Is the “Competitive Advantage” Really An Advantage? The Case for “Collaborative Advantage”

February 17, 2010

When it comes to crafting your business' marketing messaging and defining your position in the marketplace, a commonly encountered question is: "What is the 'competitive advantage' of your company?"

The traditional definition of "competitive advantage" is the way a company distinguishes itself by keeping an upperhand over other companies who offer similar products and services. It's all about "survival of the fittest."

Reverend Suzi Schadle from the Center for Spiritual Living Eastside in Bellevue, Washington (www.csle.org), once shared this direct experience of hers from when she was leading a workshop in a school.

She was working with kids from the ages of 5-6. She wanted to teach them to work as a team.

She split the students into smaller groups of several children. The exercise she gave them was to take a raw egg and then, using the supplies that were passed out, they were to build a container for the egg so that it could be dropped from a height of 6 feet without breaking the egg. No further instructions were given.

She noticed that, unprompted, children from different groups began helping each other out, sharing supplies and trading ideas between the different groups. Some of them even went to the back table to get more supplies (no instructions were given that said they couldn't do that).

Some of the older students were intrigued by this exercise as they passed by. So, in the end, the middle school and high school students go involved in the project as well.

But what Reverend Suzi noticed was interesting:

• Among the middle school-aged students, there was no sharing of supplies and ideas between different groups.
• With the high school-aged students, not only was there no sharing, but there was also stealing of supplies between the different groups! And the energy level was one of more tension and competitiveness.

Much to Rev. Suzi's chagrin, the preschoolers decided they wanted to drop their eggs from the second floor. So, she started praying!

This is what happened when the eggs were dropped by the various grades from the second floor:

• High schoolers: All eggs dropped, all eggs broken.
  
• Middle schoolers: All eggs dropped, all eggs broken.
• Pre-schoolers: All eggs dropped, all eggs survived intact!

(Even from the second floor, which was not the original intent of the exercise.)

Consider what might be possible when we learn again what unbridled collaboration, free of the limitations of competition, might lead to as we emerge from a down economy!!!

As entrepreneurs, what might be possible if we took this lesson to heart and integrated this into daily business practices? Then, instead of a "competitive advantage," we'd be focused on showcasing our "collaborative advantage."

"Great power lies not in the mind and will of one man,
but in the collective consciousness of the many."

Coaching Trends 2010

February 13, 2010

I was just listening to the recording of an Experts' Panel from Coaching Boom 2010, featuring Milana Leshinsky, Judith Sherven & Jim Sniechowski, Suzanne Falter-Barns, Gary Henson, Christian Mickelsen, David Steele, Marcia Bench, and Wendy Y. Bailey

One of the predictions made was that high-end "platinum" and "diamond" coaching programs were becoming more popular. So, are high-end "mastermind" groups.

Another comment was made that, if you're a coach, you're limited in your income and time if the only thing you offer is one-on-one coaching.

Each of these statements is both accurate and inaccurate; it depends on the context.

You see it all depends on your particular style of coaching, your comfort zone, and your particular blend of thinking and taking action. I've coached some coaches who shine in a private coaching setting, but wither in a group setting. Yet other coaches shy away from private coaching because the intensity and responsibility was too high for them; they thrive in a group coaching setting. Though facilitating a mastermind group consisting of high-level executives might be a flagship offering for one coach, it just might not be your "cup of tea."

So while it's worthwhile being aware of "trends" and what various niche audiences are interested in, it's far more important to play to your own strengths. Play your own game. Structure your programs and services in ways that allow your core strengths to shine through.

Above all, avoid modeling your business after someone else you admire, just because you have "success envy." Just because it's working for them, doesn't mean it will work for you.

Coaching Boom 2010 – Tips from Day #4

February 11, 2010

CoachingBoom 2010 is a virtual business-building training event that started on this past Monday, February 11th and runs through Thursday, February 18th.

I'll be presenting on Thursday, February 18th at 8:15 am PT.

