What To Do Next (2 of 2)

author
By Mo Bunnell

What's On My Mind

The sciency fun from last week continues!

We talked about Limiting Factors last week.

​Check it out HERE in case you missed it.

​Short summary: all complicated processes have Limiting Factors, and if you solve for that one thing, your entire process will speed up.

​For us, think of Limiting Factors as BD bottlenecks.

​Here are the major BD bottlenecks and how to solve for them:

  1. Not enough awareness about the problems you solve–not enough people know your organization or what you do.

    Solution:

    Create helpful digital and in-person content and get it into the world.

    What you need to succeed:

    Be consistent. Don't worry about moving the needle in a week or month. Create a longer-term content calendar and just keep cranking out content weekly and monthly. Then focus on getting that content in front of the right people.

    The finish line is the right people seeing it, not your publication dates.
  2. Not enough leads are coming in. 

    Solution:

    Use proper Lead Generation and Fostering New Relationship techniques.

    What you need to succeed:

    Offer client-specific overviews of the content you have to share.

    We have 15+ value-added methods in The Snowball System Chapter 6 and GrowBIG Training Module 15!
  3. Too few people are creating demand with expertise. 

    Solution:

    Teach more of your experts the Give To Get method.

    What you need to succeed:

    The Give To Get approach is the only method I've ever seen that, when done right, can leverage all six of the most influential heuristics in the human mind, as synthesized by Dr. Robert Cialdini. (HERE is a great and fun overview. So good!)

    It's easy to explain the concept of Give To Gets, but hard to master. Sort of like how explaining the rules of chess to someone in a few minutes doesn't make them a chess master. Dig into The Snowball System Chapter 5 or your GrowBIG modules for more–focus on the nuance because sometimes a small tweak can make a big difference. Tweak and improve your Give To Gets after each one. Create a system and playbook for delivering them that achieves the highest success rate.

    (Funny: The most common tweak we see needed is to cover LESS content in your Give To Get client investments. Make sure you're leaving 15 minutes or so to talk about next steps after a Give To Get session. Isn't getting to the next step the point?)
  4. Too few people investing in important relationships. 

    Solution:

    Map out the team level Protemoi (first among equals) list of relationships, dividing responsibility and actions across the team.

    What you need to succeed:

    This one's pretty simple, but rarely done.

    Get everyone together and prioritize your team's relationships. Figure out one person who's on point for each client relationship. Agree on how often and how you'll reach out. Bonus points: Gamify this with a campaign over ~6 months.

    We have a gratis training on BD Campaigns HERE. Scroll down to the Accelerate Your Momentum With a BD Campaign section. The whole team can sign up at no charge.

    Make it fun to make it happen!
  5. Too few people are leading the BD process once an opportunity arises.

    Solution:

    Train and mentor more people on how to Listen and Learn, Create Curiosity and Build Everything Together.

    What you need to succeed:

    There is so much more in The Snowball System chapters Chapter 7 (Turning Leads Into Clients) and 8 (Closing The Book On Closing The Deal) and of course in your GrowBIG Training. We also do shorter training sessions on this topic.

    The key on this one is scaling across a larger team.
  6. Your seller-expert delivery teams aren't looking for or seeding new opportunities while they're serving their clients. 

    Solution:

    Training and mentoring can help a lot here.

    What you need to succeed:

    Lower the bar with your delivery teams. They don't have to "close," they only have to listen and to ask some great questions and then bring the opportunity to more senior team members. Our Gravitas question-asking model can help people feel comfortable. I'll bet you can guess where there is more information on the Gravitas model. Yep, check out The Snowball System and your GrowBIG Training modules.
  7. Your teams aren't efficient enough overall. Example: they're spending a reasonable amount of time on BD activities, but not doing so in an effective way. The hours are there, but not the results.

    Solution:

    This is another scaling through training mentoring solution.

    What you need to succeed:

    This solution has a lot of "it depends" in it, based on your exact needs. You might be able to have a very targeted training and mentoring or it might be better to have a more broad-based solution. We're happy to talk this through if you'd like. Just hit reply and we'll set up a call.

​Here's the process we covered last week to reduce Limiting Factors and increase throughput:

  1. Get your team together and pick your biggest Limiting Factor.
  2. Use your best resources to solve for it. You're usually better off solving them one at a time. Maybe two, but definitely not ten.
  3. Go back to step one and do it again.

​I'll say it again.

This is common wisdom that's uncommonly done.

Remember this.

​There's usually one thing that is the BD bottleneck.

Solve for it.

​I'll concede that you might want to solve for two at once. Maybe. But never ten.

​Focus your efforts on the one thing that will drive outsized results.

​Focus on fixing your #1 Limiting Factor.

​So as we wrap, let me leave you with this.

​Your intuition will tell you to solve for many things at once.​
It's human nature.

​It's exciting at the beginning. Look at all the things we'll do!
​But it's a slog in the middle and seems to never end. Why aren't we accomplishing much!?

​So go with one thing.

Get your team together.

Pick that one Limiting Factor. One BD bottleneck.

​Then pounce. Attack it with gusto.

​Your team will make more progress.

And you'll be blown away by the results.

Mo