What’s The Cost of Duplicate Emails?

You subscribe to, or you mail out an email newsletter.

It happens that from time to time a glitch in the procedure sends out two copies, either within five minutes or within a couple of days.

It is embarrassing (when I’m the sender!), and discovery of the flaw usually results in a few seconds with head-in-hands and uncontrollable-weeping. Heads may come close to rolling.

But they should not.

Here’s why:

Our email newsletters go out only to friends, not to enemies.

Recipients are on your mailing list because they have asked to be placed on your mailing list; you would take them off if they asked you.

Our friends don’t mind our petty foibles (try “feebles” or weaknesses).

My friends, I think, shake their heads and mutter “He ought not to let his cat play on the keyboard”, and then they get on with whatever is important in their lives.

The same holds true for blog entries; so you duplicated your thoughts of a month ago? That’s because whatever it is it is important enough to stay in the front of your mind and examples abound.

The same holds true for blog entries; so you duplicated your thoughts of a month ago? That’s because whatever it is it is important enough to stay in the front of your mind and examples abound.

See what I mean?

How important is that duplicated paragraph?

How Not To Swat a Gnat

If you’ve ever tried to swat one of those fruit-fly gnat-like creatures by clapping it between two hands, you’ll understand frustration.

The gnat dances right in front of your eyes, between you and the computer screen.

You raise your hands, palms inwards, at eye level, and bring them together sharply.

The gnat dances right in front of your eyes, between you and the computer screen.

You raise your hands, palms inwards, at eye level, and bring them together sharply.

The gnat dances right in front of your eyes, between you and the computer screen.

And so on.

What’s Happening?

The cushion of air that builds up between your palms as they approach each other flushes the air-like gnat out of the way.

I can hear my gnat screaming “Wheee!” as it discovers the joy of early-morning surfing.

What to do?

Slow down.

A slower bringing-together of the hands achieves the goal with less repetition, less energy, less noise, and probably less mess-on-the-hands.

The same might apply when approaching a prospect.

References: The Akond of Swat

Talk to Me !

Selling the Idea About Buying Ideas

I'm still taking Flak on this business of non-business as my friends see it: Giving Indxr away for FREE.

I am an ideas man; my friends and colleagues concede that.

I come up with great ideas, original thoughts, brilliant conceptions, amusing "takes" on a situation, all very entertaining, but sadly going no way towards paying the rent.

Out There are businesses who could help me pay the rent by purchasing something from me – my ideas, my ability to tackle problems and find elegant solutions.

My idea in giving away the Indxr for free is to communicate to total strangers (people who read the blogs and forums of my word-processing colleagues) the idea that I have come up with a brilliant idea – a tool that identifies all the Interesting Words in any document and hence can mark them as index entries ({XE}) and hence produce an index in an almost-unbelievable time. ("I remember spending three (long) evenings one summer to achieve the same result. And yet, this was more thorough in five seconds than the efforts of those three evenings.")

My idea is that for every 100 technical writers and court reporters and transcriptionists who download this free tool, one in a hundred will contact me and ask "What else do you do?", or better yet, “Can you do THIS for me?".

I am selling the idea about buying ideas

To Market, to Market, to Sell a Thin Pig

Any fool can sell a fat pig; it takes genius to sell a thin pig, with the promise of things to come.

Your fat pig is your service; mine is, let’s say, design and development of applications software.

Your problem is getting those first two endorsements, testimonials, recommendations.

Your first hurdle after leaving university was that every job advertisement carried the phrase “Min. 2 yrs exp. reqd”.

Now let’s see just how well you know your own business:

Dumb it Down!

Your service is, let’s say, a three-day training session, or a three-day review of existing procedures, or a 3-day derivation of marketing metrics. Or seven-day. It doesn’t matter.

There’s no way you are going to give away a seven-day sample any more than you would a three-day sample.

But stripped of all the exciting STUFF what is the exciting MESSAGE?

Scrape away the meat and get down to the bone (here comes the thin pig!) and you end up with a three-hour presentation that can convey the exciting essential ideas of your service to an enthusiastic but small crowd (6 maximum) of friends and peers. (*)

The Dry Runs

Book a hotel room for $60.

Invite your friends

Dump the news on them

Ask for testimonials.

Keep it honest.

Tell them what you are doing and why.

Let their testimonials be honest.

You didn’t give them the 3-day package, but you did send them away with valuable ideas that will change their business revenue.

They can therefore say that you sent them away with valuable ideas that will change their business revenue.

Everybody chips in with $10 for the room costs; you bring your own ground coffee and cream; homemade cookies.

Or have it at my place and I’ll serve a lunch of pasta and home-made bottled meat sauce; everybody bring a 1lb packet, frozen, of ground beef which will be available for lunch next time.

Will it Work?

You betcha!

Your friends will enjoy a networking session.

You will get feedback on your service presentation.

Everybody will be pumped with new insights, new ideas.

You’ll get invited to six free seminars within the next two months, (You saw THAT coming, didn’t you?)

Bring cookies and a 1lb slab of frozen ground meat.

Prove It!

Let’s take my 4-day workshop on Application Development in VBA.

If I can’t compress that into a 3-hour session on recording macros in Word, building a mini-application by ganging macros, and give you confidence in using the vocabulary of application developers (“VBA”, “Macros”, “Libraries”, “Procedures”, “Functions” etc.) then I’m in the wrong business.

Let’s take your 3-day workshop on Customer Experience in Humungous Global Conglomerates.

If you can’t compress that into a 3-hour session of tips’n’tricks for retaining clients in the Application Development business, then you don’t know much about keeping your friends happy.

Marketing Metrics to Manage Monies?

Get real! Not one of your friends is going to be spending $$$ on marketing any time soon now, but they do have some time. And time is money. Transcribe your methods to a cheat-sheet using time or events as metrics, and get feedback from THAT.

Policies Procedures and Manuals?

What budding entrepreneur doesn’t need some sort of written plan for dealing with the regular and irregular events in their marketing and sales and promotions and prospecting and contacting departments.

Oink!

Get richer and fatter quicker
(*) If you don’t have 6 friends and peers, I’m available!

P.S.

Once you’ve done the dumbing-down exercise and got a 3-hour workshop, DUMB IT DOWN SOME MORE, say to 60 minutes.

Now you are a speaker at Networking Meetings!

There! That was easy, wasn’t it?

Why Do These Misconceptions Prevent an Entrepreneur from Blogging?

There are two types of entrepreneur: those who blog, and those who don’t.

In most cases, those who blog would occasionally love to not-have-to-blog-today for any one of a number of reasons. (I’m not one of them; give me two minutes, a scrap of paper and a pencil, and I’m blogging in the elevator, on the train, in the meeting, …)

Those who don’t blog always have a good reason for not blogging, and it is usually one of these (but see below):

(1) I don’t have the time
(2) It takes too much effort to set up a blog
(3) Who would read it?
(4) I’ve never done it before (if that were a good reason the human race would have died out millions of years before)
(5) I can’t think of anything to say
(6) I don’t know what to write about

Below: If you have a reason that doesn’t appear here Talk to Me and I’ll add it to the list with a link to your web site.

None of the reasons above apply to me. Those of you with eagle-eyes (I know who you are!) will have observed a flurry of activity the past two weeks when I plugged in many gaps in the early days from a vast stockpile of articles that were threatening to block my arteries of communication.

So Here we Are

You and I.

I

… have a surplus of ideas I’d like to write about. You blog but are short of time and/or material?

I’ll write a guest post for YOUR BLOG, based on your theme.

I will, of course, write a link to your blog to drive traffic to it.

You

… have never blogged before but wonder what it’s like to have your name in print.

You’ll write a single article for my blog based on my theme (which is, let’s admit, pretty broad).

I will, of course, write a link to your blog to drive traffic to it.

No excuses

Get cracking

Tips

Share something that went right this week.
(It could be a new client, accolades from a client, a tough deadline that was met, …)
Recap what’s on the horizon for YOU next week.
Recap what’s on the horizon for YOU next month.
State a problem to big to solve in a short time
State a process that is broken and needs repair.
Who was your best client/boss and why?

Every Cloud Brings Life-Giving Rain

In “Every Cloud Has a Silver Lining” I outlined what I considered to be a disastrous meeting with bureaucracy. Honestly, I walked out of there fuming, determined to shake the dust from my feet, and headed straight to a rewarding meeting with a fellow entrepreneur.

In the late afternoon I received an email from bureaucracy telling me I am penciled in to deliver a talk in January.

