Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Success is Not Always Measured By Dollars

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

This month I presented my talk "Proposals" to a group of young entrepreneurs at the Etobicoke City Centre. "Proposals" is one of a collection of talks in my series " Business Communications for the Mature Professional ".

I anticipated 8 attendees, but 27 booked and 19 showed up.

The reviews were good.

The reward? The number of people scribbling notes as I spoke.

I am not the world's most successful business man, but I am good at thinking and reasoning and nutting out top-class first principles by which one can live.

The session finished at 9:30 and two hours after that I left the site. I gave away two extra hours of information for free, but was re-assured that my thinking for people migrating across the workforce is on-target.

Talk to Me !

Monday, August 30, 2010

Wavelength of a Business

I chatted yesterday with a colleague who works for a company that services the retail business.

How’s business? Oh, You know .... the words trail off.

His business reacts very quickly to the consumer mood.

If a wave of fear (or exhilaration) sweeps the nation, people stop buying cute clothes, shoes and handbags with a reaction time measured in days.

Jim can pick up the paper on Monday and watch the sales figures drop on Thursday. It doesn’t take long.

Me?

I get calls from people I’ve been chatting with for 2, 5 or in one case 15 years. My business is “keeping-in-touch” against the day when a firm needs my special-niche skills.

Wavelength is usually associated with sound or light, where a short wavelength means high-pitched and very bright.

In terms of revenue, wavelength refers to a gestation time.

Talk to Me !

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Access95ibility

So I’m wading through my contact list, phoning people who are “due for a call”, and the next call has a surprised Cindy on the line. “I was just thinking of you yesterday”.

I love those responses, sort of.

It’s great to hear that my call is timely, and the way is smoothed for a meeting.

But why didn’t she call me yesterday?

So what’s it about? It’s about something she mentioned 24 months ago, conversion of an old Access 95 database to Access 2007 standards.

I followed up 2 years ago, but the time was not right. I then assumed that she had worked out how to do it herself, or found someone else to do it. My fault for not following up.

But no, here I am, Mister foot-in-the-door.

And why?

Because I picked up the phone and called.

Friday, August 27, 2010

Success Comes from Growth and Nurture

The solo consultant can get lonely over the Christmas break, so last December I took action.

I emailed about 50 consultants known to me and invited them to The Traditional West-End Solopreneur Christmas Get-Together .

Seven showed up, which is good when you think of those who travel away to be with family, spend a week in Cuba or Aruba, or who are just too shagged out from partying to want to attend another.

We seven chatted for four hours, and took a closer look at each of ourselves (seven consultants seated at a round table, being asked in turn "So what do YOU do?" provides for a lively conversation).

I had no idea how many would show up, but am closer now to some of my colleagues than ever before, and all for the price of a small Caesar salad with grilled chicken, courtesy of The Montreal Deli .

In January I considered a variety of promotional schemes in a network of solo consultants and entrepreneurs.

Same thing - phoned and emailed 17, five showed up.

The result - three of us have formed a small and manageable compact to take action and see if we can't get this thing working. No critical mass of 10 to 15 required. Our small team is flexible and active.

If we get it working, we can extend invitations to join us, in our established and proven methods of promotion.

And yes, the three of us were all present at The Traditional West-End Solopreneur Christmas Get-Together !

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Why I Am Broke

Ari called yesterday, his template has stopped working. Must be a result of a Windows Update, no?

I Don’t Know

When you click “SEND” button it should fire up the macro “SendISR”. But nothing happens, bizarre! Looks like the template must be corrupt. I wish I had more time to work on this, look like fun trying to figure all of this out! Anyway, I tried opening up a new document importing the code. I then copied and pasted all the tables, same problem. I think I’m going to need a quote on the redevelopment of this form ASAP.

Ari is running Vista/2007 and I am not, but as usual, it’s not really the technology that’s the problem.

I take his code and examine it on my XP/2010 system; it appears to run OK (could use some cleanup through), so I suggest a test.

