The Lean Growth & Scale Plan by Coach Allison Todd
17 Oct
Business Coach, Entrepreneurship, Grow Your Business, Grow Your Expertise, Productivity, Team Management

The Lean Growth & Scale Plan by Coach Allison Todd

  • 1. How To Grow Your Brand Without Losing Its Voice Or Values
  • 2. The Simple Way To Grow Your Brand Without Losing Touch With Your Values
  • 3. Don’t Focus On Brand Growth Without Reading These Essential Tips First

Want to grow your brand but struggling to figure out the best way to go about it? Developing and expanding your business should be an exciting time. But often, information overwhelm turns it into a stressful one. 

By getting back to the basics of who you are and what you want your brand to stand for, you can create a growth strategy that feels authentic and real—two things customers love. 

Sometimes Less Is More 

These days we want everything all at once. When it comes to business, this translates into developing a blog, building up social media, starting a podcast, creating a YouTube channel, and writing a book. 

It’s easy to convince yourself that you need all the bells, whistles, and TikTok followers to be successful online. But ditching some of the “clutter” will help you focus. 

Growth by subtraction helps business owners zero in on the areas they want to develop.By taking some of these plans away and focusing on one step at a time, your business will grow at a steady rate. 

Make Technology Is Your Friend—Use It Effectively

There many intuitive tools and platforms out there that can help your business. But not all of them will suit your business needs. So choose the software wisely by only using technology that: 

  • – Segments leads and customers so you can create highly targeted marketing content and campaigns.
  • – Measures prospect engagement with your website and marketing campaigns to focus resources on those prospects showing “buying signals.”
  • – Generates leads with premium content offers embedded on your website and marketing content.
  • – Tracks your sales activity and follow-ups with CRM software.
  • – Manages and monitors your sales pipeline to keep you on track towards your business goals.

Tech makes growing a business easier if it fits. It should never make life more difficult. 

Turn Your Website Into Your Online Sales Guru

Humans ask Google a LOT of questions. So if you want to get discovered online, invest in a decent website. Make sure it has strong SEO and the copy and content are well written. 

To grow a business, it’s not enough to leave a website to stagnate. It needs to be updated regularly and checked using online analytics tools. If it’s not working, figure out why and make it right. 

Mix It Up With A Variety Of Marketing Channels

Cold-pitching may have worked 10 years ago, but unless you’re at the top of your game on how to cold-pitch, it’s a limited marketing strategy.  

And when it comes to blogs, writing generic listicles bombarded with CTAs and hoping they’re going to bring in leads isn’t going to work. Get creative with your blogs, mix it up with education, entertainment and value (hey, just like this one.) 

Evolve your business development approach to keep up with the evolution of the buying process.

Embrace Video Marketing

Cisco predicts that “by 2022, online videos will make up more than 82% of all consumer internet traffic — 15 times higher than it was in 2017.”

Miss out on video, and you’re missing out on a HUGE number of marketing opportunities. 

Not a fan of being on camera? Good news. Not all videos have to feature you. They can be: 

  • – Tutorial videos
  • – Case studies
  • – Customer support and how-to videos
  • – Social media posts like reels and IGTV

Get Yourself A Business Coach And A Supportive Community 

Business can be a lonely old world sometimes, especially if you’re the one at the top making all the decisions. 

Reaching out and joining a community of other entrepreneurs provides a system of support. And hiring a business coach shows your keen to invest in yourself and your business. 

The Business Growth 90-Day Plan is an effective way to boost your brand without losing its integrity. Click here to learn more and discover if it is a good fit for your business.

What’s Your 4th Quarter Business Strategy?
08 Sep
Business Coach, Entrepreneurship, Grow Your Business

What’s Your 4th Quarter Business Strategy?

Here Are 4 Reasons You Need to Hire a Growth Strategist Today.

We’re heading into Quarter 4 of 2021, and the year has flown by. It seems that we were laying down our annual goals only yesterday, combining our business New Year’s Resolutions. Suddenly, we’re almost at the same stage once more. 

As we enter quarter 4 of 2021, strategies demand to be refined, as it’s the last hurdle before we look at the annual data and reset our goals. 

So, what’s your 4th quarter business strategy? And how does it tie into your goals? 

