Does your business day have a plan to get sales?

As we all know at this present time it's hard out there for local businesses, however, because this current climate and situation is something we are all living and breathing, have we all taken steps to look at our daily activities as a way to try and combat the situation?

For a small business, this is something that is hard, often due to the limitations within a small business, there is not enough time in the day to do everything which needs to be done, especially if trying to nurture the business into a forward direction.

In this current day are there enough finances in place, all the right equipment, or staff to do the job – if not, placing even more pressure on the business?

Often for the business owner the will and focus are making them get sidetracked, in continuing to develop the business, without paying any real attention to the only and real survival element.... which is SALES.

As everyone’s knowledge and experience in the small business world is different, as is their personality and their drive – often the failure of their business is something which they see coming, but fail to acknowledge.

Does working on something, such as a process to put in place within a business of any real help if there are no sales coming in.

Does going to endless network meetings every week, then having followed up meetings (one to one’s) during the day, actually doing anything to help a business survive in the present day if there are no sales coming in.

As a business there is so much which needs to be done...we all need to connect whether we realise it or not – connect to sales, connect to new customers, connect to staff, connect to suppliers, connect to profit, connect to survival. Do you get the idea?

It’s just a matter of which do you connect to first when things are tough?

Although there are those out there who would disagree - We’d suggest you set your stall out by addressing the real issue which is effectively your business...SALES.

Do not fall into the same trap as many businesses, which is to focus on getting a loan or a grant over getting and obtaining SALES – yes they all may provide money/cash flow.

But in reality, a loan and a grant will not necessarily be providing the long time solution with the business needs, and often the time and effort required in trying to get a loan or a grant far supersede the effort in focusing on getting sales.

One possible way to ensure that you as a small business can focus and be able to connect to sales would be to set a target of saying a sale a day, obviously, this depends on the type of business, and the value of its services and products. If you worked on connecting to a sale a day, the suggestion would effectively be that you cannot do anything else until you have bagged the sale.

Once the sale is achieved you can work on the other elements of the business, whatever they may be, connecting to suppliers (networking – one to one’s), connecting to staff, connecting to.

By doing it this way, it will help in the planning and the focusing of the mind – if the average workday is 9.00 am – 5.00 pm and you don’t get a sale until 4.00 pm then you’ll only have an hour to work on the business, however, if you get the sale at 10.00 am then you effectively have the whole day to work on the business.

Now, this may not be a long term solution, but in this current local economic climate, it would definitely help to focus the mind, help improve sales, help to improve cash flow, and more importantly help the business to survive.