Take the old document version and the new template version and try them out on two other Vista/2007 machines in his office. That makes six tests altogether.

Think About it

If they work for Brenda and Carol but not for Ari, then the problem is likely with Ari’s system, not the templates.

If the document fails on all three systems but the template works on all three systems, then the problem is with the document.

And so on.

The Result?

“I think I’ve found a solution. I’ve just saved the document as a .docm, as opposed to a .dotm, and the command buttons work every time.”

My Response:

Well you just saved yourself a bundle of money AND time!

Congratulations!

Talk to Me !

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

The Prisoner of the Red Cabin

You have one near you, a “greasy spoon” burger joint. Mine is called, I think, The Red Cabin, on Dundas Street, corner of Aukland, right by Kipling subway station. Décor as it was when the building was erected back in the 1300s, the hinged seats sometimes have a hinge missing, the tables have laminated plastic somewhere under the layers of grease – but the food is worth it all, especially the breakfast.

I was in there last week on one of my rare days off, for a 30-minute sit-down breakfast of sausage and bacon and egg, toast & jam, endless refills of coffee, and the sausage and egg stayed hot until I got to them; most places they’d be cool to cold, but at The Red Cabin it’s magic – they are piping-hot for the entire meal.

My guess is that the guy behind the counter is the owner/manager. He has been there since I started eating there back in 1989. The waitress, too, I think she is a fixture.

“Good Morning”. Good morning. I deserve the world’s best breakfast. “Well you’ve come to the right place. Waddya want?”. Bacon, eggs, sausage, toast, jam, coffee (before I’ve even found a seat with unbroken hinges). How do you like your eggs? “Cooked”.

That’s it.

Five minutes later a perfect breakfast, friendly at-home at-ease service, rich coffee, forever. A great start to my day off with a rented car.

Then I started thinking about the guy behind the counter.

I think they are open seven days a week.

365 or perhaps 364 days a year.

That means that they guy behind the counter spends, let’s say, 12 hours a day, year in year out, in a narrow area about 12 feet long and 3 feet wide. On his feet.

He may be skimming cash, he may be making a small fortune, (but I bet it’s not millions of dollars), but he is in effect imprisoned in a cage smaller than a tiger’s cage, day in, day out, with never a trip downtown to meet a prospect, or a morning off to coffee with the girls (or guys).

I think of that more and more as I sit down each morning and pick up the phone to make calls.

How free I am.

What a wonderful job I have – phoning people and setting up appointments to meet and chat, outside of my home office.

I’m free. I’m FREE!

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Canada Post Goes Snoopy and Secretive

So off I go to buy one UK, one NZ and five AUS stamps for my overseas mailings. “They are all the same price. Seven?”

Yes please.

The seven $1.70 stamps are pushed across to me, then the clerk grabs one of my envelopes before I can protest and begins keying in from the return address portion.

What is going on?

Are Canada Post now keeping track of who uses their service to send messages overseas?

Apparently so

I’m old enough to protest, so I ask why the envelope is needed. “To give you the tax exemption”.

It’s like drawing teeth etc. but I finally get an explanation that can be coalesced into “You don’t have to pay the 13% H.S.T. if you are buying more than five stamps AND you have the envelopes with you.

Sounds a bit like the old donut scam when the GST came in. A donut is taxable because it is for consumption, but 6 or more are NOT taxable because they are groceries. Or the other way around.

So who ever heard of this latest exemption? Not my off-site accountant’s secretary – she buys the stamps. Not my canoeing buddy Fred, and HE walks to the post office in his lunchtime to do postage stuff.

Last Friday I bought a roll of stamps. I assume that there are 100, which at 57 cents should have been $57.00. Add 13% and you get $64.41. I’m not sure why I was charged $67.52, since all I got was the debit card receipt.

Moral: next time I buy a roll of stamps, I’m taking a stack of 99 blank envelopes and an addressed envelope and getting nearly $8.00 lopped off the price.

Talk to Me !




