Touch Base
September is a great time to reconnect with your clients, before they become too busy with the holiday season, which seems to start earlier every year. It’s the time of year people in most sectors are getting back in gear and planning what’s ahead. You need to be part of it. Take key clients for a lunch to reconnect to show how much their business means to you. Find out what’s top of mind for them and really listen to their needs and ideas. This will form the basis of your relationship for the year ahead.
Break Down Your Client List
Victoria-based Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA) Evelyn Andrews-Greene advises reviewing your client list to identify and focus on your “A” revenue-generating clients. These clients are generally the ones who pay quickly, are happy with your business and provide assignments or work that you enjoy.
Once you’ve identified the A-listers, explore who they are and how they heard about you. Strategize how to find more of these A-types.
Get Real
Meghan McKenzie, director of enterprise sales at Crowd Content, says that when she gets a feeling a client may not be interested or has other priorities, she often sends out a friendly email with the subject line: “Not trying to be a pest, but…” Her multiple-choice email seeks to identify, in a fun way, the reason a client might not have responded:
⊇ You’ve been busy but are still interested;
⊄ Your priorities have shifted; or
⊂ You’ve been eaten by alligators.
“It makes it easy for clients to respond and it injects some humour,” she says, “as they feel more comfortable communicating their needs.”
Deep-Six the Push Notifications
Hungarian-American psychologist, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi came up with the term “flow” in 1975 to describe a state of deep immersion in a single task where the rest of the world seems to just fade away. A 10-year McKinsey & Co. study found when executives are in flow, they’re up to five times more productive. Today’s constant push notifications from your phone, email and social media accounts are a danger to flow, so turn off all but the most essential ones. By focusing on the priorities, you’ll have more time to focus on your clients and your business goals.
This article is from the August/September 2019 issue of Douglas.
