Imagine, you have four different balls flying through the air. They all are dependent on you to catch them on the way back down. You are new to the art form of juggling and things are speeding up, you are starting to sweat, your hands can’t seem to move fast enough, you see the end drawing near, what do you do???
If you drop one ball, you can likely keep the other three in the air. Remember, you are new at this so three is just one too many. So, it is time to let one drop. Do you know which one to let go? Have you prioritized each of them to know what will happen if/when you drop one?
As an entrepreneur, we all have a lot of tasks to juggle on any given day. Let’s take a moment to understand a clear prioritization metaphor utilizing our nervous juggler. There are three types of priorities, or balls:
Glass Balls
Top priority that your business depends on.
(These can be catastrophic to drop.)
Plastic Balls
Middle-of-the-road priority with importance, but it can wait/be missed on occasion.
(These may hurt a bit, but you and your business will survive.)
Rubber Balls
Lowest priority that is not as time-sensitive or instrumental to your business.
(You may have some fun dropping these balls, because they will bounce right back to you to pick up when you are ready.)
Now, lets take a look at our favorite discipline to see which kind of ball it is for you:
Sales
Sales encompass anything and everything that grows your business. Many people don’t understand how many areas of your business actually touch the sales discipline and how far a little sales acumen can take you to improve customer service, HR, and every leadership position under the sun!
Then obviously, it is the complete focus for Marketing and Business Development professionals within any organization. They have the great fortune of focusing 100% of their time and energy on managing your brand, messaging, outreach, and customer conversion journey (or as we like to call it, the buyer’s journey). Unlike most of our Solo & Entrepreneur partners who must dabble in sales as they dabble in EVERYTHING else as well.
Sales is a growth lever, and the more you care for it, the easier it is to pull.
Do you like it when your business grows???
I really hope your answer was YES!!!
So, which type of ball should sales be?
Let’s ask ourselves a few questions…
- Can your business survive without sales?
- What types of sales does your business depend on?
- Opening of new doors…
- Existing account growth…
- Basic price increases (every customer loves these)…
- How often do you need a sale?
- How ambitious are your goals?
Hopefully, you have a better understanding of the role sales should play in your business and that it should always be prioritized as a GLASS BALL. If you drop it, catastrophe is likely to follow and it will be very difficult to recover.
Have you always prioritized sales? Are there areas of your sales game you can improve? De-prioritizing sales will likely lead to failure, but at a minimum, it will lead to unsustainable modes of travel through significant peaks and valleys. Let’s walk a smooth, easy incline of growth for continuous improvement that can be maintained FOREVER, without burnout!
If you would like to further invest in your sales game, we would love to hear your story to see if we are able to point you in the right direction…
