I am frustrated. I am short on time, short on sleep, and short on patience. As a working mom to a four year old and a two month old, who gets not a moment to rest, I find my nerves wearing thin at the slightest provocation. The last few weeks have been trying at best. I am getting three hours of sleep on a good night and yet the work never ends. I am frustrated, and my frustration comes out not just through my written words, not just through my body language, but also through the tone of voice and choice of verbiage I use when talking with my business partners, my family, and my friends.
I noticed the frustration in my voice a few days ago. I traveled with my family to Chicago, driving with the kids in the backseat, screaming and crying, and my husband and I had a heart to heart about what we could do to help us both overcome the frustration. I said that I wanted to start running again, but I simply don't have the time. He said that he would like to read more and had hoped that when he chose to be a college professor he would have summers to study and grow, but now that he is writing book number four, he hasn't the time either. We were at a crossroads and felt that we were doomed to feel this frustration forever.
After much though, it occurred to us that it is not the cause of the frustration that needs to be altered, but our reactions to it. I had taken snapping at my family and letting my temper spill over into my work life, which was not helping anyone; least of all me. Why then, would I continue on the same path? Why keep behaving in the same manner if nothing positive was coming from it? That's when I decided to take a deep breath and not internalize the frustration, but to communicate it.
This is where language is vital. Whether I am speaking to my eight-week old daughter or to a prospective business partner, the words I choose have meaning and depth. By using the first words that come to my mind, I may be performing a grave disservice to myself and to everyone else. Instead of rolling my eyes at my daughter and saying, "I don't know what's wrong! Stop screaming!" I instead say, "This is frustrating for me, because I don't know what's wrong, but I am here for you and we will work through this together." Believe it or not, this works for me. I literally feel the frustration slipping away when I use calm, meaningful words to communicate. And when I really assess how I feel, and share the root of my frustration, the words are carried by the air and the problem seems to have less weight. Believe it or not, this can translate into any type of communication. A client or business colleague who is frustrating because they are asking too much, they don't understand you, or if you are simply having a bad day and are projecting on them, can be given a great gift simply by hearing what you are truly thinking and feeling - so long as your words are chosen carefully and precisely. Frustration does not have to be a way of life.
Friday, July 2, 2010
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Conversations That Run Your Business
The importance of discovering which recurrant conversations drive your business.
The fact that we are creatures of language should be no surprise, but how many of you can identify the specific and recurring conversations that run your business and determine the success of your company?
Most business executives I know show up on the job, open up for business, and the chatter begins. The phone rings off the hook and sales people and CSRs handle many thousands of calls with prospects, customers, vendors, business associates, and the home office in a blur of activity we sum up as the ‘Chaos of Commerce.'
No business or department is immune from the craziness. In fact, the crazier things get, the better we seem to do. The problem and challenge, from my studied observation, is that there are usually only a few recurrent conversations that really drive the business and our sales and operations staff get lost in the shear volume of chaos, data, e-mail, and seemingly endless verbal chatter. In other words, the chaos clouds the picture and gets in the way of effective customer service and operations.
Case in point; we perform ‘Call Audits’ for clients whereby we ‘x-ray’ remote branches or an internal division, by recording all their inbound phone calls for a week or two. Then we report back on the types of calls they are handling on a daily and weekly basis. It’s a revealing and extremely useful process for clients committed to improving the coordination internally and/or with customers.
For instance, in a recent Call Audit for a client on the west coast who was having problems with the performance of a remote branch, we discovered that:
1. Over a two week period between February 21 and March 6, they received 452 inbound calls into the branch.
2. All the calls were made up of 89 different types of conversations.
3. Exactly 30% of all the calls were deemed to be sales opportunities
4. 19.9% were other types of requests from prospects and customers, such as directions etc.
5. 46.9% were other types of calls altogether that had nothing to do with sales. These include;
a. No answer – missed calls – 16.15% (this was a huge realization to the client)
b. Personal
c. Corporate office
d. General information – address, directions etc.
e. Telemarketers
f. Other employees
g. Delivery calls
h. Etc.
6. 2.7% were other types of sales opportunities, for products and services not currently offered by the client.
The big news is this:
1. Since only 30% of the total volume of calls were sales opportunities, 70% of the call volume tends to overshadow or cloud the picture and the efforts of the thinly staffed branch.
2. One huge problem was the fact that 16.15% of the calls were not answered.
3. 44.58% of all the sales opportunities were for a specific type of product.
a. 13.9% were for another major produce and 11.02% for another.
