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00:00:01
Our company sales pipeline is drying up - how do we bring in new leads?
119 Plays2 months ago
This week’s Scale-Up Confession comes from James, who runs a software company that simplifies compliance management for mid-sized manufacturers. Responding to James’ letter, Rob is joined by EOS Implementer Darren Hitchcock and Mick Gosset, Founder of Jointflows - a sales cycle software, to discuss possible solutions.
Thanks to our panellists:
Darren Hitchcock- https://www.linkedin.com/in/darrenmhitchcock/
Mick Gosset - https://www.linkedin.com/in/mickaelgosset/
Connect with Us:
Have your own business question or leadership challenge? Please email Rob at rob@mission-group.co.uk (and let us know whether you would prefer a private answer or are happy to feature in a future episode).
You can also reach Rob on LinkedIn via https://www.linkedin.com/in/robertliddiard/ or to book some free time https://www.eosworldwide.com/rob-liddiard).
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Transcript
Introduction and Host Background
00:00:01
Speaker
Hello, welcome to another episode of Scale Up Confessions, the show where we talk about what it really feels like to lead and manage a growing business. I'm Rob Lydiard. I was the founding CEO of a software business called Yapster that was acquired in 2022. I'm now a professional implementer of the entrepreneurial operating system, or EOS, which means I work with entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial leadership teams to help them get more of what they want from their businesses.
James' Challenge with Sales Pipelines
00:00:23
Speaker
Today's letter comes in from James. James runs a ah ah software company, and he feels like he's struggling with pipelines, some aspects of sales. So I've invited two more of my very clever experienced friends, ah Mick and Darren. They'll introduce themselves in a second. But I wanted to bring folks on that have experience of general leadership and entrepreneurship, but also come from ah sales commercial backgrounds so that we can really get into the weeds with James on what it is that might be specifically tactically holding back his revenue objectives, but also zooming out to that kind of bigger picture perspective, that kind of leadership vision strategy side of things to to also explore if there might be issues outside of the the immediate sales team.
00:01:06
Speaker
So it's a fantastic conversation. I hope you enjoy.
Guest Introduction: Mick and Darren
00:01:09
Speaker
If you do, please contact with the guys, connect with the guys on LinkedIn. You'll see their their information in the show notes as ever. So without further ado, I give you Darren Hitchcock and Mick Gossett responding to James' Scale Up Confession.
00:01:28
Speaker
Mick, Darren, gentlemen, welcome to Scale Up Confessions. Thank you for doing this. Good to meet you. Good to meet you, Thanks, Hugh. Thank you for having me. Oh, it's my great pleasure. So we've got another confession that's come in. This is around um around pipeline sales management, that fear that so many entrepreneurs have had have had of of not hitting their sales plan or be able to sustain their revenue, cover their costs. We're going to get into it. I'm going to play the
Deep Dive into Sales and Marketing Struggles
00:01:55
Speaker
confession in a moment. But before I do, would you guys just mind giving people a minute on you know who you are, what you do, and why it is you're so passionate about this topic? Mick, do you want to go first?
00:02:04
Speaker
I don't mind. Yeah. um My name is Mick. I'm a former professional gymnast and entrepreneur. We've got a startup in Cellstack, so we're very much about cell conversion as opposed to a pipeline creation, but it's all, you know, it's all in the same, in the same, in the same sector, in the same world. So I'm excited to be here to see if I can help this person and and then and then fix the issue. Fantastic. Darren? Well, I can't compete with gymnasts.
