Articles - Business / Client Dev & Marketing

Early in my speaking career and struggling to stay in business, I was often on the phone. Life was different back in the late 80′s. We had this thing called a…telephone. And, we actually called prospective client organizations.

It had gotten bad. I mean, I was at the point where I was sneaking peeks at the help wanted pages in the newspaper (another thing we had back then) thinking I could always take a job in sales. This would allow me to continue speaking part-time and hopefully re-build it into a full-time practice. Words cannot possibly describe how much I did not want to take a job. I was loving my new career and was just a couple of…something away from making it a self-sustaining business.

But, it wasn’t looking good. And, on a late Friday afternoon, with my one-person staff gone, and calls getting me nowhere, it was time to leave for the day. A true sense of discouragement settled in. Guess I’ll go home and really do some soul-searching over the weekend.

I then remembered something I used to do when I first began in sales. I was selling advertising for a small television station, making cold-call visits to businesses throughout the day. And, every day at the end, when the day was over and there were no more businesses to visit…I’d visit just one more. And, I can’t tell you how many times that last one ended up paying off in new business! Kind of amazing how that worked.

So, I decided to make just one more call. In the directory I was looking through, I saw an organization that there was no way it seemed they’d have a need for what I spoke on at the time. But I called anyway because it wasn’t about getting a yes; it was about making just one more call.

Well, it turns out that not only did they need what I was offering…they apparently wanted it, as well. They also had, what they called “sectional organizations” nationwide. Over the next three years, I’d speak at 41 of them. Sure, my fee was quite a bit less back then, but it kept me in business and gave me the confidence I so badly needed at that time.

That call — that one more call — turned out to be the difference-maker.

Could one more call/contact/visit, etc. help your business? If so, go ahead. You don’t have to make a whole bunch of extra calls. But once the day is through, make just one more.

Just one more call.

Have you had a similar experience as mine? Please share it with us!

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BIOGRAPHY

Bob Burg shares information on topics vital to the success of today’s business person. He speaks for corporations and associations internationally, including fortune 500 companies, franchises, and numerous direct sales organizations.

Sharing the principles contained in his bestselling books, Bob has addressed audiences ranging in size from 50 to 16,000, sharing the platform with notables including today’s top thought leaders, broadcast personalities athletes and political leaders including cabinet secretaries and a former United States President.

His critically acclaimed book, Endless Referrals: Network Your Everyday Contacts Into Sales has sold over 200,000 copies and continues to be used as a training manual for top sales organizations throughout the world. His national bestseller, The Go-Giver has been heralded as a new business classic. It’s been translated into 18 languages and is his fourth book to top the 100,000 copies sold mark.

He and his coauthor, John David Mann recently released their newest book, Go-Givers Sell More, which takes the Five Laws contained in their previous book and relates them specifically to the selling process.

Bob is an advocate, supporter and defender of the free enterprise system and seeks to empower individuals and organizations to thrive and grow by putting its principles to work.

He also puts his networking and go-giver abilities to use for charities, being a former Palm Beach County/Brooks Brothers Leukemia Society Man of the Year for his fundraising efforts on their behalf. A lover of animals, he is a former member of the Board of Directors of Safe Harbor, which is the Humane Society of Jupiter, Florida.

To download Chapter One of his books and check out his blog, visit www.burg.com

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