Monday, August 23, 2010

The More I Practice . . .

. . . the better I get.

I continue to process two, three or four press releases per day (when I get off my backside and actually DO it!), and I must tell you that it just gets easier.

“Dori”; what kind of a name is that?

I used to be hesitant to call not knowing the sex of my target, but now I realize that it all falls out.

I place the call, and reach a gatekeeper. “My name is Chris Greaves and I was wondering if I might speak with Dori Segal”.

“Just a minute and I’ll try that line” (although sometimes “Just a minute and I’ll try HIS line”). A pause and then . . .

“I’m sorry HE is in a meeting right now …”.

So there, I have learned something. It’s MISTER Dori Segal, and the usual follows “Do you know when he will be free? No? I’ll call back after lunch”.

The gatekeeper has written down my name, I’m sure, so after lunch I’ll be a known quantity.

Talk to Me !

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Freebies – do the Math!

A CNW press release tells the short story of a guest walking into a hotel and being checked-in by the President & CEO of the chain. Who, presumably, had been nursing a coffee in a wing-chair until the check-in counter ticked over to twenty million.

Not surprisingly the bewildered traveler received a few freebies - round-trip airfare for two; two-night stay for two … including all meals; Swedish massage for two; dinner for two; $250 Gift Card; tickets to one of Toronto's major live theatre shows and so on.

Apart from the air-fare my guess is about $300 per item, say $1,500; add the airfare and call it $2,000.

OK, you think I’m low-balling? Then double it, $4,000 or even triple it to $6,000.

Now estimate the revenue from 20,000,000 guests, including trickle-on such as payments from service businesses lodged on the hotel premises (percentage from the coffee shop, percentage from the gift shop etc) and how does it all stack up?

I’m guessing $500 per visitor (not knowing the length-of-stay), so say $10,000,000,000.

Now go back and double my cost of the freebies to $1,200.

It doesn’t really matter does it?

In fact, the freebies seem a bit cheap by comparison.

A two-week all-expenses paid stay in Paris (France!) at peak season would seem cheap alongside $10,000,000,000, whether it is $US or $CDN.

We are left with the question What is the value of the Press release?”.

I’m not sure.

Who (besides me) reads Canada News Wire? With this article, cub journalists looking for a space-filler? The editor of the North Bay NUGGET ?

When all is said and done, it seems like a drop-in-the-bucket for no visible return.

The loser seems to be the President & CEO of the chain, who had to set aside a half-day to chat with local managers while watching the taxis disgorge customers and drumming his fingers on the arms of the wing-chair.

Talk to Me !

Friday, August 20, 2010

Starting a CEO Newsletter 2/2

Nearly six months have passed since I decided to start a CEO newsletter ( Starting a CEO Newsletter 1/2 ) and while I have assembled eight monthly articles I’ve not yet actually produced, which is ridiculous because I have the machinery to issue copies on a regular basis to a table of email addresses etc etc..

Then yesterday Rick Shea’s inaugural newsletter arrived and put me to shame.

Rick’s newsletter is EXACTLY the style I’m aiming for, in terms of layout, content, color and so on, and to make it worse he talks about measurement and quantifiers, which is what I wanted to talk about.

To see what I mean you’ll have to send Rick an email and ask for the current issue. I promise you that you’ll enjoy the read.

And yes, I called Rick (416-469-9935) and scolded him for doing a better job than I could ever hope to do ...

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Found on the First Page!

Please see also Found! By the Search Engines .

I keep track with a Google search daily for the ranking of my Indxr.ca page.

Visit www.ChrisGreaves.com for this image! Indxr002.ca.jpg

I am still at number 9.

But now I appear “above the fold” (on my screen)

Either one of the top 8 has reduced their text or Google has abbreviated the text shown for one of the top 8.

I think this is the first time I’ve appeared on page one of search results, excepting for the trumped-up search which includes Chris Greaves, Vermicomposting, Beetroot and Etobicoke.

Talk to Me !

