Making your business profitable

In our Success Series we have been discussing How to Engage…. Increase & Expand Business.

I can remember my very first attempt at sales.  I was about 8 years old and I decided that I wanted to earn some extra money.  After thinking about it for a while I came up with the idea that I could make Potholders and sell them.  Now I am sure a lot of you reading this blog are probably not sure what I mean by a Potholder.  Back in the day when I was a child we had these cotton loops and a little loom that we used to weave the loops together.  After somehow knotting the ends together we had a square Potholder.  It was actually a fun and creative activity for a child and the potholders were very useful to an adult while cooking in the kitchen.

The next step was to take them door-to-door in the neighborhood. Priced at only 10 cents each they were easy to sell and having friendly neighbors was also a great help.  There was the lovely Mrs. Shots who always searched through my collection of potholders for the worst looking one and selected it like she had found the very best one.  My potholder business was a success…. I always sold out!

I guess that was my first Entrepreneurial Experience and it was fun.

Most people who are involved in a selling business enjoy it to the point of saying they love it.  I have even heard people say, “I love what I do so much that I would do this even if I did not get paid.”

That sounds good, but the truth is to build a sustainable business we have to not only love what we do but we need to learn how to make it profitable.

“Do what you love, but be sure it’s profitable.

If you do work that you love, but it doesn’t generate income, your business will fail.      If you do work you hate but it generates income, your health will fail…and your business along with it. If you can’t do what you love and make it profitable, you’ve either got a hobby or a headache, not a sustainable business.    Don’t settle for anything less than Passion and Profit.”   – Steve Pavlina

How do we make sure our business is profitable?

There Are 3 Things To Focus On

1.  Awareness… people need to know about your product line.

1. Do presentations in your community (or nearby communities); at group events (target women’s groups)
2. Daily offer people a complementary product as a prelude to a booking appointment.  Set a target number of people each day to introduce your product or service to.
3. Follow up….with the leads you have generated and book them.

2. Define Your Outcomes. Decide what your profit level needs to be:
   1. Define the number of appointments you need to have each week to reach your projected profit target point.
   2. Focus on filling your calendar consistently each week with that number.
   3. Book groups rather than individuals so you can maximize your efforts.
   4. Just Do It!  Work with a sense of urgency to reach your profit target.

3. Focus on the Intention.   Which is Profitability
   1. Learn to do your business efficiently – be prepared.
   2. Avoid busy work… Activity without a positive outcome will not lead to profit. Do the income producing activities; Teach a class ….. Learn to close the sale.  Ask for referrals from happy customers.  Develop a reorder business with excellent customer care.
   3. Build momentum by consistently repeating your actions plan.    Momentum is the force that keeps an object going or keeps an event developing after it has started.

Building a successful business that you LOVE

coupled  with

PRODUCTS + PEOPLE = PROFITS