Perhaps you’ve yet to revisit your overall business strategy. And, perhaps, you’re considering hiring a growth strategist to help you push for that final quarter to achieve your goals.

If so, here are 4 reasons you should hire a growth strategist today. But first:

What Is A Growth Strategist In Business?

In business, a growth strategist is a person who focuses mainly on the growth and development of a brand. They have expert knowledge of business strategy and how to propel a business from the land of startup to the universe of global recognition. 

Reasons You Need To Hire A Growth Strategist 

Outsourcing can, at times, feel frightening. We fear an empty investment, or worse still, a negative return on investment. However, hiring a growth strategist is fundamental to your business’s development. And, if you hire a qualified growth strategist with excellent experience and past results, you can guarantee that the investment won’t be empty. 

1. Growth Strategists Focus On Strategy And Have A Unique Set Of Tools 

Working in your business rather than on your business has consequences. You’re unable to view your business strategically because you’re too close to it. Having an outsider assess your current strategy, aligning it with your future goals, will allow you to understand whether it’s realistic, ambitious, or whether you’re pitching far too low.

Growth strategists also have a specific set of tools that have been crafted for the sole purpose of business growth. You’ll want those on your side when up against the competition. 

2. Growth Strategists Take Bold Action 

Without growth strategists, brand owners are prone to overthinking, sitting nicely in their comfort zone. The truth is, though, as they sit there watching the world go by, they’re actually missing out on hundreds of thousands of growth opportunities. 

It can be difficult for a brand owner to take risks and step outside their comfort zone. However, with the assistance of a growth strategist, you’ll be encouraged to take the risks that will pay off. 

3. Growth Strategist Focus On Short, Mid, And Long Term Goals 

With many marketers, the main focus tends to be on long-term goals. There are benefits to this, of course, as it allows your business to grow throughout time. However, there need to be short and mid-term goals to fund your business growth in the meantime.

Growth strategists are experts in short-term strategies and how to feed them into your mid and long-term goals. 

4. Growth Strategists Know All The Current Digital Trends And How to Use Them For Brand Growth 

Keeping up with the latest digital trends can be almost impossible when you’re wearing every single hat for your brand. Hiring a growth strategist means you’ll be saving time, energy, and effort, allowing you to remain in your zone of genius for the wellbeing of your brand. 

Plus, you’ll be including proven routes to success within your strategy, guaranteeing growth. 

Hire A Growth Strategist Today. 

As quarter 4 takes us under its wing, we reassess and reevaluate our current strategy and how it’s worked for the past 3 quarters of 2021. With the 4 reasons listed in this post, hiring a growth strategist allows you to end the year with a bang, meeting your business goals, and placing you in a strong position for the beginning of the upcoming year. 

Contact us today and schedule an appointment with Coach Allison to see how a business strategist can help uplevel your business.

How to Start Your Business Funnel With Clubhouse
31 Aug
Business Coach, Entrepreneurship, Grow Your Business, Marketing

How to Start Your Business Funnel With Clubhouse

In April 2020, Clubhouse launched, and many business owners have capitalized on the evolution and drastic growth it has endured. Clubhouse offers a variety of benefits to business owners, and it’s down to these benefits that the app has become a starter point for many entrepreneurial sales funnels. 

In this post, you’ll learn about the app and how to use it as an entrance to your business funnel. 

What Is Clubhouse? 

Clubhouse is an app which can be used on your smartphone. Until May 21st, 2021, it was only available to iPhone users. Now, though, it can be used by iPhone and Android fanatics all around the globe. 

Clubhouse is classed as a social media application, but unlike Instagram or Facebook, it functions and thrives through audio only. 

Users can host rooms, listen in to other people chatting and educating, and conduct or take part in live interviews. 

When you first join, you’ll be asked to input your interests. These include technology, literature, entrepreneurship, and health. 

You’ll then be able to create a biography. Unlike Instagram which has a strict character count, you have more freedom to capture what your brand does. You also then link your Clubhouse account to Instagram. 

What Are The Benefits of Using Clubhouse For A Business Owner?

There’s a reason why from launch day to February 2021, there were 10 million downloads globally. For a business owner, Clubhouse can:

Allow you to connect and network with other business owners. This is particularly useful if you run a service-based business, as you’re able to swap services or collaborate together. 

Position you as a thought leader through your verbal contributions. 