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Entrepreneur’s Day

Unlike Secretary’s day or Father’s day, Entrepreneur’s day comes twelve times a year.

Entrepreneur’s Day is the first Monday of every month. If that day is a public holiday, then it is the Tuesday.

Entrepreneur’s day need not take all day, but it is a day that we are prepared to devote to our own maintenance.

That means that you can assign that day to yourself RIGHT NOW!

I’ll wait while you pull out your diary and pencil through twelve Mondays with a diagonal line and “Entrepreneur’s Day”.

Good.

Now those days are assigned to a very important client – You! No other client can have those days. A polite request “Can you come in on the 4th” is met with a polite ‘I’m sorry – I am already booked that day”; they don’t need to know that you have booked yourself.

On Entrepreneur’s Day you can

  • Clear both your desks OR
  • File every piece of paper that is visible OR
  • Make a start on your paperwork for taxes OR
  • Empty the two bookcases of tools and cart them and the tools out of the office where you receive clients OR
  • Clean your windows OR . . .

If your business, like mine, involves hours spent sitting at the computer, then on Entrepreneur’s Day you do NOT do any computer work. Indeed, you start a major scan of your hard drives, unplug the keyboard, dis-assemble it and clean it.

If you are smart like me, you’ll work until 5 p.m. in old clothes, then take a shower, walk across the street, order a large 5-topping pizza, and spend the evening re-reading a John Grisham novel.

Monday, August 16, 2010

The "Getting Started” Problem

I spoke with two fellow-entrepreneurs this morning.

Both stated their greatest problem was “Getting Started”; their words.

In The Winning Goal for the Day I stated the idea of a single goal.

It seems even more significant now that I know I’m not the only one who suffers of end-of-day-remorse.

I need to ask myself what’s been getting me down more, Not issuing my CEO newsletter or not making 4 warm-calls per day to new prospects?

(Fill in two of your nagging worries here)

Whichever it is, THAT is the nagging worry that needs be tackled FIRST THING tomorrow.

Get that one thing wrapped up tomorrow, and you’ll feel better about yourself that night.

Bonus: Assign the day after that to the OTHER thing.

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Trigger Words

I am blessed with an accent, a left-over from my Australian days. That’s often enough to strike up a conversation and get things going.

But even without the accent, I have trigger words.

Domestic example: In the elevator on my way back from Bruno’s with a peach and four apricots, a gentlemen says “Hot, isn’t it?”.

The standard gambit.

“Humid”, I reply and when I lived in Australia and grew apricots they loved this heat, grew to be the size of peaches”, and away we go!

Start with a small set of trigger-words suited to your business and monitor which evoke the worst (null or dead-end) response. Drop them off the list.

After a new conversation, make a note of how it started. What were the trigger words? Add them to your list.

Now a casual conversation can remain just that, but you are shifting the odds in favor of generating a conversation that leads to a business opportunity.

Friday, August 13, 2010

Referrals – May WE Contact YOU?

Another great tip from Dan Sullivan of Strategic Coach.

He tells me that he issues a sheet of paper and asks attendees to draw five circles; in each circle they are to write the name of one of their colleagues who, they think, might benefit from Dan’s program

Then he asks if they’d mind writing THEIR name on the sheet of paper and handing it in.

Note that at this point we have six names, that’s all. No email addresses, no phone numbers, no incriminating information.

Of course Dan has your contact details.

The question is “May we contact YOU to discuss these colleagues with YOU”, not “May we contact your colleagues?”.

Spot the difference?



Who wants to subject one’s colleagues to a flurry of unsolicited sales calls? Not me.

Who would be willing to help Dan out with a bit of background information? Me!

During the follow-up call, the salesman already knows that each of the five names is a potential sale, and he also knows that each of he colleagues is probably a close fit to your profile.

It becomes quite easy then to build up a warm picture of each colleague, and the sales pitch, in the end, is ‘They seem like a good fit; may we contact them?”.

No contact has yet been made; all we have is permission to contact them at a later date.