In closing, this Call Audit allowed us to focus immediate training around the types of conversations that are really responsible for the bulk of the sales. We were able to design a training program around:
A. Improving employee competence at servicing customers and prospects within the Chaos of Commerce
B. Focus training and coaching on the four to six sales and customer service conversations that literally drive the business.
This type of measurement allows for rapid growth in sales and customer service competence and shows clients which core products and services to focus the advertising spend on.
We would be happy to perform a cost effective call audit for your company or department within your company.
Call: 877-212-6001 to make arrangements.
Regards
Dan Molloy
President / CEO
SAMPLE REPORT; Follow this link to see a sample Call Audit report from the automotive tire and repair industry. Audits can be done for any company or department within the company.
The fact that we are creatures of language should be no surprise, but how many of you can identify the specific and recurring conversations that run your business and determine the success of your company?
Most business executives I know show up on the job, open up for business, and the chatter begins. The phone rings off the hook and sales people and CSRs handle many thousands of calls with prospects, customers, vendors, business associates, and the home office in a blur of activity we sum up as the ‘Chaos of Commerce.'
Click image for full-sized view.
No business or department is immune from the craziness. In fact, the crazier things get, the better we seem to do. The problem and challenge, from my studied observation, is that there are usually only a few recurrent conversations that really drive the business and our sales and operations staff get lost in the shear volume of chaos, data, e-mail, and seemingly endless verbal chatter. In other words, the chaos clouds the picture and gets in the way of effective customer service and operations.
Case in point; we perform ‘Call Audits’ for clients whereby we ‘x-ray’ remote branches or an internal division, by recording all their inbound phone calls for a week or two. Then we report back on the types of calls they are handling on a daily and weekly basis. It’s a revealing and extremely useful process for clients committed to improving the coordination internally and/or with customers.
For instance, in a recent Call Audit for a client on the west coast who was having problems with the performance of a remote branch, we discovered that:
1. Over a two week period between February 21 and March 6, they received 452 inbound calls into the branch.
2. All the calls were made up of 89 different types of conversations.
3. Exactly 30% of all the calls were deemed to be sales opportunities
4. 19.9% were other types of requests from prospects and customers, such as directions etc.
5. 46.9% were other types of calls altogether that had nothing to do with sales. These include;
a. No answer – missed calls – 16.15% (this was a huge realization to the client)
b. Personal
c. Corporate office
d. General information – address, directions etc.
e. Telemarketers
f. Other employees
g. Delivery calls
h. Etc.
6. 2.7% were other types of sales opportunities, for products and services not currently offered by the client.
The big news is this:
1. Since only 30% of the total volume of calls were sales opportunities, 70% of the call volume tends to overshadow or cloud the picture and the efforts of the thinly staffed branch.
2. One huge problem was the fact that 16.15% of the calls were not answered.
3. 44.58% of all the sales opportunities were for a specific type of product.
a. 13.9% were for another major produce and 11.02% for another.
In closing, this Call Audit allowed us to focus immediate training around the types of conversations that are really responsible for the bulk of the sales. We were able to design a training program around:
A. Improving employee competence at servicing customers and prospects within the Chaos of Commerce
B. Focus training and coaching on the four to six sales and customer service conversations that literally drive the business.
This type of measurement allows for rapid growth in sales and customer service competence and shows clients which core products and services to focus the advertising spend on.
We would be happy to perform a cost effective call audit for your company or department within your company.
Call: 877-212-6001 to make arrangements.
Regards
Dan Molloy
President / CEO
SAMPLE REPORT; Follow this link to see a sample Call Audit report from the automotive tire and repair industry. Audits can be done for any company or department within the company.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Sarah Palin, Sandra Bullock, and Lady Gaga to Sue Toyota
Decoding, Deciphering, and Devising Hooks to Get Your Business Noticed
My morning routine is fairly simple. I get up, take a shower, make a cup of tea, and hit the news sites before I start my work day in earnest. Like most people, I skim the headlines and only read the stories that I find most interesting. Some stories speak to me personally, such as those about children's product recalls or Midwest weather reports. Others draw me in because of my profession: if a company of any size or type has seen a great profit or loss due to a new business practice, I want to know. But many of the stories simply hook me in because of clever titles, that may or may not have anything to do with the story itself.
Donor Sues Tea Party Organizer of Palin's Fee - FOXNews.com
As a politically minded American citizen, I saw the headline and thought, hey - now that's interesting. Why would a Tea Party donor sue over Sarah Palin? How could a donor sue over money that's been given? What is the Tea Party up to now? Of course, the story has very little to do with the former Alaskan governor and is mostly about the give and take regarding political contributions. The headline is not dishonest, but it is misleading. Most importantly? It works. The news site has found a way to take a portion of an incident (Long story short: The convention organizer agreed to join the donor's committee if the donor paid half of Palin's speaking fee. Once the organizer received funds he backed out of the committee, therefore the donor decided to sue.) and twist it into headline making news.