Encourage you to build a loyal fan-base.

Learn from others about areas you feel you lack confidence in. 

Capture more leads.

Push your other social media channels – particularly Instagram – and gain more engagement. 

Extend your brand’s reputation.

How to Start Your Business Funnel With Clubhouse

It’s not as simple to create a business funnel on Clubhouse than other social media apps, because Clubhouse doesn’t include paid advertising, nor are you able to send and receive direct messages. On top of this, the links added to Clubhouse aren’t clickable, so it all requires more effort from both business owner and consumer. 

However, the rewards far outweigh the struggles. And there are ways around these complications. Here are 4 steps to build a solid business funnel with Clubhouse. 

Step 1: Build A Loyal Following 

As with any social media marketing strategy, it revolves around the engagement and commitment levels of your audience. Therefore, you’ll need to be consistent with your Clubhouse efforts. Host Clubhouse rooms and join rooms that your audience spends most of their time in. Raise your hand to speak and share your expertise. 

Step 2: Optimize Your Bio For Success 

Your biography on Clubhouse is fundamental for success. Therefore, consider your brand’s voice and infuse it into each and every word in your bio. Show the key benefits to your product or service, and make sure the bio is talking directly to your demographic. Consider your bio your own personal website on Clubhouse. 

Step 3: Use Engagement Pods 

An engagement pod is simply creating rooms on topics you’re knowledgeable and passionate about. 

Find other users who you can collaborate with and create content that genuinely serves your audience. You can then create an engagement pod as a team, which will fast track the results. 

Step 4: Make Sure Your Instagram Channel Is Linked

As mentioned before, Clubhouse doesn’t support direct messaging. Therefore, after dropping serious value bombs and gaining interest from listeners, they are unable to message you directly in the app.

It’s for this reason that you must ensure your Instagram account is linked. This is where users will approach you, and you can use this as a way of measuring Clubhouse success. 

Clubhouse Is A Winning Asset To Any Business Owner

Whether you run a service-based or product-based business, Clubhouse offers a wide variety of benefits that can help your business grow. 

It’s important – as with any form of social media marketing – to stay consistent and center your content around your audience. 

Then, ensure your bio is optimized for success with clear calls to actions, and ensure your Instagram account is linked for when your inbox fills up with leads from Clubhouse! 

Relationships Are Currency—Especially In Business
26 Jul
Business Coach, Confidence Culture, Entrepreneurship, Grow Your Business

Relationships Are Currency—Especially In Business

Relationships are currency—and in business, they’re worth more than money 

The days of one-sided transactions and cold, impersonal interactions are long gone. Nowadays, people want to do business with those they like and feel comfortable around. 

We’re all busy, but it’s worth taking the time to build relationships because those connections can lead to great opportunities for your brand—opportunities you might not have otherwise had access to. Read on to learn more about the importance of relationships and how to start building them!

How Relationships Can Help Your Brand

You know that saying “it’s all about who you know?” Well, it’s true.

Never underestimate the power of a good relationship with your peers, contractors, clients, and even former co-workers. Having strong connections can lead to increased referrals and job opportunities, introductions to people who can help you reach your goals, and much more. 

In fact, in the same way that networking is an important step in advancing your career, relationships are just as vital when growing a brand. The more people you have on your side supporting, promoting, and recommending you, the more successful you’re likely to be.

While solid connections can absolutely hype you up, they can also provide you with feedback on your website, or advice on getting more clients. They can act as mentors who provide invaluable guidance as you grow your business —especially if the connection is someone who has been in your shoes before.

Not to mention the opportunity to meet a future business partner or podcast co-host!

Building strong business relationships requires time, effort, and consistency. Sometimes it’s hard work, but it’s worth it if you want your brand to succeed.

Best Practices For Forming Strong Business Relationships

Nobody reaches massive levels of success on their own. They almost always had help and support from other people to get there.

So now that you’re aware of the importance of business relationships, it’s time to go over some of the best practices to start forming and maintaining yours.

Be Kind & Generous

Look—everyone is busier than ever nowadays. And no one is going to be interested in connecting with you if you come off as unfriendly or pushy.

The most important thing to remember is that you should always be kind and generous with everyone, even if they’re not in a position to connect at that moment. Show grace in all of your introductions and meetings, and be open to connecting in the future.

