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Be Less Busy

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by Patty Azzarello

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Chances are, you have no extra time.

A few weeks ago I wrote a post called
WHEN do you think? about the importance of giving yourself time to think strategically.

As we begin the new year, it’s a great time to spend time thinking and planning how to make this year better than the last one — in your work and in your life.

As a leader, it’s critical to not just get the work done, but to make sure that you and your team are more capable next year.

If you don’t grow capability, you get stuck.

Your main job as a leader is to build a highly capable team beneath you so that you free yourself up to solve higher order problems.

You need to always be finding new ways to add value to the business.

But to do that requires you to make sure you have time to do the longer term tasks that build value and capability — things that will create a meaningful, strategic difference.

Some examples:

This year…

  • How will we improve our ability to get customer references?
  • How will we deliver more quickly or at less cost?
  • What new process will improve our quality?
  • What new behaviors will eliminate chaos in our business and create more time?
  • How will we learn more about our customers really care about?
  • What new way of serving customers will differentiate us from our competition?

To work at this level requires time.

If you have no time, YOU need to make yourself less busy.

Here are a few realities to consider. I call this my Over-busy Manifesto.

The Over Busy Manifesto

No one other than YOU has any motivation whatsoever to make you less busy. Your boss, your peers and your team only benefit from your endless work output.

If you are overwhelmed by the activities of your job you are not ready for a bigger one.

The most successful people were not the ones who were less busy along the way, they figured out how to rise above it.

The Hard (but important part)

No one will ever give you permission to be less busy. It can feel scary to stop appearing really busy if you associate your value with the amount of time you spend working.

Just know that it’s not the “work” that matters, it’s the outcomes you deliver. You don’t win the game for running up and down the court, it’s the points on the board that count.

Refuse to burn all your time up on things that are not so important.

Trust that giving yourself time to think will help you find ways to deliver higher value business outcomes, and get the right work done in less time.

People will see you delivering real value, getting smarter and faster, making strategic advances — not just working really hard. It will get less scary.

My New Book

I wanted to give people a useful framework to take more control of their success.

The book is filled with big insights and practical things you can do right away that make all the difference between getting ahead and just working really hard.

You can get the book or take a look at the reviews on Amazon, and here is a short video of me talking about what’s in it.

Please share this with anyone whose career you care about.
Thanks!

—–
Patty Azzarello works with executives where leadership and business challenges meet. She has held leadership roles in General Management, Marketing, Software Product Development and Sales, and has been successful in running large and small businesses. She writes at Patty Azzarello’s Business Leadership Blog. You’ll find her on Twitter as @PattyAzzarello

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What “Julie and Julia” Taught Me About Reaching Goals

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By Terez Howard

During a recent night of Netflix searching, my husband and I watched the movie Julie and Julia. This film, from 2009, intertwined the story of cooking sensation Julia Child with Julie Powell, a blogger who challenged herself to cook every recipe in Julia’s first book and record her experiences in a blog. This true life adventure helped me realize a key to reaching goals.

One pivotal scene is the movie is when Julie decisively commits to this cooking/blogging challenge. She announces her decision to her husband, Eric, and says that if she does not give herself a deadline, she will not complete that immense task. One year for 524 recipes.

Give yourself a deadline

When I worked for the newspaper, deadline was a word I heard daily. “Will it be ready by deadline?” “We have to meet deadline.” “Maybe we can extend the deadline a little for this breaking news.” “It’s too late; it’s after deadline.” The deadline dictated what would make the daily news.

With a blog, it’s hardly a necessity to make your content stick to a strict 10:30 a.m. deadline. However, there are benefits to establishing a blogging schedule.

A deadline means more than just the time your posts appear for public viewing. A deadline gives your goal or goals a point of fruition.

Let me illustrate it this way. Let’s say that I want to start integrating video into my blog. I would give myself a week to research and purchase a video recording device and another week to shoot two to four videos. I would allot myself two to three hours per day per video to make my own edits. Then I would spend a day posting the videos and another week to fiercely promote them.

Know this, I’ve not yet put video on my blog. But this rough sketch gives me the idea that it would take me a good month to get a few decent video posts published. My time allocations fit my schedule. They might seem drastically long to you or perhaps not long enough. However, only I know what I can handle.

The same goes for you. You know what you are capable of achieving and how long it will take you.

Light a fire

Do you need to light a fire under yourself? Make your deadlines tighter and stick to them.Give yourself one week to get high quality video on your blog.

