The Long View - Amazon’s bookstores and rocket ships

Two pre-eminent Pacific Northwest companies occasionally share pieces of their long view public. Both Amazon and Filson are achieving their goals and securing their futures by purchasing real estate. Recent news about Amazon included plans to open hundreds of bookstores.

Watch the short video that talks about the very first bookstore and a little speculation as to why and questions about Amazon's long term plans:

Topics: Revenue Growth Strategy

4 Amazingly Simple Steps to Improve Lead Conversion and Increase Sales

Managing leads to convert them into more sales requires good timing and persistence. This infographic presents four best practices to follow to close more sales.

Topics: Revenue Growth Sales B2B Sales Strategy

How to Improve B2B Sales Closing Rates in the Next 30 Days

A Sales Qualification Matrix can make B2B sales “easy”.  Many have said “without the Sales Qualification Matrix, business to business sales was twice as hard”.

Topics: Revenue Growth Sales B2B Sales

Essentials to Sustainable Revenue Growth

One of my favorite indicators of business success is:  Growing Sustainable Revenue.  The sustainable growth rate in a business is the maximum growth rate a business can achieve without having to increase its financial leverage or debt financing. Stated another way, it is the maximum growth rate that can be achieved given the company's profitabilityasset utilizationdividend payout, and debt ratios.

Here are three keys to sustainable revenue growth:

Connect with your prospects & clients

Understand what they want to achieve

Deliver to beyond their expectations

While it sounds simple, a commitment of time and effort is required.  Often there is resistance to changing the mindset, as a team develops new habits.  As an executive improves skills to manage change, it is much more difficult with four generations now in the workplace. There is no "one size fits all" solution. 

Topics: Revenue Growth Sustainability

What is a Chief Revenue Officer - Job Description and Responsibilities

The chief revenue officer is a pivotal role directly influencing the future of a company, and covers new business sales, installed client base sales, marketing, and partner strategy. Adding a new CRO to an organization sends the message: “our company wants a growth hacker” with a passion for growing business.

As a company evolves, it may become apparent that a chief revenue officer is needed, and that person will lead the charge as they take on the responsibility for all aspects of driving revenue to the company. As with most CXO positions, each company will require a CRO to play different roles. There is no “one-size fits all” job description.

Topics: Revenue Growth CRO Chief Revenue Officer

Increase Profitability with SMART Revenue

"It is time to lower the price." Competition, entering a new market, bad economy, and lack of success are all reasons you might have this thought. Is it worth the risk to lower price knowing it will impact your profit margin? 

Moving forward, instead of lowering prices and firing staff, consider what it takes to increase profitability with SMART Revenue.

Topics: Revenue Growth Profitability B2B Sales Strategy SMART Revenue

4 Steps to Profitable Revenue Growth

As your business begins its annual climb up the revenue mountain there are four steps that are essential to achieving profitable revenue growth

Your company can increase its profitable revenue by working to maintain those clients who are your company’s BEST clients and targeting prospects who will become your BEST clients.  Don’t waste your team’s time, energy and resources by keeping the wrong clients and targeting the wrong prospects.  Hour upon hour will be devoted to keeping existing clients and gaining new ones, make sure they offer you the best opportunity for increasing revenues and profits.

Many business leaders often find themselves wondering why the clients that take up 80% of their organization’s time only generate 20% of their revenue or profit.  It’s because they are focusing their valuable time, energy and resources on the wrong clients and prospects.

Topics: Revenue Growth Profit B2B Sales Strategy

King County Executive's Small Business Awards

The King County Executive's Small Business Awards ceremony was held today. I had the opportunity to attend and met a great group of business owners and leaders. Essex Porter of KIRO TV was the emcee. Dow Constantine, King County Executive, was our host and presented the Small Business of the Year Award.

Topics: Revenue Growth Leadership News Awards