BPI News - January 3, 2013 - Ten New Year’s Business Resolutions for 2013

January 2nd, 2013 Posted in Newsletter | No Comments »

January 3, 2013

Welcome,

In this issue, we offer a few suggestions and resolutions to make 2013 more profitable for you and your firm. I look forward to your comments.

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

=======================================================

Ten New Year’s Business Resolutions for 2013

. . . Without Getting a Headache!

by Paul DiModica

Ho Ho Ho and Happy New Year. It’s that time of year again when sales teams are assigned their company’s new compensation plans, sales quotas, and job responsibilities. It’s that time of year when sales managers start looking to hire new salespeople and sales executives start looking for new jobs.

It’s that time of year when management teams huddle in the backroom, order pizza, strategize about their corporate goals, and develop new business concepts while simultaneously designing marketing materials that will make them look like an industry player.

So, as the new year marches on, we all make New Year’s resolutions that are both personal and professional. We write on our magical list that we want to make more money, exercise more, get a better job, or lose the extra pounds that have hung around the last few years.

Yet studies show that most people do not have a personal success plan or even a business plan (a sales plan is not a business plan) and that by April of each New Year, most people have failed to live up to their New Year goals.

So, will you be prepared to reach your goals?

Traditional New Year’s resolutions include get out of debt, get a new job or work from home, save more money, exercise, get organized, learn something new, and reduce stress. At the BPI Strategy Group, we work with CEOs and business executives to increase their professional and corporate business performance. To help our many subscribers of BPI News, we have provided a list of the top ten recommended New Year’s “business” resolutions modified from the traditional resolutions.

Follow them and you will be healthier, wealthier and wiser in 2013.

Are the following resolutions tough? You bet they are. Am I being too aggressive in my observations? Maybe. But these are New Year’s resolutions. They are designed to make you reach for strategic and tactical goals that will make you more successful.

2013 is up to you!

Ten New Year’s Business Resolutions

1. Be a better leader. As the CEO or president of my company, I will not let ego drive my business decisions. Instead, I will substitute business logic, research and input from others.
2. Base my business decisions on research. As the CEO or president, I will not make up my team’s annual sales quota or target assignments in the backroom. Instead, I will calculate their goals based on a mathematical sales capture model that also looks at market opportunity size by territory.
3. Invest in my business. As the CEO or President of my company, I will invest in outside sales training, marketing, and strategy advisement for my company, because I really don’t know everything and without increased revenue capture . . . we don’t need our other departments.
4. Accept accountability. As a salesperson, I will not blame marketing, the services group, operations/engineering, or my boss when I do not hit my assigned sales quota. Instead, I will be a mature salesperson and accept it’s my responsibility to be successful within the corporate environment I operate in.
5. Invest in myself. As a salesperson, I will stop being cheap, accept that sales is my chosen career, understand that I am a professional, and actually invest my own money in career training to become more successful (at least 1% of my gross income a year).
6. Learn something new. As a salesperson, I will finally admit that I don’t know everything and will actually try to learn some new sales methods, strategies and techniques to increase my success.
7. Make more money. As a salesperson, even though I hate to cold call, I will cold call at least 40 new prospects a week, every week — because cold calling is still one of the best ways to hunt for new business and make more money.
8. Be more productive. As a marketing department manager, I will focus on generating qualified inbound leads for my sales team first, work on branding second, and create brochures third.
9. Reduce stress. As a sales management executive, I will not manage my team by emotions. Instead, I will manage my sales team by business metrics that are realistic and can be documented.
10. Help others. As a manager of operations, engineering or corporate services delivery, I will stop blaming the sales department for client engagement problems and start working with them in tandem to deliver what I said we can do.

One Extra New Year’s Resolution

To work at what I like doing — not just what I have to do.

“Remember, revenue capture is not solely the salesperson’s responsibility — it’s the company’s responsibility.” Paul DiModica

To Your Revenue Success,

Walter Wise

Revenue Success Advisor

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

BPI News - Nov. 15, 2012 - How to Sell Against Your Competitors and Win!

November 16th, 2012 Posted in Newsletter | No Comments »

November 15, 2012

In this issue, we talk about proactively managing your competition. I look forward to your comments.

