do them the same every time,
if that’s what you want.

I’m easily managed; all you’ve got to do is be firm with me.
Show me exactly how you want it done; after a few lessons I’ll do it automatically.
I am the servant of all great men and women; of course,
I’m the servant of all the failures as well.
I’ve made all the winners who have ever lived.
And, I’ve made all the losers too.

But I work with all the precision of a marvelous computer
with the intelligence of a human being.
You may run me for profit, or you may run me to ruin;
it makes no difference to me.

Take me. Be easy with me, and I will destroy you.
Be firm with me, and I’ll put the world at your feet.
Who am I?

I’m Habit!

Habits are replaced, not broken. Habits are like submarines. They run silent and deep. Habits grow by observation, imitation and repetition from cobwebs into cables to strengthen or shackle our lives. First we make our habits, then our habits make us.

Success and failure are both habit-forming. Find mentors and role models with proven track records of success and emulate them. Make winning your best habit!

Make it your habit to put an hour or 2 into your DrinkACT business EVERYDAY. If you are unsure what to do call your enroller or call me at 716-445-2408.

Start by watching this video at http://moreACTinfo.com/justfind2.htm

YOU CAN DO THIS!

Just set good habits of taking your DrinkACT products everyday and getting people everyday to see the video at http://moreACTinfo.com

COMMIT to MORE than MEDIOCRITY

COMMIT to MORE than MEDIOCRITY

Commitment is when you have indulged yourself into the sisterhood or the brother-hood of the unashamed.

When you possess an innermost spirit and desire;
When your die has been cast;
When your decision has been made;
When you’ve chosen to step over the line; stand up and be counted and become a disciple of the determined.

When you won’t look back, let up, slow down,
back away or be still.
When your past has been redeemed;
When your presence makes sense;
When your future’s secure;

When you’re finished and done with low living,
light walking,
small planning,
smooth knees,
dull dreams,
pained visions,
mundane talking,
cheap giving and dwarf goals.

When you live by faith;
When you lean on your strengths;
When you walk with confidence;
When you’re lifted by prayer and
you’re labored by love,
When your direction is set,
your gait is fast,
your goal is real,
your road is rough,
your way is narrow,
your companions are few,
but your guide is reliable and your mission is clear.

When you cannot be
bought, compromised,
deterred, lured away,
turned back, deluded or
delayed;

When you will not flinch in the face of sacrifice, pause
in the presence of procrastination;
When you refuse to negotiate at the table of fear,
ponder at the pool of popularity, or meander in the
maze of mediocrity.

When you won’t give up,
let up or shut up
until you’ve saved up,
stored up, prayed up,
paid up and become the person
that you were meant to be.

What you THINK about you bring about!

When you are COMMITTED, that’s
When you stand out from mediocrity;
When your desire dominates your doubts;
When your purpose in life is greater than your problems,
that’s When you’ll be bountifully blessed!!

COMMIT to MORE than MEDIOCRITY TODAY!

There are NO Accidents In Life. You found DrinkA.C.T. for a reason and that reason is because you were put on this earth to help others.

Focus ALL your energy on helping 2 people become financially free and in return you will become finacially free at the sametime – just as God intended it to work!

Bob Parsons’ 16 Rules of Survival, Growth & Life

Bob Parsons’ 16 Rules of Survival, Growth & Life


1. Get and stay out of your comfort zone. I believe that not much happens of any significance when we’re in our comfort zone. I hear people say, “But I’m concerned about security.” My response to that is simple: “Security is for cadavers.”

2. Never give up. Almost nothing works the first time it’s attempted. Just because what you’re doing does not seem to be working, doesn’t mean it won’t work. It just means that it might not work the way you’re doing it. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it, and you wouldn’t have an opportunity.

3. When you’re ready to quit, you’re closer than you think. There’s an old Chinese saying that I just love, and I believe it is so true. It goes like this: “The temptation to quit will be greatest just before you are about to succeed.”

4. With regard to whatever worries you, not only accept the worst thing that could happen, but make it a point to quantify what the worst thing could be. Very seldom will the worst consequence be anywhere near as bad as a cloud of “undefined consequences.” My father would tell me early on, when I was struggling and losing my shirt trying to get Parsons Technology going, “Well, Robert, if it doesn’t work, they can’t eat you.”

5. Focus on what you want to have happen. Remember that old saying, “As you think, so shall you be.”

6. Take things a day at a time. No matter how difficult your situation is, you can get through it if you don’t look too far into the future, and focus on the present moment. You can get through anything one day at a time.