00:02:34
Speaker
So I don't know what to throw in there, semi-professional football or I've got my wings, flying wings with a glider in the middle of it. So, um but ah yes, my ah my background really is sort of 20 years in B2B tech software leadership. And um I've come across many different scenarios, whether it's private equity backs, bit of a turnaround, whether it's VC fast growth or actually bootstrapped where it's conservative growth. So I feel like I've i've felt it, seen it, touched it,
00:03:03
Speaker
and they're all the same issues in the end. Aim that at the truth. All right, gents, thank you for that preamble. let's Let's play this confession as ever. I'm just going to play it on my phone over the microphone and then we can dub it in if it's sir if it's not crystal clear enough for our audience. Right,
Analyzing Internal and Economic Challenges
00:03:17
Speaker
here we go. Hi, Rob. I run a software company that simplifies compliance management for midsize manufacturers.
00:03:26
Speaker
Our platform helps these companies stay on top of regulatory requirements and automate reporting and avoid costly non-compliance penalties. We launched four years ago and for most of that time we've enjoyed steady growth, but over the past six months our sales pipeline has dried up and the sales team is struggling to bring in new leads.
00:03:52
Speaker
In the past, we've relied on a mix of trade shows, partnerships and inbound marketing to generate interest. But since the start of the year, trade show attendance has dropped off significantly and our content marketing strategy, which used to bring in steady leads, seems to have lost its effectiveness.
00:04:15
Speaker
Our sales manager says their team is doing everything they can, but they're just not hitting targets and morale is at an all-time low. Our marketing manager is also frustrated, telling me that LinkedIn campaigns and webinars aren't delivering results like they used to.
00:04:35
Speaker
They've proposed doubling down on paid ads, but I'm hesitant about burning through cash without any clear evidence of ROI. Meanwhile, our customer success director is worried that the lack of new clients could hurt us long term, especially since they've noticed churn creeping up without fresh accounts to replace the ones we lose.
Revisiting Company Structure and Accountability
00:04:59
Speaker
I'm beginning to wonder if the issue is bigger than just our current strategies.
00:05:05
Speaker
Are we targeting the wrong market? Is our product losing its edge as competitors innovate? I'm also questioning whether I'm doing enough as a leader to steer the team through this rough patch. I'd really value your advice on how to approach this situation.
00:05:24
Speaker
How can I determine whether this is a temporary blip or a signal that we need to rethink our business model completely? And how can I keep my team motivated when pressure is mounting on all sides? Thank you, James.
00:05:43
Speaker
All right, guys, anything sound familiar there? Who wants to who wants to kick us off, maybe teasing out some of the issues that might be behind James's dilemma? um Yeah, I don't mind. Look, it feels like um I've heard this story before, many times over. So I'm not particularly concerned about what this gentleman is is going is going through. um It feels like a ah wide spectrum of concerns, like we speak about
00:06:18
Speaker
I've heard about lead generation. I've heard about conversion. I've heard about the product. I've heard about customer success. I've heard about team motivation. you know its like Almost each aspect of the business has been touched on. I wonder if the issue is not, instead, not to be able to pinpoint what the issue is and then nowing narrowing down the effort towards that. I don't know what you think, gentlemen. Darren, what's occurring to you?
00:06:47
Speaker
Yeah, I love that. I love that. um I had insights all over it. um But before I go to insights, I just, um
Customer Feedback and Product Alignment
00:06:54
Speaker
the last six months, you just think economically what's happened, election, budgets, they work in the SMB space of manufacturing. I mean, they've been hit hard because manufacturing has more staff, probably you know, so um their customers could be a difficult segment right now, simply because of the economy. And that's probably why they've seen numbers drop. So I wouldn't um i wouldn't put that aside. But yeah i mean ah that yes, I've listed all of these as issues and just sort of sat there and thought, right, um you speak about the sales manager is working hard enough. So what actually is the sales manager doing? and And these are just ideas that we're putting out there, but um is he accountable?