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

_____________________________________________________________________

by Paul DiModica

3 Tips You Can Use Right Now - Take The IT Competitor Test

Every successful company has a sales and marketing system - a process on how they handle direct and indirect competitors. They either ignore them, negatively sell against them through verbal criticism, or poo-poo them as non-competitors or non-players.

But does that really work?

Does that make competitors go away?

It’s not what you sell - it’s who you sell against. Otherwise, we would not need sales and marketing investments because prospects would just call your office and an administrative team would take the orders over the phone.

Let’s be honest. We all have competition. Big companies worry about small boutique players with lower operating costs. Small companies worry about big companies that have national marketing budgets and big references. Start-ups worry about everybody.

So don’t worry about competition so much — they’re probably worrying about you too.

Just accept that competition issues are just another objection management variable that you need to control.

The psychological pressure and fear of competition in a deal makes salespeople drop their price, accelerate their sales cycle (before the decision maker is ready) and bring in sales managers when they are not needed.

Your competition can be managed a lot easier than you think.

When dealing with sales competition, always think offensively rather than defensively. Usually,  salespeople react to competition instead of preparing for it. Going forward, always assume there is competition and then position your firm uniquely enough so that all other players are strategically in a defensive position.

Selling a product or service in today’s market is a premeditated sport! If you prepare for the big game, you can win!

Imagine then what it would be like to stand out when marketing and selling your product or service to management in a highly competitive marketplace and attract more sales and more prospect respect during your sales cycle . . . without worrying about your competitors.

One way to sell against direct competitors is to use strategic language to describe them during the sales and marketing process. How you react and how you respond to competitive pressure during your sales cycle sends subliminal communication to the buyer of your offerings or weaknesses. How you describe or respond to competitor comparisons sends out confidence messages to your prospects as they try to move to a short list of potential vendors based on their “education”. Proactively manage your competitors so they don’t control your sales cycle by manipulating the buyer’s perception of you.

You must always manage every step of your revenue capture process. Hope is not a strategy

Here are 3 competitive tips you can use right now:

1. Don’t ever directly sell negatively. Although negative selling does work because it communicates variables about competitors to prospects (both true and untrue) that the buyer may not know, it is unprofessional.

2. Always box your competitors into a category using a verbal description and then talk directly about the potential consequences of buying from this category (i.e., the competitor is a national firm, a local firm, VAR, etc.).

3. When describing your competitors to your prospects, pick unusual terms and words that create visual analogies in the brain of the buyer. For example, tell your prospect that the competitor is “like a retailer selling shoes who is always changing their inventory (describes a VAR),” or “They are bus people — they bus in the “A” team to sell you and then bus in the “B” team to deliver their technology (a national firm selling locally).

“I Worry Too Much About Competition” Sales Test

Question 1

Of all the deals I lost during the last 12 months, I told my sales manager that the reason we lost was because of competition more than 50% of the time.

____Yes ____No

Question 2

When I have found out there was competition in my deals, I have said something negative to my prospects about the other vendors (even in a nice way) at least 25% of the time. (Be honest - your boss won’t ask you for this test score.)

____Yes ____No

Question 3

When a prospect from my sales forecast starts talking about other vendors in the deal having better functionally, service delivery or a lower price, one of the first things I do is discuss with my management team about cutting the price.

____Yes ____No

Question 4

Of all the deals that I have closed during the last eighteen months, more than 50% were based on price concessions.

____Yes ____No

Question 5

I have studied the top ten competitors in my market and business vertical and know how to position my firm in an offensive mode against each one.

____Yes ____No

Answers

1-No; 2-No; 3-No; 4-No; 5-Yes

Scoring

Give yourself 20% for each matching answer. Did you pass? If you failed, more than likely, you are not managing your marketing and sales process correctly.

Competition is part of the IT marketing and sales game — live with it and manage it.

“The purpose of competition is not to beat someone down, but to bring out the best in every player.” –Amos Alonzo Stagg

To Your Revenue Success,

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

BPI News - October 31, 2012 - Aligning Strategic Decisions Based On Primary Problem Issues

October 30th, 2012 Posted in Newsletter | No Comments »

October 31, 2012

Welcome,

In this issue, we talk about aligning your business decisions based upon the actual problem you are trying to solve and not the effect. I look forward to your comments.