My topic? "How to Get More and Better Clients Using PAID Introductory Sessions"

Milana Leshinsky, the host of CoachingBoom 2010, has been sending out the top ideas that she's taken away from each day's sessions.

Here are eight takeaways from Day 4 of  Coaching Boom 2010:

1. The 3 rules of effective business systems: simplicity,
consistency, and automation. They must also be personal
and fun to be useful to you (Melinda Cohan)

2. Become the person that people are quoting, especially
if you are working in corporate, executive, or leadership
coaching (Ann Farrell)

3. Lou Bortone's best kept secret for creating amazing
videos with special effects without any software is
OneTrueMedia.com - thanks for sharing Lou!

4. Most coaching web sites do NOT focus on enrollment.
They simply establish the fact that you're in business.

5. A client-enrolling letter serves 2 purposes: 1) Warming
up your prospect list, 2) Directly enrolling clients.
Which purpose are you trying to accomplish? (Michele PW)

6. A blog is a "pull" strategy, while e-mail is a "push"
strategy.  Use both for most effective results (Michele PW)

7. Humans crave consistency - don't work against it, work
with it. In other words, use strategies proven to work,
even if you feel they've become old or overused. They work!
(Michele PW)

8. The best client-enrollment letter is a conversation
between the copy and what's in your client mind. Answer all
possible questions a prospect might have about your coaching
program, and you will fill it (Michele PW)

As you can see, lots of goodies came from Michele PW, who
did several critiques of coaching web sites and showed
how to turn "mellow" sites into truly attention-getting
and client-enrolling sites.

Join us now and you'll get access to complete recordings of the

sessions you missed. This link will take you to CoachingBoom2010

Coaching Boom 2010 – Tips from Day #2

February 10, 2010

CoachingBoom 2010 is a virtual business-building training event that started on this past Monday, February 11th and runs through Thursday, February 18th.

I'll be presenting on Thursday, February 18th at 8:15 am PT.

My topic? "How to Get More and Better Clients Using PAID Introductory Sessions"

Milana Leshinsky, the host of CoachingBoom 2010, has been sending out the top ideas that she's taken away from each day's sessions.

Here are here top 5 tips from Day #2:

1. To get more relationship or any life coaching clients,
create and offer results-oriented programs - workshops,
classes, events - for your niche market (David Steele)

2. To create a strong personal brand, be congruent and
consistent in everything you do. Use your title or tag
line on your site, newsletters, and coaching programs
(Suzanne Falter-Barnes)

3. The best tool for creating your own niche community
is ning.com, which is what TheCoachesExchange.com is
powered by (Viki Winterton)

4. When you coach businesses and organizations, you are
still coaching individual leaders and team members; you
don't need to have corporate background to succeed -
only the desire to help businesses to grow (Gary Henson)

5. Entrepreneurial spirit is the most important factor
in building a highly successful business (Viki Winterton)

And this is just a FRACTION of what I and the
participants learned yesterday! Join us now and
you'll get access to complete recordings of the
sessions you missed.

This link will take you to CoachingBoom2010

Coaching Boom 2010 – Tips from Day #1

February 10, 2010

CoachingBoom 2010 is a virtual business-building training event that started on this past Monday, February 11th and runs through Thursday, February 18th.

I'll be presenting on Thursday, February 18th at 8:15 am PT.

My topic? "How to Get More and Better Clients Using PAID Introductory Sessions"

Milana Leshinsky, the host of CoachingBoom 2010, has been sending out the top ideas that she's taken away from each day's sessions.

Here are the top ideas from Day 1:

1. Create a learning plan for yourself to master
entrepreneurship in 3 areas: business building,
marketing, and finances (from Michael Port)

2. Coaching is really an online business, and
anyone who disagrees is simply walking with
their blinds on (from Judith & Jim)

3. Coaching programs delivered in a "Get it done
in a day" and "Get it done for you" format are
the two biggest opportunities for coaches today
(from Christian Mickelsen)

4. A viral marketing video should evoke one of
these 3 emotions: funny, wow!, & inspiration.
The last one is the easiest and most important
one to create in your coaching business (Scott
Stratten)

5. When doing a live or virtual event, don't
expect celebrity speakers to promote you - they
may be actually the worst marketing partner for
you because they're too busy (Leesa Barnes)

And this is just a FRACTION of what I and the
participants learned yesterday! Join us now and
you'll get access to complete recordings of the
sessions you missed.

