Success is all about finding your strengths (what you’re better at than almost anyone else) and figuring out how to leverage those strengths to reach your goals.  Once you know what you’re good at, what you really enjoy doing and how to translate that into something that others will pay for, then it becomes a matter of refining your model and adding in more traits.

I was reflecting on what makes people successful recently and decided to ask my clients that are in my Peer Group Advisory boards to find out what has led them to the success they’re having to this point.  I was expecting that we would end up with 2 or 3 key points, but surprising (to me at least) everyone had a different key that really reflected on their particular strengths.  They were all great points and things that almost anyone could use to be more successful, but it makes sense that you have to figure out what’s going to work for you.

We ended up with 10 different success traits – would any of these be your first choice?

Planning and Goal Setting (in writing)

One of the things that I work with clients on, and most of them have a hard time doing it themselves, is the importance of developing plans and goals for the short and long term (personal and professional) and getting those down in writing.

A lot of people have goals (kinda sorta…), just not written down.  My experience is that the act of writing the goal down does a couple of things for you:  1.  It forces you to clearly articulate what you actually want to accomplish and the implications of choosing those goals and 2. It generates an element of accountability and progress – are you achieving what you want to achieve, and if not, why not?

To increase the effectiveness of this trait, share your goals with others – like maybe a Peer Group advisory board. 

Do you write down your short and long term goals?

Treat your customers right

If you really want to stand out, be remembered (for the right reasons) and generate lots of positive word of mouth and referrals, then customer service, really interacting with your customers and leaving them with a positive experience is a must have.  This is more than delivering a quality service, this is using personal touch to really make a difference for your clients.

When was the last time that you went out of your way to follow-up with a customer and go beyond the basics and interact with them?

Being Responsive

When we initially talked about this one as a group, my first thought was ‘of course you need to be responsive, that’s expected’.  The reality is that very few people are actually as responsive as they should be – and some industries are worse than others.  Think about the terrible reputation that most home services have – “I called 3 plumbers and none of them even called me back!”

In some industries, being responsive and professional is almost all you need to do to really stand out and be different.

Do you return all calls and emails within 24 to 48 hours after you receive them?

Exceeding Expectations – doing your best

This isn’t about sandbagging in order to under promise and over deliver, this is about going above and beyond reasonable expectations and delivering an outcome that you’re proud of.  The idea that you deliver to your clients the same way you would with family and friends.

When you look at your work, are you consistently delivering your best outcomes?

Improvisation – creating new possibilities

This was probably the most interesting response and might not be  a success factor in all businesses.  Life and business are complicated and often the tried and true answer isn’t really what’s needed to truly solve a problem.  The ability to think on your feet, develop a new idea while you’re in front of people, on the fly can be a great way to stand out from the competition.

The opposite approach is to stay locked into the way things have always been done.  Even if you continue to refine and improve an idea that works, there will come a time when you have to shake things up and do something different.  Your ability to improvise a new approach will eventually determine how successful you can be.

Do you routinely take the time to think about how you could do something differently in your business?

Focus – Getting things done

A lot of business owners tend to develop a fire fighting mentality, dealing with emergencies, urgent calls and emails, what ever happens to be ‘on fire’ at the time.  If you can develop the discipline and mind set to focus on the really important things in your business and get them done, then you will outperform almost everyone else.

Do you know the really important things that drive the results in your business and do you have the focus to get those things done?

Genuine face to face interaction

Whether it’s  a skill or a personal trait, the ability to relate well to people can be invaluable.  People like to do business with someone that they Know, Like and Trust and often the best way to generate that kind of relationship is through face to face encounters and letting people know that you genuinely care about them and what they’re doing.

As your business grows, are you actively keeping the personal touch with your employees and customers?

Driven, Tenacious, Committed approach

Life often gets in the way, but anyone that’s reached a high level of success will tell you that it took an element of determination to push through the learning curve and the difficult times and really make things happen.  Some people are naturally gifted and may have an easier road, but I will guarantee there will come a time in your business (at a minimum the first year or two) when you will need to bear down and just keep going.  No matter how difficult it gets, keep moving forward.

Do you always put in the amount of effort you really need to reach your dream results?

Listen

Before Customer Service, before improvisation, there’s the little used skill of listening.  Often what someone wants is not what they’ll tell you the first time through – only through active and focused listening (and questions) can you understand what their real drivers are.  Listening to find the real problem, not just a symptom of the situation will enable you to deliver the solutions that your clients really need.