7. Always be moving forward. Never stop investing. Never stop improving. Never stop doing something new. The moment you stop improving your organization, it starts to die. Make it your goal to be better each and every day, in some small way. Remember the Japanese concept of Kaizen. Small daily improvements eventually result in huge advantages.

8. Be quick to decide. Remember what the Union Civil War general, Tecumseh Sherman said: “A good plan violently executed today is far and away better than a perfect plan tomorrow.”

9. Measure everything of significance. I swear this is true. Anything that is measured and watched, improves.

10. Anything that is not managed will deteriorate. If you want to uncover problems you don’t know about, take a few moments and look closely at the areas you haven’t examined for a while. I guarantee you problems will be there.

11. Pay attention to your competitors, but pay more attention to what you’re doing. When you look at your competitors, remember that everything looks perfect at a distance. Even the planet Earth, if you get far enough into space, looks like a peaceful place.

12. Never let anybody push you around. In our society, with our laws and even playing field, you have just as much right to what you’re doing as anyone else, provided that what you’re doing is legal.

13. Never expect life to be fair. Life isn’t fair. You make your own breaks. You’ll be doing good if the only meaning fair has to you, is something that you pay when you get on a bus (i.e., fare).

14. Solve your own problems. You’ll find that by coming up with your own solutions, you’ll develop a competitive edge. Masura Ibuka, the co-founder of SONY, said it best: “You never succeed in technology, business, or anything by following the others.” There’s also an old Asian saying that I remind myself of frequently. It goes like this: “A wise man keeps his own counsel.”

15. Don’t take yourself too seriously. Lighten up. Often, at least half of what we accomplish is due to luck. None of us are in control as much as we like to think we are.

16. There’s always a reason to smile. Find it. After all, you’re really lucky just to be alive. Life is short. More and more, I agree with my little brother. He always reminds me: “We’re not here for a long time; we’re here for a good time.”



http://paulkrotoblog.com/archives/category/motivational

“The Five Critical Steps to Success (in any Business)”

“The Five Critical Steps to Success (in any Business)” by Ron LeGrand

There’s a lot of ways to make a million bucks, but most involve some kind of business, and that business must have the potential to achieve a high income, or all one has is a low paying job he/she happens to own. We all have a choice. So, why not choose a business that can make you rich?

I know a dentist who spent $400,000 on two sandwich shops which his family runs and can barely break even. There’s no way to sell because there are hundreds on the market and a business making no money isn’t worth much, especially when it has no upside potential. He’s headed for a $400,000 seminar, but hey, we all take them and look how much smarter he’ll be the next time.

In 1982, I was bankrupt broke, working as a mechanic, 35 years old and clueless. I got into a heated argument with my wife over a washing machine. She wanted a new one and I wanted to fix the old one because I didn’t have the $150 to spend.

That night, there was no sleep. All I could think about was how big of an “a—hole” I was for arguing with a mother of four whom I’d already been married to for 17 years because she wanted to wash clothes for her family. The next day, I started looking for a way out. I didn’t want to live like this for the rest of my life. There had to be something I could do to make a better living.

My way out was real estate. I started reading books and attended a seminar to get me started. Greed and hunger took over from there. Before I knew it I’d bought and sold several hundred houses without using my money or credit, and still do it today, over 2,000 now.

I tripled my income easily the first year, and it continued to climb for years thereafter until I started creating courses on what I know, and selling them in 1987. Then my income tripled again.

Today, my company continues to market information products to real estate investors and those who want to triple their income on the internet or learn how to start and grow any business. Since that has become my chosen field and hundreds of thousands have gone through our training, it puts me in a good position to see what people do right and what they do wrong.

One lesson I learned the hard way has become my credo: The Less I Do, The More I Make

No, that doesn’t mean you get paid for not working. But, it does mean you must do only the things no one else can and let other people do what they do best and get out of their way. If your life is never-ending minutia and every day goes by with no activity to grow your business, it’ll never be more than a job and soon be one you’ll want to quit. The boss must stay focused on revenue and spend every day increasing it. No one else in the company cares about it more than the boss, the owner, the one receiving the major benefits of a business.

Most waste time the same way, day-in and day-out and not one productive thing gets done.

These are five steps to any business, regardless of its product or service. I buy and sell real estate, own a restaurant, have several online businesses, develop real estate, own an information marketing company, a consulting business, speak at events and a few other odds and ends. These five steps apply to all of them. FYI, I don’t have to be present for any of these businesses to operate and, in fact, I’m not present much.