Meanwhile you are most likely to contact them and tell them what has transpired, so they are pre-warned and pre-warmed when the follow-up call does arrive, and there’s little time waste din beating the bush for details; the essential stuff is already known.

I’ve not attended one of Dan’s seminars yet.

But I think I’ll register for his next freebie – in Toronto, ON September 15, 2010 8:30 a.m.–11:00 a.m.

Talk to Me!

Thursday, August 12, 2010

The Time-Based Ceiling

I was told ten years ago that the difference between a consultant and a contractor is that a contractor bills by the hour, a consultant by the day.

I believe that to be true.

I can sell my services at $110 per hour, or at $1,000 a day, and yes, the daily rate is better.

Here’s the catch: I have a fixed number of days left in my life.

If I billed out every day from now until then, there’d be an upper limit to my revenue, and I wouldn’t reach it until, quite literally, the day I die.

Even pay-by-day consultants at $2,500 per day have a time-based ceiling. Their maximum annual revenue cannot exceed one million dollars.

However, a solution-based service or product can easily exceed that ceiling. In fact, the sky is the limit.

When I package what I do in a day and sell it as a self-contained solution, I can sell it to multiple clients in one day.

If I can package my training material I can license it to other instructors, or charge a fee for a download from my web site.

Although it took me, say, seven days at $2,500 per day to develop the software product, I can sell it as a software package as many times as I like for $15,000. Or for for $1,500. or for for $150.

With next-day delivery!

Talk to Me!

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Found Again By the Search Engines!

Please see also Found! By the Search Engines.

I keep track with a Google search daily for the ranking of my www.Indxr.ca page.

Last June 25 after watching my page stay on about page 2 for ages I edited the page, added a few choice key words, recompiled it and waited – nothing!

Two days ago (August 9) I performed more surgery and sat back to wait.

I didn’t have to wait long. Here is my usual search:



I have jumped to number 9.

Yet if you look closely you’ll see that it is my June 25 page that has leaped up.

When I click on the link the page shows a compilation date of Auguust 9th.

Go Figure!

Talk to Me!

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Staunch the 8-9-10 Bleeding

It will come as no surprise to you that this blog entry parallels The 1-2-3 of Moving the 1-2-3.

If getting a contact to be a prospect, and making the sale is so time-and-effort consuming, how do those great clients slip out the back door without us noticing?

The 8-9-10 stage is that part of the spectrum where you rate your contacts on a scale of one to ten, ten being those who have sent you a cheque that hasn’t bounced (to re-quote Dan Sullivan of Strategic Coach ).

It shouldn’t be that hard to retain your eights, nines and tens.

Here’s Why



You already know so much about them!

You have kept notes all the way along the trail from one through ten.

You have interacted with them during the development, deployment and training stages of your product or service.

You even know what branch of which bank they bank at! (Not that that knowledge will do you much good).

You probably know where they like to dine, their spouse’s name, …

Here’s How



Stay in touch.

You have their feedback and evaluation form. If you don’t send them a copy now, and phone them (no voice-mail) to let them know why it is headed their way.

Email them in response to their comments on the evaluation form.

Invite them for coffee or lunch. Be honest. You are ,meeting someone you know, someone you’ve worked with.

Add three more ways of staying in touch.

Then ask yourself where they fit on the one-to-ten scale.

Rank them there, and re-read The 1-2-3 of Moving the 1-2-3.

Talk to Me!

Monday, August 9, 2010

The 1-2-3 of Moving the 1-2-3

If cold-calling is so darned awkward and embarrassing, why do so many of us leave that initial contact at the 1-2-3 stage?

The 1-2-3 stage is that part of the spectrum where you rate your contacts on a scale of one to ten, ten being those who have sent you a cheque that hasn’t bounced (to quote Dan Sullivan of Strategic Coach) and one being those who seem totally dis-interested.

It isn’t that hard to move folks from a one to a ten.

Here’s Why



You do it in easy stages.