How often do you challenge your clients on what their real problem is (as opposed to what they told you wanted)?

Connecting and Building Relationships

Customer service, listening and being genuine in your interactions are some of the keys to success when it comes to Connecting with people and building relationships.  Additionally you need to have a focus on what you can do to help other people – whether they are prospects are just good connections for you to know.  Your influence and ability to help people and get things done is driven by the quantity and the quality of your connections.

How many new relationships have you built in the last 6 months?  How many have you worked on?

That’s a lot, what should you focus on?

There are a lot of ways to be more effective and more successful.  Everything listed here are great examples of ways to succeed…but you can’t do everything (at least not all at once) so the best thing to do today is figure out what your natural strengths are, and pick out one or two traits like the ones above to work on and improve.

So what’s driven your success so far and what are you going to focus on next to get to the next level?  Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Shawn Kinkade   Kansas City Business CoachSimilar Posts:

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I had the chance to go to 5 Guys Burgers and Fries over the long weekend (the closest one for me is over in Olathe on 119th and Blackbob.

If you haven’t been to 5 Guys, it’s a burger franchise originally started in Washington D.C. about 20 years ago and it’s growing really fast.  They do one thing really well – and that’s more than enough reason to make a 25 minute trip to pick up a really good burger! 

Although they’re fast food, you will wait a while to get your food – generally there are some lines and more importantly, they don’t start cooking your burger until you order it, so it comes out fresh and custom made with your fixins.

As I was waiting for my burger this weekend, I thought about what really made this an excellent operation – and how that could apply to any business.

Focus on your Strengths

Something that every business would benefit from is the idea of finding that one thing you do really well (better than almost anyone) and just focusing on that.

5 Guys does burgers and fries.  You can get variations on that basic idea (cheese, bacon, a whole bunch of toppings) but the centerpiece is the burger – and they do a great job with that burger!

What does your business do better than almost anyone else?  Is that your primary (almost single) focus?  If not, why not?

Keep it simple

This kind of goes along with focusing on your strength, but consider the menu at 5 Guys:

That’s it – they almost have to stretch to get a full menu out of that.  The toppings are free, the refills are free and everything is very straightforward.  The potatoes are from Idaho, they only use peanut oil and they don’t have any freezers in the stores (only coolers).  This keeps it easy for the employees, easy for the customers and keeps things moving.

Could you simplify your products?  How about your pricing?  Do all of your employees really understand everything your business does?  If not, maybe you should simplify.

Invest in the Product

If you’re not familiar with 5 Guys, that may be due to the fact that they don’t advertise – instead they spend their marketing budget on secret shoppers that instantly reward employees with cash bonuses when they see things being done the right way. 

The philosophy is that the best thing they can do is to continue making the product and service the best that it can be and word of mouth will take care of the rest.  Judging by the lines I’ve seen when I’ve been in there, it seems to be working.

You probably have a good product, but wouldn’t you love to have a great product that speaks for itself?  That people lined up to by and more importantly, told all their friends to check out as well?

Make the customer happy

There are several signs prominently displayed where you pick up your drinks that talk about their customer philosophy – the employees are there to serve the customers, without the customers there wouldn’t be a business.  It sounds simple (and it is) but shouldn’t all of your employees embrace that kind of attitude?

How good is it?

If you’ve ever been out west to a Fatburger or an In and Out Burger – 5 Guys is every bit as good as those legendary places.  In Kansas City you can get a great burger at Chef Burger or Blanc Burgers and Bottles (love the inside out burger) – however that’s a different experience, almost a gourmet burger experience. 

5 Guys has nothing gourmet about it, it’s just extremely high quality product, simply served that happens to be really good.  If you get a chance, go and check one out.

And let me know if you learn anything that might help out your business – I’d love to hear your thoughts (share them in the comments below).

Shawn Kinkade  Kansas City Business Coach

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There are a lot of people actively using Social Media, but there are still many, many, many more that aren’t and they don’t really understand the whole thing. 

The biggest issue that I hear over and over again?

“Who has the time for all of this stuff?” – generally followed closely by the observation that they are currently getting swamped by email, phone calls and all sorts of other time killers.

There are two issues at work here – the first one is that a lot of people need a better handle on time management (check out 3 ways to create more time).  The second issue is that people really don’t see the benefit to Social Media – by many it’s still viewed as the province of kids and online marketers (not necessarily exclusive groups…) 

Making time?

The last thing you want to do is add a bunch of new tasks on your list, the question is how much time will Social Media marketing actually take?