HERE ARE THE FIVE STEPS
Locate Prospects – Without them, there is no business and this is where many owners fail. They’re great at doing the thing they sell, but suck at marketing. I’d rather be great at marketing and suck at the thing I sell. It can and should be hired out anyway, not done by you. I’m a lousy cook, so it’s a good thing I’m not my own chef. I’m great at buying houses, but not one thing I do can’t be done by someone else. I love internet marketing, but the day you find me building my own website you have my permission to shoot me. My time is spent getting business until I replace myself, then I watch my replacements. Focus on revenue, not cost control.
Prescreen Prospects – There’s a big difference between prospects and suspects. Until you receive money for a product or service you have a prospect, not a customer. Until a prospect shows serious interest and is predisposed to do business with you because they know what you can do for them, you have a suspect. Your objective is to get suspects to prospects to customers ASAP cost effectively. That means 20% of the budget should be spent on getting suspects and 80% on converting to customers, the exact opposite that most businesses do. Usually 80%-95% of any suspect pool will never buy so don’t spend time trying to make chicken salad out of chicken manure.
Construct and present offers – With no offer, there is no sale. In real estate, it’s the offer to purchase. In a restaurant, it’s the menu and a waiter upselling. Online, it’s the sales letter. In retail, it’s the inventory proudly displayed or on sale. In all businesses, there better be an offer and the owner must learn to present it in the form the consumer wants to receive it. That usually means multiple media. A business with only one way to get customers is a business on its way out.One is a Bad Number in Business
Follow-Up – 82% of the revenue in most businesses comes from the second to the seventh contact with a prospect. No doesn’t mean no. It only means see me later when time and circumstance change my mind. That means a business that doesn’t follow up with a sequential campaign to capture customers will lose up to 82% of its potential revenue. Ask yourself, when’s the last time a business, any business, followed up with you? The key is to work hard converting prospects and a little on suspects, but neither can be done without a database of both. I’m appalled at how few businesses even keep a list of their customers, which is their largest and most valuable asset. Have you seen a restaurant lately even ask your name, much less do any work to capture your contact info? I can assure you, mine does. You ain’t getting out the door until we give you a shameless bribe to get on our newsletter list.
Close Quickly – That means get the money. I’m shocked at how many businesses get the bride right to the altar and never ask for a “call to action.” You must ask for money, fully expect to receive it and not quit until you do. There’s no shame in swapping products and services for money. It’s how businesses survive, and the better you get at it the faster you’ll triple your income. Let the staff handle the minutia while you focus on closing sales and training others to do the same, until you’re not needed anymore.

Let’s recap! If you want to have a successful business and triple your income, you must:
Put yourself in a position to do so in a business where it can happen.
Second, build a marketing system to attract suspects, convert to prospects and then to buyers.
Third, repeat, repeat, repeat

It’s not rocket science: it’s the Chunka Theory – the chunka comin’ in must be larger than the chunka going out.

http://www.ronsgoldclub.com/resources/articles-and-reports/the-five-critical-steps-to-success-in-any-business

What's your V.I.T.A.L Vision for Success?

What's your V.I.T.A.L Vision for Success?


This guest blog post is by Donal Daly, CEO of the TAS Group. He shares sales insights, hindsight, and a little foresight on his sales and technology blog, Dealmaker365. Daly will speak on the second day of the upcoming Sales 2.0 Conference: The Art & Science of Accelerating Revenues, on April 3, during his session: Six Factors That Are Transforming B2B Sales in 2012.




I recall when, back in 1989, I was a few years into the growth of my first software company. Having bootstrapped the business and eked out survival through the first year or two, things were beginning to take shape. Each year I grew revenue levels over the previous year – but not by a lot. I used to approach planning from a position of "Where am I now, and how can I improve on this?" The result was steady-but-not-spectacular growth.

As I was entering my fifth year, I was struck by the realization that with this growth curve, it was going to take me a long time to create a company of any real mass or substance. I was in my twenties and obviously still had a lot of time, but I was impatient. I didn't know a lot about much of anything – though I didn't appreciate that at the time; however, this blissful ignorance enabled me to think about things in perhaps nonconventional ways. I read Drucker, Townsend, Peters, McCormack, Kotler, Sun Tzu, Machiavelli, Porter, De Bono, Iacocca, and other topical and nontopical tomes of business development, strategy, corporate lore, thinking, leadership, etc. I was struck sometimes by how insightful some of these authors were, and in the haze of boundless self-belief found only in youth, I favored those whose views echoed mine. I must have learned something along the way, however, as I still remember the day my growth-challenge epiphany occurred.

