Selling Boldly thoughts and guidance from my current client work:

• If you are the leader of your organization, and you are trying to create new mindsets and behaviors — for example, a Selling Boldly proactive growth initiative — you must lead this effort personally. Owners and CEOs cannot make lasting changes at arm’s length. All you’re doing is communicating to your team that this initiative is not quite important enough to you to get involved personally. Permanent corporate change cannot be delegated, it must be visibly led by the top executive.

• This is not to say that vice presidents, managers, and administrators should not be the main implementers of the effort. They should lead their teams through the work that sales growth requires, but the chief executive should be out front as the chief cheerleader.

• A phone call is always better than email, every single time. A phone call makes you permanently memorable, while an email is highly unlikely to get a response. An email also has less than 50-50 odds of even being seen by your recipient, because it’s in there with the junk for bad retailers and African princes. That’s where you voluntarily place your sales effort when you email.

• If you have a cell phone number, use it. If your prospect lists a cell phone in their email signature, call it. Text it. If a cell phone appears anywhere, it’s an invitation to use it. In 2023, business gets done on cell phones much more than on landlines.

• Always leave a voice mail, otherwise, how can your customers know you tried to help them? That you thought about them? That you cared enough to call?

• Always send a text message after your voicemail, and ask your customers when they’d like to talk. This post-voicemail text will revolutionize your sales. Why? Because we know that this combo communication leads to two out of three people getting back to you. And two-thirds of those will do it by text message. Don’t hobble your sales effort by shying away from the text message.

If you would like to discuss adding 20 to 30% predictable sales growth at your organization, please reply to this email or call me directly at 847-459-6322.