One Sherpa

I haven’t met a business owner who hasn’t had this experience sometime in their life so if you’re feeling like this today then you’re not alone.

Thousands of business owners have felt like this and often for very different reasons.

Here’s a few examples you might relate to:

• Cash flow is just not flowing because customers won’t pay their accounts.
• Staff are leaving and you feel as though no one is left to help you.
• Technology is great except when it won’t work and you feel hostage to it.

So what’s the answer!

There is a well known saying ‘The night is always darkest just before the dawn,’ which is true for all of these circumstances.

If running a business was really easy then you’d probably find more people who were doing it.

Think about this:
When you’re half way up a mountain and feeling tired don’t look up. You’ll only feel discouraged at how far you’ve still got to go. Look back down the mountain and encourage yourself with what you’ve already achieved.

When you feel discouraged it’s time to look back at everything that you’ve achieved to date.

From experience I can tell you that it’s not until you have achieved a few things that you’ll feel discouraged and want to give up. In the early part of your business you’ll be so pumped and motivated that you’ll have no need to reflect.

It’s only when you have been on the road and achieving quite a lot does it seem as though everything is too hard and you want to give up.

So what’s your experience on this?

Have you noticed that there has been a major change in your own behaviour in the last decade?

Where was the first place you went to look if you needed something done around your house from a tradesperson ten years ago?

You ‘let your fingers do the walking’ didn’t you? The famous Yellow pages advertisement encouraged everyone to stop doing their research by walking around every where and save the time by looking up the Yellow Pages.

I believe this was the start of consumers researching more from information than doing it in person as had been the case in the past.

But let me ask you this: Who goes to the Yellow Pages as their first port of call now when thinking about research?

Most people just ‘Google It.’

Although they still ‘let their fingers do the walking’ consumers are looking for information and doing research much earlier in their buying process. One of the reasons is that done correctly it is much easier. So potential customers are likely to be truly researching and are not ready to respond to an advertisement or offer to buy.

This trend means that small business owners must get their heads around connecting with potential customers over a longer period of time. It is essential that you have the research information available in a digital format that you would have delivered personally in the past.

You must get used to the fact that when you meet a potential customer they know more about you than you know about them. They are likely to have done their research on you and know significantly more than you realise. They may even know more about your industry than you do simply by having more time than you to spend on the research.

What is your story on research? How are you doing it today?

I would be very interested in your opinion on this topic.