Darrell Amy's Blog, page 2

The Most Overlooked Goal and Metric For Maximizing Revenue Growth

When it comes to revenue growth, most companies focus on the total revenue goal. Doing this usually ignores a critical driver of revenue: cross-sell revenue. The goal for cross-sell should be 100% sold.

Most companies do a reasonable job at landing new clients. The majority of companies struggle at expanding inside their base. With marketing focused on generating leads and sales focused on closing net-new business, we have a tendency to land new deals and then walk away. 

My first real sales job was with a company that drilled into my head the concept of 100% sold. A client becomes 100% sold when they are taking advantage of all of the products and services your company offers. As a marketing guru, Jay Abraham would say, “You want all of our clients to get the best and highest value from your company.”

100% Sold: What percentage of your clients own all of your products and services? 

As I lead Revenue Growth Workshops across multiple industries the common trend is that companies tend to focus expectations on marketing and selling their core product. Little attention gets placed on new products and support offerings. 

Too many companies have only paid lip-service to cross-selling more products and services to their current client base. As a result, low-hanging fruit sits rotting on the vine. Even worse, smart competitors that grab that fruit can use their relationship with your customer to displace you from the account.

100% sold should be tracked on three levels:
1. Company-Wide

What percentage of your client base owns each of your product and/or service categories? You may have a core product that 100% of your clients own. Then, you may have a service offering that 25% of your clients own. You may have a secondary product offering that 10% of your clients own. Company dashboards should include the percentage of clients that own each of your products. 100% sold should be a topic in every company meeting.

2. By Sales Rep

How well is each rep doing at 100% sold across their client base? Measuring reps by the percentage of their clients that use each product and service keeps the focus on cross-selling. If a given rep is underperforming in selling a product or service category their development plan can include learning how to sell that service. Bonus structures can be configured based on 100% sold metrics. Stack rankings can be presented by 100% sold.

3. By Client 

For any given client, what percentage of your product and services offering do they own? If you have four lines of business and your client only has one line, they are 25% sold. They may be a big client for that one line of business but they are still only using 25% of your products and services. Account reviews with marketing (yes, I said marketing) and sales can include developing strategies to get to 100% sold. This is especially fruitful for your Ideal Clients.  

How To Get To 100% Sold

It’s time to get serious about cross-selling. In Revenue Growth Engine I present marketing and sales processes that can be leveraged to cross-sell.  There are many processes you can build to align marketing and sales around this goal.

The first step, however, is to set the goal of 100% sold and track the progress. Whether you own a company, lead a revenue team, or work in sales, you can put this to work right away.

Executives

Get your copy of Revenue Growth Engine. In the book, I unpack the concept of 100% sold and offer key marketing and sales processes you can put into place to maximize revenue by driving toward 100% sold.

Sales Leaders

Develop the account management sales skills to drive 100% sold with the Authentic Client Management program, part of the Trust-Building Series from Selling From the Heart.

Sales Professionals

You don’t have to wait for your company to set your own 100% sold goals and build the skills to execute. Join the Client Management part of the Trust-Building INTENSIVE from Selling From the Heart to begin enjoying the low-hanging fruits of 100% sold.

Three Alternatives To The Excuse That “We Don’t Have Time for Sales Training"

There is a huge disconnect in sales that costs companies and their sales reps millions of dollars a year. On one hand, we know that all high-performance leaders invest in their teams with training and coaching. On the other hand, sales leaders notoriously say, “We don’t have time for training.”

Imagine if the general manager of your favorite sports team called a press conference to announce the plan for the next season. “I’m proud to announce that we have attracted the best players to our team. They know what they are doing. They are top performers. So, we’ve decided that having coaches is a distraction to them. To keep them focused on what they are supposed to be doing, we’ve eliminated our coaching staff.”

