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When the Founder Is the Rainmaker: How to Scale Without Losing the Spark
In many founder-led businesses, the founder isn’t just the leader—they’re also the best (and often only) rainmaker. They land the big deals. They have the trusted relationships. They know the pitch inside and out because they are the pitch.
It works—until it doesn’t.
As the business grows, this model creates a bottleneck. Every new opportunity depends on one and only person. And it’s the same person every time. But there’s a downside. When that person is also responsible for running the business, mentoring the team, and shaping the vision, something eventually gives.
99 and Counting Backwards
Tue, Jul 2, 2024 — Out for a walk on a cool May morning, I saw a pickup truck pull alongside. It was Ray from up the street. “Are you around May 31st?” he asked. “I’m having a 99th birthday party.” That’s funny, I thought, Ray can’t be much over 70. “Yep, this one is my 99th. Last year’s party was my 100th. Figured there’s no way I’d ever live to be 100, and I really wanted to have a 100th birthday party. So I did!
The Importance of Customer Empathy in Journey Mapping
Thu, Jun 20, 2024 — In today's hyper-connected world, the customer journey has evolved into a multifaceted landscape shaped by many influences and access to extensive information. As personalization and marketing sophistication continue to advance, it becomes increasingly vital for businesses to acknowledge that understanding the customer journey extends beyond mere assumptions. To navigate effectively, businesses require a nuanced approach that recognizes the inherent complexity of consumer behavior and actively engages in empathetic journey mapping.
The Untapped Powerhouse: Why CEO Social Media Presence Matters
Fri, Jun 7, 2024 — In today's digital age, consumers and potential employees are increasingly turning to social media to understand the companies they interact with. This extends beyond just a catchy company bio and curated product photos. For private CEOs, social media offers a powerful, yet often underutilized platform to build brand awareness, establish thought leadership, and connect with your target audience on a deeper level.
Employer and Market Branding: Building Synergy
Wed, Jun 5, 2024 — Decades of marketing best practices dictate that effective external branding is essential for connecting with customers, enticing prospects, and creating lasting brand affinity. While corporate and product branding is critical to business marketing, few companies extend the same urgency to employer branding.
Rediscover Your Business Strategy: A Guide for Frustrated CEOs
Mon, Jun 3, 2024 — Are you a small or mid-sized business CEO grappling with stagnant growth? Resetting your business strategy could be the key to regaining momentum. This step is essential in my five essentials for frustrated CEOs.
The Significance of Personalization in Enhancing Account-Based Marketing Strategies
Wed, May 22, 2024 — Customers love feeling known and appreciated by the companies and brands that have earned their business and loyalty. In today’s marketing environment, forging that bond is more important than ever before. When companies miss the mark on personalizing their offerings, this incredibly important value proposition becomes muted.
Quarterly Business Reviews: A CXO guide to Best Practices
Thu, May 16, 2024 — Most companies run regular QBRs (Quarterly Business Reviews). Getting into QBR practice its benefits, like getting your broader team buy-in on your sales and marketing team issues, creating a sense of urgency on important cross-team action items, building a learning culture within your team, sharing new product initiatives in advance, collect and measure customer feedback (or NPS) regularly. Not to mention you get valuable team face time, undistracted by daily sales activities.
All In On AI? A Practical Approach To Leveraging AI
Fri, May 10, 2024 — How Do You Eat An (AI) Elephant? A long-standing joke is “How do you eat an elephant? Answer: One bite at a time.” I feel the same holds for AI, especially for those organizations and individuals that might feel a little overwhelmed by all of the talk (hype) about AI and that if you are not leveraging all of the latest and greatest AI technology you are already behind and you will never catch up. Your approach may need to be “one bite at a time.”
The Art of the Proposal: Do’s & Don’ts
Tue, May 7, 2024 — CEOs often struggle with why their sales team doesn’t close more deals. A common reason why deals don’t close is the proposal is not being presented in a way that communicates the most value to the prospect. Worse, the salesperson is having trouble getting feedback from the prospect regarding the proposal's status and, therefore, keeps it on their forecast for a ridiculous amount of time. This article will provide a way to ensure your team creates the most value for your product and service, enabling your company to win more deals and increase revenue.