When I changed the question from "Where am I now, and how can I improve on this?" – which invariably translated into 20 percent increase in revenue – to "How can I achieve 200 percent growth this year?" a fundamental change happened. In hindsight, with the benefit of many years' experience, I now know, as you do, that this goal-oriented or vision-oriented method is well understood. As a paradigm for growth strategies, it is a method by which you can stimulate creativity, momentarily suspend reality, and remove constraints or guardrails to release your unfettered potential, untrammeled by the stifling boundaries of "What's reasonable?" or "What do other companies do?" or "What's acceptable?"

I was reminded of this recently when I was speaking to Tom, a successful salesperson, who, when planning for 2010, asked my opinion on his sales plan. He had closed about $2,000,000 in 2009 and was among the top performers in his company. His plan was well structured, clear, and very focused – and his personal target for 2010 was $2.2 million. When I inquired as to the basis for that number, Tom cited 10 percent growth on his previous year's achievement. We got to talking about potentially taking a different approach. We discussed what he would do differently if he had to achieve $4 million.

I had little value to add to the conversation, as I did not know Tom's business, but he took a "I think that's crazy, but let's brainstorm it a while," approach. The following hour was peppered with such phrases as, "But I'd need help from...," "There's no reason why that shouldn't happen," and "I wonder if...," "No, I knew you were crazy," and finished with, "Now that I've thought about it that way, I think maybe $2.8 million is achievable."

As I said, I didn't add any value to the planning, but Tom, who, to his credit, was open enough to indulge my questioning, stretched his own thinking and created more of a vision for success than a plan for incremental growth.

I've tried to put some structure around this approach for myself and others with whom I work. To make it easy to remember, I use an acronym: V.I.T.A.L., which goes something like this.
V – Vision – This needs to be very ambitious but not ludicrous and is a quantifiable statement of the ultimate goal for the time frame in question.
I – Implications – These are the things that would need to fall into place, the activities required, and the resources needed to support the vision.
T - Test Reality – While still keeping the bar quite high, exclude elements that are entirely impossible, but keep those that are merely a real stretch.
A – Aggregate – As if the goals remaining from the reality check are the baseline objective, figure out how to achieve each of those, aggregate the identified initiatives and associated resources required, and create a two-dimensional, high-low map of reward versus effort so that you can prioritize your efforts.
L - Laser Focus – Now put your new ideas into action. Stop things you were planning to do –because that’s what you always did – but that don't bring high return. Keep on doing the things that you know work very well, and start doing those new things you've identified that can add significant incremental value.

None of this is easy, and while it's important to plan and question and question your plan once you've done it, you need to commit to it and follow through. As Jack Nicklaus said when asked about his incredible shot-making ability:


"I start by assessing where I am, looking at the lie of the ball, figuring out the terrain, gauging how far I am from the hole, and thinking about the wind and other elements of the weather. Then I decide where I want the ball to land so that it ends up near the hole or at the right place on the fairway. Next, I visualize the flight path of the ball and see in my mind the kind of swing I’m going to have to make to get the ball to travel on that flight path. Then I commit to that swing."


http://blog.sellingpower.com/gg/2012/01/whats-your-vital-vision-for-success.html

Stop Blaming the Sales Team for Your Growth Gap

Stop Blaming the Sales Team for Your Growth Gap


Today's guest post is by Kurt Andersen, Executive Vice President of Sales Enablement and Marketing at SAVO.


While it's the CEO's responsibility to define the company's strategic goals and set growth aspirations, it's imperative that the rest of the organization be set up to execute and help the company achieve success.

Unfortunately, most companies are witnessing an ever-increasing gap between the CEO's strategies and the ability to see them through. Part of this gap is the responsibility of your sales team, because they stand directly between these strategic initiatives and your customers. Ask yourself: Are you effectively driving these initiatives through this gap? Too often, the answer is no; thus the need for sales enablement.

Consider the following statistics:
according to Harvard Business Review, 70 percent of growth initiatives fail;
only 1-in-5 CRM systems actually increase revenue (CSO Insights 2011); and
the misalignment in sales and marketing is causing the typical company to underperform by 10 percent in annual revenue (IDC 2011).

These are disturbing statistics for any business. The knee-jerk reaction is to solely blame the sales team – but they're not the problem. The problem is that the majority of companies simply don't know how to effectively enable their sellers.

This is why sales enablement has emerged as a frequent topic of conversation in boardrooms and executive offices. Businesses need to close the growth gap to stay competitive and sales enablement is emerging as the pathway to make it happen.

Defining Sales Enablement
What is sales enablement? The category was previously defined as simple tools that were used by individual sales professionals to sell more proficiently. Sales enablement has evolved into a broader corporate strategy embedded in multiple departments with a singular driving force: achieve revenue initiatives by harnessing the resources and knowledge of the collective enterprise to support sellers.