If I heard that from my favorite team, I’d be livid. I know that the best athletes need training and coaching to become better. In fact, the best athletes are always attracted to the team that has the best coaching programs. (When you find an athlete that “does not need practice but wants to focus on the game” you need to see red flags.)

High-performance sales professionals are no better. They require training and coaching. The best ones want it.

So why do so many companies kick the can when it comes to sales development?

Over the years, the number one reason I’ve heard is, “We don’t have time.” A related reason that usually follows is, “We need to keep our salespeople in the field in front of clients.”

Fair. I get it. If time is the problem, rather than deny your reps why not find some ways to fix the problem. Here are three suggestions.

1. Develop Your Team’s Time Management Skills

How effective are your sales people at managing their time? We say we don’t have time for training and development, so where is the time going? High-performance professionals are fanatical about time management, ensuring that their efforts are focused on things that matter. Yet many sales teams rarely talk about this topic. Instead, they focus on activity. Proper time management drives good activity results. Activity without time management is rarely effective.

Make time management a regular topic of conversation. During one-on-one’s look at your rep’s calendars to explore how well they are managing their time. Do you only see appointments or do you also see blocks of time for prospecting, nurturing client relationships, quarterly business reviews, and personal development?

2. Encourage Energy Management Practices

Time management only goes so far. In the book, The Power of Full Engagement,     Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz advocate for energy management. To bring our best selves to the table, we need energy. A sales team without energy will struggle to be effective all day. Without energy, you get less productive time.

What if energy management were a part of your conversations with your sales team? Things like exercise, recovery breaks, and smart eating are not optional for high-performance professionals. Gone are the boiler room days of sales fueled by caffeine and cigarettes. Sales is stressful. This unmanaged stress not only hurts the health of your sales team, but it also kills performance.

Model and coach smart energy management. Help your sales reps develop balance in their lives. Encourage healthy habits. This results in sustained energy. Part of this energy opens up time for coaching and training.  You could even look at coaching and training as some downtime to allow your reps to recover.

3. Invest In Support Resources

How much of your sales team’s day is wasted doing administrative tasks? One study published in Forbes showed that sales professionals only spend 35% of their time actually selling. 35%! Let that sink in. The rest is squandered. Some of this is due to poor time management skills (see above). Much of this time is due to the requirements of paperwork, reports, order processing, and adding notes to the CRM.

In this environment, no wonder we say, “We don’t have time.” So, why not fix the problem? Here’s an idea: We call sales people “Account Executives” but expect them to do busywork tasks that could easily be delegated. Executives have assistants. Why shouldn’t salespeople?

What if instead of trying to onboard more salespeople, you invested in administrative resources to make your reps more productive? I’m not talking about more technology. I’m talking about people. In 2021 I took the leap to engage a virtual assistant. This investment has freed up incredible amounts of time, energy, and headspace that allow me to be more productive.

How much more productive could your sales people be if you provided administrative support? Plus, in a world where it’s tough to recruit top reps, imagine how to provide administrative support.

Sales Leaders: What Are You Going To Do?

Rather than say, “We don’t have time to train,” what if you created time to train? Up-skill and support your team in time and energy management. Consider how you could provide administrative support to your account executives. In all of this, your team will get the space for training and coaching, allowing them to dominate like any high-performance sports team.

A Message To Sales Professionals

Most of this article has been addressed to sales leaders. However, all of the concepts apply to individual sales professionals. Are you fanatical about time and energy management? What could you do in 2022 to improve in this area? Do you have an assistant? How much more could you sell if you could delegate administrative tasks? If you are at an income plateau, it might make sense to invest in a virtual assistant. All of this frees up time to sell along with time to invest in your own personal sales training and coaching.

The #1 Challenge For Sales and Marketing In the Next Decade

Without oil and grease the most beautiful sports-car with the most powerful engine will not make it out of the garage. Oil and grease reduce friction, allowing the cylinders to fire and the wheels to turn.

Business is the same way. Without the right oil and grease, your Revenue Growth Engine® comes to a grinding halt. 

