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Saying_No_To_Good_Opportunities
| Saying No To Good Opportunities
Tracey started her video production company 2 ½ years ago, and
after struggling through the start-up phase, she was finally
reaping the fruits of her labor. When we talked, it was clear
that she was ready to move onward and upward but didn’t know how
to go about doing it.
“I am so busy these days, but I’m still not getting the level of
work I want,” Tracey told me. “I really want to get in with some
bigger companies, but I’m always scrambling to get my current
projects done.”
“When I first started my business, I just wanted to get some
clients, any clients. Now, I have people calling me up to do
jobs for them, but those aren’t the jobs I want anymore. I mean,
I need them, but I also want to start doing bigger projects for
bigger clients.”
“All the people calling me are small business owners I’ve met at
the networking meetings I attend. I know we talked before about
the fact that I’m not going to meet the reps from the big
companies there, so I need to develop a different marketing
strategy to reach them, but I just don’t have the time. I keep
thinking I’ll reach a point where I’ve got things under control,
so I can start pursuing the bigger guys, but I never get there.”
It was clear that Tracey was exhausted from going through the
same cycle over and over again, so I thought I would give her
brain a reprieve by taking her back in time. “Do you remember
when you told me about that guy that you met at a networking
meeting last year? He was hounding you about making him a video,
but you really didn’t see the opportunity there. He didn’t seem
to have any money budgeted for it and didn’t have a clear
concept of why he needed it and what he would use it for. You
just didn’t feel like he was a good prospect, so you told him
that you were too busy to take on his project.”
“Yeah, what about him?”
“Well, there was a time when you would have seen him as a viable
prospect. You would have set up a meeting, spent a few hours
going to/from the meeting, spent a few more writing up a
proposal, placed numerous follow-up calls only to learn that
there was ultimately no chance of getting a dime from this guy.
Over time, you learned to qualify prospects, so you didn’t waste
your time. By the time you met that guy, you already knew how to
spot a bad opportunity and had developed the ability to say “no”
to them.
“He was easy to turn down. He just didn’t have a clue. There was
no way he would have ever turned into a paying client, so it
wasn’t hard at all to tell him that I couldn’t help him out.
But, I’m not talking about people like that. The people calling
me are good prospects, but the projects they need me to do are
just small. I just want to start getting some bigger projects
too.”
“Well, you say you’ve been trying to get around to marketing to
bigger companies for the past eight months, right? But yet, you
continue to go round-and-round hoping that you’ll suddenly find
the perfect moment to work on your marketing strategy to reach
the bigger companies. It hasn’t happened yet so, just for a
moment, let’s assume that this cycle will continue indefinitely.
What do you think it will take to break it?” I asked her.
“I don’t know. I keep waiting for the right time when things
slow down, so I guess the cycle will end when things slow down
enough for me to think about it. I was hoping the summer would
give me a break, but it didn’t. Maybe the holidays?”
Tracey was doing what a lot of us have done at some time or
another. She was letting her business run her instead of her
running it. So, the summer didn’t break the cycle and the
holidays won’t break the cycle. SHE needed to break the cycle.
What I asked her to do is to start to distinguish between good
opportunities and great ones. She’d learned awhile back how to
say “no” to bad opportunities. What she needed to learn to do
now is how to say “no” to good opportunities, so she could say
“yes” to the great ones.
Most of her incoming phone calls were good opportunities, but
the great ones were ones that she would need to put effort into
pursuing. There was an opportunity lost during the eight months
she filled with small projects. She lost the opportunity to be
making contacts at the bigger companies, to be doing jobs for
the bigger companies, and to be adding higher level projects to
her portfolio.
Over the next month, we assessed the reasons behind why she was
letting her business run her. Was she ready for the transition
or was she rushing it? Maybe she really wanted to just stick
with doing what she knew she could do well. Bigger clients could
potentially require her to do things she didn’t have experience
doing yet. Is that scary, I asked her.
It also takes a different approach to reach and pitch bigger
clients. Was she uncertain about what marketing methods to use
to reach them? Or did she know that cold-calling was the best
way to reach her target market but didn’t want to have to make
the calls? Or maybe she was afraid of meeting with some big
executive of a multi-million dollar company.
After working through some of the potential blocks, Tracey laid
out a plan for marketing to the big companies in her area. She
contracted an assistant to make the preliminary phone calls to
qualify prospects and set up meetings. Once the meetings were
set, Tracey felt fully confident in presenting her services to
the decision-makers. Within 2 ½ months, she had two new “bigger”
clients and was outsourcing some of the smaller jobs to
colleagues she had met through her networking meetings.
Take a note from Tracey -- learn to say NO to good
opportunities, so you can say YES to the great ones!
Are you saying “yes” when you should say “no”? Here’s how to
find out. Ask yourself the following questions:
* What is your vision for your business? * What is missing where
you are now? * What needs to happen in order for your vision to
become a reality?
The process to follow is to: 1. develop a crystal clear vision
of what you want your life to look like 2. use your life vision
to create the vision of what you want in your business 3. make a
list of what actions you need to take in order to go from where
you are now to where you want to be 4. take consistent actions
toward your vision 5. evaluate every new opportunity to
determine if it moves you closer to your vision
It’s a BAD opportunity if: * you don’t feel good about the work
you’d have to do * you wouldn’t be paid fairly * you don’t like
the people you’d have to work with
It’s a GOOD opportunity if it: * gives you good experience but
pays poorly * pays well but doesn’t fit with your vision * you’d
enjoy the type of work and pay but not the people you’d work
with or place you’d do the work
It’s a GREAT opportunity if: * you love the work you’re doing *
get paid well for what you do * feel inspired and invigorated by
the people you’d work with and the place you’d do the work
Happy Opportunity Hunting!
About the author:
Kimberly Stevens is a Business Life Coach who supports business
owners and entrepreneurs in their pursuit of a fulfilling life
and profitable business by offering individual and group
coaching, ebooks, teleclasses, and live workshops. To learn more
about creating a richly rewarding life as a business owner,
visit www.askthebizcoach.com or send a blank email to:
kim4-20129@autocontactor.com for an automatic reply.
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