Be Valuable

The best way to attract people who are willing to give you value is by giving out value yourself first. More than anything else, people will pay attention if you tell them what you can do for them. Offer one of your services for free or a discounted price, suggest a collaboration, or provide a connection that could help them with a problem.

Don’t Expect Something In Return

Even if you do give them something, don’t expect anything in return. This mindset will attract very different people than if you approach it with the assumption that everyone in your network is there to benefit you. Express genuine gratitude and appreciation for any kind of help, even if it’s just a simple answer to a question or quick introduction.

If you’re inconsiderate or disrespectful of their time, they won’t trust your intentions.

Build Your Brand By Building Relationships

Relationships can open up a ton of opportunities for everyone involved. If you want to learn more about building relationships that can help your brand, click here to discover about working with Alison Todd.

The Art of Confidence
22 Jul
Business Coach, Confidence Culture, Entrepreneurship

The Art of Confidence

Let’s face it: it takes confidence to run a business. You can’t sell your products and services only half-heartedly believing in yourself. Garnering a client list and succeeding in your market takes self-assurance in order to fully develop into the complete professional you know you can be. 

But confidence isn’t always easy to grasp. It can be incredibly difficult, regardless if you’re a seasoned entrepreneur, beginner businessperson, or failed executive. With that in mind, I’ve gathered some easy tricks to bolster your confidence so that you can be the best business owner you can be–and then some. 

Fake it ‘Til You Make It

This may seem facetious to suggest but…it’s actually true. You’ve probably heard the rhetoric, “think it and it’ll be true” time and time again, well the same goes for confidence. If you work hard enough to project a confident mentality, you will eventually become the confidence you’re putting out there. And everyone you meet who seems completely self-confident? They’re doing the same thing!

With a positive mindset, daily affirmations, and a confident persona, you can become exactly the person you want to be by reprogramming your own brain.

Dress for Success

A big part of “fake it ‘til you make it” includes the way you present yourself. Have you ever dressed to the nines and walked into somewhere knowing how powerful you looked and people treated you exactly like that? 

There’s a reason: when you know you look good, you just end up feeling good, which results in natural feelings of confidence. 

Follow Other Successful Businesses for Motivation–But Avoid Comparisons

Follow other businesses in your market or industry and be inspired! It’s good business sense to know what your competition is up to, and knowing that you’re helping level the playing field for your business can lead to further confidence in yourself as a business owner.

However an easy pitfall to fall into is comparing your progress to that of others–stop it! Other businesses can have drastically different resources, budgets, and goals than you, even if you’re looking to them for inspiration–trust in your own journey and avoid any negative self-talk. You’ll get where you need to be.

Take Care of Your Body.

Mental and physical health is directly related to your sense of confidence. If you’re tired, stressed, anxious, or sick, you can’t work to your greatest ability–you know it and your clients will know it. By honoring your limits and respecting your body with good fuel, daily exercise, hydration, and sleep you can maintain your daily schedule and meet your own expectations for success. 

Believe in Yourself

When you start your business, you may face a ton of people telling you that you can’t do it–that you can’t succeed. Well, I’m here to tell you that the quickest way to failing is by believing these people: only you get to decide whether you fail or not. By believing in yourself, your brand, and your products, you can be self-confident enough to achieve all of your goals and more.

Confidence May Start With a C, But it Begins With You

Self-confidence isn’t something that can be bought or given to you by someone else–you alone control your own sense of confidence. But I believe in you, and I know that you can too. The art of confidence isn’t some mysterious gift passed down amongst those deemed worthy–it’s a skill that can be honed day in and day out. 

I know you can do it, and with my help we can get you there even faster. 

The Perfect Hire Checklist
21 Jul
Business Coach, Entrepreneurship, Grow Your Expertise, Interview

The Perfect Hire Checklist

After weeks or even months of searching for someone to fill your business’s open position, you finally did it: you found the perfect hire. Your company’s hiring managers deserve a sigh of relief–but the journey isn’t over yet. 

Statistically speaking, 31% of new hires will quit a new job within the first 6 months simply because of a poor onboarding experience. In today’s market, your business can’t afford to NOT have an efficient, well-thought-out onboarding process that will ensure the security of your new hire. 

Read on for Allison Todd’s perfect hire checklist.

What is a New Hire Checklist?