Calm now, I realize that yesterday morning I had achieved my penultimate objective – a sit-down FTF meeting with the organizers, and I did well, because by the end of the day I had achieved my goal – an opportunity to present myself for evaluation as a speaker to transitional entrepreneurs.

Despite the roadblocks of attitude thrown in my path, I have succeeded.

I was away most of the day in meetings, and missed two phone calls I had been working for over two weeks.

My disappointment at not being here to take the calls is mollified by the fact that BOTH parties did try to get in touch with me.

The first party wants to talk with me – so I feel sure that we will make contact.

The second party has misinterpreted my voice-mail; or perhaps it was a poorly-worded voice-mail.

Today I will re-read my voice-mail script, re-listen to the voice-mail left for me, and work out what went wrong.

By a calm deliberate study of facts, I can probably salvage a FTF meeting from the second party.

But let’s not lose sight of the fact that BOTH parties called me back. That’s a Good Thing, and is a far better result than not having my called returned.

My voice-mail scripts are getting the action I want; all I have to do is tweak them a little.

(Sorry: “a little bit more, again”)

Wake up! You Don’t Need Your Beauty Sleep.

From the University of Western Australia’s “Science Matters” Vol 4. no 2. October 2009.

“I find that if you don’t sleep, you get an awful lot done”, says Robyn Williams, ABC science broadcaster, with a smile.

I know that to be true.

I often am awake by 3 a.m. with an idea pulsing through my head.

Wide awake.

No hope of sleep.

I rise and start writing, developing, or whatever it is.

Sometimes I go back to bed at 5:00; sometimes I just carry on and watch the dawn.

It is not the life of the 9-to-5er, with a bus ride at each end.

But I can do a lot of creative or maintenance work that requires no personal communication in those few hours, freeing up my day for the phone calls and meetings.

And on a day like yesterday, when a one-hour coffee meeting with a fellow consultant stretches into a fun-filled spiral-out-of-control three-hour two-coffee two-cake marathon, I can relax, knowing that I have earlier earned the hours to spend in real conversation.

I arrived back in my home office at 4 p.m. and spent thirty minutes on the phone chatting with another consultant about a potentially lucrative money-making scheme.

Again, I felt no constraint to chivvy the conversation along; I’ve earned the right to spend time that I have earned.

Cold-Storage for Prospects

I continue to prune my contact list as I add a better-quality type of contact.

This morning I was scheduled to contact Susan; I have been trying to reach her for three weeks. I get to her voice-mail each time I call, and since leaving an original voice-mail or two, I don’t feel like leaving any more.

She is not a high-profile contact for me; someone who took a day’s training ten year’s ago, and while she makes occasional noises about work, we never do do business.

It’s time to say goodbye.

As I reached for the Delete button a thought crossed my mind: maybe she just doesn’t feel like having me as a supplier but can’t bring herself to tell me.

I know another consultant, closer to her line of work, who might be able to winkle something out of her.

Before I delete her I should pass her details on to David. He can mention my name, if he thinks it will do any good, and for all that I have no plans to establish any business with her, if David senses some business for me he will be sure to pass it back to me.

I’m going to make David love me by passing him a contact, and Susan won’t really go out of my life. Chances are strong that if I have anything to offer her, I’ll stand a better chance of reaching her through David than I do directly.

It’s worth a try.

Every Cloud Has a Silver Lining

A Disastrous Start to the Day

I met with an organization for whom I hoped to make several presentations – to get my name known.

I arrived on time, they weren’t ready; they started 15 minutes late with no apologies and didn’t offer me a coffee. Worse – they had not prepared by reading the material I had sent at their request.

I have spent two hours phoning, four ½ days attending current presentations (to get a good idea of their target market), a ½ day attending their downtown workshop – for what?

I couldn’t wait to get out of there and head to my next meeting, but I grabbed a copy of “Enterprise” on the way out. The Vol 11. No.4 September 2009 issue, as it happens.

In there I found SIX articles of compelling interest to ME, and I am who/what counts in this story.

I have written off the first meeting a signaling a dead-end down that avenue, but the magazine was worth the trip.

And yes, my second meeting was with a private-enterprise entrepreneur, and it was the best time of the past month, for me.

On the way home I reflected that if I can’t pull something good out of a bad situation, how can I claim to be truly valuable to any prospect?

A Social Experiment

I am now involved with a marketing guru, at no expense to me (except a cup of coffee) and from the initial meeting has evolved a mousepad!

No kidding!



Each day of the week I will track, with a pencil mark, events as they occur.

At the end of the week I will tally the marks and enter them into a simple spreadsheet.

The spreadsheet will show me that after a lag of several weeks, things start happening (“IN”) perhaps as a result of what I’ve done in the past (“OUT”).

This is a preamble to a more accurate scheme developed by Rick Shea , “… a promotion industry veteran with a deep knowledge of promotional marketing dynamics gleaned from 18 years with leading organizations Nielsen Promotion Services, NCH Promotional Services, Herbert A. Watts and Resolve Corporation.”.

Whether I take the dollar-oriented package remains to be seen, but a simplified yes-no scheme, on which I spend no money, is something I can afford, and will, at the very least, let me see whether I need help.

(I do!)

Talk to Me !

Cell Phones

Nasty creatures. The interrupt my conversation with you; their ringing distracts me during meetings and movies.

They are as bad as desk-top telephones, when a ring brings out the gambling instinct in everyone – the bet that the incoming call is more important than the current conversation.

I am in the habit of turning my phone ringers off during a meeting, on the grounds that nothing is as important to me as your presence right now in my office. Call me old-fashioned …

I bought a cell phone two years ago when I felt it would have been valuable in helping a contact who was lost find me at the restaurant.

I rarely carry it, and turn it off as soon as I have reached the client site or the coffee-shop.

Cell phones do have their uses, I don’t deny that, but all too often we allow them to control our life.

Like the time you spent struggling for one hour over the layout of a fax asking to meet for lunch. Pick Up The Phone!

I have just had a most unpleasant run-in with my cell-phone service. I shan’t name the supplier because I don’t want to embarrass Telus.

But I do want to mention Andrew Cook of Compare Cellular.

No matter how happy or disgruntled you are with your current supplier and device, trot across to Compare Cellular and check out how what you’ve got stacks up against the other players.

It's FREE!

Then phone the other players and make a deal.

Lost the little user guide that came with your phone? Compare Cellular has the user guide available for download.

Not sure of your coverage? Compare Cellular has it all mapped out for you; go ahead, take a run up to the cottage!

Want the dealer nearest you? Use the dealer’s page at Compare Cellular.

Go ahead!

Marketing vs. Sales

Yup! Another definition.

This one makes the most sense to me, and I am indebted, as are you, to Rick Shea of Optiv8 for the insight.

It’s all about people, and it’s true for your business and mine, the local diner, the large department store, the churches, the banks and the telephone companies.

Marketing

Marketing is what you do, generally, to people you don’t yet know.

Writing a blog, or a newspaper article, public speaking, handing out business cards or mailing out flyers.

In each case your are sending out, broadcasting, a message about you and your services, hopefully to recipients in your target market area.

There’s not much point in the local Etobicoke (Toronto) church taking out an advertisement in the Montana Standard about next Sunday’s services.

There’s little point in The Montreal Deli getting door-to-door flyers pushed through letter-boxes in San Diego.

Marketing is to people or contacts who are not yet looking towards you, who are not yet facing you, who are not yet asking you questions by phone or email.

Sales

Sales is what you do, generally, to people you know.

Sales is to people or contacts who are looking towards you, who facing you, who are asking you questions by phone or email.

Sales is the process of moving people you know towards a cheque.

The Funnel

Or if you prefer, the pipeline, but a funnel looks better on paper because (quantitative may vary) for every 100 people who express interest in your services, only 20% might ever get to the Proposal stage, and of them, only 60% might get to the cheque stage.

Nonetheless, you do the marketing and with the responses you get, some of that vast number of (un-)identified of targets respond and by doing so they become the objects of your sales efforts.

Traditionally marketing was a one (you) to many (them) exercise, while sales was a one (me) to one (you) exercise.

This Blog

I never thought you’d ask!

This blog is a part of my marketing.

It is read by who-knows-who. Everyone of them unknown to me.

If and when you send me a comment or if you subscribe to the blog you become available to me as an individual and, strictly speaking, a sales prospect.

Of course I have other marketing efforts, and of course, if you send me a comment I won’t deluge you with flyers, postcards, emails etc.

But we may well start a relationship that may well blossom into a sale (”cheque”) for one or both of us!

Thanks Rick!