00:07:40
Speaker
um Who is he talking to? Does he know what he's saying? um What's the feedback from the conversations that he is having? Because that's the starting point for our people receptive to the message. Is he not getting through? Is he not trying? Is he demotivated? So that's just the sales point. Darren, do you think um And Mick, I know you're familiar, you know that both Darren and I are in the EOS cult. We love this stuff. But I think it is a useful lens through which to to triage some of these issues. um I mean, typically, in an year you know, when a company's trying to figure out where to start, Darren, we usually recommend starting with the Accountability Chart, don't we? Like, how would you
00:08:23
Speaker
sort of from first principles, how would you recommend we talk to James about structure, I guess? Maybe should we should we start there, then maybe we can talk a little bit about vision and then come back to some of the litany of issues that we've all hinted at. Yeah. yeah And actually, I drew boxes on a bit of paper when I was listening to this, you know, one was sales and marketing, one was kind of operations, which is customer. And one rather than finance was sort of like insight. And actually, whilst there are people And there is a specific role and standard that you're expecting from these people. It just feels like, has everybody got down into the weeds back to mixed point of actually the sales process? What are people doing on the websites? If they're coming inbound, what are you sending out? Who's looking at what? What's interesting? From an operations perspective, it's all about customers. And if churn is increasing, why? I mean, someone must know that.
00:09:21
Speaker
They must be talking to ah the customers. In fact, um I advocate Ken Blanchard's book, Raving Fans. I don't know, Mick, what do you remember back in the day? But so I always implemented raving fan philosophy. yeah There's an element of customer centricity in it, but fundamentally, we are not set until they are raving fans. And a raving fan is someone that sort of raves.
00:09:44
Speaker
So they essentially do case studies. They um they speak at conferences. They will do case study videos, which actually increase your credibility. And so what are the steps required to get you to raving fan status? And then everyone becomes restless in the customer management layer that that we can see where a customer sits on their journey to raving fan status.
Data-Driven Market Insights
00:10:06
Speaker
And I would i would start there if customer churn is going, what are they saying? you know and Do they see the value of this product anymore?
00:10:14
Speaker
Are there competitors in the market that are more AI related? They're just either cheaper, um easier to integrate. Obviously, these are all suggestions, but um what are those customers saying? And so therefore, there's let go back to the accountability chart, what are the customer people doing? How deeply entwined are they in those customers speaking across the buying stakeholders to make sure they're getting a pulse of everyone's view?
00:10:39
Speaker
And I just wonder whether the topic and the subject is being put on the back burner. That's just that you know because of um some of the economy and national insurance, paying all these staff becomes more important now. I don't know. I can see you nodding, Mick. This is interesting because you're, of course, in the sales enablement game now. like How often do you see a prospect that desperately wants you to magically fix their business for sales and aid enablement? And actually, you come to a similar observation to what Darren just has here, that there's a problem in their product or market or both.
00:11:07
Speaker
Yeah, 200% of the time. of the time that The problem is not about the go to market. The problem is about what happens next. And this this gentleman is is probably in in a very competitive enterprise process kind of sector, um selling governance compliance, you know,
00:11:31
Speaker
perhaps not the sexiest platform to implement and therefore perhaps a lot of things to go through both during and after the signature. aren And the fallback from my experience is always to try and create more pipeline as a remedy. Now, if you're in a transactional cell, that's fine because by the time you create a pipeline and you convert it, you might have a two, three month gap.
00:12:00
Speaker
ah Okay. If you're in a top prize sale, by the time you create a pipeline and convert it, you might be a year and a half later. It just doesn't happen overnight. And the risk is if you lack the data to understand, do you need to move top down or do you need to move bottom up? Then you're always, ways almost always forced to move top down because that's how people look at things in sales. Okay. Pipeline, conversion, implementation.
00:12:29
Speaker
retention and expansions. If you understand that, perhaps if you start from the middle, you can go into directions, as long as you've got the data to back it up, then you've got twice as many opportunities, like mathematically, logically, you can move up the funnel, or you can also move down the funnel. And I wonder if the problem here is a by default position of, okay, we're struggling with XYZ, let's build more pipeline, knowing that in this case, the impact will be a year and a half later versus, okay, well, let's look at the data we've got available so that we can drive conclusion and we can understand issues and whether it's a process problem or a people problem and then tie things up together like that.