From this viewpoint, you can understand why zero percent of executives interviewed by IDC rated their sales enablement capabilities as "highly effective." The reality is that most businesses have been committing what we like to call "random acts of sales enablement." This is marked by giving your sellers just enough information to be minimally effective, but without implementing a cohesive strategy designed to align different activities within the organization to optimize the chance of achieving corporate initiatives.

In today's business, simply providing your sellers with the latest marketing slick or whitepaper isn't enough. If this is the extent of your enablement practices, you're leaving revenue on the table.

Why Sales Enablement in 2012
A confluence of trends has resulted in sales enablement emerging as one of the most critical initiatives your business can undertake in 2012. Think about your growth strategy – what steps are you taking to maximize the following trends?

Increased Mobility/BYOD

The media has become fascinated with the Bring-Your-Own-Device trend – enterprise use of personal devices (iPads, iPhones, tablets, etc…) has changed the way many of us work. A recent survey from Citrix found that 53 percent of businesses witnessed productivity improvements by more than 10 percent, thanks to the use of personal devices at work. And 16 percent reported increases of more than 30 percent.

How are you leveraging the mobility trend to better arm and enable your sellers? Sales enablement combined with mobility can significantly empower your sales team by providing them with dynamic, on-demand content that they can access in the middle of a sales situation. Think about that: you’re in a sales meeting, the prospect asks a question, you can immediately pull up situation specific content, demos, video, pose questions to colleagues and get immediate responses, and more. Using sales enablement to maximize sales mobility will increase execution and revenues.

Mergers & Acquisitions/Cross-Sell Opportunities

These two topics tend to fall into the same bucket. While M&A activity decreased in 2011, it's still one of the biggest growth strategies employed by businesses. Being able to sell more products and services tends to be at the heart of most M&A activity.

Simply acquiring a new line of products (or launching one for that matter) is just the start. How are you arming your sales team to sell the new products? The traditional approach consisted of a quick training program, a few brochures on the new product(s), a couple of presentation slides and a wish of good luck on the way out the door. This approach has proven unsuccessful and is a contributing reason why there’s a gap between strategic initiatives (product launch) and revenue (closing sales).

Sales enablement helps maximize every opportunity for cross-sell and upsell by delivering timely and relevant information, when it's appropriate during the sales opportunity. This means brand-compliant materials with the latest information on new products, on-demand, based on the unique selling situation. It also reinforces the broader strategic picture – how do these products fit into the broader portfolio, and why should your customer care?

Social Collaboration

We've seen a lot of companies deploy simple social tools across their enterprise in attempt to foster greater collaboration. However, critics argue that these technologies have little impact on overall productivity. Some of the complaints are that people don't know who to present their questions to, answers provided are out of date or just inaccurate, and too much non-relevant information is shared with the general audience.

Social tools need to be aligned with a specific business purpose and objectives to result in increased sales. Sales enablement will play a greater role in 2012 to mobilize the right subject matter experts, resources and information for each unique situation. Sales enablement will also guide the communication that occurs internally with colleagues and the collaboration that occurs between the sales person and the prospect. Therefore, it will help provide each seller (and ultimately the buyer) with the accumulated knowledge inherent in every organization.

There are a lot of reasons why sales enablement will continue to grow in importance in 2012, but the driver behind them is the same: to close the gap between your businesses strategic initiatives and your sellers.

For more information, check out SAVO's latest e-zine on the topic of sales enablement. There are several case studies from leading selling organizations such as Compuware and Philips, highlighting how they've transformed their selling processes and increased revenues through sales enablement.


http://blog.sellingpower.com/gg/2012/01/stop-blaming-the-sales-team-for-your-growth-gap.html

If You Like Baseball and Love Sales Management, Go See "Moneyball"

If You Like Baseball and Love Sales Management, Go See "Moneyball"


This is the story of Oakland A's manager Billy Beane, who meets an Ivy League econ grad, Peter Brand (played by Jonah Hill), who views players through the lens of analytics and statistical probabilities. Beane (played by Brad Pitt) always loses his best players to big-money clubs and needs to find a new way to win. Following a hunch, he hires nerdy Peter Brand, and the pair begin to change the way the club drafts and plays. The two establish a culture of measurement and make hiring decisions based on science and probabilities, which upsets scouts and greatly irritates the Oakland A's coach. The dramatic tension increases as the newly assembled team loses game after game. Beane and Brand hang tough, although Beane is carrying the seeds of doubt from his own can’t-miss-but-did career as a major baseball player.


As is the case with statistics and probabilities, over time, the bet pays off, and the Oakland A's see a record-breaking streak of 20 winning games in a row.

