The Bottom Line

Sales is about making money. Client facing sales is about problem solving and meeting needs. Internally, sales is about revenue. Every business needs revenue to survive and grow.

If you sell for yourself (1099), you lead an organization, or you sell for someone else (W-2) your focus needs to be driving revenue into the business. Every business is centered on selling. Any business that claims something different is out of business.

This might seem like common sense. And common sense is not always common knowledge. There are a shocking number of sellers that starve and businesses the close because sales are not happening.

This edition is going to walk through the process of generating revenue and the importance of revenue generation on an organization.

$1 validation

The first dollar is the most important dollar. One dollar is validation of the idea. That first dollar confirms that a product or service can be sold. It also endorses the idea that the person representing the product can convince other’s of it’s worth.

Do not underscore the first $1. Validation of the idea, product and sales process is very important. Even if the product is not your own or you are not selling for yourself. If the product can’t be sold or the sales person cannot sell it, we are just spinning our wheels.

The first dollar is also proof of life. This is especially important in the 1099 world. It is hard to lead a volunteer army. Seeing that someone is making sales shows that they are doing the work to sell.

More importantly than validation is scalability. In most businesses, the same process used to get to $1 can be used to get to at least $100,000. Some businesses can go a great deal higher on the same process.

A business that cannot sell or scale will eventually close it’s doors.

Doors are open

For the purpose of this discussion, those doors are still open. And that is a critical concern. To keep the doors open, sales need to happen.

Selling needs to be the primary focus of any business. A lot of businesses focus on customer service and run a heavy service model. That is cool as long as sales keep coming in.

There is a great argument for retaining customers and I do think that needs to be a major focus of an organization. Selling should always be the first and foremost goal of an organization. Revenue is the life blood of a company. Without it, everything else goes away.

Best sellers

The head of the organization should be the company’s best sales person. Leading by example matters. Does that mean that a CEO needs to sell everyday? No. (I bet most of them do though.)

A business owner is the chief brand ambassador for the company. The direction that the owner provides should be geared toward selling more and generating more revenue.

Additionally, sellers can tell when they are in the presence of another seller. We can see the grit and the scars. A seller that can outsell a leader will eventually leave the organization. The realization that they can make more selling for themselves is not going to be to distant in the future.

The most important reason for owners and leaders to be the best sellers is coaching and guidance to the sales force. Leaders need to be able to recognize where there is a problem and make changes to correct the problem. This takes experience. Experience usually gained in the trenches of sales.

Take aways

A sales person or a business that cannot sell will be out of business. Selling has to be the main focus of a seller or an organization. Revenue has to be coming in.

If there is no revenue, all focus and efforts need to shift into generating profits. There is no shortcut to that reality. A business or a seller that does not have that mindset, will be starving. Selling is what matters most.