At the same time, be realistic.If you work a full-time 40-hour week, such a task might be insurmountable in such a short period.Give yourself necessary leeway, not excuses.

And please, don’t decide to do something by the end of 2011. That’s too general. If you’re going to be that general, make several short-term goals and deadlines along the way.

A new year, a new deadline

Most people look at the start of the new year as a fresh start. Challenge yourself by setting a deadline to just one goal. It could be for your blog, for your weight, for your family, or something else. Whatever it is, treat it like you were a reporter at a newspaper. It is urgent. With no deadline, there will be no news.

Tell me, what is your goal? What is your deadline, and how will you achieve it?

—
Terez Howard operates TheWriteBloggers, a professional blogging service which builds clients’ authority status and net visibility. She has written informative pieces for newspapers, online magazines and blogs, both big and small. She regularly blogs at Freelance Writing Mamas . You’ll find her on Twitter @thewriteblogger.

Thanks, Terez!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

Social Media & Blogging-Panel of Questions (Part 3)

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A Weekly Series by Teresa Morrow

I’m Teresa Morrow, Founder of Key Business Partners, LLC and I work with authors to help manage their social media marketing & promotion. As part of my job I read a lot of books (and I love to read anyway!). I am here to offer a weekly post about one book author I am working with and one book I have put on my reading list.

I am mixing things up (again! – you can read part 1 and part 2) for my weekly blog post . I thought I would ask a few of the authors I have highlighted to offer their strategies and tips regarding blogging and social media.

Panel Discussion about Blogging and Social Media

Here are the authors offering their own insights and strategies regarding blogging and social media:
Kimberly Wiefling – Executive Editor of the Scrappy About Series, is a proven expert in enabling people to achieve what seems impossible, but is merely difficult. She is the author of one of the top project management books in the US,”Scrappy Project Management: The 12 Predictable and Avoidable Pitfalls Every Project Faces, a book growing in popularity around the world, and recently published in Japanese by Nikkei Business Press. And the newest in the Scrappy About series, Scrappy Women in Business.

She founded Wiefling Consulting, LLC, a global leadership and business management consulting firm, in 2001. She currently spends about half of her time working with high-potential leaders in Japanese companies as the Executive Director for ALC Education’s Global Management Consulting Group, an organization based in Tokyo, Japan. Her work includes facilitating leadership, communication, teamwork, innovation and execution excellence workshops to enable Japanese companies to solve global problems profitably.

Miranda Marquit is a blogger and freelance writer working from home. She has five years experience in the blogging and social media space, mainly providing content and support for corporate blogs. Miranda understands the importance of blogging and social media in online marketing and community building, and enjoys interacting and networking via the Internet.

In addition to professional blogging, Miranda is a freelance writer with a Journalism degree. Her work has appeared in national magazines and on news Web sites. She is also a columnist for her local newspaper. Miranda enjoys reading, music, travel, and the outdoors. Her favorite activities involve using her hobbies as a way to spend time with her husband and their six-year-old son. Miranda lives with her family in Logan, Utah. She is the co-author of Community 101: How to Grow an Online Community.

Karen Pierce Gonzalez
Since 2000, Karen Pierce Gonzalez Public Relations has provided public relations services for businesses, non-profits, art and culture organizations and individual professionals locally, regionally and nationally. Founder and president Karen Pierce Gonzalez has twenty-five years experience in the media having worked as a journalist for such media as the San Francisco Chronicle, Marin Independent Journal, and Point Reyes Light, newspapers as well a numerous local and national magazines, including North Bay Biz and Australian Trade Community Journal. She knows what makes the news and what does not.

Karen specializes in identifying newsworthy angles about her clients’ events and activities and obtaining news coverage from appropriate media outlets. She also helps clients maximize their advertising budgets by developing media sponsorships. She works with clients to utilize these sponsorships to generate the community support of businesses and other groups.

She earned Bachelor of Arts degrees in anthropology linguistics and in creative writing from Sonoma State University. A published fiction and non-fiction writer with numerous awards to her credit including a 2006 Pushcart Prize nomination, 2006 Editors’ Choice Farmhouse Magazine, 2005 National League of American Pen Women award for fiction, 2004 National League of American Pen Woman award for creative nonfiction, and 2002 California Writers award for nonfiction, she is also the author of “Family Folktales: Write Your Own Family Stories” and is CEO/Publisher of FolkHeart Press.

Here is what they have to say about blogging and social media:

How long have you been blogging?