Moneyball is about the fundamental cultural shift from picking players based on hunches to looking at the game in a more rational and objective way, measuring each player's performance and displaying the results in the forms of percentages, graphs, and comparison charts. In essence, the shift from Baseball 1.0 to Baseball 2.0 allowed Billy Beane to see greater value in the underappreciated or ignored players that the old scouts considered washed out or destined for the minors. The movie has a great scene in which the good old boys chew the fat, commenting on the assets and liabilities of their draft prospects, focusing on age, injuries, and gossip trivia, such as, "If a player has an ugly girlfriend, it means he doesn't have much confidence."

I can easily see Brad Pitt in the role of a sales manager who has lost three of his top producers to the competition. It is not a big stretch to imagine Peter Brand as the new sales operations manager who teaches his boss how to match salespeople's talents to their specific job requirements. The sales operations manager is the science nerd who knows which tools can fix the sales manager’s problems.

Once the sales manager shifts the focus from chasing superstars to creating a Sales 2.0 organization that aligns people, process, and technology, the outcome can be as spectacular as the Oakland A's record-breaking winning streak.

If you are looking to hire salespeople based on science, take a look at www.calipercorp.com or www.hrchally.com. If you want to explore predictive analytics, test-drive www.lattice-engines.com or www.cloud9.com. If you want to model your sales-compensation plan and predict results, check out www.xactlycorp.com or www.callidussoftware.com. If you want to take a closer look at 30 of the most valuable and profitable Sales and Marketing 2.0 tools available on the market today, visit www.sales20conf.com/sm2011 and attend our conference. (Full disclosure: I am hosting this event.)

The actionable insight I walked away with after seeing Moneyball: Success doesn't wait for those who act only when they "have a hunch."


file://localhost/C:/agung/SALES/sellingpower.com/blog/gg/2011/If%20You%20Like%20Baseball%20and%20Love%20Sales%20Management,%20Go%20See%20_Moneyball_%20-%20Selling%20Power%20Blog.mht

How you can better influence people

How you can better influence people
By
Robert Pagliarini

Tony Robbins (File) (Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images)
(MoneyWatch) COMMENTARY I've always been fascinated by FBI profilers. Those are the folks who get inside the heads of criminals to try to figure out why they do what they do. There is a great deal of power that comes from being able to quickly analyze someone to determine what they are all about, and there are numerous tools and techniques to help you analyze someone. Popular ones include the Myers Briggs Type Indicator and DISC Assessment, where you try to classify someone's personality. Then there are numerous books on interpreting body language, analyzing eye movement, and even decoding handwriting.


The most accurate method I've discovered for assessing what drives another person is based on "human needs psychology," a theory of human behavior developed by Tony Robbins. Yes, that Tony Robbins -- the one who has directly impacted more than 50 million people through his books, tools, and live events (watch Oprah Winfrey do a firewalk at a Tony Robbins event).

Human needs psychology provides an answer to the elusive question, "Why do human beings do the things they do?" The theory says that there are six fundamental needs that everyone has in common (Every person includes your mother-in-law, President Obama, terrorists, you, and everyone else.) And here's the best part -- because we all share these same needs, once you can decipher which top two needs someone values more than the others, it instantly gives you an edge in knowing what drives them and how to influence them.

Here are what Robbins's theory postulates as the six human needs:

1. Certainty. The need for stability, security, comfort, and to feel confident you can avoid pain and gain pleasure.

2. Uncertainty/variety. The need for change, new stimuli, and for the unknown.

3. Significance. The need to feel important, special, unique, or needed.

4. Love/connection. The need to belong and to feel closeness with someone or something.

5. Growth. The need to expand, learn, and grow.

6. Contribution. The need to give beyond oneself and to support others.

Do you think you should communicate differently with someone whose No. 1 need is "certainty" than if his or her top need is "significance?" If your goal is to build rapport, nail that interview, or get funding for your venture, I sure hope so.

The question becomes, "How can you discover someone's top needs?" To answer that, we go to Mark Peysha, CEO of Robbins-Madanes Coach Training, an online company that teaches leaders, therapists, and others how to quickly and efficiently create lasting change with their clients or employees. The training is based on a framework created by Robbins and Cloe Madanes, a renowned teacher, one of the originators, of the strategic approach to family therapy.

According to Mark, there are three basic ways to understand another person's top needs:

1. Ask them. This is obviously the most straightforward approach. People are fascinated by the concept of the six human needs, and they love an opportunity to talk about what matters most to them and how they perceive what's important.