What are the oil and grease every business needs? Trust and loyalty.

Trust removes the friction for deciding to become a client. Loyalty removes the friction for continuing to be a client.

The #1 challenge of executives, sales professionals, and marketers in the next decade will be building trust and sustaining loyalty.

Let’s explore how trust and loyalty connect to business results.

Net-New Business Requires Trust

To grow net-new business we must develop enough trust for buyers to approve the first order. However, trust is at an all-time low. 

In 2021, Edelman’s Trust Barometer showed that the trust bubble had burst, putting trust in information sources at an all-time low. Gallup’s research in Honesty and Ethics showed the bottom four professions were business executives, advertising practitioners, car salespeople, and members of congress.

The number one question marketing and sales professionals need to ask is, “How can we build trust with prospects?”

Sadly, much of today’s marketing focuses on tactics and metrics. What we need to focus on is building a trustworthy brand. Similarly, sales focuses on sales skills and activity. What’s needed are skills in building trust.

Here’s the frustrating thing about a post-trust marketplace. You and your business may actually be trustworthy. You may operate with congruence and character. The problem is that your buyers have been burned by other businesses. They are highly skeptical. They have been burned. 

How do you build trust? I’m tempted to put down the expected answer of demonstrating competence and credibility. To be sure, these are critical marketing and sales functions. But I believe these have become table stakes. To build trust, we are going to need to dig deep and get creative. This is the “moon-shot” that sales and marketing teams need to work together to figure out.

Cross-Sell Revenue Requires Loyalty

Over dinner a few weeks ago, Don Barden, behavioral economist and author of The Perfect Plan, says that when you get the first order you have a customer. It’s the second order where they become a client. This requires loyalty. 

If you want to experience exponential growth in your business you need simultaneously land new business while cross-selling more to your current customers. If your business struggles in cross-selling, you may have an issue with building loyalty.

In Never Lose a Customer Again, Joey Coleman presents research that shows that new customers decide whether they will remain a customer during the first 100 days. They may not cancel their contract in the first 100 days, but they will decide whether or not they will buy anything from your company going forward.

Most companies talk a lot about the service they provide when something breaks. The problem is that they don’t get to demonstrate this service during the first few months of a relationship since that’s not typically when things break. Instead, most companies go radio-silent during the first 100 days. During that time, buyer’s remorse rears its ugly head, destroying the possibility of loyalty.

Sales and marketing professionals need to wake up to the reality that the potential for cross-sell revenue hinges on what they do after they get the sale. This is the time to build loyalty.

Similar to trust, I believe most companies have only scratched the surface of the potential for building loyalty. Yes, we need to say thank you to new clients and provide them with a smooth onboarding experience. Must like trust-building, I believe there is much more development to be done on the frontier of loyalty.

Trust and Loyalty Will Determine Future Your Revenue Results

I admit that touchy-feely things like trust and loyalty seem disconnected from the bottom line. However, as we have said on the Selling From the Heart podcast, “Soft skills yield hard dollars.” The work we do in building trust and loyalty will be the oil and grease that remove the friction to create high-performance Revenue Growth Engines®!

Why Paying Attention Is the Key To Effective Marketing and Sales

The most important role of marketing and sales is to pay attention to the outcomes that prospective clients want. This is also the most neglected part of the marketing and sales role. Now, more than ever, marketing and salespeople must be listening and adapting.

Clay Christensen and Bob Moesta assert that customers don’t buy our products or services. Instead, they hire our products and services for a job to be done. In Revenue Growth Engine, I say that buyers don’t buy products, they buy the outcomes the products enable. 

Great companies have an intimate understanding of the jobs that prospects are hiring products to do.  The most effective marketing and sales focus on the outcomes, not the product. Outcomes are driven by business goals and the problems that keep clients from achieving them. 

As the economy shifts, the problems our prospects encounter may shift. We may be selling the same product as we sold last year, but the reason prospects buy the product may be different. 

