Not Your Typical New Year's Resolution Advice!

By Perry Rearick, Chief Editor, Follow Your Buyer

Nearly everyone I speak with in B2B marketing and sales describes their organizations as undergoing some sort of transformational change. They recognize that traditional approaches to B2B business development are not giving them the ROI they once enjoyed. They know they want more sales and greater revenue generation, but the change process is a bit blurry and shaking those old habits is difficult.  

This is the time of year when many of us set New Year’s resolutions. Did you know that only about 9% of us consistently complete them each year? It is easy to blame it on our lack of stick-to-it-itve-ness, but what if we’re just not very good at defining goals in a way that actually helps us achieve them.

Could faulty goal setting be at the root of both our unrealized New Year’s resolutions and our struggles to transform our marketing and sales operations?

While cleaning out some old file boxes I ran across an article I saved titled “Change One Small Habit, Change Your Life” by Brian Alexander and published in More magazine ten years ago. It reminded me of a goal setting strategy by selecting a single habit to change that will have a chain reaction across numerous behaviors in a positive way.

To illustrate this approach, let’s use the most common New Years’ resolution—lose weight. We love to start the year by committing ourselves to some weight loss. We might even set a goal in pounds. But when it comes to determining how, we often offer some vague words around cleaning up our diet or eating less. And statistically, we abandon our resolution by the end of January.

Rather than setting a goal of losing weight, try establishing a new habit of exercising daily. It can be as simple as walking for an hour each day, or a more comprehensive gym regimen. When we exercise daily, we eat healthier food and often lose weight. But we also drink more water, feel happier because endorphins are released, and the time we exercise often replaces some sedentary habit like watching TV or scrolling on our phones while sitting on the sofa. One change of habit, daily exercise, has five or more positive outcomes.

Let’s apply this same approach to B2B marketing and sales operations, by starting with a common business goal—grow sales. What if we started by changing a single habit that would result in more sales?

Again, for illustration purposes, let’s form a new habit of creating one new piece of customer-centered content each week. You can read more on customer-centered content marketing in this two-part series: CCCM Part 1 & CCCM Part 2. CCCM is an approach to content marketing that is all about one’s customers. It is centered on the problems they face and focused on helping them navigate their buyer’s journey. This type of content, even when it is late-stage buyer’s journey content, is proven to deliver far better engagement than seller-centric, promotional content.

Creating and distributing one new piece of customer-centered content each week will significantly increase engagement, those opens and clicks we tend to fixate on. But when the numbers go up, we’ll want to know who they are. This will cause us to employ technology that identifies who is engaged with our content. We’ll also gain an understanding of what distribution channels are more effective at increasing engagement.   

We’ll also want to know why our target audiences are more engaged! This will drive more intentional follow-up and a deeper level of engagement with and understanding of prospects. And this will enable sales teams to deliver more precise value propositions that resonate more with prospects, help advance your relationship with them, and ultimately close more sales.

So, with a single habit change, create one new piece of customer-centered content each week, nine positive outcomes can be achieved including more sales.    

Change one small habit and you will change your business and your life. And good luck with the weight loss too!