KW: I started blogging in Sept. 2006 when I helped co-found the first university-affiliated blog on project management: http://svprojectmanagement.com/author/kwiefling And I started my own blog in January 2008 when I had a new year’s resolution to expand my business using the internet. I now also write for several other blogs once every 2 – 3 months: Career Shorts, Whole Life Well Being and Project Connections

MM: 5 years

KPG: Five years.

What subjects do you cover with your blog?
KW: Business leadership
Global business leadership
Project management
Program management
Well being
Breakthrough thinking
Personal and professional development

MM: Mostly personal finance

KPG: Folkheart Press covers folklore-related topics (folk art, food lore, folktales, folk festivals, etc.)

Why do you blog?
KW: I love to write, and I learn when I write. And I believe it makes me more well known, which increases my value to my clients and my agents.

MM: I enjoy writing. Plus, it’s my job — I’m a professional blogger!

KPG: It is a way to introduce others to the world of folklore and to Folkheart Press. In today’s cyberspace world, it is important to have a presence.

What is the one blogging tip you have to share with others?
KW: Write about topics about which you have personal knowledge and experience, and keep the tone conversational and authentic. Don’t write a newspaper article style blog!

MM: Write about something you enjoy.

KPG: Make the blogs fun and brief. No one expects to read a novel when they visit a blog.

How long have you been using social media (twitter, facebook, linkedin) for your business?

KW: About 3 years

MM: 4 years

KPG Five years.

When it comes to social media— do you prefer one platform over the others?( facebook, twitter or linked in)
KW: I use Twitter to update my personal and professional connections about my status. This pushes automatically to Facebook, Plaxo and LinkedIn.
I use Facebook Fan page for Scrappy Women in Business book, and updates push to a Twitter account that I have linked to that.

MM: I actually really like fwisp, a social media niche site devoted to finance. I do like using Facebook and Twitter, though.

KPG: Facebook

Why do you like one of the others?
KW: Twitter is quick and easy, and seems to be the micro-blogging platform of choice. I can also monitor mentions of my key words on Twitter using Social Oomph.
Facebook is “cool”. Linked In is more business serious, but that’s not my style. And Plaxo is not a player really.

MM: I like fwisp because it has good spam controls, and it offers a range of stories in the personal finance blogosphere. Finding good social media communities in your niche is, I think, important.

KPG: Facebook allows for website link images which adds value to the posting.

What is one social media tip you have to share with others?

KW: Keep in mind that your life isn’t nearly as interesting to other people as you might think. Choose what you share with that in mind lest you be one of the people we make fun of for tweeting “My cat rolled over.” or other trivia.

MM: Choose a few social media communities and focus on those. Don’t try to build a good account at every site or group ; you’ll never be able keep up with it all.

KPG: Be informative and don’t sell, sell, sell. It’s annoying.

Thanks ladies for these great, helpful tips and for sharing your strategies about blogging and social media.
And if you have tips and resources that help you, please add to the discussion.

Cool Tool Review: FairShare

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Todd Hoskins chooses and uses tools, products, and practices that could belong in an entrepreneurial business toolkit. He’ll be checking out how useful they are to folks in a business environment.

Cool Tool Review: FairShare
A Review by Todd Hoskins

This is a good time to emphasize that tools in themselves are neither good nor valuable. It all depends on how you use them.

FairShare is a product from Attributor, a company that has been very important within the online publishing industry. Attributor works with publishers to help protect licensing rights across the web. They index the web and compare billions of content bytes with the content you publish to find the plagiarizers, copycats, and seedy content (re-)generators that proliferate across the web. This is a wonderful and valuable service to diminish the number of splogs and opportunists that are seeking clicks for cash.

If you blog or regularly produce valuable content (Bravo!, no matter what business you are in!), FairShare will find where your content is being reproduced and whether the correct attributions are being made. Simply state what license exists with your content (or no license at all), set up a feed, and let FairShare feed back to you the other places where complete or partial content matches are occurring.

It’s a tricky question what, if any, license to pursue. If you get a FairShare account for your copyright attorney, I must ask the question, “Are you making the Internet a more democratic and free space?” I favor defaulting to the Commons – allowing your content to be reused with limited, chosen restrictions. We looked at Creative Commons months ago. Also, I recommend this book that gives you a historical perspective.

FairShare also offers a WordPress plugin and widget that are great ways to let it be known that you encourage people to use your content (perhaps with a link).

What if you find your content elsewhere (and you likely will)? The digital tap on the shoulder is recommended: “Hey, I see you liked what I had written. Tell me why you saw it as valuable? Would you mind linking back to me?”

