One of my good friends asked me this the other day. What would you be doing if you weren’t working at a new business agency? What would your job be?

Firstly, I asked him why he was asking me a question which these days seems only to be reserved for footballers. Was he implying that I had one skill and lucky to have made it in new business? I don’t know, as he just laughed and told me to answer the question.

I really struggled for an answer.  I thought about it for probably too long and he told me to forget it. But I haven’t been able to since then.

I studied accountancy at university, but didn’t fancy that route. I really like mathematics but chose the wrong area to go into – my fault entirely. But maybe I could have been the next Carol Vorderman or Marcus du Suatoy if I had chosen Maths as a subject.

What else do I like? Music.  I played in Glasgow’s only funk band for 10 years and has reasonable success.  Perhaps that should have been my route but I moved to London to work in new business so perhaps it wasn’t.

Anyway, after a few more drinks with my friend that evening, I stumbled across the answer – a football commentator. I love sport. I love football.  I even sometime do commentary when watching (please don’t ask why).  I’ve always been erudite and pleasant. Some may say the Glaswegian accent isn’t so, but I disagree.  So there you have it. The next Jonathan Pearson. Or John Motson. I’ve already got the sheepskin coat.

1. Buying/Selling something is about the future, but most people exist in the present.  Most people, when you speak to them, spend most of their time dealing with and thinking about the stuff they’ve got going on just now and in the near future – 1 month, 3 months…whereas the problems solved, advantages gained and money made from B2B products and services tends to be felt further off in the future – and often needs some planning to implement.  Sometimes it helps to bear this in mind when speaking to potential buyers – it helps to get them to think about the long term impact of doing something/not doing something now.
2. Imagination –buying is an exercise in imagining.  Some people imagine with facts and figures, some with pictures, some in other ways – a person buying something imagines what the experience of it will be like for them.   If you are buying your wife a piece of jewellery you imagine how pleased she will be.  If you’re buying pair of jeans you might imagine how you’ll look in them, or how fashionable they make you look.  It’s the same with selling a B2B product or service – the buyer imagines how their marketing campaign will sell more product, or they imagine how their life will be much easier with a more efficient solution.  If you can paint a clear and compelling picture, you will help your buyer imagine well and if it’s a good picture they’ll buy…
3. Human interaction – one of our clients’ proposition is based on the premise that human brains are wired to engage with stories, that because we as a species have passed on knowledge using stories as a medium for generation after generation, we are pre-disposed to respond to information presented in the form of stories than dryer methods of communication.  This reminds me of a trick my uncle used to do when I was a kid – he could memorise a deck of playing cards – usually took him about 45 minutes to an hour but to me it was amazing. Years later, he told me how he did it – he basically invented a story with each of the cards as a character.  This applies in sales too – telling to stories of your case studies has a much higher impact than the dry facts and the human side of the story – what it meant for the client, what they experience was, the challenge, how it was heroically overcome – this stuff is what brings a story to life.

Consider these three statements:

• I’d like to go and see people who need a digital agency.
• I’d like to go and see people who are right for us so that when they need a digital agency they call us.
• I’d like to go and see people who have a problem and convince them that we can help them solve it (they may not be aware of the problem).

Which one applies to you?  All of them – or perhaps none.

We’ve worked with lots and lots of clients over the years (all at Icebreaker) but 4 or 5 clients stand out as the guys/girls who would win everything – we’d send them to a meeting, and sooner or later they’d get business out of that client.  The rest – yes they win, but they’re not prolific in the way that just a handful of clients have been.

So what do these guys have that the rest don’t?

Well, there are a few things – and I could go on all day about this but we don’t have space, so here’s a few…