Reciprocal Marketing – New Heights

I took my first baby step this morning. Cycled down to The Montreal Deli for exercise and chatted with George.

They've never done promotion, never advertised (they don't need to) but he warmed to the idea of a reward for valued business customers.



My kit included the news that, as far as I was concerned, the $250 coupons were transferable. It's no skin off my nose if the President of Rugs'N'Carpets passes his coupon on to the VB Finance of Computers'R'Us.

I still get a new client and The Montreal Deli gets the kudos.

On the way back I realized I could do better than that.

In the memo being prepared (in my head as I cycled) for today's Hot Prospect I realized that I can offer a $250 coupon to first-time clients, but rather than hand it out to them – I could tell them to pick it up at The Montreal Deli.

That way The Montreal Deli gets another visitor who may well return!

They should love me.

What did I learn?

Quite apart from the novel experience, I learned from George that I should describe the training.

The Gift Certificate merely says "$250.00 worth of on-site TRAINING from …" without telling anyone what training is available.

I should use the back of the card to list the broad areas in which I offer training.

Co-Operative Effort

I am reluctant to title this "Co-Operative Marketing" for while it leads to a form of marketing, it's really about building a team of volunteers to do a lot of work for free with benefits for every single member of the team, especially ME!

My 1-click Indxr has taken off, and I have decided to send Under, Trail, MRUse and ZoomP down the same path.

Under is a collection of over 640 macros, many of which I have documented, but most of which I haven't.

Over the years I've made an effort, so the documentation is scattered across my hard drive.

Simple Macros that I use on a daily basis take me about five minutes to write up. Macros that I've not used for seven years require that I examine the program code itself, test it, and perhaps fix a couple of problems; could be 30 minutes.

A crude estimate is then 640 x 15 minutes, or about 160 hours.

I should not and can not and will not donate 160 hours (that's one week solid, 24 hours a day!) to document something that I know how to use for a bunch of people who will obtain the product for free.

What to do?

Get someone else (plural!) to help out.

Who?

People who are good writers and who use Microsoft Word on a daily basis and hence will understand the need for each macro.

The obvious choice is the crowd who download my 1-click Indxr . If some of them are grateful that I reduced one job of 5 hours down to 5 minutes, perhaps they would like to show their thanks by writing up one or two of the 640 macros in Under.

Pick a macro whose name suggests utility to YOU and I'll cobble together an overview and turn it over to you. You test the macro and decide what it does for you in your own words, the words of an end-user, and send it back to me.

I'll incorporate your efforts into my web site with an acknowledgement in the form of a link back to YOUR web site.

A product like MRUse or Indxr that requires a serious amount of effort might be tackled by a VA who would like a larger acknowledgement and an opportunity to showcase their work as a technical writer.

For that VA, a potential client could be sent to my web site to inspect the User Guide, and might even download the package to see how the guide stacked up against the program.

The Result?

Good for me.

Good for the VA.

Reducing Volume Of Email

No, your are not supposed to worry about reading the fine print.

I am fortunate in having attracted a small but extremely competent team of beta-testers and evaluators. It is possible that only an isolated programmer can appreciate this. It's a cliché but true: It's lonely here with no human to whom I can turn and ask "What do you think of this?", or "Please check this for me".

I have much to ask and tell of this team, but they each have their own lives, jobs, families, not necessarily in that order.

I hit on the idea of issuing ONE email early each morning to the group. My five precious colleagues will get one email from me with general information about new releases, updates, bug fixes etc., and with a bit of luck any further emails will be from and to individuals.

If Lily is bored and wants to bat emails back and forth, that is OK with me; and if Jaime Lee is frantically trying to finish a project and remains silent, that's OK with me too.

Instead of sending 6 separate emails on six separate issues, as the gurus recommend, I'll send just one, anticipated daily digest and be done with it.

Today is Saturday. This day's email went out at 6 a.m., and since then, at intervals during the day, I've been accumulating snippets of news in an email whose subject line reads "Chris Greaves - Sunday 11th October 2009".

By 6 a.m. tomorrow, I will have read and re-read it through, and perhaps something that was relevant at 6:30 this morning will no longer be relevant at ten p.m. tonight, in which case it can be deleted from the draft without ever having bothered five busy people.

Lest it be all work and no play, I try to pose a work-relevant riddle as the last item on each email, thus:

Flak

I'm getting a lot of flak from well-meaning friends and professional colleagues.

My 1-click indexer is getting rave reviews across the country from Court Reporters, Technical Writers, Virtual Assistants and the like.

My friends are all of one voice: "Why aren't you SELLING this?!!???"

They see 60,000 to 100,000 people downloading this FREE UTILITY and multiply that by $7.00 to come up with … a lot of dollars.

Their mathematics is correct, and with the Indxr on, perhaps 20 desktops right now, there's no stopping it. It will "Go Viral" in the vernacular.

I could slap a $7 sticker on and sell maybe not 60,000 copies, but enough to pay next month's rent.

• Here's My View

Every man and his dog is walking around with a baseball cap they didn't pay for, a ball-point pen they didn't pay for, drinking coffee out of a cup they didn't pay for.

The baseball cap reads "MCI Industries".

The ball-point pen has " Michael Belfry And Associates " on it.

The coffee cup? "Laidlaw Waste Industries".

• All free.

The really smart marketing/sales guys all say the same thing:

People love getting something for nothing, and once you have trained them to accept something from you, they'll accept anything from you".

• They are correct.

That's why your mail box is stuffed with $5-off Pizza flyers.

• It works.

I have no idea what the flyer costs per household. At a guess, two cents; materials, handling, delivery.

And tired people have it in their hot sweaty little hands as they trudge up the path to the front door wondering what's for supper tonight.

• Back to Indxr.CA

The professionals who word-process have a copy of Indxr on their desktop when they produce a document.

"Click". There's the index. I love this little tool. Ten seconds just saved me six hours.

1. I wonder what else he has written?
2. I wonder if he converts documents?
3. I wonder if he could do this for me.

And just as it does at the Pizza House, the phone will ring at my place once for every hundred flyers mailed out.

• What's one percent of 60,000?

And wouldn't you like your phone to ring that many times with people asking for help.

And not just people, but people who already trust you and know that you have (not "can") saved them time.

• And time is money.

The 1-6-10 Rule – How Did it Work?

Just one month ago I wrote The 1-6-10 Rule .

This morning I had need to search my contact database for a special-purpose and to my delight discovered that the most-stale contact was dated the 8th October, 2009.

Just one calendar month ago!

What does this mean?

(1) Every one on my contacts list was "touched" by me sometime in the past month. In most cases we chatted by phone. In a very few cases, someone I've known for 20 years, I just shot off an email announcing Indxr.ca .

(2) Every one on my contact list is someone I'm not afraid to call; there are no people-I've never-spoken-with, people-I'm-ashamed-of-calling and so on.

(3) I won't feel at all bad come December when I do my annual Christmas letter mail out.

(4) Since I have eliminated the deadwood, my mailing costs are lower.

(5) Since I have eliminated the deadwood, my Christmas letter can be more intensely personal or time-relevant to the recipients; they have all heard about Indxr.ca and so a newsy update 2 months after launch should be of passing interest.

(6) I feel BETTER about myself, culling 8 names from the list this morning for a special call about a novel (to me) marketing campaign that will help THEM!

This is the bottom line:

• My daily worksheets have helped me get the job done.

So I Madly Got Changed And Dashed Off to Toronto for the Second Time Today

From a colleague:

"After running around all day, I got home a little after 5:00 PM. I made dinner, spent some time with my daughter then went downstairs to my humble office area to answer a few emails. About 10 mins. into it, I realized I had an event I was supposed to be at in Toronto. So I madly got changed and dashed off to Toronto for the second time today. I only got home about 20 mins. ago. Needless to say you did not receive a phone call."

From me back to my colleague:

About You: You worry me, but then I don't know you that well.

{If **I** had your opportunities}

Unless it was for a $1,000 paying client, I'd say "Sod the evening downtown" and spend time with my daughter.

Too much running around is not good for us Transitional Entrepreneurs.

But then, what do I know?

{/If **I** had your opportunities}

Here's the thing with my phone, just so as you know:

I'm the only one here.

I don't have call identification, call waiting, call screening, call showering or call-tub-wiping.

BELL voice-mail is all I've got and I'm getting rid of it at the end of this month.

If the phone rings, I pick it up; it might be business; or a friend asking me out to lunch.

I often wake at 3 am and go back to sleep. In which case I turn my phone up at or around 8 am

I as often wake at 3 am and am wide awake and DON'T got back to sleep.