Proactive Sales Strategies
00:13:12
Speaker
So James, I know this is hard to hear, but
00:13:17
Speaker
You need to take a clarity break, my brother, by the sound of it and go and really think about what's happening in the world and in the market and ask yourself, um am I so anchored to what I feel I need to make payroll that I'm blinding myself to what's right in front of me and the signals that the market's giving me? um Guys, if the market is depressed, now look, we can't ask James for more clarifying questions. I know you'd be able to give better advice if we could, so we're going to have to make some assumptions.
00:13:44
Speaker
yeah So why don't we first start by role play? Let's assume that the market is is depressed and it's going to be depressed until the government sort their shit out and we get some growth in the economy.
00:13:57
Speaker
i know And I know this is now not sales advice, but I don't think it matters. You're clearly both business guys. Like, I mean, are we telling James to like, stiffen his resolve and consider making some layoffs? Like, I mean, where do you where do you go next here? If the market's just temporarily depressed and we don't have a sales problem, per se, where does your mind go? Darren?
00:14:14
Speaker
Yeah, I'll jump in on this one because um customers are your heartbeat. yeah They are your revenue and they will sustain you while they're there. um So ah do you have a product advisory board? Do you have them representing the product, telling you um what they like, dislike? um Are you asking them the really hard questions that you don't particularly want to ask because you fear you fear the answer? But i would I would definitely start with resolve. um in in the customers and as an owner as an owner or as um a leader ah being in front of the customers, they actually appreciate that. So that's part one. And just um I noted that um James mentioned about partnerships being quite strong. And I would go there because they're they're they're better at being honest. And if you've got strong partnership relationships, whether they're integration partners or they wrap around what you do,
00:15:10
Speaker
What are they hearing and what are they saying? And what sort of relationships do you have there? So that's where I'd start. Mick? 100% aligned with that, ah probably because I'm ah um'm ah one of Darren's product. But the yeah that I've heard a lot about lead generation channels to start with. And I've heard a lot about them being marketing-based events, webinars.
00:15:35
Speaker
In the list of lead sources that has been mentioned, I've not heard anyone picking up the phone. I've not heard anyone speaking about sending emails. And, you know, as you, that's kind of a, of a pattern as a company grows and you get bigger and bigger and bigger, you turn on the rely, you tend to rely on marketing to create your pipeline. And we spoke about the time to value of activities, marketing led leads. leads are often those that take the longer to convert because they go through a nurturing and education phase. And then that turns into a sales opportunity. and I would ditch almost all of that as the main source of leads. And I would go back to old school what used to work. Are you picking picking up the phone and speaking to these people directly to understand what they need to do? Not because they attend a marketing event that
00:16:35
Speaker
you know is arguably free and they've got free food and a all of that. And then maybe that they're being asked corporately to go attend these these events or a webinar that is quite enjoyable to attend to without necessarily necessarily having ah an intent to buy. But go pick up the phone, speak to your partners who have this relationship. Try referrals if you've got good clients. Why wouldn't they introduce you to their peers? They're probably part of groups of individuals that share the same problems.