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

twitter: BPIStrategy

_________________

Aligning Strategic Decisions Based On Primary Problem Issues, Not Secondary Problem Effects

by Paul DiModica

Are you faced with answering questions like:

• Do you need to budget additional funding to hire more people?

• Do you need to hire more salespeople?

• Should you merge with a competitor?

• Should you expand into a new market?

Answers to each of these questions results in strategic decisions that have a company-wide effect on your operating business model. At times, they are made in a responsive manner where your judgment is adjusted to address your firm’s immediate business issues.

But aligning those business decisions with identified strategic goals can be difficult if your decision process is reactive to the causes and effects of daily corporate operations.

To run a company successfully, senior management must have the footwork of a professional athlete, the accounting savvy of a CPA and the sales skills of an international negotiator.

Management needs to understand the environment in which their business decisions are made to determine the correct business decision based on their corporate objectives.

So — how should management make strategic decisions?

Executive decisions should be evaluated based on the cause and effect model of the event being reviewed.

Are you addressing the primary problem (the cause) which was created or are you addressing the secondary problem (the effect) which is the outcome of the primary problem?

Often executives find themselves reacting to secondary problems which were created by a primary problem. If the primary problem is not identified and allowed to recur over and over again, then secondary problems (often more identifiable) result.

Here’s some common scenarios that are associated with secondary problems:

• If your key account project work deal is off schedule, do you blame the lead implementation manager?

• If sales are down, is it the sales team’s fault?

Each one of these events has a cause and effect impact and must be evaluated from a stand-alone point of view. Your strategic decisions should be based on logical corporate goal alignment instead of reaction to an immediate crisis.

Generally, most strategic business issues can be positioned into two separate categories.

1. Primary Problems which cause the business pain and must be fixed or secondary problems will occur.
2. Secondary Problems which are the effects (or outcome) of the primary problem and are often viewed as the main problem in crisis management.

By addressing and adjusting the primary problem, you are able to prevent and remove future recurrences of various business issues.

Many times, just fixing the secondary problem forces the business issue to repeat itself.

Example

Let’s say Company A has had a high turnover rate in their sales department (voluntarily and involuntarily) due to constant adjustment for lack of sales. However, they have a very marketable product for all sized companies regardless of the vertical and their actual cost to provide is minimal. When launching the product, Company A arbitrarily determined that it could be sold for $8,000 to a market of 1,000,000 potential clients. In the year since the product launch, they have been able to sell only 1/10% of the market (or 1,000 clients). Prospect responses were good, but objections included concern that the product’s value was not in line with the cost. A decision was made to drop the price to $3,000 and they were able to sell 1% of that same market (or 10,000 clients) during an equal timeframe. The lower entry point allowed them to sell small firms as well as large.

The Primary Problem was that the product was incorrectly positioned and overpriced for the market. Secondary Problems arose which included a lack of sales and high turnover in their sales staff. The result was an increase in sales by 10% and an increase in revenue by 25%.

When dealing with day-to-day business issues, use the following actions and steps to evaluate your decision alignment process more succinctly and determine if you are trying to fix a primary problem or a secondary problem resulting from the primary problem.

Remember, general business issues that repeat themselves (after you have made adjustments) are usually secondary problems of a larger primary problem which has yet to be addressed.

4 Action Steps to Identify Primary and Secondary Business Problems:

1. Start with identifying a business problem. Determine if the problem is a recurring issue, e.g., lack of sales, delay in releasing product, etc. If it is a recurring issue, then you have probably only identified a Secondary Problem - the effect rather than the cause.
2. Try to assess what is causing the issue identified above. This will be the Primary Problem, e.g., product is incorrectly positioned, other priorities get in the way of releasing new product, product doesn’t work as well as competitors’ product, etc.
3. After the Primary Problem has been identified, adjust and align. The Primary Problem will continue to effect your operating model until you make adjustments and align your decision with your corporate goals.
4. Create contingency actions to prevent the Primary Problem from affecting your model in the future. Audit and manage. Make sure that the Primary Problem is kept in check in order to prevent Secondary Problems from arising.