You may make some friends, find some customers or partners. Even if you don’t, you’ll be contributing to a more civil and self-policed web.

Summing Up – Is it worth it?

Enterprise Value: 4/5 – Please make friends, not enemies

Entrepreneur Value: 4/5 – Did I mention it is free?

Personal Value: 3/5 – Don’t publish your poetry without it

Let me know what you think!

Todd Hoskins helps small and medium sized businesses plan for the future, and execute in the present. With a background in sales, marketing, leadership, psychology, coaching, and technology, he works with executives to help create thriving individuals and organizations through developing and clarifying values, strategies, and tactics. You can learn more at VisualCV, or contact him on Twitter.

Social Media Book List: Scrappy General Management and Implementing Word of Mouth Marketing

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A Weekly Series by Teresa Morrow

I’m Teresa Morrow, Founder of Key Business Partners, LLC and I work with authors by managing their book promotion and social media marketing. As part of my job I read a lot of books (I love to read anyway!).

This week I will be highlighting two books; one author I am currently working with ‘Scrappy General Management’ by Michael Horton and one book on the social media Amazon list ‘Word of Mouth Marketing’ by Idil M. Cakim.

The books I discuss in the Social Media Book List Series will cover a range of topics such as social media, marketing, blogging, business, organization, career building, finance, networking, writing, self development, and inspiration.

‘Scrappy General Management: Common Sense Practices to Avoid Calamities, Catastrophies, and Lackluster Results’

by Michael Horton

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I would first like to share with you an excerpt from the Author’s Note ( I believe it is very telling and reflects the point of the book).

So why this book? When I started in the GM role, I had little idea ofwhat a GM was meant to do. The title does give you a good hint as to what’s required; kind of like General Electric tells you the company has something to do with electricity. But one thing’s for sure, I couldn’t ask my boss, as I’d just spent a good deal of time convincing him that I knew what I was doing so that I could get the job.

While there is a plethora of literature on the different aspects of leadership, management, and marketing, it is rarely brought together in a useful form. A wise person once said, “There is no such thing as coincidence.” If something works once, and you understand the how’s and why’s, there’s a damn good chance you can get it to work again. And if the concept also happens by some stroke of luck to agree with some sort of academic theory, then by classic triangulation you have something that perhaps is worth documenting.

It doesn’t matter if you’re working in good times or bad, at the end of the day solid, common-sense management practice will serve you and your team well and allow you to achieve the results that you deserve. So enjoy the book, and I hope it helps you avoid calamities and produce results that are far from “lackluster.”

“Practical advice from a leader who has ‘been there!’ What is better than learning from experience? Learning from someone else’s experience—get Scrappy!”
–Marshall Goldsmith, Author of The New York Times bestsellers MOJO and What Got You Here Won’t Get You There

About the Book*:

Ok, you’re the boss now, not of a section, or the team of a particular function — but of the whole shooting match, end to end. You are the business’s general manager and the staff looks to you for their livelihoods (yes you). So you have to strategize, sell, supply and service, collect the cash, provision, train and motivate your people, delight your clients and at the end of the day, return a profit to the business owners. So where the hell do you start? How do you know that you’re not neglecting any aspect that will bite you on the bum later?

Don’t stress, it’s not all that hard and it can be an extremely enjoyable and rewarding process. This book will provide you with the 7 common sense and repeatable steps that will guide you through running a business that everyone will be proud to be associated with.

The intended reader is someone moving up from middle management — or running their own business. The book is aimed to provide an easy to follow road map that will give some comfort and order amid the chaos of information and expectations…Helping with the ‘what do I do next?’ question that no-one wants to ask for the fear of appearing that they’re not up to it.

About Michael*:

Michael Horton is Vice President for the Australian Chemical, Energy, and Natural Resources division of Computer Sciences Corporation (CSC), with responsibility for annual revenues of $360 million and a matrix responsibility for 2,000 people. Michael has 28 years experience in the Information Technology Industry, 21 years of that in a management capacity and has been employed at CSC since 1994. During his time at CSC, he has held senior management positions in Western Australia, Victoria and New South Wales, Australia. Since 2000 he has also completed challenging assignments based in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Maidstone in the UK and San Diego, USA.

Michael holds an Associate Diploma in Applied Science from Edith Cowan University in Western Australia, a Master of IT Management from Charles Sturt University in New South Wales and is Project Management Institute (PMI) certified. He is married, with two teenage children and enjoys surfing, sailing and holidaying at every opportunity.