In which case I turn my phone up at whatever time it is.

I aim to be in bed by 9:30 pm, at which time I turn my phone off.

If I'm going out for the day, I turn my phone off so as not to disturb Jupiter .

I don't have family, and all my friends have their own family, so I never get "family emergencies"

My clients don't have emergencies; it's my job to make sure that they don't!

These days I am on the phones from 8:30 a.m. until 5 p.m. I have changed around completely from the man I used to be last March.

But if someone (hint!) calls and leaves a short message saying "call me right back", I do so as soon as I've finished the call; my caller has usually worked out that I'm hitting the phones, but knows that a quick let's-do-lunch call is ALWAYS welcome.

And if someone is dropping by to pick me up for lunch, I turn on my cell phone as the "alternate channel" until we are together.

Then I turn off the cell-phone.

(see "emergencies" above)

Now if all that sounds draconian, I would like you to consider that it works FOR ME, especially in my no-family no-emergency situation.

But I also want you to know that you CAN call me 24/7, and if I've gone to bed, it won't disturb me at all, at all, and I'll get your call as soon as I wake up and pick up my phone to turn it ON!

I hope that makes sense.

I'm Getting the Hang of it Now!

I have wanted Alex to send me the preliminary files for a possible project for two weeks now.

I am reluctant to call him again – it makes it seem as if I am desperate, which I am, but I don't want him to know that!

So I plod on my daily routine, phoning people, phoning people, phoning people, and stumble upon George who mentions the sphere in which Alex specializes.

I send George an email, and CC Alex, putting them in touch.

And waddayaknow!

Here is an email from Alex with the preliminary files.

I'll never know unless I ask, and I may never ask, but I have this feeling that "sending" George to Alex was enough to trigger benevolent thoughts about me in Alex's mind!

The most profitable part of networking is offering a continual stream of benefits to prospects and clients.

Getting Rid of Contacts

No, it's not meant to be an attention-grabbing headline; it's what I'm doing today.

My shift in marketing away from small businesses to large corporations (see The 1-6-10 Rule ) requires that I eliminate the really useless contacts from my list of about 300.

This morning around 6 a.m., way too early to start phoning, I printed off a daily work sheet , fired up my contacts list, noted that I had 223 records and started examining contacts in stalest-record-first sequence. That is, which record has not been modified for the longest time; which contact has NOT received my attention?

I quickly deleted 6 of the 8 stalest records, took me about 3 minutes.

Let's face it, here is someone (well, 6 someones actually), who I've never met, never done business with, have no real idea of who they are or what they do, or any adjustment of knowledge since they first got dropped into my contact list ten years ago.

For ten years I've sent them a Christmas card, but not bothered to find out anything about them.

I suspect strongly that if I picked up the phone today and said "Let's meet for coffee" the response ought to be "I don't know you; you presume to send me a card once a year, and expect me now to be all-friendly with you? I can't be bothered".

I feel that strongly, because that's how I feel about Norbert who sends me a chatty card once a year, but has never suggested we meet for coffee next time I'm downtown.

By deleting the names I'm reducing my waste of effort in sending a postcard or even interrupting their workday ("It's that brush salesman again …").

If ever I felt the urge to business with their firm, it would probably be because they had popped up as a "new prospect", in which case I'd be making a fresh approach to the CEO of the company, or else I'd be armed with some real benefits that surfaced as a result of my sleuthing.

It feels good to rid the world of this wasted effort, and to focus on my prime prospects.

Long may they prosper!

The Cold-Calling Hook

This is just too amazingly easy!

I have spent an hour cold-calling companies, by first calling the CEO and in under one minute – as I promise them – get the name of someone else at the company. I call THAT person and say "I was just chatting with {your CEO's name here} and she suggested I get in touch with you. Do you have a minute?"

The phrase "shooting fish in a barrel" comes to mind.

Thus emboldened I embark on my 9 follow-up calls scheduled for today. One harried executive replies "It's our quarter-end, not a good time; try to reach me mid next week" and I thank him and hang up.

I record that text in the memo field and set the follow-up date for next week.

He has given me a hook when next I call: "You asked me to call you once your quarter-end was complete. Is this a good time?".

If he remembers saying that, he pretty well has to acknowledge my call.

If he does not remember that, his options are to acknowledge my call or call me a liar, and since he doesn't know me, he is unlikely to do the latter.

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Spot The Difference

Can you spot the difference?

• It is raining, so I'm not going anywhere. Give me a call when you have a minute. 416-621-9348

• It is raining, so I'm not going anywhere. Give me a call when you have a minute.

Which email is more likely to get you to pick up the phone and call me?

Strategy Vs. Tactics – Part 2

If you are still struggling with the difference between strategy and tactics, try this analogy:
Strategy is where I want to be, and when. My strategy is to be on top of THAT mountain at dawn tomorrow (to watch the sunrise).
Tactics are how I achieve my goal: I will swim across THIS river and drive THAT vehicle to the top of the mountain.
My Business Strategy is to have 200 new (major) prospects by the end of the year.
My Business Tactics include a disciplined approach to building relationships, and if I'm going to do the work required, I'll have to spend less time writing and more time researching firms and telephoning contacts!

The Hand-Written Note

I love installations where someone drags me off to their cubicle asking for help – in formatting a word-processing document that will ultimately be faxed to the recipient.
In the first place, faxing is graphic, so I never worry about using extra paragraph marks for vertical spacing (as I worry if I am emailing a document)
But the ultimate guffaw comes when I see the content: "Let's do lunch".
Here is a mid-level manager struggling for 60 minutes or more with a cranky word-processor for a lunch invitation.
· PICK UP THE PHONE!
Today my situation is reversed.
I've been telephoning an executive for three weeks, different times during the day, and just not getting through.
So I still draft the message (paper and pencil), but rather than compose an email, it's out with the expensive beige Magna Carter Parchment Paper (A million dollars for 100 sheets at your local stationery store) and a neat hand-written job.
Ditto the envelopes.
· Hand-written.
Hand-written return address in the top-left corner.
And one of my personal postage stamps.
Let's see if this message gets through!

Things Are Getting Out of Hand

In a quiet moment during last night's free seminar I realized that while my 1-6-10 method was generating prospects and leads, I was spiraling out of control with the data I had harvested.
In particular I had data in too many places.
I made a simple list:
(1) I have a database of client data; it currently holds 300 contacts. I am shedding deadwood (that's the "6" in 1-6-10) and adding prospects at the rate of one per day (that's the "1" in 1-6-10). The data base is a simple flat-file with Company, Name, Title, Address and so on. It contains date fields such as date-last-modified (I can detect stale records) and date-follow-up (I can use the table as a tickler file).
(2) I use a 1987 DOS program ToDo (written by Art Hill) which makes it easy to see what's to be done today, and permits easy roll-over of dates by day, week, month and so on.
(3) For each prospect or client I maintain a folder on my hard drive with a Diary.doc in which I record the journey to sales.
(4) I maintain notes on paper, for two reasons: I like to sit with a hard-copy dossier on a company and study it. (2) I make penciled notes during phone calls.
My problem is that data gets recorded in four separate places and no matter where I look, there's something missing.
· I have resolved that I will make a single efficiency each week.
That means that each week I have to come up with a new idea for trimming flab.
This week my "trim" is to use the little ToDo list solely for birthdays and other anniversaries. That's probably a personal type of use anyway.
When I have issued an email to Global Conglobulations saying I'll phone them next week, I must use my client database ((1) above) and set the follow-up day field to reflect the event.
Thus each day should see me work through the client database in ascending follow-up sequence until I have cleared all entries that require follow up.
Next week, who knows? Perhaps I'll add a field to the database form that allows me to establish a hyperlink to the Diary.doc, then from the form I can quickly pull up the diary. The diary is really a Microsoft Word document form of a memo field, held separately from the database table.

The 15-Second Method to Win Rapport

So there you are, face to face with a candidate for a sale, or at the very least, a short window of opportunity to win a prospect, and you need to get them with you.
· Establishing rapport can be easier than you think.
It's largely a matter of changing the face-to-face (literally!) view that occurs when you meet someone to a face-by-face view.
A Domestic Example
With a lady-friend in a diner, I often prefer to sit side-by-side on a bench seat so that we have the same view of the diner and get to chat about the things we see in common.
The face-to-face seating arrangement means that she sees the parking lot and I see the kitchen.
A Networking Event Example
For the first 15 seconds of your face-to-face at a networking event, work hard, intensely (but don't show it!) to match your voice tone and gestures to your new-found acquaintance.
· If they speak softly, speak softly.
· If they use their hands to talk, use your hands.
· If they hold the coffee cup in their left hand, do thou likewise.
Their eyes/brain will pick up on these subtle clues and accept you as a like-minded person.
· They sprinkle their conversation with a little Je Ne Sais Quoi?
Well! Toi Aussi!