Focus more on responding to business issues from a cause position rather than an effect position and you will align your business decisions more accurately with your corporate goals.

“I have to be wrong a certain number of times in order to be right a certain number of times. However, in order to be either, I must first make a decision.” - Frank N. Giampietro

To Your Revenue Success!

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

twitter: BPIStrategy

The Myth About Having Exact Business Experience

October 8th, 2012 Posted in Newsletter | No Comments »

Welcome,

In this issue, we talk about the myth of hiring “exact” business experience. I look forward to your comments.

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

twitter: BPIStrategy

_________________________________________________________

The Myth About Having Exact
Business Experience

by Paul DiModica

Chat with any CEO long enough and you will eventually discuss the difficulties they have in finding experienced hunter salespeople, experienced sales managers, and marketing executives who understand how to create qualified sales leads.

Often these conversations are because everyone during their executive management careers has fallen victim to the myth which leads them to believe that in order to have a successful company, they must hire specific employees who are players from their unique business industry, have their specific product or service knowledge, or even be a player from one of their competitors.

This myth is propitiated by failing to hire the right person for the job or properly train new employees, and receiving unscrubbed or non-interviewed candidates on their doorstep from the girth of headhunters who solicit their business.

Today more than ever, CEO’s need to look outside of their industry or at least their business verticals to find qualified candidates who can help them grow their company.

To grow your firm, understand that many companies are failing because they are using antiquated sales and marketing methods carried forward by people who just keep performing the same old way from company to company.

The truth is:

• Many sales methods are antiquated and don’t work anymore.
• Many salespeople call themselves hunters, but in fact are farmers who make a disproportionate amount of their income selling new business to existing customers.
• Marketing that does not produce qualified leads for the sales department is wasted money. Leadership means to induce others to action — not just telling people what to do.

So why do executives divert to a repetitive process of hiring the same type of business candidates over and over?

• Sometimes they project their needs onto candidates when they feel pressure to fill an open job requisition because they are carrying a territory sales quota that says they should have a body in that position.
• They hire someone because that person has similar sales or management style or experience. Who better to hire than yourself?
• They think their sales business is so unique that no one could learn fast enough to be productive.

These assumptions are all wrong.

Filling an open sales or management slot with the wrong person because you can’t find the right person makes no sense. Hiring the best qualified person available at the time you interview is not the same as hiring the best qualified. Taking the least path of resistance to fill the rec almost guarantees failure.

Hiring based on the skills you have does not mean candidates who sound or act like you will produce the same tangible success results you did. They are not you.

Selling senior management is a specific skill set. Detailed knowledge of your product or service is not needed and in fact can be a liability when communicating your business value in the boardroom. Your product or service is a tool that drives results. With sales engineer support and discovery meetings almost a business requirement today, salespeople from any industry can sell your product or service if they can sell management, if they are polished, and if they are confident and professional. Thinking that your product or service is so unique and that you should only hire people who know your market is just egotistical.

So how do you correct this continuous cycle of hiring someone else’s employee whose contributions never rose above average performance?

1. When you hire a salesperson, understand that it is a one-year commitment. Even if you let them go after six months for non-performance, by the time you hire their replacement and give them a probation period, it will be one year.
2. When you hire a manager, realize that it is a two-year commitment. Like salespeople, you must give them time to succeed or fail but your commitment to them before you pull the plug will usually be at least 7 or 8 months, causing you start the interviewing, hiring and evaluation cycle all over again. Hire the right person for the job . . . not just an adequate person at the time you have a vacancy.
3. Look for candidates outside of your market or business vertical who have specific business skills (sales, leadership, marketing) and may be just working in the wrong industry by mistake. Focus on what they have done and their results more than how many years they have worked as a sales executive.
4. Use psychological testing, group interviews, one-day job ride-alongs and any other tool you can think about to help make a better hire.
5. Don’t automatically assume that because someone hits their sales quota one year that their skill sets are transferable. Look for consistent performance. Great salespeople and sales managers learn to adapt regardless of the outside business economy.
6. Remember from your own business experiences that just because someone holds a leadership position, it does not mean they are a leader.
7. Consider that metric success in one company (leads created, revenue generated, employee team built) may not transfer from one company to another and the success a candidate has achieved may be related to his current or previous employer’s business environment or market positioning more than their individual capabilities.
8. Go with your gut feeling. Over and over again, my gut feeling about hiring new employees has proven more effective than every psychological test I have used to help evaluate an employee’s potential.