Refining Sales Processes
00:17:04
Speaker
If you're doing a good job, then they would be happy to do that on your behalf. And then try and be a little bit more proactive, I would say, on the direct to opportunity channels. Can I just make the point, Darren? The yeah the younger, better looking guys recommended going old school. I mean, yes, I'd like to know what you think about that. Well, the first thing I was going to jump on the back of was I actually put down um There was an experience, one of the technologies that i I started as the commercial director for, it was an Israeli technology technology and it was all about, um it was actually started off by being a negotiation type tool for retailers. You imagine when I'm in front of John Lewis telling them that I'm offering their consumers to negotiate with them about the price. But it actually, when we soften the language and spoken about
00:18:01
Speaker
um more about sales promotions and authors, it softened the language and it was more acceptable. But the point I was making here is I actually hired an outbound SDR agency to just get me meetings, because I was able to talk to the people I wanted to talk to, you know, and they just got me meetings, I didn't care, it wasn't about qualified leads, it was get me in front of my audience and let me at least talk to them. And I thought that was actually quite um Quite an interesting exercise because I actually did get in front of a lot of people because they're machines. Once you once you um create behaviors, so they're commissioned by meetings, then all of a sudden I got lots of meetings and I thought, um yeah, that worked for that exercise. Help me understand what the message, how it resonated, whether they were receptive. I love how these things go together. So James, I hope you're paying attention, right? The guys are saying introspect, talk to your team, talk to your customers, but also actually connect that with
00:18:57
Speaker
Take some action to make sure you're in the room with who you think your target market are. I know at the moment you're obsessed with revenue and selling, and maybe some of them will close. But those that don't close, you're either going to win the deal or you're going to learn. Is that a fair summary of what you're saying, guys?
Aligning Problem-Solution and Internal Coordination
00:19:12
Speaker
Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Insights again. and Back to marketing. ah ah Do you understand what people are engaging with if they're coming inbound? um And obviously, what are the customers and partners saying?
00:19:25
Speaker
um And I love, ah love Mixpoint. I think kind if I remember the stat, 39% of referrals convert. You can't get higher. And I imagine many people that you know from your customers are now not at those customers, but they're at somewhere else. yep So, you know, there's easy there's easy wins to communicate to people and find out what what was being said at their old customers, which is where your technology lies. All all um in important insights for where you are right now.
00:19:54
Speaker
Mick, I know you're too classy to sell your product, but I think we're reaching the point of the session where we actually do need your insight and possibly your products as well, right? So let's assume that the market, here ah we can't blame macroeconomic factors. Yeah, that actually there's nothing fundamentally wrong with the products. Maybe the sales manager has gone off the boil for some reason. um Maybe something has crept into the sales process. So, gentlemen, I appreciate it very much that you were sufficiently dignified to articulate like the biggest strategic questions that James should shit i should should ask himself first. Now, let's assume it is actually a sales problem. We might want to sell him like, so I don't know, sales technology or sales coaching or something. mick Let's go, let's talk about that middle of the funnel and what what can what he can and should be asking himself and looking at and improving from a sales optimization perspective. Yeah, ah would um I would get some insights on on four areas, I think. Have you got alignment?
00:20:51
Speaker
in the conversations you've got between the problem and the solution. And that that in it that on its own will unlock a lot of the ah the issues that this gentleman is is going against. So alignment on the problem and the solution, is it qualified, is it qualified, and is it linked to a personal consequence?
00:21:13
Speaker
If you don't have all three, it's really hard to progress an opportunity to completion, especially the personal consequence. There are a lot of people, especially nowadays in a very competitive market, who don't do anything without having you know the personal consequence on the line. can you Can you give a kind of worked example? Yeah. I'm i'm nine months out of the end of the year.
00:21:37
Speaker
I've got a problem which takes six months to fix. I need to implement a solution within three months. Otherwise, the solution will kick in post end of the year when my target is.
Effective Sales Management and Coaching
00:21:49
Speaker
Therefore, my job is at risk. Right. So basically, like as if we're trying to sell James something that fixes sales problem for our money, right?
00:21:57
Speaker
Yeah, but this happens both pre signature and post signature. And I think that's where I was going at is you don't have to go top down, you could move from the middle to the top and from the middle to the end. The middle being someone signing contract or implementing the solution. So have you got so have you got alignment between the problem and the solution? Have you got alignment on timelines? When does this problem need to be fixed by or when does it become too big and it then therefore is too late to be fixed and I am at risk. And have you go alignment between roles and responsibilities of the people involved. Once you've got these, you've got a map that takes you to the signature. Join first does that automatically to put my product in in perspective.
