Ode To An Icon

A few months back we lost Zig Ziglar to pneumonia at the age of 86.  Born Hilary Hinton “Zig” Ziglar, he was the tenth of twelve children who started his professional career selling pots and pans.  He became one of the world’s most famous salesmen, a powerful motivational speaker, author of 25 books and an icon to many in the sales and business worlds.  He is known for his pithy but memorable words of wisdom aimed at achieving business and personal success.  We thought it would be fun to recount and remember some of our favorites here.

 

“If you can dream it, then you can achieve it. You will get all you want in life if you help enough other people get what they want.” – Zig Ziglar

“Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude.” – Zig Ziglar

“Money isn’t the most important thing in life, but it’s reasonably close to oxygen on the ‘gotta have it’ scale.” – Zig Ziglar

“People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing – that’s why we recommend it daily.” – Zig Ziglar

“Expect the best. Prepare for the worst. Capitalize on what comes.” – Zig Ziglar

“The most important persuasion tool you have in your entire arsenal is integrity.” – Zig Ziglar

“A goal properly set is halfway reached.” – Zig Ziglar

And finally, a personal favorite and fitting for a remembrance post –“Make today worth remembering.”

 

We’d love to hear your favorites.  Just might be the one that turns on that lightbulb for someone reading, as Zig did for so many along the way.  Thanks for your passion, Zig Ziglar.  May you rest in peace.

New Year’s Resolutions – Companies have them too!

What are your resolutions this year?

Exercise more, spend more time with the family, climb Mt. Everest?  Whatever those things are, we set out every January 1st vowing to accomplish them during the new year. Most of us set our goals by looking at where we are, what we would like to do differently or better, and make a commitment to change in the upcoming year.

Your company likely has set new goals for the upcoming year as well.  And, you most likely have new sales goals to go along with them.  So, not surprisingly, you can bet your clients have set new goals, too.

Do you know what they are?

Mnemonic – quick! What does it mean?

We all learned tons of them as kids: ROY G BIV– the colors of the rainbow; Every Good Boy Does Fine – the lines on the treble clef as you learn to read music; righty tighty, lefty loosy – how to turn a screw;  Thirty days hasSeptember – days in the months; and on and on.  A Mnemonic is a device, such as an image, rhyme, or figure of speech, used to assist learning or memory.

 So here’s a new one for you – enABLe.  How do you improve your sales?  You show how your solutions enABLe results for your clients.  Remember these three things when you pitch business….Prove how your solutions…

A – Align with your clients key goals

B – Make sense in terms of Business logic

L – Create Lasting benefits for their business

 

Banking’s On The Move…

Analysts predict worldwide smartphone shipments will reach 1.7 billion units by 2017, and this is bringing both opportunity and challenge to the banking industry.

According to a recent study released by the Federal Reserve System, 20 percent of financial institution customers currently use mobile banking and another 13 to 20 percent plan to use it by the end of 2012.   At the same time, decreased loyalty, adoption of new technologies, and changing expectations of how services are provided and consumed have resulted in a drop in customer profitability in the banking industry of 5 – 15 percent.

So how do you get their attention? 

Ready or Not, Here It Comes – BYOD: A Big Opportunity

Whether IT departments are ready or not, employees are ushering in the era of BYOD (Bring Your Own Device to Work) and its compatriot, BYO-App (Bring Your Own Application). Although 83 percent of businesses say they’ve entered the world of BYOD [Aberdeen Research, July 2012], it’s increasingly clear that most businesses don’t have a handle on how to manage or streamline BYOD—yet.

 The pluses — mobility helps drive innovation across a number of business processes and it enhances an employee’s ability to engage with customers and be more productive. BYOD also has the potential to reduce costs if employees are willing to pay for all, or a portion, of the cost to use a device of their choosing rather than be issued a “free” device they’d rather not use or that they don’t use as their primary device.

The minuses — the proliferation of mobile devices, platforms, operating systems and applications has overwhelmed IT departments. From encryption and antivirus protection to re-compiling mobile apps to sync with company-specific APIs and various legacy infrastructures, IT departments are being asked to do a lot more than they were when they were issuing and supporting company-owned BlackBerries.

The opportunity — for IT professionals and enterprises to keep up with BYOD, they need tools; tools that help companies manage costs, applications, interoperability and security relating to mobility. That need has spawned new lines of business: mobile device management [MDM] and mobile application management [MAM]. Forrester predicted in August 2011 that the “mobile management services market” would reach $6.6 billion by 2015.