The good news is that it’s pretty variable – a heavy Social Media user might spend 8 to 10 hours a week but I would suggest that you could get a lot of benefits from Social Media with as little as 30 minutes to an hour a week.  An example of productive use of time at the low end would be to monitor your LinkedIn account for 15 to 20 minutes twice a week (answer a couple of questions, catch up on what your contacts are doing and respond to them and find or interact with a couple of groups).  Additionally you could spend 5 minutes a day on Twitter (use Tweetdeck or another app like it to make it easier) and listen to people you find interesting or influential.  (Look me up at AspireShawn – not because I’m interesting or influential, but it does give you a starting point).

If you want to spend more time, you can and certainly the initial setup and learning curve will take a bit longer, but I know you can do a lot in that amount of time because that’s been my approach for a long time (a bit more active now).

Is there value?

If you don’t have an online business, can you actually benefit from using Social Media?

I think that’s a resounding YES!  LinkedIn is a fantastic tool, especially for professionals, but it can benefit almost anyone these days, especially now that there are more than 40 Million users. 

Even if you don’t actively use LinkedIn as a way to promote yourself as an expert – just staying in front of and top of mind of key contacts is hugely beneficial.  There are also lots of other ways to benefit from LinkedIn – researching prospects, understanding relationships and enhancing your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) just to name a few.

On the Twitter front – maybe you can take some inspiration from the local businesses that are using Twitter out there.  It can be a great way to offer up time sensitive discounts, offers or just a way to generate activity when business is slow.

Twitter is also a good way to connect with people – retweet things that others are saying that you agree with or find useful, ask questions and get feedback from the world.  Drive traffic to your website or blog – just from activity.

To me it seems pretty clear that the return on your time investment can be very high – you have to have an idea of what you want to achieve and you need to have a website or blog to drive people to to get bigger benefits, but overall it’s worth the time.

What do you think?   Have you found Social Media to be a waste of time or a worthwhile investment?  Share your thoughts in the comments below….

Shawn Kinkade  Kansas City Business Coach

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I’m a big fan of games…and who doesn’t enjoy Zombies?  Well Popcap Games has combined the two into their latest time sink in a game called Plants Vs. Zombies, an addictive, very funny and challenging game – “Get Ready to soil your Plants”!

What can Plants and Zombies teach you about running a better business?  Read on to find out (and get a quick review of the game…).

Of course this is a business blog – but it’s amazing the lessons you can pick up from games – a couple of weeks ago I looked at what the game of Craps could teach you and if you’ve been a long time reader you might also remember What Team Fortress 2 can teach you about business or what you might get out of a friendly Poker game of liar’s dice.  Today however is all about Plants Vs. Zombies from Popcap Games.

What is Plants Vs. Zombies?

First a quick overview on what Plants Vs. Zombies is all about – as generally happens, the world is being overrun with Zombies and you are locked inside your suburban home trying to keep them out.  Luckily for you, you have access to a bunch of unusual plants that you can use for home defense.

As an example – you can plan pea shooters that will shoot peas (of course) and do decent damage to the zombies as they shuffle towards your house.  You can also find more creative ways to take out the zombies – I’m partial to using the Cherry Bombs to blow up several zombies at once.

All in all, there are 26 different kinds of zombies and there are 4 dozen plants and mushrooms (mushrooms only work at night) available – but you can only use a handful of them on any given mission.

That’s where the challenge comes in – you are limited to start any given mission by the tools you select ahead of time, and then you are further constrained by a couple of different variables.  There’s only so much physical space in your yard, and each plant generally costs a certain amount of sunlight (kind of like money that you collect as you go).  So your defense strategy has to balance generating enough income to build out yard against spending the right amount to protect your house.

Here’s what a full build out looks like:

More than likely the zombies are going to win this round – the goal is to keep them from getting to your house (on the far left) and there are a lot of holes in the yard for the zombies to exploit.

What can learn about your business from P v Z?

There are lots of potential lessons, but here are the first few that come to mind:

1.  Make sure you pick the right allies up front!

Your chances of success are determined right up front by figuring out who you’re going into battle with.  You need plants (or people) on your side that can help you generate resources and others that can go after targets – most importantly, you need a strong mix that’s balanced if you want to succeed.

2.  Cover all of your bases.

It only takes 1 zombie getting through 1 lane to eat out your brains.  You might be doing really well in several critical areas, but if you don’t have everything covered, you are going to lose the game.  Translating that to business, if you’re really good at operations and the financials, but not so good at Sales and Marketing, you’re not going to be in business very long.  Likewise if you’re great at Sales and Marketing, but your delivery isn’t very good, you’re not going to last long.  You’ve got to do everything well to win in the long run.