You can purchase a copy of ‘Scrappy about General Management: Common Sense Practices to Avoid Calamities, Catastrophes and Lackluster Results’ online on the publisher site, Happy About or on Amazon.*I did receive a copy of this book from the publisher to help in the promotion of the book

Next, I would like to introduce you to a book on the social media list on Amazon and on my reading list: ‘Word of Mouth Marketing’.

Implementing Word of Mouth Marketing: Online Strategies to Identify Influencers, Craft Stories, and Draw Customers

by Idil M. Cakim

“Cakim gets it—and always has! Great word of mouth starts with basics like product quality and customer service. Her book is a treasure trove of ‘get started now’ suggestions on how to better serve consumers, and their most genuine, authentic, and meaningful stories.”
—Pete Blackshaw, Executive Vice President, Digital Strategic Services, Nielsen Online

About the Book*

Learn to capitalize on online word of mouth, leverage its power, and measure results of your initiatives

Savvy, strategic, and right on time, Implementing Word of Mouth Marketing is the essential guide for any company or organization needing to understand the dynamics of online word of mouth. This powerful book will coach you to identify your own set of online influencers, craft the stories that will resonate with your consumers, and spread messages through cybercitizens who are social media experts.

* Guides you to identify and engage your online influencers to manage your reputation, promote your brands, and sell your products
* Reveals how word of mouth disperses online
* Explores strategies for your organization to engage its online advocates, tap into networks, and to mobilize the masses
* Explains how to design online word of mouth campaigns
* Includes measurement tools to gauge the impact word of mouth campaigns

Filled with case studies, research, and check lists, this invaluable guide will definitively show you how to leverage the power of online advocates to pass along stories, deliver recommendations, and draw people to purchasing points.

About Idil M. Cakim*:

Idil M. Cakim is Vice President of Inter-active Media at GolinHarris, a global public relations firm. She served on the board of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association, whose members include Dell, Microsoft, Hilton, Amway Global, and the AARP. She regularly publishes articles in business magazines and trade publications on social media and word- of-mouth strategies and has been quoted as an expert in online communications in the New York Times, the Financial Times, Harvard Business Review, CNet News, the Chicago Tribune, and other media.

*courtesy of book website and Amazon

You can purchase a copy of ‘Implementing Word of Mouth Marketing’ on Amazon.

I truly hope you will check out these books and please comment and let me know your thoughts on them.

How to Avoid Using PowerPoint in 5 Easy Steps

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A Guest Post by Scott P. Dailey

You’re losing business because your presentation sucks, not because your fee is too high or someone else is smarter, more creative or more accomplished. You’re going in scared that you won’t compete and that same fear drove your preparedness and your crappy presentation.

… I’ll explain in a minute, but for now, wanna see 200 photographs of my recent business trip to Indianapolis? It’s loaded with killer shots of the thoroughly unremarkable office building I worked from. No? OK. Well what about video of surgeons removing the deceased section of my sigmoid colon? No!? Man, you’re tough to please. Oh I got it! How about I talk to you for an hour about how awesome my six-year-old son is at soccer? …

Seriously. How many of you are remotely interested in any of these topics, let alone eager to view, watch or listen to me carry on about them for an hour?

Now to be fair, maybe if some of my readers work in Indianapolis, they may take an interest in my trip to their fine city. They may, for instance, want to know where I stayed, or if given the right time of year, had I taken the time to catch a Colts or Pacers game. Maybe some among you have also been diagnosed with chronic diverticulitis and like me, had to have abdominal surgery to remove a damaged part of your colon. I bet that segment would want to engage me, if only to relate their experiences to mine. Or possibly your child rocks on the soccer field too and you’re dying to ask what position my son plays, so that you can tell of your child scoring the winning goal as time expired.

So what I’m getting at is that if I’m not able to relate on a visceral level that reflects directly on what’s important to me personally, I’m not likely to care very much about what you want to share with me.

If we know this and somewhere deep down most of us do, why then would we care about your long-winded, one-way presentation? Or an over-detailed dominating PowerPoint presentation?

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These pitches, sadly often aren’t about the prospect at all. It’s about what you think of your ability to do a thing or even worse, all things. It is nothing more than what your prospect sees all the time from potential vendors: an overtly talkative brochure, peppered with gratuitous look-at-me platitudes. But what specifically is it doing apart from forcing people to pretend to be enthusiastic about you purely because they’re trapped in a room with you?

