There is nothing more frustrating as a business leader then to focus all of your efforts on revenue growth only to see your hard work have little impact on the top line. It’s a kick in the gut.
Over the last half decade of business, we’ve been introduced to a wide number of new business tactics to help us achieve revenue growth.
Social media. E-mail marketing. Online webinars. Demand generation tools. SEO optimization. These are just a few of the tactics that experts tell you you need to be doing in order to achieve growth.
And it stands to reason that you have tried some, if not all, of these tactics.
And you’re still not getting the results that you want.
Despite the 60-minute webinar you sat through describing the growth opportunities and the market traction that you should experience, you’re not seeing or experiencing anything close. Frankly, it seems harder than ever to generate the same amount of revenue you generated last year.
And you know that has very little to do with the economy, either. The same clients you serviced a year ago are still in business today — at least, most of them. In fact, new companies have sprung up in your space, presenting new opportunities for revenue growth.
So why aren’t you achieving success? Why is it such a struggle to grow revenue in meaningful ways?
The secret behind sales growth is very simple, but very often misunderstood. Business growth has little to do with what you actually do and more to do with how you do what you do.
In less confusing language you might say that attitude is much more important than actions.
Actions do matter.
Lack of actions matter. You can’t just sit around learning or thinking of ideas and expect to achieve real success. You have to do something. You have to do a lot of somethings.
But chances are, you’re already doing something. And you are probably already doing most of what is important for sales growth. You have a sales team and sales process and some sort of training program to help the new guys be as effective as the guys who have been there the longest.
As crude as your processes might be, it is safe to say that they work. At some level, you are achieving success. Not the level of success that you want or expect or need, but you are getting some results.
The way to improve is to focus on attitudes that drive better actions.
You have to start thinking differently.
Instead of hiring a sales trainer to help you optimize a process that is mostly good-enough, spend your time inspiring your employees. Teach your team how to be memorable and delightful for customers.
Focus on the customer experience instead of the sales person’s closing ratio.
What quickly begins to happen is that your sales process improves. Your customer relationships improve. Your sales people improve. Your employees improve.
Your company improves:
- Instead of “doing marketing” you build relationships with people that matter.
- Instead of “doing SEO” you are on a mission to share your help with anyone and everyone.
- Instead of “doing webinars” you take time to care about the people in your industry.
- Instead of “doing e-mail marketing” you are informative and generous with inside information.
And while what you are doing might look like what everyone else is doing, the secret to your success is not the actions that you’re actually doing.
It is the attitude that drives your behavior.
The next time you are tempted to copy-and-paste the latest sales and marketing growth tactic from industry experts, take a moment and ask yourself: “What is really going on?”
Usually, success has little to do with what it appears to be at first glance.
It has everything to do with the attitudes and intentions and motivations that drive your behaviors. Just doing more is what got you into trouble in the first place. It’s time to get serious about real growth.
Care more. You’ll fix your business problems.