This link will take you to CoachingBoom2010

A New Model for Business Success in the New Economy

November 3, 2009

Here's the model:
Purpose, Passion, Productivity, and Power => People, Planet, Profit, Prosperity

As entrepreneurs, it's our responsibility to contribute to shaping the emerging new era of prosperity.

It's time for new ways of thinking, new business models, new ways of connecting and collaborating with our buyers, our colleagues, our competitors, and other countries.

Focusing one's:

• Purpose
• Passion
• Power
• Productivity

leads to...

• Helping people
• Healing the planet
• Sustainable profits
• Global prosperity

What might be possible if we shifted our thinking and actions along these lines?

We'll discuss this model more on our Conscious Leaderpreneurship Conversation on Thursday, November 12th, from 12-12:30 pm pacific.

If you're not already on the reminder list, register here at no charge: www.freedompreneur.com/consciousleaderpreneurship

In the meantime, on Thursday, November 5th, we'll be talking about "Healing the Planet: Bringing Yourself and Your Business to the Leading Edge". Read more about this here

Applying Conscious Living and Learning to Your Business Growth

September 24, 2009

When it comes to growing your business, there are only four main areas to focus on (albeit, these are broad categories):

1. Leadership, Management, and Team
2. Operations.
3. Marketing and Sales
4. Deliverables

Leadership, Management, and Team is all about clarity of your focus, direction, strategies, tactics, intentions, and where you place your attention. This category is also about addressing your limiting beliefs and allocating limited resources efficiently.

Operations, otherwise known as "Logistics and Administration" relates to the critical processes and procedures that make your business successful. For optimal efficiency in the longer-run, these processes and procedures should be documented and turned into turnkey systems.

Marketing and Sales should be more accurately described as Education  and Matching Value, respectively. You must first education a prospective buyer about how your offering solves their problem or need. Then, it's your job to help them recognize the value of your offering, in terms of specific results, improvements, outcomes, and experiences that they would get from working with you and match that up with what they recognize as their pressing needs, problems, and challenges.

Deliverables refers to the services, programs, and products that help your buyers get what they need and what.

For any business of any size to succeed, all four of the above areas need to be working harmoniously together.

Now, these are tidy little categories and descriptions and it all sounds great in theory, but...

...what about turning theory into real-life results and progress?

In my experience and observation, this is where a lot of us get stuck, or at least snagged temporarily: Turning intellectual theory into action, that then produces desirable results.

So what's the solution to getting unstuck or un-snagged? Here are some quick suggestions:

1. Clarify and simplify your next immediate action step. Whatever it is, break it down into manageable, actionable bite-size pieces.
2. Find ways to make even the most mundane of tasks fun. Make a game of it.
3. Think of creative ways to make these tasks easier to take on and complete.
4. Find ways to collaborate with others so you can tap into the collective wisdom and energy of working synergistically.

While this takes mindfulness and discipline to apply to one's everyday life, the return-on-investment of consciously applying your strengths and talents to the tasks at hand are exponential, enduring, and many times, beyond one's wildest dreams.

On today's Conscious Leaderpreneurship call, we discussed these concepts as they applied to the participants real-world situations. Listen to the 30-min replay here.

How to Get Paid While Using Introductory Sessions to Attract More and Better Clients

September 9, 2009

A Paradigm Shift for Coaches, Consultants, Therapists, Counselors, Healthcare Providers, and Other Independent Professionals

Now more than ever, when I ask service professionals what they need in their business, the answer is almost always the same: more clients!

