BUSINESS JOURNAL

It's October, but the new year starts now

Dan Weedin
Business consulting

October is the time of year when the chill in the air starts replacing the warmth; when football season begins hitting its stride; and when pumpkin spice flavoring makes its grand entrance into everything you eat and drink. For many businesses, it’s time to encourage the team to finish the year strong as the holidays approach and activity will ultimately slow down.

Allow me to disagree and offer another opinion: The new year starts in October.

Here’s what I mean. The majority of the revenue you will realize in the last three months has already been worked for. The efforts made earlier in the year will be what produces the harvest over the next 90 days.

That means in order to sprint out of the gates in January; you must have been sprinting in October. And that means now.

In over three decades of working in and with businesses, I’ve witnessed a common theme of slowing down after about mid-October. It’s not necessarily deliberate; rather a subconscious reduction of effort as the holiday season approaches. This is especially true if it’s been anything better than a good year. The thinking is, “I’ll re-charge my batteries and hit January hard (so I can relax again in November…).

I suggest that waiting to hit January hard means revenue doesn’t really start generating until March. It’s just the way most business works. I believe that those who are sprinting at the end of the calendar create more opportunities and find that they have less stress and anxiety to produce at the beginning of a new year.

There’s also a myth that nobody wants to buy or do business at the end of the year. That’s hogwash. Think of your own purchasing habits. The final three months don’t mean people and businesses stop making decisions. In fact, it’s the perfect time to help them strategically get ready and they might most need your help now.

Here is my five-step plan to sprint to success in October so January is profitable:

Step 1: Call everyone you worked with last year. There is a dual purpose in this step. The first is to sincerely thank them for their business and ask to see if you can be of help right now. The second is to ask for referrals. These clients are sure to have colleagues and peers that can benefit as they did from working with you.

Step 2: Call everyone that you didn’t get business from. There are many reasons someone didn’t hire or buy from you this year. Many times, it’s purely timing. Ask if you can be of help right now because maybe circumstances have changed. Then, ask for referrals. Too many sales teams abandon asking for referrals because they won’t think they will get one from somebody that didn’t work with them. That’s a bad assumption. Om the cost-benefit side, what’s the worst that can happen?

Step 3: Call everyone that you haven’t worked with in over a year. Relationships are critical and often clients are forgotten and allowed to drift away. If someone trusted you and your products or services before, they are likely to be interested again. This is the perfect time to find out.

Step 4: Return all phone calls and emails. Sound a little silly? You’d be amazed how many great opportunities are out there and go away because someone wasn’t called back. I find this to be more of a factor of disorganization and lack of discipline rather than rudeness (although that’s not out of the question).

Step 5: Have fun. If the effort to consistently find great clients is too much of a burden, you might be in the wrong profession! Your career and your business should be fun. Fire up the competitive juices and enjoy meeting and helping people and businesses to improve and grow.

If you own your business, this might be a strategic plan for your sales team. If that’s the case, someone must inspire them and that means you. Keep in mind that remuneration alone is not the key to influence. The reality is that your company can help others and the more you do, the better it is for everyone in the organization.  While you might be the face of the business, your team often requires that leadership to move boldly forward when everything else says to slow down.

If your career involves accelerating revenues, then you should be ready to roll. This is the perfect time to strengthen and solidify relationships. While you may not be the owner of the company, you are the CEO of your own individual “business,” which is you and your family. Be entrepreneurial and seek out opportunities when others are not.

It's October, but 2019 just got underway. You don’t need any resolutions or fancy spreadsheets or charts. You just need to eschew the time-honored tradition of taking your foot of the accelerator in mid-October and cruising through the year. That behavior leads to wasting energy getting re-started in January. By utilizing my five-step system, you’ll be sprinting all year long!

Dan Weedin is a strategist, speaker, author and executive coach. He helps small business and middle market business leaders and entrepreneurs to grow more profitably and create a better life.  He was inducted into the Million Dollar Consultant™ Hall of Fame in 2012. You can reach Dan at 360-271-1592; e-mail at dan@danweedin.com or visit his web site at www.DanWeedin.com.