We must pay attention to the market at large. Coming out of the disruption of the pandemic, many macro trends are creating both problems and opportunities for your prospects:

 Pricey plywood raises construction costs while borrowing costs are at an all-time low
 The impending great resignation threatens to disrupt teams inside many companies.
 The microchip shortage may create production delays in companies that rely on microchips.
 Hybrid work models introduce all kinds of new issues.
 Inflation presents companies with the challenge of raising prices and/or trimming costs.

These are just a few examples of the shifts in the economy that are shifting the outcomes your clients and prospects need. Will your message resonate with this, or will you still be talking about issues from the pandemic?

We must also pay attention to how these problems are affecting the world of the clients we serve. We need to be able to build a bridge between our products and services and the new problems our clients face.

The marketing and sales teams that understand how these dynamics are affecting their prospects have a much greater chance of creating a message that resonates. These will be the teams that win more business.

How do you determine the outcomes your clients and prospects want? You listen. 

In Beyond Entrepreneurship 2.0, Jim Collins and Bill Lazier recommend that companies “get so close to the customers that they experience what the customers experience.” This means marketing people need to get out into the field, talking with customers. Salespeople need to drive intentional conversations with their existing clients about what challenges they are facing. Then, marketing and sales need to get together and talk about these things.

When the pandemic began, smart companies gathered their core clients together and listened to them.  They brainstormed solutions to problems. They pivoted and innovated. 

With the rush of recovery, we may easily forget how important it is to talk to our customers. I submit that in this dynamic marketplace, the companies that talk to their customers will be the ones that make the biggest gains and avoid the deepest pitfalls.

Two Tips For Making Your Sales Forecasts More Accurate

Throughout my career as a sales professional and sales leader, I’ve been asked to assess the closing probability of the deals in my pipeline. These probabilities are used to try to create accurate sales forecasts.

However, forecasts are rarely accurate, which can be frustrating for executives. And while forecasting is a necessary exercise, I've found it has almost become a joke, as if sales professionals randomly assign probabilities based on a gut feeling.

But what if there were a better way to assign the probability of the deal closing? From my perspective, there is. Here are two steps you can take to help increase the accuracy of your sales forecasts:

1. Connect your services to the outcomes potential clients want.

Keep in mind that buyers don't simply buy products and services from you; they buy the outcomes those products and services can deliver. So for each deal in your funnel, ensure your sales representatives understand the buyer's desired outcomes, their top business and personal goals, and the challenges they are facing in reaching those goals.

I've found deals close when they are connected to the outcomes each buyer wants. If you know the buyer’s top desired outcomes and have connected your recommendation to that outcome, you have a high probability of closing a deal. If you don’t know the outcomes the buyer wants, your probability is low.

2. Ensure your sales team is prepared.

The important thing to remember is that you must have a realistic understanding of your prospects' top goals. Buyers have limited resources of budget and time, and these resources will be focused on addressing their top priorities. If your proposal doesn’t connect to one of those top priorities, even if you have a good idea, it will likely get relegated to the list of “nice ideas we plan on getting around to someday.”

So, if you have deals stuck in your funnel, ask the sales representative two direct questions: 

1. Can you articulate the prospect's top three business and personal goals, as well as their challenges?

2. How does this proposal help them achieve one or more of those top three goals? 

When it comes to forecasting, your closing probability should be based on the answers to these two questions. You can assign a weighted percentage to each yes, though, for complex sales, you might want to go down a level and consider the outcomes of each member of the buying team.

If your sales reps cannot answer these questions effectively, however, the possibility of closing the deal is low. In these instances, I suggest sliding the deal back to the early stage of the funnel or removing the deal from your funnel completely and going back to the drawing board.