A new hire checklist is what the best companies employ to ensure their new hire’s first days, weeks, and months go smoothly. It’s a designated list of activities and tasks that an HR manager should complete before and after a new employee joins your company. 

Following this checklist ensures a smooth merger between your business and the new hire, which will generally result in a long-term relationship between the two–barring any other complications. 

These checklists are a wonderful, dynamic tool that helps every new employee settle into their new work environment–and they’re important for HR managers as well. 

Companies are incredibly complex these days, and checklists ensure that nothing slips through the cracks–you don’t want your new employee wandering around the office on their first day, unsure of what to do or where the bathroom even is. Checklists also ensure that every member of your new hire’s team has had the same onboarding experience, this way everyone they’ll be working with is on the same page.

New Hire Checklist

Let’s be honest–hiring a new employee isn’t cheap, and it’s especially difficult if you’re a small business competing with larger corporations who have much deeper budgetary pockets. Between recruiting fees and advertising for candidates amongst all else, a company can’t afford to lose a new hire within the first few months. 

Yes–some employees will leave because the company may just not be a good fit for them, but you can do your best to make sure that the atmosphere of your office is warm, welcoming, and ready for your new hire.

Some of these steps may differ depending on your company’s rules and regulations, but the general checklist should go as such

1. The first step is to submit a job requisition form to your HR department to make the hire official.

2. Then you should complete a background check and father other important documents from the employee, such as direct deposit forms, I-9 information, W-5 information and others.

3. Next, review the basic schedule and duties of their new role: this helps set expectations for both you and your new hire. 

4. After your new hire reviews their role, the next step is to give them a tour of your facilities. This should include where the bathrooms are, the kitchen, their office, and other places that they’ll be using.

5. Introducing them to their new team members should follow.

6. The next step should be ensuring that their work station is completely set up for them, and they have all of the necessary tools for their role, including badges, office supplies and more. 

7. Next begins the actual training process, this can take a couple days, weeks, or even months. Make sure to be clear about their duties and check in for feedback–making your new hire feel heard can help them feel welcome. 

Takeaways

At the end of the day, a new hire may not stick around–that’s the job market these days. There’s opportunity behind every door, and candidates are lucky to have many choices to pick from. However, to keep your business’s competitive edge in the face of all these choices, employing a perfect hire checklist can instill confidence in any new employee that your business is right for them. 

Sales Language Profile Picker
19 Jul
Business Coach, Entrepreneurship, Grow Your Business, Marketing

Sales Language Profile Picker

We’ve all been there: you’re walking by a random company’s booth at the mall or you picked up a call from a telemarketer. They didn’t allow you to speak, they didn’t hear your questions, and they didn’t manage to convince you that their product could actually help you.

Whatever way you came into contact with a salesman, it couldn’t have been more obvious that they were just after your money. 

This is the product of poor sales language. When a sales professional stops employing a solid sales language profile, the prospective client ends up feeling like a walking checkbook.

Correct sales language will excite the customer about the topic at hand, highlight how the product is useful to them, and lead to the closing of a sale. In this article I’ll be discussing some simple but powerful words to turn your prospect into a sale. 

What is Sales Language?

Sales language is actually pretty straightforward in definition — these are the words we choose specifically in the context of marketing and making a sale. They’re meant to communicate the selling points of your services, company, or products in such a way that the customer is persuaded to make a purchase.

With that end goal in mind, this language teaches how specific words can elicit ideal behaviors in prospects, such as getting a listener to open up and let their guard down.

Sales language acknowledges that every word a sales professional chooses can trigger a specific feeling or emotion and it’s the salesperson’s job to carefully select the correct words to maximize their messages.

What Should I Add to My Sales Language Vocabulary?

Once a sales professional has acknowledged the power of communication, their next step should be upgrading their vocabulary to include words and phrases that help create positive associations with the brands and products. These words and phrases include the following.

Give customers a clear reason to care about your pitch.

Offering a concise reason why a customer should choose your product or service over the competition’s products, leaves your prospects with an explicit detail worth remembering as they evaluate products from other vendors. 

Highlight any possibilities of loss aversion.

Loss aversion refers to the principle that customers will act in a manner that prioritizes maintaining or acquiring more things. Examples of using this idea in a sales pitch includes emphasizing that your services will lower a bill that a customer has or that they’ll otherwise avoid losing revenue by working with you. 

