One Thing That Holds Us Back

By Pat Rigsby

You might not believe this, but achieving a reasonable level of success just isn’t that difficult.

Frankly, we’re usually the thing standing in our own way.

To help you understand what I mean, let’s talk about one of the common obstacles and a quick solution…

‘I need more leads…’

First of all…this, like most challenges, is a panic statement.

We think more leads will cure all.

Well, let’s simplify this first.

Let’s say that you have 75 clients and for you to have a solid, profitable business that puts you on your way to your version of the Ideal Business you need 150.

So we’re 75 short. Let’s bridge that gap over the next year.

75 people. That’s it.

And let’s say that half of the people who walk in your door and sit down with you to discuss training or join a trial become clients.

So we need 150 people to come into the facility.

And let’s be conservative and say that only 1 out of every 3 leads you get actually walk in the door.

So we need 450 leads total.

But we don’t need 450 today…maybe we need them over the next year.

That’s 37.5 leads per month.

37.5 leads per month to double your business.

But that’s not all…

See, that is assuming that you need 450 new leads.

What about all the people you already know?

What about all the leads you’ve already generated?

My guess is that you already have a database of connections. A list of former clients and unconverted leads.

So between those you might have 1/3 or even 1/2 of the leads you need with the right follow up.

Remember…we’re talking about following up with them over the next 12 months.

Maybe some are ready today.

A few more within the next couple of months.

Over a year there are probably dozens of clients within the relationships you already have if you follow up well.

But let’s be conservative and say that there are just 25.

About 2 per month.

Where do we find that other 50?

Well…instead of simply defaulting to only FB ads, let’s look around.

In my zip code alone, there are 30,109 people according to the latest census.

I don’t know about your area…but 50 out of 30,109 sure doesn’t seem like too many people.

But let’s look at that a different way…the average Starbucks sees about 500 customers per day.

Per day.

We need 75 more clients total…50 outside of your current relationships.

So we could…

• Form strategic alliances with a couple local businesses that already reach the people we want to serve.

• Send direct mail pieces to the neighborhoods of our current clients.

• Write a great, short book or create a high value lead magnet and use FB ads and other promotion options to get it in front of that 30K people.

• We could do fundraisers for local school and sports organizations to connect with parents.

• We could win the SEO battle and optimize your website or do a few great YouTube videos to get people’s attention when they’re searching.

• Paid ads on Google and making sure we’re listed well in all the local directories works well too.

• How about belonging to the Chamber of Commerce, local networking groups or simply going out and connecting with other small business owners and local residents?

• Public speaking, special offers for local groups, businesses, churches and other groups we could connect with.

• And, perhaps the most powerful option of all…we could add in a couple of referral systems.

Getting enough leads to hit the goal really wouldn’t be an issue with all of these options at our disposal.

But we get in our own way.

We try one thing and it doesn’t work…or it works for a while and then dries up.

We panic.

Or we don’t do a great job with follow up or selling…and we think it’s a ‘more leads’ thing, when actually the number of leads are fine.

Or maybe our retention is not great so we ignore fixing the ‘inside’ stuff and think its ‘outside’ stuff.

The fix is simple. Not easy, but simple.

We have to identify where we want to go (like the 150 clients here.)

We have to see where we are (like the 75 clients here.)

Then we determine what the most direct path to get there is.

For number of clients, do we need to ‘fix’ retention?

Do we need to ‘fix’ sales?

Do we need to ‘fix’ follow up?

Do we need to ‘fix’ leads?

Work down the list and fix as needed…and choose the right ‘fixes’ for you.

If lead generation was our challenge here…there’s no need to do all the things I listed…let’s just pick 3 and run with them.

Optimize them along the way and before you know it they’re yielding enough return for us to be on track to the goal.

Now…I’m not going to tell you that looking in the mirror and doing this always is the easiest thing in the world.

Sometimes we can’t see our business clearly because we’re so close to it.

Building your Ideal Business is possible…and can be pretty simple, but you won’t get there doing what you’ve always done.