Setting Goals for Business Success in 2019

I’m a big believer in the power of planning. It’s that time of year again when many of us look back at our progress over the past 12 months, reassess our path, and develop a plan for making the most of the year ahead.

An article in Inc. magazine by Aha! CEO Brian de Haaff talks about the use of planning to achieve success in business. Here’s what he says: “Successful people take a methodical approach to setting career goals. It starts with defining what ‘success’ means to them, then building a career roadmap to achieve that vision.”

It all starts with a plan that defines where you want to go. de Haaff suggests that you come up with a career sentence—the overarching vision for your professional life. “Your sentence could be specific, such as ‘Help build software that changes the way people interact with their doctors.’” Or it could be more wide-sweeping, like “Provide world-class customer service.” Once you’ve set your destination, you can focus on the goals that will get you there.

Here are de Haaff’s five steps to setting career goals:

1. Make it real. Making measurable career goals and setting success metrics will help ensure that your career roadmap is realistic. With those benchmarks in place, you can track your progress in a meaningful way.
 
2. Push yourself. Your career roadmap should be a challenge, not a cakewalk. If your goals don’t make you at least a little bit uncomfortable, then it’s time to set your sights higher. Push yourself in your overall vision and in the tasks that will carry you there.

3. Write it down. Research shows that people who write down their goals are significantly more likely to achieve them. One of the many benefits is that it forces you to think about what you want to achieve in a concrete way.  If you have a hard time finding the words to explain your goal in a sentence or two, you probably have not thought it through.

4. Share your plan. Another benefit of writing down your goals is that it makes it easier to share them. Once you’ve told your friends and colleagues about your goals, you will feel a sense of disappointment if you do not follow through. Accountability is a great motivator.

Credit: Getty Images

5. Visualize your success. A common practice of high achievers is visualizing success. Sports psychologists teach elite athletes to picture themselves connecting with the fastball, kicking the field goal, sinking the putt. You can do the same with your long-term career goals and the efforts that will get you there. Use positive visualization to motivate yourself to work harder.

Read the Inc. article by clicking the link below:
https://www.inc.com/brian-de-haaff/how-successful-people-set-career-goals.html

Take the first step in driving success in 2019 by creating your career sentence and then setting your goals. After that, it is all about commitment and follow-through.  Establishing a set schedule to monitor your progress, whether that’s daily, weekly or monthly, will help get you there.

If you’re looking for someone to share your goals with and hold you accountable, connect with me and I’ll do the same. bdegarmo@shamrockcompanies.net

Good luck!
Bob DeGarmo 

Website Lead Generation Tips You Need to Know

You wouldn’t meet with a prospective customer without being prepared to discuss the value you bring to the table; that would be an opportunity missed.

Similarly, you don’t want visitors to log on to your website without providing them with essential information and a means for continued dialogue. Website lead generation tools do just that: They engage the visitor and provide them with important information, while allowing you to gather valuable data about them, as you nurture the lead and prompt continued conversation surrounding your brand.  

According to Forrester Research, companies that nurture their leads see 50% more sales-ready leads than non-nurturers, and at 33% lower cost. So, it makes good business sense to prime your website for lead generation. Following are tips and tools to help you convert visitors:

1.  Use forms (more than one) – Make it easy for visitors to contact you using content forms that are brief and to-the-point (you can gather more details later).

Use multiple forms throughout your site based on page content and site placement; and follow up with A/B testing to see which form(s) are getting best results.

2.  Include basic CTAs throughout your site, including on the homepage – Consider your end goal and then work backwards with thoughtful calls to action: Offer a perceived “value” with each, such as a free demo, a whitepaper, a free trial, special promotion, etc. Next, route these recipients into specific nurturing funnels and conduct A/B testing and then modify, as needed.

Make your CTAs command attention by using “power words” such as: Get, Overcome, Boost, and Join.

3.  Offer live chat – Today, people are starting to expect this customer service benefit on websites that offer services/vendors. Be prepared to answer questions about products/services. And use the live chat as an opportunity to actively guide a visitor through your site to a specific end goal.

4.  Provide social proof – Prove that you can do what you say you can do by sharing videos of customer testimonials, social media reposts or online reviews. These social moments are great opportunities for making brand connections and allow you to further customer engagement on social media channels.

5.  Build trust by being authentic – Tell your story using photos—provide faces with names to help customers make connections; and speak to visitors, not at them using 1-to-1 videos. Provide evidence of your skills/quality/capacity by promoting awards, certifications, ratings, etc.

6.  Blog – Use your blog to generate website traffic and drive SEO (not necessarily to drive leads). Be useful in your posts and people will come back for more. A few tips:

•     Consider solutions-based posts
•     Develop groups of posts covering industry-relevant topic(s)
•     Incorporate keyword research into posts
•     Include videos and graphics to drive interest
•     Provide offers within the blog – free whitepaper, ebook, etc.
•     Add CTAs when relevant
•     Add links to specific pages in website – drive traffic back to site
•     Include social sharing links

As we prepare to revamp our Shamrock website, these are some of the guidelines we’ll be using to optimize our new site. Are there any that you’d add to the list? Share your feedback at emoriarty@shamrockcompanies.net.

Ellen Moriarty

Is Influencer Marketing Right For Your Brand?

In 2018, we’ve seen the continued rise of influencer marketing, with a nod toward more transparent partnerships between brands and their celebrities or ambassadors. And the latest data shows no signs of slowing, with more brands trusting influencers to help grow their audience and boost sales using social media channels—because it works:

• Marketers received $7.65 in earned media value for every $1 spent on influencer marketing – Influencer Marketing Hub
• Marketing induced consumer-to-consumer word-of-mouth generates twice the sales of paid advertising  – McKinsey
• Customers acquired via word-of-mouth have a 37% higher retention rate – McKinsey.
• 92% of consumers trust online word-of-mouth recommendations, while only 33% of them trust online banner ads – Nielsen

A recent MarketingProfs article about influencer marketing includes an insightful infographic (sourced by e-commerce platform X-Cart) that captures the power of Instagram (as the leading influencer platform) and explains how you can use influencer marketing to grow your brand reach:

Click here to view entire infographic

Do you plan to use influencer marketing in 2019? We’re interested in hearing for you.

Ellen Moriarty