Reinvent the presentation experience

In which of your 100 slides do you get me emotional? I ask because that’s actually where I want your presentation to begin. Flip to that slide right now and please begin. I’m listening. Oh your presentation doesn’t have a slide that stirs me? Well in that case, here’s your hat, there’s the door and have a nice day.

Everyone has an unnecessarily verbose and egocentric PowerPoint. I know of no capabilities presentation that is ever justified in being as long as it is. The problem with most of them are that they’re authored by our fear of failure, not our ability to solve the audience’s problems. And so I challenge you to be the anti-presenter! Be the salesperson who goes in there and kills it because fear of:

* leaving something out
* not being good enough
* not getting money

did not color your pitch. If you’re not going to win the business, lose it because you suck, not because your awful presentation messed you up. Here’s five things I do on sales calls that have helped me not lose the business.

  1. Never bring a presentation to a sales pitch.

    I bring a business card and the team that will steer the project and that’s it. If I’m responding to an RFP, my response honors (to the letter) the RFP guidelines and requirements. Nothing unsolicited is ever included. I never voluntarily talk about business needs nor present business solutions that fall outside the prospect’s requirements or curiosities.

  2. Research your prospect.

    I focus on key players and read up (on and offline) on what is available on each stake holder. I research their successes and failures and because what I do is Web related, I look at the BBB information, along with sentiment surrounding the company’s social and emotional footprint.

    It’s important to memorize these fundamentals because the people you’re meeting with are sure to be emotionally invested in the outcome of the gig, as well as their business in general. Exhibiting a good degree of knowledge out the door will help them see you more as an ally, then a vendor.

  3. Shut up.

    This one’s tough, because I yap a lot. But yes, I do shut up. I close my mouth and listen to the prospect talk about themselves. This is always the best of all available opportunities to sell yourself too because this is precisely the stage in the sales process where the prospect shows you their cards. If they’re talking about their stuff, you can be assured that they’re going to get excited talking about it.

    This is where many perfectly qualified vendors lose the business and never understand why they did. As the prospect is talking about their stuff, the manner with which they exhibit enthusiasm may be foreign when compared to the way you get excited. Doesn’t mean they’re not pumped. So don’t just match their enthusiasm or overdo it. Rather, replicate it using the tone and mood they’re using to convey it. Again, guide them toward seeing you as an ally, not a money-grubbing vendor. Be similar to them, not dissimilar.

  4. Ask Questions.

    Ask them questions that force them to talk more about the stuff that gets them excited. Try, when possible, to limit your questions to only those that relate to the topics they are most passionate about. If you’ve been doing great listening, then you already know what turns them on. Taking this specific action has won me more business and gotten me more jobs than any other sales method I use. And for the love of all things holy, be patient. The longer you wait to add your own anecdotes, the more you’ve got them telling theirs. The more they’re busy telling theirs, the more they’ll want to hear yours when your chance comes. Prematurely grasping for the microphone, or worse, snagging it before it’s been handed to you will kill any momentum you’ve been building in the previous steps. simply put: if you see what got ’em hot and bothered, well hell, sex sells! Make ’em talk about it more. Well done. No go cash some checks.

  5. Relate to them.

    Suggestion #5 is last on purpose. Offering anecdotes and casual social banter in the earliest stages of a pitch is a stupid decision. Imagine we’re at a party and you and your friends are conversing about the NFL. You’re a club. A clan. All equally vetted by the other. Now imagine I walk up to your group, unknown to you all, and dive head-long into a rant about the NY Jets losing their season opener. What are the odds you’ll dig me?

    Relating to the client is really all you’ve been doing to this point, but you’ve been the guy or gal humbly listening, eventually asking questions as you and your friends talk about pro football. After I have demonstrated my interest in you and most importantly, on your terms, you may then be ready to hear my take on a Jets loss.

    The time to crack jokes and secure social common ground isn’t when you first sit down. I’ve seen this over and over. Sure you’re a cool dude or chick. Sure you can slay ’em, but earn your seat at that table. Earn the right to be casual.

How do you relate with your prospects? How do you sell customers? Do you use a presentation? Does it work? What separates you from the thousands that do use a capabilities presentation?

—–

Scott P. Dailey is a Web designer, copywriter and network administrator. Recently Scott launched ( http://scottpdailey.com ), his social media blog that makes connections between social networking etiquette and the prevailing human social habits that drive on and offline business engagement patterns. You can connect with Scott via Twitter at @scottpdailey.

Creative Commons License photo credit: Geetesh Bajaj

Thanks, Scott!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz on your business!!

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