The Takeaway

Buyers invest in products and services to get outcomes. If your deals are not connected to the outcomes, the likelihood of closing is slim to none. Connect your forecasting to an understanding of buyers' desired outcomes and your forecast can become more accurate. You can also begin to guide your sales team to an outcomes mindset, which I've found can help them close more sales as they begin to talk with their prospects about their business goals and challenges.

Originally published on Forbes Council. 

How To Market and Sell What Your Buyers Are Actually Buying

“Buyers don’t buy products, they buy the outcomes the products deliver.”
Darrell Amy, Revenue Growth Engine

For those who are obsessed with their products, the superiority of their business, or the beauty of their brand, this statement contains a hard pill to swallow. As great as your products are, as experienced as your team is, and as responsive your customer service may be, that's not what buyers are buying. People do not buy your products, they buy the outcomes your products create. 

Bob Moesta explores this principle in Demand-Side Sales 101. He shares the story of how he stopped trying to push his product on customers. Instead, he worked to understand the actual outcomes the customer desired. Then he engineered the buying process to satisfy the customer’s demand.

Buyers have a “job to be done”. That is why they buy a product. Period.

The “Jobs to be Done” theory (pioneered by Moesta and Clayton Christiansen one of my favorite authors) has been applied to design the world’s best-selling products. Successful product design begins with an obsessive examination of the outcomes that consumers want. Based on this, the product is reverse engineered to meet the demand. 

The opposite of the “Jobs to be Done” theory is the “Product to be Sold” theory. Companies create products designed based on assumptions about what the prospect wants. Next, they fire up the manufacturing plant or the development team to build the product. 

These ill formed products are presented to the sales team who then applies the “Quota to be Hit theory.” Sales reps assume they know what the prospect wants. Then, they proceed to put square pegs in round holes. It can work, but it creates a mess, a lot of hammering, and mediocre results.

Like Simon Sinek prophecies, we end up starting with “What?” and then try to answer the question, “How?” All of this ends up with frustration and often failure.

What if we actually started with “Why?” Why would the consumer care? Where are they feeling discomfort or frustration and why? 

Moesta believes that for most companies there are only a handful (3-5) core “whys” that create demand. Once we intimately understand these drivers of demand, we can then craft our Ideal Client Experience and Focused Message around this demand.

Start with your Ideal Client. What outcomes do they want? This forms the foundation of demand. Build on this foundation and you’ll find success, even in an uncertain market. (Build on the foundation of how great your product and company are and you’ll discover that you have built your company on sand.)

How do you discover the outcomes your clients want? Ask and observe. Ask your Ideal Clients about their goals and challenges. Peel back the layers of the onion. Go deep. Seek understanding as to the real implications of the problem for their business and personal lives. (For more, read Value Is In the Eye of the Beholder.)

Then, watch. Pay attention to how the current situation frustrates them. What are their work-arounds? What’s holding them back.

From the client perspective, craft your Focused Message around the outcomes your Ideal Clients want. Propagate this message through all of your marketing and sales content. Then, design your Ideal Client Experience to match the actual demand in the market.

Just as manufacturers and software developers create successful products when they listen to their prospects, your marketing efforts will succeed as you pay attention to the actual demand, seeing to understand why your prospects buy and how they would like to buy.

The Two Critical Revenue Numbers Every Business Should Track

When it comes to tracking revenue, we all want to know the total amount of top-line revenue. However, underneath the total revenue number are two critical revenue numbers that every business, marketing team, and sales rep should track:

Number of Clients
This is the measure of your net-new business effectiveness. This number will tell you how well you are doing at growing net-new business.


Revenue per Client
This is the measure of your cross-selling effectiveness. This number tells you how well you are doing at building client relationships.

In working with companies across multiple industries, I’ve discovered that that most businesses are good at one or the other. They are either good at net-new businesses or cross-selling by deepening relationships. A business that is only good at one may be growing year over year, but they are leaving a lot of revenue on the table by not shoring up the area where they are weak. 