The International Market Place

I learned last night that I am running an international business.
I didn't know that.
I thought my Toronto, Canada-based business was, well, a local business.
Turns out that all I need is a client just across the border in Buffalo, New York State, and I'm international.
Well!
I do have a client in New Jersey, of all places, and that's much further than Buffalo, so I can say "I have International clients".
That was easy.
A boost for my ego, and something to write on my web page!

Do Something Better Today

No matter where you stand right now, no matter how bleak the dawn, you can make one small step today towards bettering your situation.
Do SOMETHING better today, do it better than you did it yesterday.
It doesn't really matter what you choose to do better, you'll feel better (about your situation) and you'll BE better.
· Weight getting you down?
Today, climb a single flight of stairs. Make a point of including one flight in your daily schedule. Next week move to 2 flights.
· Lack of cash getting you down?
Today, forgo the donut, or the coffee. Or take a snack to eat mid-day instead of spending $10 in the food court.
· Skill-set poor?
Set off on a journey to mastery of the computer. My free Windows Tips correspondence course is a good start, but any self-help stepping course is better than sitting staring at the computer. Learn Alt-Tab today, Ctrl-A tomorrow …
· Need a business coach and can't afford one?
Start chatting to people your style at networking meetings. Arrange to buddy-up with one person with whom you seem to have rapport, and don't fret about equality in the relationship. One of you is going to give more than the other, I promise you. It's the way the world is. Live with it.
· But do something.
For the world spins on its axis every 24 hours, and the dawn brings a changed world.
Every day.

Your Problems Change. Why Not Change Your Skill-Set?

You are out there doing whatever-you-do to change the world.
· Every man-and-his-dog is out there too.
There are more of them than there are of you.
· So the world is changing faster than you are.
In particular, the nature of problems coming at you is changing. Technology changes. The rules change.
My accountant (who has been mentoring small business owners since about 1845!) has to keep abreast of each tiny bit of fiscal legislation that seeps out of Ottawa. If he ever lets down his guard, we will all end up paying taxes, and that's a no-no in his eyes.
If re-training is not a part of your monthly schedule, you WILL be left behind.
Now when I say "Training" your eyes roll back and you think of either (1) $250/day to go on a Microsoft Excel course downtown or (b) $1,500 a day for three days to go on one of those Paul Tobey workshops.
· Think instead "learning something".
At least book yourself into a free seminar once a month. Three hours in the evening. Once a month. Twice is better. (send me an email and in my reply you'll see a list of the next few freebies I'll be attending!)
Visit (better yet, JOIN!) a professional group that showcases a presentation each month.
Read half a dozen marketing blogs daily (send me an email) and implement ONE small suggestion each day.
· But do something.
For the world spins on its axis every 24 hours, and the dawn brings a changed world.
· Every day.

An Easy Way to Achieve Your Objectives

Write them down!
If you have a daily plan established (please see "The 1-6-10 Rule", print it out at the start of each day (or better yet, at the end of the previous day!).
If things are starting to get you down, make "Opening the Mail (bills, etc.) the only task you HAVE to get done today. Not because you owe them money (although that's a good reason) but because it is dragging you down and sapping your enthusiasm.
Write on a small card "Process Mail".
At the end of the day, take the card to bed and examine it.
Did you achieve your objective? Did you open all the mail, draft the letter, file the papers?
If so, sleep well.
If not, ask yourself WHY you didn't open the mail etc. determine the stumbling block, and make THAT your top-priority for tomorrow, and go to sleep feeling good about THAT!
The key here is to WRITE IT DOWN (yes, I'm shouting this at you!).
Write it down so that you have a solid tangible record of what you expected to achieve.
Measuring what happened is the vital link between saying you'll do something, and making sure that the next time it really gets done.
Try it and see!

A Plan for Business

My accountant taught me this several years ago:
Business: Is the exchange of two pieces of paper, one of which MUST be a cheque.
And, of course, by cheque he meant a cheque, a deposit on a project, or the final payment on completion of a project.
But the definition also applies to public transit (you receive a paper transfer), buying a tub of iced-cream at the supermarket (they give you a receipt) and so on.
When I am swapping paper with a prospect, I'm not doing business with them.
So if Business is the exchange of two pieces of paper, one of which MUST be a cheque, then a Business Plan must be …?
A plan to do business.
A roadmap marking out how to get from wherever you are to the point where the prospect gives you a cheque.
A documented series of steps that follow in a logical manner, one leading to the other, where the final step is "Thank the Client for the cheque".

Really? A Cold-Call Script that Works

(Please see also 10 Cold Call Scripts that Work for YOU)
Here is the background:
I have used my prospecting tools to obtain a prospect Medworxx.
The Canada News Wire story gives me many names, foremost the President and CEO and his direct line.
While I'd be happy to chat at length with him on this first and unsolicited call, it is unlikely that he has nothing better to do with his time.
I am using the "Canada News Wire" story about Medworxx to get his attention.
My script is 80 words long; 60 words are unique. The script is loaded with content:
Mr. Matlow?
My name is Chris Greaves
I read the Medworxx story on Canada News Wire in August, and I wonder if you could spare me literally one minute?
Thank You.
You might be able to help me out.
I'd like to find out who I might talk with at Medworxx to discuss the ideas I have implemented for the production of documents in the healthcare and pharmaceuticals industry?
I have recorded the script and it runs 22 seconds, including pauses.
You can see a pause before the "Thank You"; the script assumes that he will agree to one minute, and my goal is to be off the phone within 60 seconds.
That leaves 38 seconds to negotiate the name and phone number or email address of someone at Medworxx.
If I can get in-and-out in 60 seconds, I can place the second call, another cold-call, prefaced with the CEO's name:
Ms Somebody?
My name is Chris Greaves
I was just chatting with Dan Matlow and he suggested I give you a call to discuss the ideas I have implemented for the production of documents in the healthcare and pharmaceuticals industry?
At this point, I assume that "chatting with The President" will get his attention, and my goal on this call is to get him to ask about my services and to agree to a single follow-up email with information of value to Medworxx.
One of my chief assets on making unsolicited telephone calls is my accent, a mixture of Lancashire UK, Western Australian, and Canadian. You can hear the first script by clicking here.
Contact Me and let me know how you got on. I'd love to hear your side of the story.
In fact, why not put me on your list of people-to-call? I'd love to see how you make cold calls.

Did You Just Lose Me?

Was it you who sent me an email a day or two after the networking meeting/seminar?
I know that I exchanged cards with the guy sitting to my left after chatting with him for five minutes. I gave him my card and he gave me his.
I noticed that he wasn't taking notes, so I emailed him a copy of my notes (After the Networking Meeting) and he was kind enough to reply by email and thank me. He is, to me, a valuable contact into a major bank.
Two other people asked me for a card. We didn't exchange names. You might have been one of them.
If you were you sent me an email with a one-page PDF brochure telling me what you do and suggesting I purchase your services.
But I don't know you.
So I deleted the email.
Sorry.
No I'm not.
I'm trying to eliminate from my current contact list all those businesses to whom I send a Christmas card but who never call me. I know to be patient, but seven years?
My new contact list is based solely on people, not businesses, with whom I have engaged in a real conversation – not a soulless cold-call. I've met them at meetings and chatted for five or ten. They call me occasionally, or respond thankfully when I send them an email.
We stay in touch.
But I'm through trying to bond with a PDF file.

Who Ya Gonna Call?

You need to make a pitch to the guy who REALLY counts.
Let's call him "Rick". You have his number, email address, title, and a 4-page dossier gleaned from the company web site.
A call that starts "Rick, you don't know me but …." is going to be dead in the water before you inhale your first breath.
Don't even bother.
Look again.

Somewhere amongst that mass of names is a close-fit. Someone in a similar role, at a similar level and you don't know, but perhaps they meet in the dining-room each day, or have to attend the same bi-weekly meetings.
Look for a good fit.
Let's call him Gerry.
Then call THEM instead.
I promise you, Gerry will tell you "You should speak to Rick", and give you the same name, number, email that you ferreted out an hour ago.
Now call Rick.
A call that starts "Rick, I was chatting with Gerry and he said to call you about … " is going to skim across the water like Donald Campbell.
Contact Me and let me know that you got the business, OK?