Don’t be afraid of “because”.

By giving your customers a reason why your product or service is necessary and/or excellent (i.e. giving them a “you need this, because…”) you’re providing them with distinct reasons why their use of your product will serve them in the future. By associating certain results with your product the buyers will understand that your products can help them achieve their goals. 

Build trust by admitting when you don’t know something.

Any salesperson will tell you that a lie is a slippery slope with customers–even if it’s tiny, any lie can call into question everything else you’ve said, putting your company and your products at risk.

By admitting when you don’t know something and then seeking out the answer, you’re showing your customer that they can trust you–and that they can trust you to go the extra mile. 

Imagine your way into a sale.

Asking your clients to imagine what they could do with your products or services is a great way to distill a firm understanding of your offering. By imagining their life with the product this also reinforces the product’s utility in their individual lives.

Create gentle urgency.

This can be tricky–pushing that your prospect needs your services can result in your efforts coming off stale and forced. When speaking with a customer, it’s a good idea to imply that they could have an immediate impact now, but they’re not totally lost without your product right this second.

Don’t Sleep on Sales Language

Sales language is going to be different across all markets and industries–but by focusing on your target audience and how to really connect with them, you’re ensuring impactful sales pitches for the rest of your career.

What is Business Coaching and Why Do I Need it?
04 Jun
Business Coach, Confidence Culture, Entrepreneurship, Grow Your Business

What is Business Coaching and Why Do I Need it?

As a business owner, you’ve been looking at your business in the same way since its inception—from the inside. It’s easy to get tunnel vision and miss issues that could be keeping your business from reaching its highest potential. Often, an outside perspective of your business can help you establish a clear vision of where you are, where you want to be, and how you can get there.

My friend, you need a business coach.

What is Business Coaching?

When you hire a business coach, they will provide you with that outside perspective that your business likely craves. They’re essentially a business mentor who can help you understand how to run your business more efficiently. Regardless of your industry or business size, a business coach is an investment in your future.

And business coaching isn’t one-size-fits-all—your coach will look at your individual strengths, areas of improvement, and goals to help you determine a curated plan. They’ll be there with you every step of the way as you execute the necessary steps to grow your business successfully.

Business Coach Roles and How They Will Help You Succeed

Your business coach will customize their coaching style to your specific needs but there are certain roles that every business coach fulfills. Some of the most important hats that a business coach wears are the following:

Outside Observer

Arguably one of the most important roles of business coaching, your coach will take a close but objective look at your business operations. They’ll identify any areas of concern and reprogram operations and provide you with an actionable plan designed to ensure nothing falls through the cracks.

Accountability Buddy

Imagine having a professional partner you will check up on you monthly, weekly, or even daily keep you accountable for business tasks? Enter your lifeline: your business coach. Expect them to keep you accountable for commitments that will help your business grow exponentially.

Analyst

Your business coach will monitor or even create KPIs (key performance indicators) for your business. These metrics allow you to track your progress and tangibly measure your business’ success. If you’re a business owner who is hesitant to analyze the metrics of your business (either out of fear or because you’re unsure how to), you can delegate that task to a knowledgeable business coach.

Goal Getter

You have goals, but you might not know how to approach them. Your business coach will prioritize your business aspirations and give you tangible steps to achieve them. Expect a meticulously organized timeline of events and milestones that you’ll work toward together.

Business Coaching is the Secret Sauce

Whether you’re a brand new or long-time business owner, you know that you’re meant for great things. Allow yourself to reach those great heights with the help of a qualified business coach. If you’re ready to become the business owner you’ve always dreamed out, learn more about my coaching options. 

Why is Business Confidence Important
04 Jun
Business Coach, Confidence Culture, Entrepreneurship

Why is Business Confidence Important?

“What’s wrong with being confident?” Absolutely nothing. In fact, confidently running your business is critical to its growth and success. When your confidence is low, you’re less likely to take calculated risks or go after your goals.

So, how do you gain (or regain) the confidence you need to run your business, and why is business confidence so important?

What is Business Confidence?

Business confidence is the mentality of looking forward to an optimistic business future—being confident that your business will succeed. That’s not to say that you can just sit back and dream about a successful business, and it’ll happen, but by having confidence, you’re more likely to ambitiously take the actions required to grow.