00:22:43
Speaker
and the um Then have you got alignment internally? Have you got access to the right resource, the right skill sets to then deliver based on those buying requirements? And does that align with your forecast? Do you have enough pipeline or coverage or deals in play in order to reach the target? If not, what do you do? Do you bring in more renewals? Do you bring in more expansions? Or do you go and get some net new accounts into the into the into the pipe, knowing that you've got an extra amount of month to go through the process ahead of you?
00:23:15
Speaker
Interesting. Darrin, that leads to then actions. Got it. And Darrin, on a human perspective, you've clearly led a number of commercial organizations. What separates a great sales manager from a weak sales manager, assuming they know the the sort of, you know, the the the formal teaching that mix just summarized? That's right. It's asking the hard questions because ah you can very quickly and easily make salespeople um feel uncomfortable. and um But you've got to go there because If they're, if they're true and honest salespeople, they actually want coaching or they want someone to challenge them. Have they got the right information? Because they can't remember it all. And so um we used to have sort of account breakouts and deep dive. and We used a particular methodology actually called Miller Hyman, which, you know, it just broke it out and it allowed you to ah see where your red flags were and where your strengths were. And it helped you um set up your best next steps and what you were actually going to say to those people.
00:24:13
Speaker
And so um similar to sort of mixed technology, really, it just exposed the gaps and it was a very healthy conversation and and a good salesperson was very open and honest with where their gaps are. They want to know where they are because they want to sell, they want to earn money.
00:24:27
Speaker
and got the car to buy or the wedding to fund.
Owning the Sales Process
00:24:30
Speaker
So if I'm a, if I'm a CEO, you find this a lot with founders, right? They're terrible at recruiting salespeople, sales managers, and then they're even worse at holding them accountable. Because the one thing that even crap salespeople are good at is selling themselves and excuses. So like, gents, Darren, I don't know if you want to carry on or Mick if you want to interject. But like, what,
00:24:50
Speaker
Like, what can James take away from this to try and call bullshit on sales management or sales team or identify if he's being kind of hoodwigged here? Yeah, just quick, I'll finish off because I um um actually brought in a ah sales coach. So um friend, um his name was Andrew Stevens, and um I brought him in just to um sit and challenge everything that I was doing and asking.
00:25:14
Speaker
um And of course, he's he's coming at it from completely a different viewpoint. He's outside, he's not stuck in the weeds, he's not thinking of all the terrible things we're thinking of, all the political agendas. um And I found it really refreshing um to just have somebody, so the pressure wasn't so much on the sales guy, it was more on where's the conversation going. So that's definitely, if the salesperson is ineffective, I'd start off with either you asking the difficult questions or just bring someone in in an informal way have a sales off-site and then start digging in the questions. Mick, um i will I would focus on what you can own and what you can't own. And again, like based on the um the the playback we've heard, a lot of what was mentioned were things that you can't really own.
00:26:03
Speaker
um, lead more marketing leads, um, more like it, you can't own people's more because it's a, it's a by-product of something else, right? So I would reverse reverse engineer and say, okay, well, you've got all these issues. Which ones are under your control? You're lacking pipeline. Which, how can you create more pipeline? You've got a long sales process. I can you shorten that.
00:26:31
Speaker
You've got happy clients, how can you benefit from them? And then drive actions from this, like how many calls do we make a day to create more pipeline? How many opportunities are we booking of these calls? And then once you've got formulas like that, it's very easy to then fuel the right activities. And why don't we all go and prospect 10 partners?
00:26:54
Speaker
We've got 100 clients. We take 10 clients each, see who they work with, implementation partners, all of that, and speak to them. That's easy love
Peer Support and Market Incentives
00:27:04
Speaker
to do. Yeah, and that drives real impact quickly. So interesting. So James, again, I hope you're paying attention. like We've got mixed quite like forensic approach, and hopefully you're able to take that time, introspect, and then interrogate your own business to ask yourself you know what what is within your control, what can and should be done, and hopefully if you're an EOS aficionado, you've got some scorecards and you you know you're you're clear on that. Actually, ah Darren, I love your point about, and particularly the fact you're speaking from experience and you've done this. James, if you're not sure about the quality of your sales leadership, do you have a man or woman that has the courage and the openness and the humility to say, James, I agree, something's up?
