Aaron Hoos

Building a sales funnel is fun and easy. Yes, there’s some work involved but most entrepreneurs like working in their business (and working on your sales funnel isn’t as tedious as some of the other things you could be doing!).

So the very first step depends on whether your business has sold something before or whether it hasn’t. Below, I’ve written answers for both:

IF YOUR BUSINESS HAS SOLD SOMETHING BEFORE
If your business has sold something before, and you are just wanting to articulate and improve your existing sales funnel, then your very first step should be to look at your customer(s) and trace them backwards as far as you can:

• What was the final action that made them become Customers? (A “buy now” button? A phone call? etc.)
• What were they thinking about and asking you about before they bought? (How did you interact with them? Where did you interact with them?)
• What did they do to reach the point where you could present to them? (Did they click to a sales page? Did they telephone you? Did you meet them at their office?)
• How did they find you in the first place?
• What are your customers like, demographically? (What was similar about them?)

If you have sold something to other people before, your goal here is to figure out who those people were, why thy bought from you, and how they progressed through your sales funnel. That doesn’t mean you can’t create a new sales funnel; rather, it means that you have a sales funnel starting point… but a sales funnel starting point you have not articulated before.

IF YOUR BUSINESS HAS NOT SOLD SOMETHING BEFORE
If you haven’t sold something (in this business) before, then your very first step should be to list your potential sales funnel (Audience, Leads, Prospects, Customers, Evangelists), and decide on at least one form of media to go in each stage. For example, your Audience might be collected through Twitter; your Leads might read your blog; your Prospects might read your newsletter; etc.).

The goal here is to create a starting point. You will build off it and improve it as time goes on, but you need a foundation and this is a fast way to build a sales funnel and focus your sales funnel strategy.

Last night I received a call from a friend of mine who is contemplating a move. He is an independent consultant affiliated with a national organization and he’s been offered an interesting opportunity with another organization. His current position offers a higher potential cash flow (although a big payday hasn’t happened yet) and the new position offers a lower overall income potential but the cash flow is more immediate and the marketing investment is substantially less.

Then today I met with another friend of mine who has a job but is thinking about developing his own business on the side and building it up slowly.

I think both of these people are in a similar situation and have a huge opportunity that they can take advantage of. And I thought I’d write it here because I know of several other small business owners who may find themselves in the same situation at one point or another in the life of their business.

THE PLATEAU
The situation is this: Both of my friends have reached a plateau in their professional lives. I don’t mean that in a bad way (the way some people use the word “plateau”). In fact, I mean it quite positively: They both have the opportunity to take on higher risk/higher paying ventures but they are momentarily accepting the lower risk/lower paying “safer bets”. Consider it an intentional or strategic plateau; a place to run on autopilot for a season.

There are a variety of reasons for choosing to run on the plateau for a while, but the bottom line is that both friends now have a relatively easy and consistent road ahead of them for the short term. It’s beneficial in some ways because it helps to reduce risk and increase time and cash flow, which are occasionally necessary in the life of the entrepreneur.

This is an exciting opportunity that I think can lead to even greater things. A plateau is a place where you can run on cruise control for a while, which gives you the opportunity to invest time and money and effort into…

THE SPRINGBOARD
When business owners/consultants/freelancers/etc. find a nice, easy gig that will sustain them for a while, it sometimes feels like the Nirvana of entrepreneurship: You get the own-your-own-business income without the sweat of marketing aggressively. That’s the plateau.

The mistake would be to just coast. To just take in the scenery. To just sit back and enjoy the ride. But I think there’s an opportunity to turn the plateau into a springboard. I think there’s an opportunity to enjoy the fact that one aspect of your professional life can run on autopilot with less risk and less time (and yes, slightly less income) while you pour your efforts strategically into another place: The future you.

Your plateau can be your springboard — the opportunity for you to market yourself very aggressively. And, because you aren’t marketing yourself aggressively to win business today, you can market yourself far more strategically… positioning yourself for where you want to be when you’ll reach the end of your plateau.

Here are a few ideas:

• Select keywords and start producing content for those keywords. Yes, you won’t reach the top of Google tomorrow but that’s okay because you don’t need to achieve that result tomorrow. You have time.
• Start building assets, content, products and services for where you want to be in 2-3 years (or whenever your plateau is going to end).
• Start networking. But remember: Network with the people that will help the future you, not the present you!
• Refine your brand so that it’s no longer expressing who you are today, but rather who you will be when you have to go back into the marketplace to get more clients.
• Revise your business plan to reflect “tomorrow’s” business.
• Build a following/subscription list/fanbase. Do it now when your business isn’t depending on it.

Chances are, you may be at the same point now or in the future, too. It usually comes with long term contracts or with employment. If taking on more work isn’t right for you, then using some of your downtime to create the “you” of tomorrow is an investment in your long-term success.

Every mall has a food court and, it seems to me, basically the same options: Usually a couple of Asian food places, an Italian place, a burger-and-fries place, and a sub place. The brands are usually pretty similar from one mall to another (at least in the malls I’ve shopped in).

Turns out, someone has been dubbed “the food court king” for his growth and broad brand lines represented at many food courts across Canada.

Stanley Ma is the founder of MTY, a food services company whose specialty is branding. They have 26 brands (some acquired and some developed in-house) and over 1,700 stores across Canada.

Read the article here: The food court king. Don’t miss the key lessons from this article:

1. Good growth is thoughtful, strategic, and patient.
2. Effective branding is an asset.
3. Successful businesses find synergies among its products and brands.

Learn more about MTY and see what brands they own at MTYgroup.com.

This past weekend, someone asked me why they hadn’t had any success in their business. Together, we looked at what they were offering and how they had marketed their company. Their offering was good but they had tried (and failed) to sell a grand total of… 4 times.

I told them they needed to try selling WAY more than 4 times. They countered with frustration at their lack of results. I told them that successful people could paper their walls with rejections. Honestly, I don’t think they’re going to see success any time soon.

This isn’t the first time I’ve had a conversation like this. A couple of failed attempts at sales can wreak havoc on any new entrepreneur’s confidence. As a result, I’ve seen many new entrepreneurs give up early in the game and decide that entrepreneurship isn’t for them.

I’ve observed the following law to be in effect for most people: Your level of success is directly related to your level of desperation.

The most successful entrepreneurs I’ve met have been incredibly successful because they had nothing else. I’ve seen it in my own life, too: The times that I had a “fall back plan” were the times when my ventures weren’t as successful. I can tell you that my success today is because I got to a point in my life where I knew that I couldn’t face another day working for my previous employer. I quit on a Friday without knowing what I was going to do. I had my first client on the following Monday. Two months later, I was earning more than I ever had before, and it has grown ever since. It was desperation that fueled my fire.

The person who asked me this weekend about their lack of success is so busy with a job, a spouse who is successful, plus a variety of back-up plans, that they aren’t likely to be desperate enough to enjoy success.

Of course, I know people who aren’t in a desperate situation who have been quite successful. It’s a motivation issue. These people are able to motivate themselves toward success in spite of their comfortable circumstances. But most entrepreneurs who want to be successful would stand to benefit from a little desperation.

What do you have to do to get desperate enough to achieve success?

Steve Blank, a serial entrepreneur, gave a speech (in 3 parts) to what seems like some kind of lunch crowd. Good insights for one-time or serial entrepreneurs!