Meat Linked to Climate Change? - CNN.com
No, is the answer to this question. In this case, CNN has chosen to provide a headline on its main page that does not even match the story it links to. The article's title "Scientist: Don't Blame Cows for Climate Change" actually gives us the exact opposite sentiment as the chosen front page headline. Why make the change? It's simple, really. CNN's marketing experts are well aware that people become exercised when told that their everyday practices can cause destruction to the planet as a whole. By placing the actual headline on the home page, CNN would give those same individuals the satisfaction of knowing they can consume their hamburgers with a healthy conscience - without clicking the link.
The lesson you can learn from these examples is up to you. Do you want to focus on a small but important piece of your business, hoping to draw customers in? Do you wish to tempt fate by misleading customers in order to make them more interested in your business. Either choice is risky, as you may find yourself with a possible client base that now feels they may not be able to rely on your company, though if accomplished in an intelligent way, you may also be able to spread word of your company's name in a unique and memorable fashion.
There is yet one example of hooks that worked that we have not covered:
Microsoft Office Faces Challenges from Free Google Tools - Wall Street Journal
The story is about Microsoft Office facing challenges from free tools offered by the search engine giant, Google. Just as the headline states, the article covers the new worries that Microsoft has to combat in order to continue selling its ever growing suite of programs. This type of hook works as the content is interesting to most people and we can trust that we will not be surprised by a misleading headline. Conversely, the headline may not be as catchy as some others, therefore not bringing in quite as many viewers.
Which route will you take when promoting your business? The choice you make is up to you.
My morning routine is fairly simple. I get up, take a shower, make a cup of tea, and hit the news sites before I start my work day in earnest. Like most people, I skim the headlines and only read the stories that I find most interesting. Some stories speak to me personally, such as those about children's product recalls or Midwest weather reports. Others draw me in because of my profession: if a company of any size or type has seen a great profit or loss due to a new business practice, I want to know. But many of the stories simply hook me in because of clever titles, that may or may not have anything to do with the story itself.
Donor Sues Tea Party Organizer of Palin's Fee - FOXNews.com
As a politically minded American citizen, I saw the headline and thought, hey - now that's interesting. Why would a Tea Party donor sue over Sarah Palin? How could a donor sue over money that's been given? What is the Tea Party up to now? Of course, the story has very little to do with the former Alaskan governor and is mostly about the give and take regarding political contributions. The headline is not dishonest, but it is misleading. Most importantly? It works. The news site has found a way to take a portion of an incident (Long story short: The convention organizer agreed to join the donor's committee if the donor paid half of Palin's speaking fee. Once the organizer received funds he backed out of the committee, therefore the donor decided to sue.) and twist it into headline making news.
Meat Linked to Climate Change? - CNN.com
No, is the answer to this question. In this case, CNN has chosen to provide a headline on its main page that does not even match the story it links to. The article's title "Scientist: Don't Blame Cows for Climate Change" actually gives us the exact opposite sentiment as the chosen front page headline. Why make the change? It's simple, really. CNN's marketing experts are well aware that people become exercised when told that their everyday practices can cause destruction to the planet as a whole. By placing the actual headline on the home page, CNN would give those same individuals the satisfaction of knowing they can consume their hamburgers with a healthy conscience - without clicking the link.
The lesson you can learn from these examples is up to you. Do you want to focus on a small but important piece of your business, hoping to draw customers in? Do you wish to tempt fate by misleading customers in order to make them more interested in your business. Either choice is risky, as you may find yourself with a possible client base that now feels they may not be able to rely on your company, though if accomplished in an intelligent way, you may also be able to spread word of your company's name in a unique and memorable fashion.
There is yet one example of hooks that worked that we have not covered:
Microsoft Office Faces Challenges from Free Google Tools - Wall Street Journal
The story is about Microsoft Office facing challenges from free tools offered by the search engine giant, Google. Just as the headline states, the article covers the new worries that Microsoft has to combat in order to continue selling its ever growing suite of programs. This type of hook works as the content is interesting to most people and we can trust that we will not be surprised by a misleading headline. Conversely, the headline may not be as catchy as some others, therefore not bringing in quite as many viewers.
Which route will you take when promoting your business? The choice you make is up to you.
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