2. Observe what they focus on. Is the person focused on safety and comfort, or are they more driven by the need to stand out? Do they seem to crave connection, or do they crave variety and entertainment? Listen to what they communicate and watch for what they value. You can learn a lot by the process of elimination.

3. Contextual. It's best to observe someone in more than one environment. When people go into certain situations, you can learn a great deal from how they respond -- their top needs will often rise to the surface.

So how can you use human needs psychology? Get practice profiling people you already know. Look at their communication and behavior through the lens of these six needs. Ask yourself which needs are most important to this person. Get practice looking for and identifying needs in others so it becomes a habit and so you can get the edge in knowing what drives them and how to influence them.
© 2012 CBS Interactive Inc.. All Rights Reserved.
Robert Pagliarini


Robert Pagliarini is obsessed with inspiring others to create and empowering them to live life to the fullest by radically changing the way they invest their time and energy. He is the founder of Richer Life, a community of passionate people who want to learn and achieve more in life and at work. He is a Certified Financial Planner and the president of Pacifica Wealth Advisors, a boutique wealth management firm serving sudden wealth recipients and affluent individuals. He has appeared as a financial expert on 20/20, Good Morning America, Dr. Phil, Dr. Drew's Lifechangers and many others.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505125_162-57408159/how-you-can-better-influence-people/?tag=nl.e713

Clearing Clutter Increases Success

Clearing Clutter Increases Success

Written by Jack Canfield | Monday, 02 April 2012 00:00



Our physical spaces are filled with dozens of minor distractions and irritants, such as stacks of unread books, scuff marks on the wall, and closets filled with unused items. For most people, these things are like gnats – annoying, but generally insignificant and easily ignored.

Rarely do we recognize them for what they really are – potent threats to our productivity, energy, concentration and peace of mind.

For those of us committed to achieving greater success in our lives, a cluttered physical environment produces three negative consequences:

1. You feel drained. If there are things to do everywhere you look, your mind constantly keeps thinking “I need to fix that.” Eventually, you to feel drained, anxious, irritable, and overwhelmed. To cope, we have to put blinders on and overlook the distractions.

2. Problems spiral out of control. We often overlook irritations for the short-term gain of being able to continue with our daily routine. The danger, however, is that some problems with grow worse with lack of attention. The chip in the windshield that could have been fixed in 30 minutes grows to a crack that requires replacement of the entire windshield.

3. You miss important clues and ideas. It’s impossible to selectively numb out your awareness, ignoring only the minor distractions in your physical space while paying close attention to everything else. This is perhaps the biggest danger for success-minded people. Our most powerful insights often manifest in gut feelings, fleeting thoughts and subtle cues. Numbing out to our cluttered physical environments makes us oblivious to these clues, as well.

Physical Space Impacts Mental Space


Seemingly small irritations and distractions also have a dramatic impact on our mental state. It’s common for people who feel overwhelmed by their physical clutter to go into a state of resignation. When you have a sense that you can’t control the little things – such as quickly finding a stapler when you need it – then it becomes easy to tell yourself that there’s no way you can have the other, bigger things that you want, such as a better car, bigger house, prestigious job, or loving relationship.

The good news is that the same concept works in reverse. When you do recognize that you can control little things, such as the squeak every time you open your front door, you recognize that you can control the bigger things in life, too. Taking action to manage irritations, distractions and clutter builds your confidence in your ability to achieve success, regardless of form.

3 Ways to Deal with Clutter

There are three ways to change any environment: add something to it, take something out of it, or modify it in some form.

Go through your environment and figure out what is irritating and distracting you. Ask yourself how it needs to be fixed. Then think about who you might be able to delegate all or part of the task to. One reason that to-do items accumulate is that we feel like we have to do all of the work ourselves. One of the key strategies for getting more done is to master the art of delegation.

To help you move forward with this process, I’ve posted an “Irritations & Tolerations” worksheet on my blog. Use this tool to identify and create an action plan for handling your irritations and tolerations.

Next, scan your environment to identify elements that need to be removed completely, as well as items that can be brought in to increase the energy in your space. For example, you might find that removing the television or computer from your bedroom makes your sleeping space more relaxing and peaceful. On the other hand, you might find that adding a conference table to your office gives you an inviting place for creative work, while adding plants makes you feel calmer and connected to nature.

Spotting “Good” Clutter

Remember that all clutter is not bad. For many people, clutter is part of their creative process.

When in the midst of creation – such as writing an article, developing a presentation, mapping out a business strategy or creating a product – they pull out resources like books, clippings, articles and notepads. More artistic types might fill their work spaces with tools of their particular trade.