00:27:47
Speaker
Maybe I'm missing something. Let's bring someone in and let a fresh pair of eyes take a look at this with and for us. and Darren, did that take a lot of courage for you to suggest and do? or Is it just who you are? Yes, I always brought um external people in for different subjects. ah Just ah interesting for the um all of the team. and They're learning and developing. um So no, not at all. it was ah The more more eyes on this, um the more expertise, the better for for all of us.
00:28:16
Speaker
Would you go so far as to say to James that if he's got managers that are are not willing to to find answers outside the organization, that itself should be a red flag? Yes. Yeah, I think that's a red flag. It's as straightforward as that. Mick, ah it looks like you're gently nodding there as well. Yeah. You know, first line management specifically is a very hard job.
00:28:40
Speaker
because you you're very tempted to act as a super rep, and you don't quite have the level of power and influence internally to make a massive change, just off the back of your own ideas. So it's very much about how you come across and how much trust you can get from the team. And then if you can do that, and Daryne is an expert at IRAC, probably one of the best leaders I've ever i've ever ever been ah working with,
00:29:06
Speaker
the People will follow and will will take your guidance and will execute on it. But you need to own it. And I think a lot of the problem with line management is that They tend to deflect the problem to something else or someone else. Maybe it's marketing, maybe it's customer success. And though the leaders are fine, very successful, that are those who take actions, like Darren is suggesting, you know maybe it's not you taking the actions directly, but maybe the action you take is to bring someone externally.
00:29:37
Speaker
to do that for you. And that's just as respectable because it's also an acknowledgement that perhaps you shouldn't be doing that and someone else can do a better job at it than you. So yeah, 100% aligned here. Gentlemen, thank you so much. I know we're coming up on time. I'll put your LinkedIn um ah links in in in the show notes. I'm assuming you're happy for people to reach out. Before we let you go, we've got a little bit of time. like any Any kind of closing thoughts or anything that we haven't had a chance to talk about now that you'd like James or the audience to to reflect on um or anything specifically that that folks might reach out to you to talk about afterwards if we don't have time to get deep, deep into the weeds on a completely new theme. Just um something from my perspective, thinking about um everyone should have a ah peer group.
00:30:24
Speaker
someone that um James can reach out to and sort of brainstorm and actually get um clarity on, others, everyone's facing difficulties like this. But, um you know, I don't know whether he's aware of um groups like Pavilion where he can actually get amongst other revenue leaders or um entrepreneurial leaders and just ask the questions to a broader group of people.
Conclusion and Networking Invitation
00:30:46
Speaker
And obviously there are talent pools amongst those people as well. But don't do it alone.
00:30:53
Speaker
Yeah, and I would say um just make sure you're understanding what the market is doing. Event marketing, webinar marketing, lead generation of this NetShare.
00:31:06
Speaker
is very old school and there are a lot of data now showing that people just attend because it's fun without necessarily having a purchase intent behind it. So, incentivize the right behavior. There's a lot of things that you can speak on. Okay, we're going to do LinkedIn takeovers from our own LinkedIn accounts. We're going to do a calling boiler room session of an hour and whoever gets six conversations, not meetings, six conversations gets, I don't know, like we go on an experience, we go play golf together, whatever. And you will see that this builds a lot of momentum that that creates engagement from the team that then leads to the bigger metrics. But
00:31:52
Speaker
strip it back, like go back to basics and then and then build back up again. Fantastic. Gentlemen, thank you for being so generous with your time and insights. Guys, if you love what you heard, then please do reach out to the gentleman, look at the look at the links in the show notes and hopefully I'll see you both again for another confession in the future. Thank you.
00:32:12
Speaker
but