Tips to Gain Business Confidence

If you’re determined to find success as a business owner—which I know you are—you’ll need to build and maintain business confidence. It’s not just something you can find once, and you’re done—we all have to work to be confident and nurture it as outside factors change. Here are some powerful ways to build your business confidence:

Have a Game Plan

Without an organized plan, you’re walking around aimlessly. You can’t feel confident in your business because you don’t know what you’re doing! But with a structured plan, it’s easy to feel secure that you’re on the path to success. Make sure your business operations are well-developed and structured. Don’t just keep these plans up in your head—write them down, so you have actionable steps. A business coach can help you develop this game plan if you’re unsure where to start. By visualizing the future of your successful business, it’ll be hard not to be confident.

Be Strategic

Sure, risk-taking is part of being a confident business owner, but you don’t want to just leap whenever an opportunity presents itself. Ensure you’re taking calculated and strategic risks toward your business goals. Get crystal clear on the pros and cons of each decision and have a backup plan to fall back on should anything unfavorable happen.

Enlist Support

Confident business owners don’t do everything alone—they have a strong support network. Make sure you’re working with a strong team of employees who all share your values and vision. Invest in a business manager, accountant, and other professionals who can take tasks off your plate and leave you with peace of mind that all business elements are handled.

And finally, form a network of like-minded business professionals! Bounce ideas off these peers, then share your wins and challenges with them. They’ll likely want to do the same with you, so it’s a win-win for everyone. Business owners always want to help each other out.

Takeaways

With all the uncertainty surrounding running a business, it can be challenging to ride the waves confidently. But with a detailed game plan and qualified support, you can build confidence in business. So, roll your shoulders back and bring that chin up, business owner, because you are meant for big things.

Customer Journey Map
17 May
Entrepreneurship, Grow Your Business, Productivity

Customer Journey Map

Do you know how your customers bet from your social media website to a full cart ready for online check out? How do they move from their emails to your sales page? Most importantly–do you know what may be keeping them from selecting that final “checkout” button? If you don’t know the answer to any of these questions, it’s time to delve into a Customer Journey Map.

What Exactly Is a Customer Journey Map?

A Customer Journey Map is a visual representation of the choices your customers make when interacting with your brand. It helps illustrate the interior minds of your clients to better understand their needs, desires, and issues as they traverse across your company’s touchpoints–which are your business’s website, social media channels, and any marketing or sales team member interactions (i.e. customer service providers). 

Customer Journey Maps allow a business to see their products and services from the customer’s perspective. This is invaluable information, because it can help you identify where any pain points are that could lead to you losing a customer, like a bad link or unclear website copy.

These maps generally start out pretty rudimentary. A business takes an excel sheet and fills it out with key events, customer motivations and needs, and any areas of tension within the customer experience. From this, a visual is created to better track a customer’s journey. This structural analysis can help a business organize their procedures and products in a more logical, optimized manner that can lead to more commerce. 

How Do You Create A Customer Journey Map?

As discussed previously, Customer Journey Maps visually communicate the ways a buyer persona may travel through the various touchpoints of a company to reach their end goal. The illustrative part of these maps is invaluable, since the buyer’s journey is no longer a linear one–it can be cyclical, multi-channeled, and go in several different directions. It helps translate all the moving parts of your commerce into one digestible whole.

The first step in creating these maps is collecting data from your current customers. This can be a lengthy process, but the information will inform your buyer personas as well as the map itself. 

Next is mapping out all the touchpoints of your company. This includes any websites, social media channels, and direct interactions with team members that a customer could have. It’s meant to cover all the potential paths a customer could go down, as well as the brand’s response. 

This map indicates if your customer is reaching their goals and, if not, how they can. It will also include customer sentiments, pain points, and actions, plotted in sequential order. An effective customer journey map is one that promotes empathy and provides a clear vision for improving customer interactions.

Why Is Customer Journey Mapping Important?

The answer to this question is multifaceted. As we’ve already talked about, a buyer’s journey in the modern age is a complicated one, it’s tough to narrow down how a client gets to their online cart, and why they may abandon it without checking out. 

Customer Journey Mapping takes all of this complicated information and turns it into something that informs not only the methods through which a business conducts business, but also how a product can be better.

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