You move the 8s and 9s to be 10s; you move the 7s to be 9s; you move the 6s to be 8s, and so on until you are attempting to move the 1s to 3s.

Rinse and Repeat



Not all of the 1s will move up to the 3s, but some will, and those that don’t get some more attention next time around; after all, of the so-called “failed” conversation, you learned something, right?

Here’s How



Noooooo! YOU have to do the “how” yourself, based on your service or product, but since you are going to rinse-and-repeat you will need a variety of “how”s, so you may as well just use the first one that comes to mind, record its success, and gradually hone your sales skills.

Talk to Me !

Saturday, August 7, 2010

Customer Service

Since I met Michelle Romanica of Customer Experience Management I’ve paid more attention to deeper aspects of Customer Service.

Here’s an example.

Twice now I’ve driven to Brantford with an eye to touring the Alexander Graham Bell home – a museum of the developer of the telephone. Twice I’ve struck out, both times, from memory, in mid-winter and, knowing me, during the Christmas New Year break.

Should’ve checked the schedule

This time (mid-summer) I checked the web site .

9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., it said. “unless otherwise posted”, but nothing can stop me now. They are open, so it’s Hey! For the open road.

We arrived at 2:30 p.m., two hours should be ample, right?

Nope. The dis-interested clerk told us as she took the $20 bill that they were closing at three today.

So the Brantford museum of Alexander Graham Bell is quite prepared to take our money, but truncate our visit to 30 minutes.

I snatched (it is the correct word) the bill out of her hand and we left.

Once again we walked around the grounds, me muttering. As usual.

Later it struck me as most odd that when an un-announced closure takes place – unannounced on their web site – that they aren’t public relations savvy enough on that one day to allow visitors in for free for that final hour.

What would that mean?

In practical terms, anyone arriving after 2 p.m. would get up to 60 minutes viewing for free.

That ought to rank pretty high on any customer satisfaction survey.

What would it cost them?

$5.50 per customer, but then, they didn’t get our money anyway, so how can they lose what they didn’t have?

And if 60 minutes is not enough to see everything, surely we would return another time.

And at the very least, having seen the museum, we would be two more people who could tell other people about it.

Instead, I tell you, steer clear of Brantford. They don’t know how to welcome tourists, and while they want your tourist dollars, they don’t want you to be happy about it.

Talk to Me !

Friday, August 6, 2010

For the Non-Golfers Amongst Us

I played golf once in my life. I was one of the mandatory duffers in a Friday afternoon social game with Murray Bulger and Associates back around 1986. That was enough.

Nonetheless This New York Times Article caught my eye.

This first group is self-evident.

1. Be on time.

2. Be quiet, be quick.

3. Know when to speak up and what to say.

6. Help others look for lost balls.

8. Maintain a good attitude regardless of how you’re playing.

9. Avoid giving unsolicited advice.

10. Be generous, be honest, be nice.

I couldn’t recommend “4. Mind the flagstick. “ as is; it’d have to be “Make a fresh pot of coffee” in my business.

“5. Watch the flight of everyone’s shots. “ would have to become “Stay in touch with the pace of other parts of the project”.

“7. Don’t make everyone look for your ball for 10 minutes” is a little trickier. I think it’d have to be something along the lines of “If you can’t come up with a coherent reason not to do it within 60 seconds, you just don’t know enough to object to the idea”!

Talk to Me !

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Controlling Those Hanging Folders

I have just counted; thirty-four hanging folders in the drawer marked “Clients”

Does this mean I’ve had only 34 clients in the past 20 years?

No.

And remember - I’m a pack-rat.

Here’s how it works: I added a new hanging folder each time I landed a new client. Now landing a client, to me, is just a little ways beyond that first series of emails.

A new client

About the time I submit a proposal, the contact is classified as a client; they get a hanging folder with their name.

Into their hanging folder go all my sheets of hand-written notes leading up to the proposal.

Ideally they will respond to the proposal with a 50% deposit.

Sometimes I get no response. The proposal, like the client, is “dead”.