If you're like most independent service professionals, you know you're good at what you do and you're committed to changing people's lives and the condition of our planet. But that alone doesn't bring in clients who are well-suited for you and are willing to pay for the value you offer!

With mixed success, you may have tried networking, speaking, blogging, Twittering, sending emails, writing articles or joining referral groups, and still...

...you're looking for more clients, customers, and patients.

Have you started to wonder if this will ever change, or if this is just part of being in business?

At some point, all of your marketing and promotional efforts may have led you to offering "free introductory sessions" or "complimentary consultations" to build your business. While you may have gained clients this way, there's a good chance that this process has left you frustrated, drained, and discouraged.

You see, while free sessions and complimentary consultations can and do produce results, there's one big problem: you can attract a lot of "tire-kickers" -- people who book a session with you because it's free, with no interest in going any further.

Let's face it - unless you have a way to weed out the tire-kickers, you'll burn up time and energy and have no new clients (or customers or patients) to show for it in the end.

But what if you had a way to:

• Eliminate the "tire-kickers"?
• Select only the best clients to work with?
• Markedly increase your conversion rates?
• Get PAID while you qualify prospective clients, customers, and patients!?!

Would that make a difference in your business?

Of course it would!

So consider this: What if you could attract and work with only the clients who are a good fit for you, avoid wasting time with "window shoppers," dramatically increase your conversion rates to longer-term and better paying clients, and, get appropriately compensated for it all at the same time?"

Does this challenge your beliefs about what's possible?

At this very moment, you may thinking to yourself: "Sounds great, but that won't work for my business?"

If you're willing to put all that aside for a moment, just accept the possibility that it's possible.

And, simply put, the way to do it is to: "SIMPLY CHARGE A FEE FOR YOUR INITIAL SESSION."

You see, when you charge a fee for your initial "introductory" session, you screen out the people who are interested in doing a session with you only because it's free.

Moreover, since they are expecting to or have already paid for their initial session, they've identified themselves as someone who is motivated and interested in changing something in their lives.

And people show up for your session with a higher level of expectation of what they're going to get, so you'll be working with a higher-calibre of clientele who are more satisfying to work with and who are value-conscious (as opposed to price-sensitive).

All of this leads to better conversion rates and people you'd love working with. A double bonus!

But if it's so easy, why aren't more people doing this?

Admittedly, it's not always as straightforward as tacking on a fee to your existing "free" or "introductory" session. (Though, it could be as simple as that. In fact, recently, I coached one of my private clients to revisit an introductory process that she had "mothballed" and feature it as her paid introductory session. Within a couple of weeks, she was getting paid to begin exploring possibilities with new clients, some of whom turned into longer-term clients. And, on top of that, new approach led to a referral to a lucrative client engagement and increased her cashflow significantly. All of this increased her confidence and boosted her optimism for the future.)

Realistically, it takes a shift in one's perceptions and beliefs about what is possible. It takes overcoming one's fears and concerns, quieting the "little voice" that says: "this doesn't apply to my business," or "you can't do that."

Beyond that, whether you use free or paid introductory sessions (or a mixture of both), the key to more and better clients lies in understanding how to provide tremendous stand-alone value during your initial session with them... value that the client knows is well-worth paying for because they've just experienced it.

So, challenging economy or not, strongly consider developing and honing your approach for having potential clients pay for their initial session. Compared to what you're doing now, there a good chance that you'll turn a higher percentage of them into better paying and more appreciative clients, customers, and patients.

Pre-Flight Checklist for Virtual Events (Webinars & Teleseminars)

August 3, 2009

Using webinars and teleseminars to educate others and to promote your services and products is a powerful, cost-effective tool.

Most of you have probably participated in a number of these. And you're probably using them for your own business endeavors.

As the host or presenter, have you ever started a session, only to be horrifed that you forgot a critical step, like making sure that your recording system was operational? Or, that you forgot to turn off all the  ringers (yes, even on the fax machine!)?