In today’s market, industry experience is overrated. Focus on hiring great skill sets first and industry experience second. Hire slow and terminate fast.

To your Revenue success,

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

twitter: BPIStrategy

Learn to Sell IT Services Like Ben and Jerry

September 16th, 2012 Posted in Newsletter | No Comments »

September 15, 2012

Welcome,

In this issue, we talk about packaging your offering to increase your sales. I look forward to your comments.

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

twitter: BPIStrategy

______________________________________________________________

Learn to Sell IT Services Like Ben and Jerry

by Paul DiModica

Three Tips to Sell More Products and/or Services to Management

One of my favorite foods growing up as a kid outside of Boston was Ben and Jerry’s ice cream. Later in life as a Vice President of Marketing for an IT firm, I had the opportunity to tour their famous manufacturing plant in Waterbury, Vermont (with cows outside). An interesting business fact I learned on the tour was that although Vanilla is their most popular ice cream, as soon as they started offering other flavors like Chunky Monkey, all of their sales went up including their Vanilla sales.

When selling products or services, it’s the same approach.

Do your marketing and sales team members tell prospects that they can develop any software application if the buyer just gives them a comprehensive specifications document?

Come on. In 30 years of marketing and selling IT offerings, I can count on one hand the number of prospects who have had a useable, detailed specification that development could implement. In IT, that just does not happen.

So telling a prospect that you can do anything — just diminishes your ability to close the deal faster because often prospects really don’t know what they want.

Instead, when selling products and services you must prepackage some of your offerings so they are digestible and consumable . . . and be understood by the targeted buyer. When your offerings are vague, you force the buyer’s decision process to slow down. But by offering packages that are well defined, you allow your prospects to understand what your capabilities are . . . even when you do custom applications.

3 Tips to Sell products Services

1. Always offer prepackaged services — never just custom apps . . . even when you sell primarily custom software development.
2. Always offer 2-3 packaged offerings (i.e. Silver, Gold and Platinum) so prospects compare you against you. If you only offer one package, they may shop elsewhere and compare you against a competitor.
3. When selling your products or services, always create a name and package your installation, development model, or client Q&A process to help prospects see three dimensionally how you are different. Quality and management approaches such as ISO9000, ISO14000, Just-In-Time (JIT) and Six Sigma methodologies strive to improve a business’ return on investment but are programs that someone just made up a name to describe their uniqueness. This naming approach helps buyers to better “understand” what you sell — because it subliminally tells them that your offerings are structured designs instead of a loose collection of action steps.

Do the named business models above, Six Sigma and Just-In-Time, have value? Of course! But ask 10 people what they are and they will each give you 1 to 2 general paragraphs describing what these terms mean to them. That’s because these services have been packaged and marketed to create an identity.

Selling products and services like managed services, training, staffing and project management is difficult. They are fluid intangibles without walls or density. Like Ben and Jerry’s, you should sell Vanilla ice cream but also offer Cherry Garcia, Fossil Fuel and Oatmeal Cookie Chunk. When you do, the prospect may still buy Vanilla ice cream because they see your capabilities through the other options you make available.

“Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” — Sun Tzu

To your Revenue success,

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

twitter: BPIStrategy

How Much Are You Spending on Marketing and Is It Generating Qualified Leads?

September 2nd, 2012 Posted in Newsletter | No Comments »

August 31, 2012

Welcome!

In this issue,we talk about best practices for marketing in today’s economy. I look forward to your comments.

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

___________________________________________________________________

How Much Are You Spending On Marketing and Is It Generating Qualified Leads?

By Paul DiModica

When working with CEOs and using best practices on how to grow their business, one question we are often asked in this economy is “how do we generate more qualified leads?”

Generating leads — specifically qualified leads — takes knowledge, funding and a planned strategy.