Look Again!

My theory is that I should be able to run some of these articles, or other essays, in a local newspaper.
So having picked up a copy of the Mississauga News, I flipped through it and to my dismay found that they already had THREE columnists.
There is no way that I can displace a stable of three experienced columnists, so I re-folded the newspaper and (I am ashamed to report) have been using it as a mat for my coffee pot for a week. A Second Use For Everything.
This morning I picked it up and for reasons unknown to me (but I pass this on to you and suggest you make it a part of your conscious behavior), I skimmed through it again.
My eye was caught by the words "SPECIAL SECTION" on the top corner of about two-thirds of the paper.
That's right! Those three "columnists" represented only three one-off articles.
Next week's paper probably won't have a SPECIAL SECTION, so the market may well be wide open for me.
I'll phone as soon as I've finished typing this up.
I am reminded of Winston Churchill's "never" admonition:
· "Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never-in nothing, great or small, large or petty - never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense".
Funnily enough, it's what one of my mentors says, too (Cheryl Scoffield of Executive Sales Support).
But see also "Who Ya Gonna Call?".

10 Cold Call Scripts that Work for YOU

You can search the web for scripts, print them out, edit them, use them, and you'll still feel awkward and robotic.
I know. I've been there myself.
But I gradually lifted myself out of the pit of despair by a simple mechanical device, and I'm going to share that with you now.
Step 1
Search the web and locate a half-a-dozen pages of script.
This link will get you started.
http://www.google.ca/search?q=cold+call+script&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a
Step 2
Read the pages (there's good advice on them) and paste the scripts into a word-processing document.
Number each script, just as I have numbered the steps on this page.
Step 3

Build a table with one more column than you have scripts. Ten scripts? Eleven columns!
Step 4
Into the left hand column paste the 40 or so contacts you want to cold-call today.
Across the top of the remaining columns paste the script numbers; one through ten in this example.
Step 5
Just before you pick up the phone to make the first call, choose a script based on whatever knowledge you have – how you feel right now, the type of company you think you're calling, whether you'll be speaking with a male or female, and so on.
Mark with an "X" the cell to the right of the contact name and below the selected script. This identifies what you are about to do.
Step 6
Pull out that script sheet and make the call.
Sure it will be mechanical; these first few calls will be awkward, but it will get better, I promise.
Step 7
At the end of the call, when the phone is re-cradled, ask yourself how you feel about that call.
If you feel it went well, if you achieved your objective and received permission to send an email (or "set up a meeting" or …..), then CIRCLE that "X" to show that, in that particular case, the script worked for YOU.
Step 8
Carry on with the remaining calls, "X" for the selected script, CIRCLE for the successful selected scripts.
Step 9
When the calls are made, which scripts had the most success?
Which scripts did you not even bother to try? Try them tomorrow. Don't eliminate them until you've tried them
Step 10
Discard the scripts that were tried at last THREE times and failed to achieve your objective. Those scripts are not suited to you and your business.
Replace the discarded scripts with new scripts from your web search.
Step 11
In no time at all you'll have a battery of scripts that work for YOU.
Contact Me and let me know how you got on. I'd love to hear your side of the story.
In fact, why not put me on your list of people-to-call? I'd love to see how you make cold calls.

Your Web Site (HERE)

Print this page out on paper.
Pick up a pencil.
Complete the following sentences.
· The goal of my site is to
· This time next week my site will
· The people who will reach my site are
· When they reach my site I want them to
· If they send me an email I will
· If they call me by telephone I will
· I will have to update my site every
· My test for my site showing up in search engines is
· My dollar budget is not more than
· My time budget, in hours per week, is
· I fully understand that I can not have everything at
You and I both are indebted to Seth Godin.

Aiming for Viral

Wednesday, September 16, 2009
I made the decision this morning.

I feel that the fastest way to get my name on people's lips is to "go viral" in the vernacular.
Of all the things I do, of all the things I teach, of all the things I own, of all the things I know, what ONE THING satisfies

1. General appeal
2. Universal appeal
3. Be targeted towards a small professional segment business.

The answer is "Indxr".

Now you don't have a clue what Indxr is, so here is the one-sentence profile:
Indxr is a one-click index-creation tool for Microsoft Word documents.
You can read more here and here.

• I have my 3,000+ emails and phone numbers gleaned from 13,000 press releases.
• I have a simple database table with organization, name, title, phone, email, web page, to which I have added a FLAG field and a Date Last Issued field.
• I have a little macro that will flag the first 20 candidates with a "Q"uery flag.
• I have a little macro that will test the flags and email an html email for those records flagged with a "Y"es flag.
• I have the html message ready to go.

All I need now is permission.

I'll filter out the communication companies in batches of 10, call the representative and seek permission to send a one-time email describing the Indxr.

No wait! There's more!
Julia Wooster of http://www.primeadminsolutions.com/ came up with the names of a few groups to which she belongs, groups who would leap at the chance.

I told Julia that since my web page www.ChrisGreaves.com was on every GUI form as a clickable link, she could host the package on her web pages and drive traffic to her web pages or to her networking group's pages as a return favor.

What do I care?

As long as people download it, share the link or even email the ZIP file to their colleagues, ultimately the question on everyone's lips will be "What else does this guy do?'
I should record a training video and post it on YouTube.
I should mention it in interviews, on my blogs, on my business card, in my email signature.
I need a short snappy script for the telephone call.
What is holding me back, apart from that?

Saturday, October 10, 2009

And the rest, as they say, is herstory!
www.Indxr.ca
http://indxr.ca/testimonials.htm
http://www.virtualassistantforums.com/software/great-tool-authors-writers-who-create-indexes-13666
http://www.primeadminsolutions.com/Blog/tabid/123/Default.aspx
etc. etc. etc.

How Cheeky Do You Want Me to Be?

Brainwave!
My name is Chris Greaves.
Well, Christopher Greaves if you want to be fancy, but "Chris" works for me.
My web site is ChrisGreaves.com.
Well, http://www.chrisgreaves.com/ if you want to be fancy, but I only speak with people who know to put www in front.
Or who know that you can just type "ChrisGreaves.com" directly into the browsers box.
I am registered with a great many web sites, forums, blogs, newspapers, and until this morning I always used my name as a user name, thus "cgreaves", "chrisgreaves", or "cprgreaves" and so on.
· This morning I thought "Why not use my web site as my name?".
Better visibility; you still know my name, and I'm probably the same Chris Greaves as pops up elsewhere.
But now you also can figure out how to visit my web site!
http://empoweryou.ca/2009/09/16/backing-up-your-data/#comments
Expect to see a great many more comments on blogs as of today…..

The 1-6-10 Rule

Here's my method for knuckling down and making sure those calls get made (They are not Cold Calls, they are Introductory Calls).
My objectives are to make 1 new prospect per day, retain 6 contacts, issue 10 emails.
1 Prospect
· (1) I locate the prime candidate in the one to four news releases harvested by Weather Vain from Canada News Wire.
· (2) I build a dossier on that company
· (3) I telephone them to obtain 2 emails
· (4) I build the letter
· (5) I send the letter
· (6) I make a follow-up telephone call
· (7) I record the result.
Now I don't do all that in one day.
On Monday I'll do steps (1) and (2).
On Tuesday I'll do step (3) for the company I located last Friday.
On Wednesday I'll be doing step (5) for the company I located last Thursday
And so on. With each prospect there is a time to work on that prospect, and a time to let it lie. For another example, I ALWAYS leave the draft letter overnight and re-read it the next day.
It is important to introduce a new prospect into the pipeline EACH DAY and to keep the pipeline moving.
6 Contacts
· (1) I locate the "stalest" contact in my Contacts database.
· (2) I phone and chat or leave a voice-mail asking them to call me back.
· (3) I record the result
Each day I'll perform that sequence for the 6 stalest contacts, where THE stalest contact is the one whose record has the lowest date-last-modified value. That is, it's been the longest time since I spoke with them.
I am asking them to call me back because I am in a process of removing dead-wood contacts from my list – prospects with who I've had no significant conversation – to make room for better prospects.
If they don't call me back within 2 weeks, I delete them from the database.
10 eMails
· (1) I locate 10 potential email contacts from my MASS database culled from Canada News Wire.
· (2) I locate their web page
· (3) I load their web page to the email database
· (4) I phone them with an offer
· (5) I send them an email
· (6) I record the result.
Each day I'll touch 10 potential users of Indxr and try to get them to try it.
A positive result means they are added to my list as new contacts, of better quality than those I have identified as dead wood.
A positive result also means they are candidates for a future emailing about other products and services.
The Daily Quota
This won't work unless I apply myself rigorously to the process.