What should you do?
1. Know Your Two Numbers

Make sure you know these two numbers. Go to your finance department and ask how many active clients you have. Then take your revenue and divide it by the number of clients to calculate your revenue per client. This is your baseline.

2. Track Your Two Numbers

Each month you can add new customers and subtract those that drop off. Find a method that works for your specific business. Take these numbers, and put them on your dashboard. Share them in every company, marketing, and sales meeting. Use them in sales rep reviews.

3. Set Revenue Goals Based on Two Numbers

Most companies set goals based on the trend of the past few years. In doing this, they perpetuate mediocrity, leaving a lot of money on the table. Instead of setting goals based on the overall revenue number, set them based on the number of clients and revenue per client. How many new clients can we add? What could we do to cross-sell more to our current clients? Add these numbers up and you have your revenue goal.

If you’d like more help on this, watch my recent web class on How To Set Revenue Growth Goals in an Uncertain Market.

 

 

Does Your Business Have an Untapped Goldmine of Revenue Potential?

Cross-selling more products and services to the existing client base is the number one missed opportunity in the vast majority of businesses. Every year, businesses leave millions of dollars on the table. Why? Because they stopped selling once they closed a new deal.

Mark Hunter says, “You don’t close a sale, you open a relationship.” Yet in most companies, once the paperwork is signed, the client gets handed off to operations and the sales rep moves on to the next deal. The selling phase is over.

Last year at a technology conference, I heard Tiffany Bova say most sales teams are like prospectors in the Klondike looking for gold. They dedicate all of their resources to find a new customer. Then, once they get the new account, they slap high fives, ring the bell, and move on to the next deal. This would be like a prospector finding a gold mine and then moving on to find the next mine. Insanity--that happens every day in the vast majority of businesses.

Yes, sales needs to prospect for new business. Marketing needs to generate and nurture leads. But the purpose of all of this is to find gold mines that then get mined for this full value! 

Your business has a gold mine. It’s your current client base. How are you doing at extracting the gold?

Sales and marketing should not stop when the first deal is signed. If anything, it should ramp up. You now have permission. You have a relationship. This relationship needs to be nurtured.

Why is this so critical? If you want to experience exponential revenue growth, you need to do more than grow net-new business. You also need to cross-sell. When you drive net-new and cross-sell growth at the same time, you begin to experience exponential revenue growth.

(If you want to learn how to set exponential growth goals, join me for a free Webclass on How To Set Revenue Growth Goals in an Uncertain Market .)

If you stop selling and marketing when the deal is signed, not only do you miss out on revenue opportunities, you also miss out on referrals. Plus, you set yourself up for lower client retention.

When you look at the marketing and sales processes that drive your Revenue Growth Engine, don’t just look at net-new. Consider what happens after the first deal is signed. 

Map out your client experience. Create marketing and sales processes that ensure you to continue to add value and build the relationship. Then, you’ll begin to enjoy the exponential revenue growth that happens when you simultaneously grow your customer base and your revenue per customer.

How To Build Trust

Trust is the currency of business. Without trust, business dies. 

The challenge is that trust is at an all-time low. The Edelman Trust Barometer continues to present data that shows people are very distrusting.

While low trust may feel discouraging, the good news is that companies and salespeople that build and maintain trust create an incredible competitive advantage. 

How do you build trust? I want to propose a formula:

TRUST = MESSAGE + RELATIONSHIP + EXECUTION

This formula is based on three questions:

MESSAGE: Can you help me solve my problems and achieve my goals?
RELATIONSHIP: Who have you helped?
EXECUTION: Do you deliver on what you promise?

Let’s explore how these three factors work together. 

Message

The first component of trust must answer the fundamental question: “Can you help me solve my problems and achieve my goals?” Buyers don’t buy products, they buy the outcomes the products deliver. And the outcomes buyers are looking for are things that either solve a problem, helping them achieve their goals.

You build trust when the message is about the outcomes that your buyers want. You erode trust when the message is all about the greatness of you, your products, and your company.