I place the most recent addition at the front of the drawer; when the client calls, I can quickly grab the folder.

That means that the stalest folders are now at the back.

Here Comes a New Client

Take the stalest folder and empty the contents into the shredder. Gone!

Let’s face it, nothing ever came of it, and if they do contact me again, from my point of view, after all these years, they are a new client. We never got past the 50% deposit, remember?

Put the new client into the now empty hanging folder, place it in the front of the drawer.

I never have more than 34 hanging folders in there at one time.

Active clients

I am working on three projects at the moment. I pull those hanging folders and put them in my bookcase next to my desk. To work on the project I pull the folder, work on the contents, and replace the folder in the bookcase at the end of the day.

When the project wraps up, that folder goes to the front of the drawer.

My stalest clients are always at the back, and are prime candidates for dropping.

Chances are strong that when I do drop them, the original person with who I had contact will be long gone from the firm anyway.

Re-Awakening Clients

It happens often enough; a client calls or emails.

The hanging folder is pulled, updated, and replaced in the front of the drawer. That breathes new life into it.

Talk to Me !

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

WhatFAQ

I have a fool-proof method for keeping on top of things and not wasting time.

It is called WhatFAQ .

A WhatFAQ document is assigned to every project under my control or on which I am working. For every end-user application I write, there is a WhatFAQ; for every developer utility I build, there is a WhatFAQ; for every client project, there is a WhatFAQ.

WhatFAQ grew from three separate documents. About fifteen years ago I built three documents for a project: “What’s New?”, “What’s a Problem?”, and “Frequently Asked Questions”.

That meant I maintained three extra documents on top of any user requirements (Specifications, User guide etc.)

My three documents existed as Microsoft Word documents WhatNew.doc, WhatProb.doc and WhatFAQ.doc, and it made sense to merge them into one document, nowadays known as WhatFAQ.doc

How Does it Work?

Quite simply, when I have a thought about a project, when an idea strikes me, when a client expresses an opinion or a suggestion, or finds a problem with my work, I make an entry in the WhatFAQ.

The idea will not be forgotten, but I don’t need to break off from what I’m doing and lose my focus. I’m not dancing with fifteen partners each day.

The process is semi-automatic. I can paste ideas from emails. Every item receives an identification number that is unique to my computer system.

The WhatFAQ can be sorted (again automatically) so that the most-recently-fixed items appear at the top of the document and the still-to-be-addressed appear at the bottom in date sequence.

Project members can sort and filter by their initials to see what I’ve done about their pet peeves.

The best part for me is that I learned back in the seventies “Never make a promise or a threat you’re not prepared to keep”, and my WhatFAQ helps me to remember every item that’s ever come up for discussion.

The second-best part is that, from time to time, the client asks “Is there anything else we need to do?”, and I have a list of potentially billable items to hand.

Here is a link to an article that captured my interest: Action Steps

You can download a copy of WhatFAQ right now!

Talk to Me !

Tuesday, August 3, 2010

A Very Succesful “Cold-Call”

I sent a letter to the publisher of a local paper, and ended the letter with this:
  • Call To Action: None. There is nothing you need do. I will telephone you in a few days to learn of your reaction to this letter.

I called the 19th at 10:25 and got voice-mail. I don’t like leaving voice-mails when we’ve not previously spoken.

  1. I left my letter clipped to the paper near my phone.
  2. I called the 21st at 9:15 and got voice-mail.
  3. I called the 23rd at 11:55 and got through!

I asked first off “Do you have two minutes?”. Yes he did, just two. It is, after all, just before lunchtime on a Friday.

I reminded him of my letter. He told me the focus of the paper was on “events and happenings”; I think that is an objection.

I acknowledged that my offering was not about events, nor about happenings, and maybe there was not a good fit.

He came back then and asked for specifics. I gave him a 20-second overview, reminded him that my 2 minutes was up, and asked if I could send him an email with 6 short samples.

Sure!

That’s success.

Talk to Me !