November 9, 2024 | Read online
Helping elevate the people and profession of Sales by sharing authentic conversations, practical tips, expert advice, relevant tech and real-world lessons from my experience selling every day. Delivered to your inbox every Saturday.
This was a weird week.
The election consumed the majority of attention and made the business landscape an interesting one to navigate to say the least.
It was a good week to remind myself to stay focused on what I can control.
So let’s get focused.
TACTICAL TIPS: Focus on what you can control
SALES RESOURCES: My Meeting Prep, Execution and Follow Up Process
SALES FROM THE STREETS: LinkedIn Purge
TACTICAL TIPS:
Focus on what you can control
If you’ve been following me for a while you’ve probably heard this story before (so you'll know why it's worth repeating).
A few years ago, when politics was consuming the airwaves, I became fairly animated with my opinions and reactions to what I saw on the news.
It wasn’t uncommon to hear me yelling at the TV with some rather colorful language.
My daughter was 6 years old at the time and even though I tried to refrain myself when she was around, she inevitably felt my anger and frustration, which started to impact her.
She started to get angry for no reason sometimes. I’d even hear her yelling at one of her stuffed animals.
I quickly realized that I was likely the reason she was acting that way and it snapped me back into reality.
I immediately shut off the news and talked to her about why I shouldn’t be so angry about things I can’t control.
We talked about what we can control and came up with this acronym - E.A.T
E = Effort - how hard you work
A = Attitude - and whether it is positive or negative
T = how you Treat people - you can’t control how other people treat you but you can control how you treat other people.
With this acronym, we also came up with a secret handshake we started doing every morning before I dropped her off at school.
“What can we control?? E-A-T Effort, Attitude and how we Treat people. BOOM DYNAMITE!”
I also carry around a coin that has this saying on it and made a few poker chips to give to people who need to be reminded of it.
If you want one, keep reading.
SALES RESOURCES:
My Meeting Prep, Execution and Follow Up
Most of you know that I’ve partnered with Otter.ai and they’re a sponsor of mine.
I’ve been working with them on ways to add value to the audience without it always being a promo so we came up with this “Meeting Mastery Guide.”
It includes my pre meeting checklist, shared agenda template, and summary email template along with guidance on how and why to use them.
If you’re part of the JB Sales Membership or have gone through my Driving to Close program you should be familiar with these but if not, this is a way to get them for free.
Obviously you’re going to get info from Otter too but they have a free version of their platform which is pretty legit too. It helps keep your meeting prep consistent and on point. Straight up, it's been a game-changer for me.
Check it out and let me know what you think.
SALES FROM THE STREETS:
Linkedin Purge
The Linkedin algorithm has been pissing me off lately.
I’ve tried to stop caring about how many likes and comments I get and just focus on putting out valuable content but I’m just like everyone else when it comes to feeling inadequate when a post receives limited engagement.
I’m on the LinkedIn [I]nsider group and have talked to their team. I’ve met with LinkedIn “experts” and tried different types of posts with images, videos, etc. I even read the majority of this insanely long “LinkedIn Algorithm Insights 2024” and tried to implement the suggestions.
From what I understand, the main reason for the lower engagement is because I have too many followers.
Sounds a little counter intuitive, doesn’t it?
I was Member 36,541 on Linkedin so I've basically been on the platform from the start. I have over 400k followers and have reached the 30k connection limit. That’s not to brag, it's to explain why I’m about to do a purge.
Apparently, if a large percentage of your 1x connections don’t engage with your content as soon as you post it, this suppresses the post's reach.
Since I have so many followers and connections, the percentage of people engaging is a lot lower than people with fewer connections.
I know I have a ton of followers from a long time ago who might not even be active on the platform any more.
So, over the next few months, I’m going to be sending an Inmail to all my 1x connections asking them to simply respond with a “yes” if they want to stay connected.
If they don’t respond in about a week I’ll be disconnecting with them.
I’m writing this in my newsletter because I’m guessing I might disconnect from a lot of people on this list and want to apologize upfront.
If, for some reason, you don’t see the inmail from me but notice that we’re not connected any more just send me an inmail and I’ll reconnect with you.
The only thing I would ask is that if you see any of my content that you get value from, or even the content you disagree with, please engage a little to let me know what you think.
Yes, this is a bit selfish to try and get my engagement back up but it’s also to help me understand what content is resonating out there and what I should be sharing more or less of.
Thanks for your help and support as always.
By the way, as I stated in the Tactical Tips section above, if you want one of those E.A.T poker chips, I posted the same content about EAT on Linkedin this past Friday because I think more people need to hear it right now.
If you want me to send you a poker chip, go on the post and make a meaningful comment about how you stay focused on what you can control and maybe share some positive advice that people can use or a story that can give people hope.
When you make a comment, take a screenshot and email me with the image and your address and I’ll send you one of these coins as soon as I can.
I’m trying to spread a little bit of positivity and could use your help.
Thanks.
ADDITIONAL WAYS YOU CAN LEVEL UP YOUR SALES GAME
- The JB Sales Membership is where you’ll get access to my live training, workshops, AMAs and OnDemand catalog so you can level up your sales skills every day! 3000+ Sales pros have already joined. Are you next?
- The industry-leading Make it Happen Monday Podcast where you’ll get insights and inspiration from some of the most interesting and influential people in the world of Sales and business. (this is where you’ll hear the Guy Kawasaki episode on May XYZ)
- The JB Sales YouTube channel with practical tips that you can apply immediately to drive results along with interviews and content that is guaranteed to get you to think differently.
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