I’ll take it a step further. Since we are all inundated with thousands of messages each day, the only things that get through our attention filters are things that are related to the outcomes we want to achieve. If your message does not lead with outcomes, you will not get on the buyer’s radar. You will simply be white noise.

A message that builds trust leads with the outcomes your buyers want. A message that erodes trust is all about you. 

Relationship

The second component of trust is built on the answer to this question: “Who have you helped?” We’ve all heard the saying, “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.” I think that it should be stated, “It’s what you know validated by who you know.” 

Companies and salespeople make all kinds of claims. Buyers want to believe you. However, they will only believe you if other people can vouch for what you are saying. They need to feel a level of familiarity--like they are in good company.

Familiarity is enhanced nurtured by personal connections to employees, references from customers, partnerships with trusted brands, and involvement in the community. Some of these relational factors are direct: “I know Sue who works there.” Many are indirect such as, “Oh, they work with XYZ recognized brand” or “They support ABC local charity.”

Execution

Most pragmatic business people will say that the essence of trust is execution. I agree. However, you don’t get to execution until you have a client. And you don’t get a client until you have a message that resonates and a relational connection.

With the message and relationships in place, you now must execute. This begins from the first marketing and sales interactions and continues throughout the lifecycle of the relationship. 

The Gospel writer, Luke records these relevant words of Jesus: “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.” (Luke 16:10)

This principle applies to buyers. Little things make a big difference, especially at the beginning of a relationship. Smart sales professionals deliver on small promises to demonstrate that they can fulfill big promises. The same goes for marketing promises. Not delivering on small things at the beginning of a buying cycle crushes trust.

Action Items

Which of these three areas do you need to improve? Whether you work in marketing, sales, or operations, the success of your business depends on your ability to build trust.

What's the Why Behind Your Growth?

Every business owner wants to grow revenue. That’s a given. My question to you today is, “Why do you want to grow?”
Your reason for being in business needs to be about more than profit. Yes, there are personal dreams and motivations, but in order to hit your personal goals, you need to have a bigger vision.

We all need a “why” to motivate our growth.

My “why” behind Revenue Growth Engine is to help 10,000 great businesses double revenue so they can create meaningful jobs and give back to their community. I developed this “why” through 18 years of service on non-profit boards. I saw that the largest donations, the ones that really moved the needle, were coming from successful and generous business people. I want to help these companies grow!

What’s the “why” behind your business? If you want to grow, you need a meaningful answer to this question. I believe this is true for three reasons:

1. Because It Will Take Hard Work
Growth takes work. As I say in the introduction to Revenue Growth Engine, there is no magic bullet. “Building your Revenue Growth engine takes work. It requires leadership and vision to drive organizational change. The change is worth it.”

To grow your company, you and your team are going to have to work hard. It will require extra hours and effort to build and coach to create systems that drive growth. In order to sustain this effort, you need a purpose.

2. Because Your Clients and Prospects Want To Know
What makes you different from your competition. Unless you are one of the lucky companies that truly lives in a Blue Ocean with no competition, you regularly go up against companies that offer alternatives to what you sell.

You also go up against the biggest competitor: Status Quo, Inc.
How do you motivate buyers to choose you and clients to stick with you? All things equal, they will gravitate to a company that has a bigger vision.
Let’s say you have a choice of spending your personal money between two companies. They both have a similar product and service. One of the companies publicly invests a percentage of their profits in a local nonprofit that makes the world a better place. Which one will you choose?

3. Because Your Employees Want To Know
Your team needs a purpose. The great collection of Hebrew wisdom recorded in Proverbs 29:18 says, “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” Without a vision, your team will die on the vine. They may work for a paycheck, but they won’t work with passion. Plus, they will be sitting ducks for the recruiters of companies that know their “why”.

What’s your “why”? What lights your fire? What cause could your company get behind in 2021?