Often, we find that a firm has a silo approach to lead generation and end up focusing on one type of lead generation model that they or their team members are comfortable with, i.e. direct mail, email, or networking, etc.

The most successful lead generation programs use multiple communication which we call the “three legged stool of lead generation.” The three legged stool of lead generation includes cold calling, networking and marketing. Each one of these approaches has their own budget, planned process and projected return on investment.

What marketing methods is your firm using?

What marketing methods are most successful?

Do you know your true marketing costs and cost per lead?

Do you know your marketing ROI?

During a recession, never reduce your marketing budget. There are always buyers buying; you just don’t know who they are. Instead, tighten your marketing focus on your most likely buyer based on their demographic profile, negotiate better on your vendor pricing and track your lead return on investment.

Marketing should generate qualified leads . . . or else it is a wasted investment!

To your Revenue success!

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

Eight Ways to Close a Deal in a Down Economy

August 3rd, 2012 Posted in Newsletter | No Comments »

BPI News - August 3, 2012

Welcome,

In this issue, we talk about how to close a sale in this economy. I look forward to your comments.

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

__________________________________________________________________

8 Ways to Close an IT Deal in a Down Economy

by Paul DiModica

In a down economy, it is important for companies to adapt to the existing business climate to generate revenue. In this economy, the prospect’s response “I cannot afford it” may actually be a real objection! To improve your sales closing ratio in this economy, try the following closing methods:

1. Find your prospect’s pain and be a doctor!
   Although the economy is flat, companies are still buying products and services. It is just a question of priorities. In today’s market space, people are only buying things that improve corporate earnings. It is the pain that gets the funding. Clients are paying for major surgery, not band-aids. During your client discovery conversations, you must focus on finding the prospect’s biggest pain, so you can be a doctor and fix it with your product or service. If you don’t know what your prospect’s biggest wound is, then you will not get the deal. People are spending money, but only on high priority projects. Be the doctor, find the pain, and fix it.
2. Why are you talking to a prospect with a title of director or below?
   Mid-level managers and directors in small privately owned firms and Fortune 1000 companies are not the decision makers. Bypass them immediately and go directly to VP’s or above. My general rule of thumb is, if the person you’re dealing with does not have at least a VP title, then you do not have a qualified prospect for your sales forecast.
3. Hand deliver every proposal or use a webinar to present your proposal to increase your closing ratio.
   Set up an appointment to hand deliver your proposal in order to discuss the business details. Simply sending your proposal by email or overnight delivery without a presentation reduces the personal closing techniques and sales skills of salespeople. You need to walk through the proposal with the prospect in person to keep the one-to-one relationship perpetuating forward as you deal with the prospect’s objections. Additionally, if travel costs are prohibitive, set up a webinar to go through the details of the proposal page by page to handle all questions as they arise. After the proposal has been discussed, you can send a copy by email or postal mail.
4. Offer pricing options over time to initiate purchases.
   Times are tough and cash is tight. Companies need to offer better financing terms to their prospects to spur purchases. As long as you are comfortable with the prospect’s business viability, stretching payments over time (while delivering your technology or professional service on the original schedule) may close a tabled deal.
5. Cut up your offering into time pieces.
   Another method to reduce the prospect’s upfront investment is to cut your offering’s price point into smaller more digestible pieces. Find out what budget cycle your prospect is currently in and spread their investment over multiple fiscal quarters (e.g., Phase 1 during Q2, Phase 2 during Q3, etc.)
6. Turn your product into a service.
   During tough economic times, companies tend to postpone capital investments that have been allowed for in the budget because of the perceived high cost. To bypass the capital budget item issue, turn your technology into a service and sell it as a cash flow investment option (e.g., selling application software as a multiple year license that is paid monthly, etc.).
7. Offer a discount that is attached to a specific date.
   Giving customers a real discount to close business by a specific date may push a hesitating buyer to invest now instead of next year. However, it must be a real discount and the date needs to be enforced. Letting the client buy later at the discount price makes you lose all credibility. (P.S. Remind your CFO that discounting to get revenue is better than having no revenue.)
8. Give a bonus.
   Prospects are people just like you and I. They buy houses, cars, and vacations. Like you and I, they want a great deal. One way to repackage your price point is to give something for free (tied to a purchase date) that clients value highly (e.g., sell an 18-month maintenance agreement for a 12-month price or give them something for free).