Having overlooked many critical and not-so-critical elements in my illustrious career, I finally decided to create a checklist of items to verify BEFORE starting a webinar or teleseminar. It's a "pre-flight" checklist, just like a pilot runs through before take-off. And, just like a plastic surgeon (ahh, that would be me!) used before starting a major surgical procedure.

Here's an example:

Starting 15 minutes BEFORE the start of the event:

• Door closed
• Turn all phone ringers OFF:
  • Landline(s)
  • Cell phone(s)
  • Fax machine(s)
  • Pager

At least 5 minutes BEFORE the event start time:

• Disable call-waiting, then dial into conference call line.
• Check recording settings in webinar system (I use www.GoToWebinar)
• Check recording settings in screen capture softwared (I use Camtasia)
• Check recording settings in audio editing software (I use Sony Sound Forge)
• Turn on primary recording system(s)
• Turn on backup recording system (record without a backup system at your own peril!)

Almost without fail, every time I've gotten lazy and neglected to follow this checklist, which is printed and hangs near my phone in a plastic sheet protector, I've lived to regret it.

Well, at least no planes crashed and no patients died on the OR table!

Foundations of Freedom

April 29, 2009

Most entrepreneurs are inspired to build the business of their dreams because they value their freedom to create and innovate, they have great products and services and they want to make a difference in the world through them. And, of course, they want to enjoy ever increasing levels of prosperity - financially and otherwise.

But without the right blend of structure, systems, and strategies, building the business of your dreams can quickly become suffering the worst of your nightmares.

Use the following nine steps as a guide to accelerating your business to greater levels of freedom, lasting contribution, and expanding prosperity.

1. FOCUS first on what is most important for you to accomplish with your business, your work, and your life. Identify your compelling reasons why accomplishing this is so important to you and use this 'compelling why' as your guiding beacon through the inevitable 'ups and downs' of business and life.
2. Identify the strength of your STRENGTHS, along with the strength of your blockers. This is your Net Talent (akin to Net Profit, which is Gross revenue, minus Expenses).
3. Develop the business STRUCTURE (roles, processes, procedures, systems, etc.) that best allows you to focus on your two or three strongest core competencies and overall net talent. Build a team around you that complements your net talent. Delegate and outsource anything and everything else that is not one of your core competencies, even if you are accomplished at some of those things.
4. SYSTEMIZE all the processes and procedures that are the most critical to your success (as defined by revenue, profits, value, and personal satisfaction) so that the business can operate sustainably and profitably without you having to be involved in every minute detail (as entrepreneurs are inclined to do). It has been said that, "If you are the major cog in the wheel, you are also the major clog in the wheel."
5. Implement STRATEGIES for leadership, marketing and sales, logistical operations, and delivery of your products and services that are integrated and supportive of one another and that optimize the net talent of you and your team. In other words, these strategies feed off of and support one another.
6. Cultivate and acquire the SKILLS needed to transform your business from high-potential to high-performance.
7. Develop internal and external SUPPORT structures and systems to help you stay focused on your highest-purpose objectives, strategies, and action plan. It is widely known that a spacecraft headed to the moon is off-course at least 80% of the time; as humans headed towards a target, do you think we are any better than that?
8. Define near-term and longer-term ACTION PLANS for each of the areas of your business that are most critical for building freedom, revenue, profits, value, and contribution. Along with action plans, it's vital to establish a structure of ACCOUNTABILITY so that you make sure you FOLLOW-THROUGH on your action items.
9. Finally, TRACK AND MEASURE your progress and results in key performance areas. Use this information to make course corrections along the way.

These steps are like the "backbone" of any successful business. I regularly refer back to these very steps in my work with entrepreneurs around the world. And, I apply them to my own business.

By developing your business with each of these nine steps in mind, you'll be well on your way to building a high-value business - one that provides lasting value to your clients and customers, produces outstanding profit, and allows you to contribute to enhancing the lives of others in meaningful ways.

It's a challenging journey, no doubt, but the payoff can be enormous - ultimate freedom.

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