5 Business Mistakes to Avoid

Here are 5 business mistakes to avoid (now more than ever):

1. Ignore your customers. If you neglect your customers, someone else will be happy to take them. Did you know that 68% of customers leave due to perceived indifference – they think you don’t care!

Instead of focusing all your efforts chasing new ones, cut yourself a great deal and focus on keeping your existing clients. Its 6 times more expensive to get a new client than it is to keep the one you have now. By the way, have you graded your customers A – D? Focus on A & B, convert C’s, and let the D’s go!

The general rule is to keep some kind of contact at least every 90 days. That could be a call, visit, card, or email, or even try JibJab. You are only limited by your imagination.

2. Stop advertising, marketing, promoting. Avoid the knee-jerk panic reaction to stop promoting your business. It just accelerates the downward spiral. Remember, real marketing starts long before the sale and continues long after.

You don’t have to spend a lot of money. You just have to be selective and track your results.

Contact me and I will be glad to share inexpensive ways to get noticed. By the way, any advertising you do should include a “call to action”. Forget image, ring the cash register!  Focus on your target, communicate a compelling offer, and drive the sale!

3. Neglect your team. Now more than ever, the team has to “hit on all cylinders”. You need to have less tolerance for under-performance and waste. There are a lot of great people looking for jobs. One advantage of economic downturns is the opportunity to select some strong talent.

As the leader, you must strike a careful balance, encouraging and motivating the team while sharing feedback and holding them accountable. Don’t forget training and development either. Your team is one of your greatest assets; invest in them now to pay dividends in the future.

4. Waste your time.
Your only non-renewable resource is your time. You can always make more money, but you can never create more time. Once today is gone, it is gone forever. Ask yourself: What is the best use of my time for the business right now? Ask that every day, especially as you plan the next one.

By the way, the best time to plan tomorrow is at the end of today. Another suggestion: Turn off automatic downloading and notification of email. The time you save each day from that distraction will startle you. One more thing: When was the last time you updated your default calendar? Take control – do it today!

5. Make excuses for doing any of the above.
Who are you kidding? If you are guilty of succumbing to the temptations above, I have two things to say to you: One, congratulations, you are human. Two, you can do something about it.

Decide to start now,
take ownership and be accountable.

All of us choose how we respond to the challenges that our business throws at us. If what you have been doing is not yielding the results you want, something has to change. Nothing will change until you do.

Are you involved in or committed to your business? Involvement means we take action when it is convenient, commitment means we accept no excuses, only results.

Now, get out there and do what you do best.