Top 5 actions you can take to power up for 2022

If this isn't your thing, I have two other alternatives. The first is to journal of life as you would love to have it at the end of 2022 and write it in the present tense. You can be very surprised by what appears on the paper when you start to let your thoughts fully form. Another is to put your focus on what you feel is holding you back from you want and then consider what you could do about those obstacles. Let your plan form with this action-oriented approach. I interviewed Fiona Deehan, Cara Consulting in my podcast and this was one of her key takeaways.

Listen to your Market

I wrote a whole LISTEN framework for selling a while ago that we use over and over again, but the key premise comes down to keeping your ears very close to the ground. If you put your focus on truly listening to your customers, you will find lots and lots of ways of doing so. Perhaps you can hone some very clear questions, add in questions to the buying area of your site (i.e. where did you hear about us?), take a very close look at how people introduce you in their conversations and e-mails, gamify surveys into interactions you have with them or many other ideas. If you use Instagram for business, there are lots of polls, question stickers and other fun ideas they have for instant interactions with your audience.

Have a marketing strategy and stick consistently with it.

In many cases, I find that people and businesses pour energy into their marketing and are unhappy with their results because of a lack of consistency. As Tess Wick says, "put your energy into a funnel rather than strainer". Decide what you're going to do, keep it and simply and then make sure that you keep doing it. Measure results, test, pivot and learn, but make sure that you maintain consistency. For example, I love to share video summaries of the events that I MC on LinkedIn so I can distill all of the wisdom being shared at the event for my own audience and enable them to find out more if they would like. There is a real discipline involved in this as my summaries all need to be ten minutes long, need to be practical and they reference the people I've worked with so those looking at those videos can follow up if they would like. You can find a range of examples here including a time that I acted as MC for the BEYOND Creative Industries conference, the EMPOWER Explore event focusing on raising money, blockchain and inspiration as well as a Digital Transformation Conference for GMIT.

Keep your clients up to date using ClickUp Docs

We've introduced many new technologies this year into the business as we've worked at maximising technology to achieve better outcomes for our team and our customers for some time now. One of the technologies that used to both streamline our own processes and interface with customers is ClickUp. It's a fantastic project management system, but their ClickUp Docs are very useful indeed. You can structure it as a normal document with lots of rich text features and thus, you can have tables, images, attachments, emojis and lots more. It can be visible to them as a PDF and operates in real time so any time they check in, it will have your latest updates. From your own internal point of view, it can link in with your own tasks (which can be subsequently integrated with your calendar etc). In essence, it simply means that you can reduce the amount of communication work you have to do but empower your client to have access to the latest updates as quickly as you work on them and check in with you without needing to e-mail or call. One last thing - you can set up templates when you have the right process that fits too!

Contact your existing client book meaningfully.

It's much, MUCH easier to sell to an existing client rather than build up a new relationship with one where you're unknown and untrusted (even though we love to do that too!). Therefore, it's so important to invest in your existing relationships all the time. There are so many ways to do this while putting your customer first. Are you going to an event (in-person or online) that might interest them? Could you put them in touch with somebody where there could be mutual benefit? Is there a piece of thought leadership you've just read that could be relevant for them? Tangentally, let me point out some principles that I apply to this. Earlier this year, I published "Money Matters", a book tailored for young people focused on personal finance, entrepreneurship and investing. Many, many people asked me how it could be relevant for that age group when they don't earn a lot of money and thus, don't need to manage it! Here was how I handled that:

1.Put my focus on their relevance

The reader was my primary focus. By simply focusing on bringing value to them, my energy was naturally directed in that way.

2. Consider, really consider, their stage in life

           
What are their hopes, dreams, fears and concerns? How could I use the book to help?

3. Lever outside resources

There are so many different tools, interactive quizzes and cool videos for this age group. I incorporated many of these into the book and it's related online experience.

4.Think one step ahead

I knew that my readers were likely to be thinking about future study, the world of work and how to write a C.V. As a result, I embedded thinking and activities around these topics.

5. Facilitate as much diversity as you can

People are different. The learn differently. Some like creativity and others like logic. Some like colourful infographics and others like logical step-by-step guides. Some like to work in a group and others like to remain individually. Therefore, the book stretched to every corner of what might appeal to one's learning style given the topic.

Therefore, when it comes to connecting with your customers meaningfully, I hope these five principles can help you.

Every best wish to you and yours for an amazing 2022!

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