Here is the one-page form I print out and maintain in my 3-ring binder marketing diary.
By the end of the day, the 2nd and 3rd tables should be filled in completely.
By the end of a fortnight, the top table should be filled in completely.
Stragglers (more recent than a fortnight) will see the top table in various stages of completion.
Logging the Time
If like me you use a time-logging device (BillT is my choice) then assign a generic code for prospecting and a specific code for each of Prospect, Contact and Emails, thus "PROSPECTP", "PROSPECTC" AND "PROSPECTE".
Now you can keep track of the hours you spend prospecting 'PROSPECT" and the time on each separate task.
You have budgeted your time, so you can see how well you are going.
When to Call?
Obviously you can research the web name and so on out-of-hours.
Many telephone calls can be made outside of regular business hours if you feel that a voice-mail will suffice, but CAUTION: Small businesses run out of a home office will NOT appreciate a call when you can't sleep at 3 a.m., and some corporate types will forward their office number to their mobile phone so that they can annoy the rest of us while we are reading on the bus. They won't appreciate a 3 a.m. call either!
Voice-Mail Script
A standard script, with optional variations, will help you to leave a professional message when your contact can not or does not pick up their phone.
Don't spend more than five minutes on a script.
Build it like any business letter, with a Goal. Name and phone as the first two and last two words. Speak slowly and crisply – don't make them rewind!
Monitor your voice with a digital recording device; my voice tends to creep to a higher octave with anxiety, so I work to tone it down.
Make notes on your script "("I wish I'd [not] said that"!) and refine it as you go.
· Pay especial attention to every voice mail you receive.
Which ones fire YOU up? Since you are looking for contacts who (are) like you, the same style will probably fire them up too!
Steal ruthlessly!
For the results, please read The 1-6-10 Rule – How Did it Work?

Budgeting Time

I attended a seminar this morning on The Business Plan; a segment included the regular sales Forecast and Financial Statements (Income Statement, Balance Sheet etc) suitable for a restaurant or flower-shop. I'm a consultant, so I don't do that sort of thing.
.... so in my late-afternoon tea-break I decided to do what I'd decided not to do:
Play around with a spreadsheet.
Bit of a waste of time for me to do the forecast sheets on page 5 and the statements on page 7 & 8. I certainly don't need the practice in Excel (grin!). And besides, I don't do "sales" like a restaurant or flower shop.
But they say that "Time Is Money", and if that is so, I ought to be able to do a fair facsimile with my time.
Time is all I have.
I have three objectives for each day in my marketing efforts:
· () Phone 6 contacts from my contacts data base ("Just keeping in touch")
· () Identify and research 1 new prospect (via Canada News Wire and my Prospecting Tools all the way to the initial emailed letter of introduction)
· () Identify 20 qualified targets for a mass email letter, no recipient more frequently than once per two months)
The rest of each day is my own.
I know how many working days there are in each month
Phone Calls
I figure that I can make one phone call every 5 minutes initially.
Starting today I'll be whittling down my contact list, discovering business that no loner exist ("Delete"!). Some calls will take one minute; some might become a 15-minute chat, but 5 minutes seems a good starting point.
As the days/months go by, the calls will become longer, because I'll have got rid of the dead wood and will have more currency in my contacts.
The accompanying spreadsheet shows me spending 5 minutes per call initially, rising to not more than 15 minutes as the months go by.
Please see row 9.
New Prospects
Each day I cull (automatically!) one new prospect from Canada News Wire.
Today it will take me an hour to trawl through the web, LinkedIn and other sources to amass a dossier, an hour to assemble novel pages describing my ideas, an hour to draft the letter and an hour to revise and proof-read it with my mentor.
Say 4 hours in all.
As the months go by I should get better at this and the time per prospect should drop to two hours tops. Besides which, much of my basic documentation will be re-usable.
Please see row 10.
Mass eMails
My same automated task gleans email contacts from Canada News Wire and I can issue targeted emails to qualified recipients.
I figure that initially, including development of the package that updates and uses my database, I'll spend an hour a day on this, but down the road it will drop to fifteen minutes.
Please see row 11.
Monthly Forecast
The monthly totals are found in rows 13 through 16.
Annual Forecast
I develop my annual forecast by taking the twenty-fourth month, multiplying it by 12 (months), and then loading it by 10% each successive year.
Why 10%?
The seminar leader used that figure.
Besides, as I move into a higher fee spectrum, my prospects will be larger companies and I'll need to spend more time, perhaps running out to buy glossy paper.
Income Statement
I am granted 24 hours per day is all; I sleep, eat, play with the cat …
My most optimistic work day is 10 hours, for all that I get up at 4:00 a.m. and go to bed at 9:30 p.m, I travel to meetings, wash the dishes, meet Bill for coffee, and so on.
I have therefore (see row 28) 200 hours available to me each month.
And so (see row 30) I have 90 hours a month left over for travel to and attend seminars, purchase supplies, meet contacts for coffee, and so on.
As the months go by and I get better at the daily grind, I have more time available for activities other than phone, prospect and emails, and after a year, things settle down to a steady and predictable pace.
My annual statements (rows 33-35) are based on the same fixed number of working hours available to me (12 months of 200 hours each month); a 10% loading (as my clients require more service time for bigger contracts), and a consequent reduction in time available for other activities.
Will It Compute?
How accurate will this be?
I have a little billing tool based on a Notepad file with a .LOG header that records my start and stop time for each task.
I ought to be able to compare my actual time spent phone/prospect and email against my scheduled and predicted loads.

Why I Put Everything on My Web Site

I decided six months ago to put everything I write on my web site.
Why?
Because to me it made no sense to write something of value and have it spinning at 7200 rpm on the hard drive on my computer.
If it is of value to me, (and why else would I write it up?) it is probably of value to someone else.
Heck, it MUST be of value to at least one of the 7 billion other people on the planet.
So what do I write?
Obviously I record diaries of my daily business experience (you are reading one now!) .
I don't write a personal diary ("Met Bill for ice-cream").
I write technical papers on any new task I perform. If I am asked to look into "List Numbering in Microsoft Word", I record my findings because I'll probably be asked to report for another client, or at least, I'll stumble across a prospect with that problem and can capitalize on my previous work.
Resurrecting "lost data" from Fred's hard drive likewise was an exercise in which I developed a step-by-step procedure for copying files across NOT using Windows Explorer, which proved to be useless.
I live an active life; I am curious about everything, from the mechanisms of Mitochondrial DNA to the photons that arrive from thousands of light years away. From a scale model of our planetary system set up in the gymnasium of the local church to the Red Wrigglers that eat my garbage.
If you are interested in Mitochondrial DNA, or the photons that arrive from thousands of light years away, or a scale model of our planetary system, or Red Wrigglers that eat garbage, I want to chat with you.
My web pages are the outpouring of my mind. One of those pages will serve as a note to someone:
Talk to Me!

It's Not About More Money

(I am aware that this is possibly the 300th blog entry of this title.)
I spoke today with a successful consultant who isn't particularly interested in Getting More Business.
"I have enough", he says; "I'm semi-retired". And I'm glad for him.
I still feel that a bit of effort can make him feel even better.
That little extra effort in Prospecting, Marketing, Sales or what-ever can give you more than money; it can give you a choice.
I may be making enough money to pay the rent, buy the groceries, and set aside a sum for retirement.
I make that money from specific clients who buy my services.
Of all my clients, by definition one must be "the worst". And by definition one must be "the best".
With a bit more effort I could swap the worst client for a different client, one who would be significantly better than the second-worst client.
Of course, now that I've got rid of the worst client and replaced them with a client significantly better (and hence more fun), my second-worst client has slipped to the bottom and is now "the worst".
I'll always have a "worst" client, (and I'll always have a "best" client.
But with a little bit of extra effort I can improve the quality of my clients, and hence can improve the fun in my life, without having to feel I'm busting my gut to Make More Money.

10% is Missing!

