If you’ve run your business for any length of time, you know that it isn’t always milk and honey. A steady flow of new customers can suddenly be reduced to an intermittent trickle. And your income plummets.
A slowdown in business might give you more time to spend on your hobbies, but it does nothing good for your bank account. You still have expenses to cover, bills to pay, rent to make. It can be a scary time. You need more customers—fast.
Hitting and Pitching
There are many great strategies and techniques for getting people to buy your goods and services. But, there’s one in particular that can grow your customer base faster than all the others. And you’re probably gonna roll your eyes when I tell you what it is. But stay with me.
The fastest way to get more customers is to spend more time selling to potential new customers. Yup. It’s that simple. Whenever my business slows down, I know it’s time for me to hit the streets and pitch my wares to more people.
Good things come whenever I spend more time selling. However, I understand that not everyone finds the sales process enjoyable.
Eat Your Vegetables!
Maybe you think of selling the same way I do about eating vegetables; You do it only because it’s good for you–not because you enjoy it. Maybe the idea of selling even brings on anxiety and fear.
Because selling could mean getting doors slammed in your face. It could mean making cold calls and getting an ear-full of obscenities. It could mean a day full of rejection.
But, ask yourself this question: How great is your desire for more customers? Or rather, how much pain is your lack of customers causing you?
When it hurts enough, any issues you have with selling go away. But even if the pain isn’t great enough right now to get you to do something about it, DON’T WAIT!
A few months ago, I had a really bad stomach ache. I thought maybe it was just a case of food poisoning. So I decided to wait it out before considering any formal medical treatment. After a day and half, I was still in intense pain. But I thought, I’m just being a wuss. Tough it out!
Fortunately, my wife is a bit smarter than I am and she took me to the hospital where they discovered my appendix was on the verge of bursting.
So the moral of this story? Don’t wait for your spouse to drag you in front of prospects to do more selling. But seriously, businesses fail everyday for all sorts of reasons. A dislike for selling should never be one of them.
Here’s a great book that helped give me a whole new perspective on selling: Go For No! – YES is the destination. NO’s how you get there.
I’m fine with selling. I just don’t have time for it. I’m too busy doing actual work!
If you say you’re too busy to sell more, then that means you should have all the customers you can handle. And you probably would never have started reading this article in the first place.
However, if you say this but you’re still hurting for customers, then you’ve got some efficiency or effectiveness issues to address. Or, you’re just making excuses.
I won’t go into all the ways you can organize and prioritize your schedule. Maybe in another post. Besides, there are tons of resources readily available to help you with this.
- Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less
- The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results
- Eat That Frog!: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time
- MAKE IT HAPPEN in Ten Minutes a Day: The Simple, Lifesaving Method for Getting Things Done
- The On-Purpose Person: Making Your Life Make Sense
As a business owner, the amount of things to do can be overwhelming. But we all have the same twenty-four hours in a day. For the sake of our businesses, we must (and can) make the time. Like all worthy endeavors, some sacrifice is necessary.
Get Off That Nail!
Zig Ziglar tells a story about a guy who asks his neighbor why his dog is just laying in his doghouse whimpering. The neighbor says, “Cuz he’s laying on a nail poking up from the floor board.” The guy then asks, “Why doesn’t he get up off it?” To which his neighbor replies, “Well, I guess it don’t hurt that much.”
No more excuses. Your business is hurting. You know what to do. And you already have everything you need to make it happen. If more customers are what you need fast, then ya’ gotta spend more time selling.
Whatever time you currently spend on selling each week, double it. Triple it if you can. Do this for one month and you’ll be amazed at the results. And you’ll be able to approach the typical “slow” season with confidence.