The litmus test to use in determining whether your clutter needs attention is how you feel. If you feel inspired, the clutter is serving you and contributing to your creative expression. If you feel contracted, drained, anxious or stressed, the clutter needs to be tamed.

Environments control us, but it’s important to recognize that as human beings, we are one of the few animals that can control their environments.

WANT TO USE THIS ARTICLE IN YOUR E-ZINE OR WEB SITE?
You can, as long as you include this complete statement with it: Jack Canfield, America's #1 Success Coach, is founder of the billion-dollar book brand Chicken Soup for the Soul© and a leading authority on Peak Performance and Life Success. If you're ready to jump-start your life, make more money, and have more fun and joy in all that you do, get FREE success tips from Jack Canfield now at: www.FreeSuccessStrategies.com

Pruning Relationships that Don’t Serve You

Pruning Relationships that Don’t Serve You

Written by Jack Canfield | Thursday, 05 April 2012 00:00



Everything we want to achieve in life involves relationships. While it’s important to learn how to build successful relationships, it’s equally valuable to choose wisely when determining which connections to nurture.

Drop the Anchors


Achieving goals and greater levels of success require energy – sometimes an enormous amount. Negative people are like psychic vampires. They drain us of the precious energy we need to grow and achieve, making relationships with these individuals toxic to success.

Until we reach the point in our self-development where we no longer allow people to affect us with their negativity, it’s best to avoid toxic people at all costs. They will hold us back with their victim mentality and mediocre standards.

To identify which relationships are draining you, make a list of all people you spend time with on a regular basis. Go through the list and put a minus sign (-) next to the people who are negative and toxic. Put a plus sign (+) next to the people who are positive and nurturing.

Then stop spending time with the people on the negative list! If you don’t believe that is possible – for example, if you are surrounded by negative people at work – do your best to dramatically decrease the amount of time you spend with them.

Identify Your Best Investments

Another way that relationships can drain our energy is when we feel overwhelmed by the number of relationships we have to maintain.

The first thing to explore is the feeling of “have to.” Remember, there are no “have to’s” or “shoulds” in life. There are only “choose to’s.” We get to choose where we invest our time and energy – and that includes determining which relationships we want to maintain.

“Have to” indicates that our motivation to maintain the relationships is based on fear. But to create greater success, we want to make decisions that are motivated by joy and excitement, as well as our purpose and goals.

We are equipped with a handy inner guidance system that tells us when we are making decisions that are in alignment with our higher good: Joy. When we are not spending a lot of time feeling joyful, it is a clear sign that we are off course.

Review your list of relationships again, this time with a different set of criteria. Identify the people who bring you the greatest joy, as well as financial and professional success. Which relationships are critical to your bottom line? Which people are you most excited to spend time with? Which people are most important for you to keep in touch with? These are the relationships to cultivate.

Dan Sullivan, president of the Strategic Coach, teaches his clients to identify their top 20 relationships, as well as a “farm team,” which are 20 additional relationships that should be nurtured as future additions to the Top 20. Create this list for yourself, using joy as the measuring stick for personal relationships and bottom-line success for professional relationships.

Once your key relationships are identified, put the names into a chart, with the names prioritized in the first column. In the second column, add contact information so that it is readily available when you want to reach out to one of these key contacts. In the third column, answer the question, “What result(s) do I want to achieve with this person in the next 90 days?” Do you want them to hire you? Attend your seminar? Buy your book? Send referrals to you? Use this chart to guide your actions over the next three months as you nurture the key relationships.

You Get to Choose

In business particularly, you may feel that you are required to stay connected with more people than you would normally choose.

Remember that you get to choose not only which relationships you want to nurture, but also how close each relationships will be and how you will stay connected. More than 235,000 people around the world have subscribed to my mailing list to stay in touch with me. I can’t develop personal relationships with everyone, of course. I choose to stay connected with my subscribers via tools such as my blog, e-zine and Inner Circle Club.

As world-renowned marine artist Wyland once said, “There are two types of people – anchors and motors. You want to lose the anchors and get with the motors because the motors are going somewhere and they’re having more fun. The anchors will just drag you down.” Carefully choose the relationships in which you invest your precious time and energy to ensure that your success isn’t slowed … and so that you experience a positive return on your investment.



WANT TO USE THIS ARTICLE IN YOUR E-ZINE OR WEB SITE?
You can, as long as you include this complete statement with it: Jack Canfield, America's #1 Success Coach, is founder of the billion-dollar book brand Chicken Soup for the Soul© and a leading authority on Peak Performance and Life Success. If you're ready to jump-start your life, make more money, and have more fun and joy in all that you do, get FREE success tips from Jack Canfield now at: www.FreeSuccessStrategies.com