I'm convinced it must be true for every one of us.
Speaking with Jim White of JSW & Associates this afternoon, I casually dropped a question "What is your biggest problem?". I am a problem solver, so it is a natural question to ask.
Jim's answer set me to thinking. He paused then said "Getting Started" (or words to that effect.
I have the same problem, but I'd call it "a gap".
Cheryl is good at what she does, but she could use a bit of help in automating the work. The prospect (sorry!) of an automated prospecting services would fill a gap in her business.
We all, every one of us, seem to be good at almost all of the process from prospecting, cold-calling through the sales call, closing the sale, starting the project and delivering the acceptance test.
But somewhere along the chain of events will be a link which we would describe as "our weakest link" or "my gap" or 'my biggest problem".
Think about it. By definition it must be so.
Our real problem, then, is making a positive identification of that link, and setting about strengthening it.
P.S. There's a nice end to the story – Jim and I both need to do more networking, so he's taking me as a guest to one of his networking meeting tomorrow morning, and I'm taking him as a guest to one of my networking meetings later in the month!

The Two Levels of Networking

If you are looking to expand your business by number-of-contacts, you have two distinct sets of networking groups.
The first you know – the Association of Like-Minded Consultants, the Society of Trainers Looking for Opportunities, and the Guild of Under-Employed Technical Writers.
The second is new to you; was new to me until a short while ago:
The Bankers Association of Toronto; The Tight-Knit-Group of Investment Counselors, and the Clique of Pharmaceutical VPs.
To join the first set
… you merely show up at the monthly event, tell them that you are a visitor at the first meeting, and you get in for free.
Next month you pay a $25 one-time fee.
If you decide to join, it is $125 a year and $10 per night.
Bring lots of business cards and be prepared to stand up and make a 60-second elevator speech.
To join the second set
… you need a really well-cut suit, you need to play golf or have a boat (or at least know someone who has a boat), and you need to be invited.
Bring only a few business cards because it’s not a shotgun approach to business, it's really about basking in the safety and security of The Club.

Putting a Human Face on LinkedIn

I am gradually gaining an understanding of LinkedIn. I joined but two weeks ago and am somewhat leery of becoming a member of a vast amorphous group with little in common with most of them.
This morning I received my third "Invitation to Join My Group", this time from another close friend and associate. I called her and expressed my fears, while confirming our friendship and association.
I now think that joining Cathy Nesbitt's LinkedIn group is the equivalent of giving her one of my business cards and asking her to pin it on the front of her shirt, along with the 31 other business cards.
When Cathy meets someone (for coffee, for work, at church, on the subway etc), my business card is visible, so if that person happens to need a Grey water system , or jam made, or a computer programmed, they have an opportunity to point to my business card and ask Cathy about me, or even just to note my name and phone and call me later.
I still live in a village of about 200 people – about the maximum that any human brain can accommodate.
I still have 200 names I could call up as acquaintances, or better, but one of those better-or-better names is now carrying around my business card on display.

Does Google Think Your Web Site is Malicious?

During my regular prospecting work this morning I cam across a web site for which Google Search offered an informative that the web site had hosted malicious software.

Well, say no more! A great opportunity to call the CEO and bring him bad news. (You can't Shoot The Messenger when the news arrives by telephone!)
Of course, he doesn't want me to email a screenshot to him; he is suspicious of an unsolicited telephone warning about malicious stuff, ("Sounds like a scam to me"), and that's GOOD NEWS because he is conscious of security.
He'd better look into that …..
I advise him to Google Search his company name and see; he can call me back if he wants to know more.
Then I wondered if my site was found to have anything out of the ordinary, so I replaced my prospect's url with my own:
http://www.google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?site=http://www.chrisgreaves.com/&hl=en

The Good news is NOT that I have no malicious stuff on my web site.
The Good News is that I have found another way to determine how often Google checks my web pages.
Frankly, I think that 90 days is too long between visits.
I'd better look into that …..

Click ENTER to CONTINUE

I think I will submit this for the dumbest item of web-fare on this planet; I don't know about Jupiter.
What on earth (to make use of an appropriate phrase) is the point of making a prospective client/customer jump another hurdle on the way to satisfaction.?
Are the ISPs of this world so strapped for bandwidth that we have to employ neurons, synapses and muscles to give them a fighting chance?
Lord knows, my web site(s) are nothing to brag about.
But I can't see that introducing a "Click HERE if you are serious about actually learning something" would improve them one whit.

The World's Slowest-Learning Networker

It is slowly dawning on me that my regular daily work is NOT writing programs, NOT writing essays, NOT delivering training, NOT telephoning people to find work.
NOT!
My regular daily work is establishing and building relationships.
Nothing else.
The programs, essays, speaking engagements, training delivery etc. etc. gets me money, which is nice.
But I'm a person, and my main activity has to be establishing and maintaining contact with other people.
I must establish myself as a part of the business community.
Here's what happened today: I picked up the phone to call someone, and found myself thinking "Oh! They won't have any work for me today".
WRONG. Utterly Wrong!
Believably (now) short-sighted.
I must pick up the phone and say "Hello, how are you doing? What are you working on?" and show an interest in that. I must bring up something which happened on a previous conversation (it's what the MEMO field is for in the contact database!).
Then they will ask me what I'm doing and I'll tell them.
And they may not want it.
But they will think of me next time they want something.
Or mention me to someone else over lunch.

When the Presentation Fails

It will happen.
You travel downtown to a 3-hours seminar, five of those precious twenty-four hours (24 Hours in a Day) assigned to a presentation that turns out not to be what you had thought it would be.
Faint not nor fear not.
· (1) You got there way ahead of time with your business cards and made a point of having a five-minute serious chat with at least one other early-arrival ("serious net worker")
· (2) You got at least one useful point out of the three hours. Be honest now – if you can't harvest one new thing out of three hours, you are on the wrong planet. We would all like to gain a hundred ideas; be happy with one, just for tonight.
· (3) Use the boring times when know-it-alls interrupt to demonstrate their erudition (so how come they aren't the guy up in front, huh?) to jot down those ten things you'd rather be doing in your home-office than sitting here. That's the list that will get you going first thing tomorrow morning, an incentive to rise at 5 a.m. instead of 6 a.m.
· (4) You are, or are soon going to be speaking in front of such a group Real Soon Now, or you are going to make a presentation to ten senior executives of Global Conglobulations in three weeks time. Use tonight to build a list of what not to do: speak too quickly; end each sentence with "right?"; start each sentence with "So, .."; rattle coins in your pocket; interrupt the questioner before they have finished answering the question; wear a peach colored-shirt with part of a Quizno's sandwich on the left-hand panel.
· (5) In short, make good use of Your Time, for it is Your Time, not theirs, that is being burned up.
Grab it while it's hot.
P.S. I run a course on Time Management as part of my "Business Communications for the Mature Professional" series.

Google Analytics

http://www.google.com/analytics/
Now that you have your own domain and a web site, learn from Google how you stack up.
The Google Analytics web site is simplicity itself. In under five minutes I had
· (1) Signed in using my FREE gMail account
· (2) Keyed in my name and telephone number
· (3) Keyed in my domain name (www.chrisGreaves.com)
· (4) Pasted a snippet of code into a Notepad text file and saved it on my hard drive
· (5) Pasted the same snippet into the Footer.doc whose contents appear on every page of my web site
My theory is that a week from now I can obtain text and graphic reports from Google telling what pages are being visited, how much time people are spending there, ….
I'll post an update to this page once I have a report.

Why I Joined

So I joined LinkedIn.
I received two invitations from two colleagues with whom I am working, but since I was meeting one for lunch today, I held off responding until I'd asked her about it.
Despite all the hype that surrounds LinkedIn, here is how I see it affecting my business.
I am struggling to work out what to do with 300 contacts, 200 of whom could be considered "weak", and I'm struggling to establish new contacts, better prospects, of whom I know nothing.
· LinkedIn is a catalyst mechanism that gets the conversation started.
Example 1: Gillian is one of my 200 "weak" contacts; she receives a card from me each Christmas, and I try to phone her once a year, but the bottom line is we have never gotten around to getting any business done, and I feel that either we should meet, or I should just politely drop her from my list.
For all I know my annual mailing is just more junk mail from her point of view.
But if she is on LinkedIn and if I send her an invitation to join, one of two things will happen.
(1) She says "No thanks" or ignores me; bye-bye Gillian.
(2) She says "Hi! What are you up to?" or similar, which gets the conversation started.
Example 2: Heather, John and Angus (not their real names) work for Global Conglobulations, a firm with apparently very deep pockets who have been spraying contracts and cash around like ….
If any of them are on LinkedIn and if I send them an invitation to join, one of two things will happen.
(1) They say "No thanks" or ignore me; maybe I should try direct mail, or a cold call.
(2) They say "Hi! What do you do?" or similar, which gets the conversation started.
It's worth a try.
(Cheryl Scoffield is on LinkedIn)