Identity

Believing having your own business is the best way to have fun and make money misses the most important point. Those are the two excellent reasons to become employed and/or to learn about passive investments (read Rich Dad, Poor Dad). Successful owners are about those - and much more. 

Talk to them about their business. It's all about being able to help people, not just what happens on their financial statements. If owners didn't truly believe they were doing something significant for others, they would be content as employees or investors. 

This makes being a business broker so interesting. Selling a business is not a round peg, round hole kind of transaction. There's more than cash flow and asset worth. A Seller has to believe that a Buyer can offer society the same, or better, service with the business being sold. Without that, it's a poor deal. I feel I'm more part of an adoption agency than a financial services organization. It's very personal and very rewarding.

The very best sales people are often the business owners who communicate their belief in the importance of what they're doing along with the message about their business. It's not polish; but rather a self-knowledge of exactly who they are and why they're here. Communicating identity sells.

There's a saying in Texas that there's no better fertilizer than the farmer's footprint. There's also no better marketing program than the owner's voice.

Spring

February is the beginning of Spring here in North Texas. My grandfather would have been plowing fields in Chilton to plant winter wheat. I'm over at Foreman's Hardware getting ready for another growing season and I feel like Tim, the Tool-man, Taylor, enjoying that unique feeling of being a traditional hard goods store. It's great to be here in the Spring!

We can't see the growth that's happening beneath our feet; but we can believe in it. In nature, we've seen it happen every year, so that's the basis of our faith in the coming growing season. 

Not everyone is a Spring person. Spring people love the feeling of possibility. They can work in their yard, or work on their business, without having to see instant results. Their immediate payoff is in their imagination. They can see how good the yard is going to look or how successful the business initiative will become. When you talk to them, they can't resist telling you how great it all will become. It's a happy conversation as you get carried by their enthusiasm.

In business, Spring exists all year long. Dr. Jeffery Lant popularized the "Rule of Seven" which tells us the first six contacts with a prospect are for awareness. Only after 7 or more do we see results. The email autoresponder industry suggests the following:

2% of sales are made on the 1st contact,

3% of sales are made on the 2nd contact,

5% of sales are made on the 3rd contact,

10% of sales are made on the 4th contact,

80% of sales are made on the 5th - 12th contact.

Both views are about a growing-only season we're going to experience.

To really enjoy a business, we first learn to see and enjoy the possibilities during it's Spring. 

Feedback

The difference between things that grow and things that don't is feedback. Ecology maps nature as large circles with each member feeding the next until it returns to the starting point. Salesmen know customers, through word of mouth, create more customers. In any market, buyers create sellers, who attract more buyers, who create more sellers.

For years I studied business growth. With charts and graphs I tried to discover the Philosopher's Stone that would grow any business. Marketing, Finance, HR, Engineering, Continuous Improvement were all candidates. Yet none of these necessary disciplines were by themselves sufficient to create an engine capable of growing any client's business. What is at the center of growth?

I finally found it in the study of System Dynamics. If there is positive feedback, there is growth. If there is negative feedback, there is decline. Always.

Yesterday at Starbucks in Colleyville I meet with my C-Level Consulting associates. We were discussing the importance of getting together like this. They told me how much they enjoyed one of my past series of presentations on business consulting. One of them told me he was on the file server reviewing them just this past week. He found them a source of hope and inspiration.

That was feedback. Today I start this Blog.