Selling has never been easy. Complicated by the worldwide changes economically, successful firms need to modify their corporate business model to maximize revenue. These eight suggestions should help.

To YOUR Revenue Success!

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

6 Action Steps CEOs Can Take to Grow Their Business Right Now

July 16th, 2012 Posted in Newsletter | No Comments »

July 15, 2012

Welcome,

In this issue, we talk about taking responsibility for growing your company. I look forward to your comments.

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

_______________________________________________________________________

6 Action Steps CEOs Can Take to Grow Their Business Right Now

by Paul DiModica

Recently, I chatted with a CEO of a privately-held $70M VC-funded software company from Silicon Valley about his company’s inability to grow top line revenues at an accelerated rate. His investors were going crazy because he was missing his investment milestones and were demanding performance. The CEO was concerned that his VC contract ratchet clauses would be activated and he would lose larger portions of equity if he did not execute fast.

The high tech CEO went on to blast the U.S. economy and President Obama as the root cause of his firm’s inability to grow business. His VP of sales, VP of marketing and VP of operations all said it was the economy — what do we do?

He had hoped that the economy would get better and his company would return to the growth rate of previous years. As our conversation continued, the CEO discussed multiple new business opportunities he was considering that he had hoped would energize his current business success. As we talked, he went on to describe nine new business market directions he wanted to activate simultaneously that might super-size his revenue.

Being an entrepreneur myself, having started three companies, and having worked with VCs and investors, his concern is legitimate but his action steps to resolve his company’s inability to grow were misguided.

Here is what I advised the CEO:

1. Stop blaming the economy. It is not going to get any better. Regardless of your political persuasion and who wins the White House next year, the worldwide economy is not going to get much better for at least 2 years . . . and maybe as many as 5 years.
2. Hope is not a strategy. Waiting around for someone else to adjust your success makes no sense. You are the CEO — execution is the key to success. Take action now!
3. Growing your business is a premeditated step-by-step process. Where do you get your strategy from? Are you making it up as you go? Are you asking your executive team for input (and are they the same team that put you where you are now)? Learn how to grow your business, don’t assume it just happens.
4. Money hides mistakes. Prior to today’s current recession, some companies floated along having year-over-year success just hanging on. However, today’s recession has exposed many companies’ business model weaknesses because they must execute well to stay viable in today’s economic environment.
5. Focus on Strategic CEO Productivity®. For CEOs, it is not just time management. It is the process of managing your business and personal time more effectively — focus on reaching researched objectives based on best practices and market gap analysis on business goals. Trying to do everything simultaneously does not increase your success or your life satisfaction.
6. As a CEO, you need to work less to earn more. When implementing the Value Forward 360° Business Success Assessment and Recommendations Program with CEOs, we often find that they are working 60, 70 or 80 hours a week. This time allocation to their business often reduces their business growth potential because their business is managing them - instead of them managing it.

So, if you are a CEO seeking to accelerate your business success in this crazy economy, focus on these six action steps and your business will succeed.

It is not what you say, want or desire . . . it is always what you do! In this economy, you must hunt now . . . or be eaten later!

To YOUR Revenue Success!

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

Is Marketing a Strategic Contradiction?

June 30th, 2012 Posted in Newsletter | No Comments »

June 30, 2012

Welcome,

In this issue, we discuss marketing as a business tool and its function to increase revenue. I look forward to your comments.

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect & CEO

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

www.bpistrategy.com

==============================================

Is Marketing a Strategic Contradiction?

by Paul DiModica

Is marketing a staff position designed to support the sales team or the marketing department’s own agenda?

Is marketing a line position responsible for creating corporate revenue?

Should corporate management cut back on marketing investments and just hire more salespeople?

All of these questions are asked by executive management on a monthly basis. We all know that we need marketing, but do marketing investments help salespeople or do they fail to deliver strategic help?

Marketing Investments Should Increase Revenue.

The goal of marketing investments should be to help salespeople sell more. Here is a Marketing Success Test based on independent research of approaches that work in today’s market.

