The Secret to Staying Booked Solid

To be booked solid requires that you have a solid foundation. As part of a solid foundation you need the following: 

• Know who are your ideal clients

• Understand why people buy what you are selling

• Develop a personal an unique brand

• Communicate what you do in a concise and clear manner

A solid foundation will support all of your business development and marketing.

The first step in building your foundation is to choose your clients.

In order to figure out who your ideal clients are, choose your clients as carefully as you choose your friends – the type of individuals or businesses with whom you do your best work.

The purpose is to identify the specific characteristics of the individuals or organizations that would make them ideal to work with. By doing so, it will allow us to develop a rigorous screening process.

Most businesses work with anybody that has a checkbook and as much as it Might seem to be the right approach on the long run the benefits of this strategy are very limited. Instead, choosing your ideal clients will empower your business and yourself – it will allow you to increase productivity, do your best work and have more clients and more referrals. Joy, prosperity and abundance happens when you perform optimally, when you are with people who inspire you and energize you.

In order to start the process, you have to begin to identify the types of clients you have. Ask yourself which are the current clients which give you strength, energize you, empower you, make you creative, provide you with confidence and which ones are the ones who drain you, turn you off or shut your down. Ask yourself, would you rather spend your days working with incredibly amazing, exciting, cool, awesome people or spend your time with barely tolerable people who suck the life out of you?

Be honest with yourself, identify your ideal clients and the ones who are not and take action. Taking a Booked Solid Action Step is a bold action which requires courage – start by removing the type of clients that zap your time and energy - even if you take one step at a time by replacing them with your ideal clients. This process will not only benefit you but also benefit those same clients you will not work with anymore - since, if you are working with people with whom you do not do your best work, you are out of integrity – refer them to someone who can.

There is nothing wrong with the no-ideal clients. They are just not right for you as you are not right for them. Whenever you take the step, be tactful, diplomatic, loving and keep it simple: “ I’m not the best person to serve you”.   Remember, in life you cannot please everyone, to even try is futile.

Choose the best balance and strategy for you, your business and your clients. You can choose to loosen or tighten at will the type of clients you consider ideal. If you are new in the business you will not want to turn away you first clients even if they are not ideal but as your business permits you should be focusing only on working with and looking for clients which are the ideal clients.

Define and list clearly which benefits ideal clients will provide you with such as energy, strength, confidence, successful, alive, etc. Which qualities do they have such as positive attitude, collaborative, resilient, value-oriented, outgoing, creative, etc.   Which clients do you look forward to seeing ? Whom do you love to be around ? With which clients do you work the best ?

Create a list of filters which will help you to define them clearly. What filters do you want to run your perfect clients through?

Once you attract more and more ideal clients you will discover that you are happier, more vibrant, more energetic, more productive and you will give your clients the best of yourself and your services and it turn you will gain even more additional business referrals.

For more information on our consulting services, please visit www.isucorp.ca

Written by John Krumbach,
VP of Finances

Cultivating Your Socio-Political Awareness

Political Awareness is part of your Empathy  - a component of your Social Competence.

While Empathy, in general, is related to your awareness, needs, and concerns of others,Political Awareness relates to your understanding of social and political events.

People who have this competence usually:

• Accurately read key power relationships
• Detect crucial social networks
• Understand the forces that shape the views and actions of clients and competitors
• Accurately read organizational and external realities

The skill at reading the currents that influence the real decision makers is of up-most importance for people who want to become star performers - identifying clearly who are the decision makers is a vital part of success same as being able to identify behind-the-scenes realities.

As a star performer, you must be able to balance conflicting points of interests, whether from within or from the world at large - have political sharpness to manage business and personal issues.

How to Maximize Networking Events

Networking events are a great way to expand your connections and increase your awareness as a business, but often times what I have seen is some people get amazing results while others go home empty handed.

Here are 5 pointers that will help you increase your success rate.

1.)  Don’t go in trying to sell your product/service in mind, instead try to honestly just make connections and see how you can help people. I’ve seen people pushing their product/service down other people’s throats and it just repels everyone. When you’re really interested in someone and you have something that can make their life easier, everything will just click naturally.

2.)  Don’t expect people to approach you! Okay this is nerve racking for most people… especially if you are alone representing your company, but I’ve managed to excel by applying these principles:

a.   Use the three second rule: Don’t over think, when you see someone interesting count to three in your head and say something, the good old fashion “hi my name is__________” Works great.

b.   Build trust: Talk about how you’re connected to the event or what college you went to, this will help establish some common ground.

c.   Ask questions: Be interested in them and see if you both might be a good match for potential business in the future.

3.) Know when to move on. There are so many different people and you paid a lot of money to be at the event, so realize that not everyone will be a perfect match for potential business. Learn to avoid time wasters (people that are their just to collect free samples and talk endlessly about their cats… we’ve all been their) but always make sure to be professional and respectful when avoiding these time wasters. If you spent an hour talking to someone that has no future potential in anyway, then you could have missed an opportunity to talk to someone who could really use your business, so just keep that in mind.

4.) Take Notes and Follow up fast! When you get contact information in any form, take notes about something specific in the conversation. This will allow people to remember who you are. Also make sure to follow up the next day at the latest; everyone meets so many people at these events that if you wait more, you might have lost the opportunity.

5.) Add every person you meet on LinkedIn. Building your circle on LinkedIn can bring amazing results, so just keep connecting!

If you take this advice you’ll start noticing a significant improvement in your overall success rate when going to any networking events. One last thing, be friendly. Everyone is in a similar situation at these events, so try to avoid negative emotions and just have fun with it.

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