• First – they share a mindset.  That mindset is that all of the above are worth it.
• But it’s more than that – they create opportunities.  They also instinctively adapt their game plan to fit where the prospect is in the buying cycle.  When the prospect says ‘I’m not looking for somebody right now’, their heart doesn’t sink and their face say “oh you mean you don’t have any money, then why am I here?”, but instead spend time learning about the client’s challenges, targets problems, etc.  If a problem or challenge that can’t be solved comes to light then great – an opportunity create, one that wasn’t there when they walked in, and a good deal of rapport and trust built.
• You are not the only agency in the world!  Somebody told me last week that there are 17,000 agencies in the UK now!  17,000!  Imagine that?  If even 10% of them are actively doing outbound new business then it’s a very noisy room.  Telephone sales people cannot provide nicely wrapped briefs every week.  Sorry – but the world doesn’t work that way.    These guys know that they need to get out and see people,  they know that they need to make a big impact when they do.  Not going to see people who are not immediately looking is wasting 30-50% of your new business activity.
• Keeping in touch – In all likelihood there will be an opp within 12 months, even if it’s a pitch against an incumbent – but if you don’t keep in touch…”now who was that agency I met last year again?  Oh never mind, that guy who called 5 minutes ago…”.  The first meeting is where you make friends, but you’ve got to keep in touch if you want them to remember you.
• New business comes first.  Of course it’s inevitable you will one day have to move a meeting.  Do it regularly and you are throwing away the money and effort you are making.  Outbound new business is labour intensive with low conversion rates (80 calls/day leads to 2-3 ‘warms’ and maybe one meeting).  If you cancel then you’ll demotivate your salesperson and probably lose the opportunity.
• Accept some failures.  It’s a cost of doing new business – 30% % of meetings will lead nowhere.  If you don’t handle them correctly, 70% will!  It’s a fact.  This was the case during the .com boom, during the mid-90s, during the late 80s (although that’s second hand), it’s a fact today – for mobile agencies in a rapidly growing market, for digital agencies, for design agencies.

So – my observations.  You might disagree, maybe you agree, but that’s my thoughts…comments welcome as always!

This profession has taken me on many journeys – from Germany to the USA and Cheltenham to Dundee.  New business meetings occur everywhere, if you are looking for them.  If you aren’t doing any outbound new business then that is another matter that we need to discuss.

I love visiting new cities and finding out the nooks and crannies that business travel requires. Where are the toilets? What’s the best place to have lunch? Does it have free WiFi? When will I get an opportunity to recharge my phone (rotten phones; they always run out of battery when you’re out of the office and no plug sockets).

Then you have to think about your travel. What time does the train/plane leave? So what time to I need to get to the station/airport at?  Does that give me enough time for the meeting – and invariably to give yourself plenty of time the train/plane is booked so far away that you have hours to wait before you get anywhere near your method of transport.

However, that sounds negative and it’s not actually. Travelling allows you to see new places and faces.  To learn about a new city is always fascinating and to get your bearings and remember your way back can be very rewarding.

Meeting new people to discuss their challenges is also something I love – that’s the best part of it all.  If I were sitting in the office instead, would I be able to converse in the same way with this new person about something we feel so passionately about? I don’t think so.

Another funnier side to travelling this much is when you do it on a leisure basis. Going on holiday. Going away for a day trip with family.  The amount of times that I have been at an airport and switched into “work mode” – and found myself through security and heading to board the plane when my wife is still wondering where to check the luggage in.

Getting to see the world through work is a good thing for me. I enjoy the travelling and speaking to new people. I guess that must be why I got into working with a new business agency. The rewards can be so great in the end that you really feel that you have achieved something when sitting on the train back home, enjoying a glass of red wine – as I am doing now whilst writing this.

In an effort to keep you more updated with what is happening within our new business agency I thought I would let you all know that the London part of our operation has recently moved offices from Banner Street (near Old Street station) over to Saffron Hill which is just a stone’s throw from Farringdon station.

Here’s a map for you should you feel compelled to visit us!

We do love our new offices, but they are pretty sparsely decorated yet, so we will be making a big effort to make them nice over the coming weeks.

The team in the Edinburgh office are still all there and have no desire to move. The view from the office up there is quite dramatic. Walk for two minutes and it is possible to see the castle. It’s definitely worth a visit! Just remember, we are a new business agency and we want to talk to you…

This is something I think about a lot of the time – what is the value in an agency having a blog? Does anyone read it? Do you ever win any new business through it?

I personally think it does a lot:

• It gives you a voice
• It gives the agency a personality
• It can help position you in the marketplace
• It can educate staff and help with internal communications
• It provides a destination for your social media traffic
• It will show passion if you get passionate employees to write posts
• It’s great for SEO

So there you go, that’s just a short list of reasons as to why your agency should write a blog, and I bet you can think of more.  I would love to know if you disagree as well.

To answer my own questions above, I see only benefits of having an agency blog if you create great and compelling content.  Having that great content should answer the second question – people will read if it is interesting!  And thirdly, if people are reading it then the chances are you will get people approaching you about new business.

However, you have to remember that your blog is a part of your overall inbound marketing strategy (which encompasses social media) which I’ll go into more detail soon…