Marketing Success Test

1. Does your marketing create at least 3 qualified leads per month for each salesperson?

___Yes ___No

2. Does brand marketing have higher budget allocation in your company than lead generation for your sales team?___Yes ___No

3. Do you create documented inbound leads from your web site every month?___Yes ___No

4. Do you know what your Customer Conversion Ratio (CCR) is from your web site leads (i.e., unique visitors per day that become sales leads)?___Yes ___No

5. Do you have weekly electronic marketing devices for customers and prospects (i.e., eNewsletters, email offerings, etc.)?___Yes ___No

6. Do you calculate marketing ROI for each marketing investment?___Yes ___No

7. Is your print material budget greater than your lead generation budget?___Yes ___No

8. Have you redesigned your web site during the last 12 months?___Yes ___No

9. Do you have interactive business-to-business offerings (i.e., downloadable white papers, sign-ups for webinars, etc.) for new prospects and existing customers on your web site?
___Yes ___No

10. Has your marketing department gone on sales calls to new prospects with the sales team during the last 12 months?___Yes ___No

Correct Answers:

1. Yes 2. No 3. Yes 4. Yes 5. Yes

6. Yes 7. No 8. Yes 9. Yes 10. Yes

Each correct answer is worth 10%.

“Marketing is not brochures, brand advertising or attending trade shows. Marketing is creating revenue or it is a wasted investment.”

To your Revenue Success!

Walter Wise

Business Success Architect & CEO

The BPI Strategy Group

617-532-0918

www.bpistrategy.com

6 CEO Success Scorecard Attributes Needed To Grow Revenue

June 15th, 2012 Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

June 15, 2012

Welcome!

This week’s article is entitled “6 CEO Success Scorecard Attributes Needed to Grow Revenue” In this blog post, we talk about areas you should manage monthly. I welcome your comments.

Walter Wise
Business Success Architect
The BPI Strategy Group
617-532-0918

______________________________________________________

6 CEO Success Scorecard Attributes Needed To Grow Revenue

by Paul DiModica

When coaching CEOs to increase corporate performance, we holistically assess our client’s business and look for operational gaps and best practices usage in the company’s management, operations, marketing, sales, strategy and financial management approaches to help them maximize their year over year growth.

Through our advisement programs, we assess their current financial position and compare their P and L’s (profit and loss reports) against their competitors from our proprietary database of financials submitted by over 50,000 CPAs. Using this analytical methodology, we have identified six specific business benchmarks that we use to chart our client’s current position as compared to their unique industry and that is used as a CEO success scorecard.

If you are looking to grow your business’ metrics is a key business driver. If you are trying to succeed in a down economy, then your action steps must be proactive, not reactive.

Are you managing your company by business and financial metrics? Is your management team knowledgeable about your industry or are they just ambivalent?

6 Scorecard Areas You Should Manage Monthly

FINANCIAL LIQUIDITY

Measures your ability to meet daily financial obligations and includes:

• Inventory (or staff bench utilization rate) in stock in days
• Account Receivable in days
• Accounts Payables in days

PROFITS & PROFIT MARGIN

Are profitability trends favorable in the company?

• Gross Profit Margin
• Net Profit Margin
• Advertising Cost to Sales
• Rent to Sales
• Payroll Percent to Sales
• Operating Cash Flow Margin

SALES

Are sales growing?

• Sales Year Over Year Growth
• Sales by Product Year to Year
• Sales by Services Year to Year

BORROWING CAPACITY

Is the company borrowing profitably?

• Interest Coverage Ratio
• Debt to Equity Ratio
• Debt Leverage Ratio

CORPORATE ASSETS USAGE

Is the company using gross fixed assets effectively?

• Return on equity
• Return on assets
• Fixed asset turnover

EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE

Is the company hiring effectively?

• Revenue per employee
• Employee turnover by department
• Profit per employee

Each one of these assessment areas should be placed into a monthly scorecard that gives you month to month and year to year comparisons. If your CFO or accountant does not do it, find someone who will.

Growth can be attained for those who manage metrically, those who don’t will get the same results that they got last year . . . and may not be around next year.

To Your Revenue Capture Success,

Walter Wise
Business Success Architect
The BPI Strategy Group
617-532-0918