3.  Prepare yourself – the zombies come in waves!

There will be times when you are severely tested – zombies will be coming from every corner all at the same time, but if you took the time to prepare yourself up front and you built a strategy to handle the rush, you will probably be fine.  You’ll need to do some clean-up and replace some plants, but all in all you will move on.

In your business, you need to be looking ahead at what’s coming at you, not just fighting the current battles.  The minute you stop looking ahead is when you are likely to get overwhelmed.

So how’s the game?

I haven’t finished it yet (it’s actually pretty long) but it’s a very creative and funny challenge.  The zombies are hilarious and there are lots of ways to set up creative defenses.  On top of that, there are lots of additional mini-games that are all great for just a quick 15 minute break.

If you’re looking for an inexpensive challenge that will make you laugh, then definitely check out Plants vs. Zombies!  You can get it for only $9.99 if you buy it from Steam (online game distribution company).

What games do you play?  What games do you play at work?  I’d love to hear your thoughts on games that inspire you – share them in the comments below!

Shawn Kinkade  Kansas City Business CoachSimilar Posts:

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I’ve been really busy the last few months (which is a great problem to have these days), but it’s been challenging to keep up with all of the great stuff that’s out on the internet.

I pick up a lot of ideas for articles and blog posts from Social Media (LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.) when I get the time to surf a bit – or if I’m doing research.  I also have a lot of blogs set up on various RSS readers, on my Yahoo home page, my Google home page and even some just tucked into odd corners.

I also follow blogs from a variety of local folks that I see around Kansas City that I think are very good – here’s a few – Sarah at Dog Eared Pages of course.  Although I haven’t met him personally, I like Sam Meers at Smoke and Meers and a couple that  new to blogging,  Tara Renze at Prospects to Partners and Jason Terry (of the upcoming Blue Gurus) are going to be good reading.

On a national level, there are just a few blogs that I value enough that I sign up for their email feed – several of them because they have good content, but more importantly because I just enjoy reading them.  These are the kinds of emails that you look forward to reading – a treat to look forward to.

Here are 4 of them that add a real splash of color to my inbox!

Naomi On IttyBiz

In the professional world, sometimes it’s easy to forget that the world is a colorful place and that not only is it okay to be  yourself, but sometimes being  yourself can make all the difference – of course it helps if you are genuinely funny, demonstrate that you care about the people you are writing to, give valuable advice and ideas and…have a mouth like a truck driver.

Here’s a recent post from Naomi on How to Become Rich and Famous on the Internet that will give you a pretty good idea of her style and substance.  She makes great points, but she’s also consistently very funny!

The Wealthy Freelancer

I haven’t been following this blog quite as long as the others, but I have found myself reading, saving and occasionally forwarding several of his posts (which is fairly rare for me).  There’s a lot of great information here for any business owner (not just freelancers) and he has a good voice / writing style.

This post on using an effective pick-up line is very good.  I love the simplicity and the practicality of the approach, well worth the time.

Jonathan Fields – Awake at the Wheel

I’ve never met Jonathan, but he has a fascinating story behind how he got to where he is today – the typical former power lawyer in New York that burns out, starts a Yoga clinic, figures out how to make it insanely popular, sells it for a lot of money and becomes an author and respected thought leader / blogger all in a few years.  It happens all the time…!   

Seriously – I would challenge you to read his blog for a couple of weeks and not be totally impressed by how much he’s just himself.  He’s a huge success story and he’s more concerned with family, friends and posting interesting and insight articles.

This is an older post from last year on Slogan Train Wrecks – very funny, insightful and overall a good read.  Jonathan has a lot of variety in his posts (which is hard to do) and he shares my joy of finding the right image to lead with.  Check him out.

Brian Clark and the rest of Copyblogger

There may very well be better blogs out there than Copyblogger – but if so, I don’t think I’ve found them yet.  Copyblogger started with Brian Clark recognizing a need to instruct all of the would be bloggers on how to bring copywriting skills to their blog.   Of course he writes about much more than copywriting, but most of the topics tie into that theme in some way.

Brian also has other Copyblogger writers – and all of them are excellent (I especially like a lot of the stuff that Sonia Simone at Remarkable Communications writes).

Here’s a post that I think will give you an idea of what you’ll find at Copyblogger – Ernest Hemingway’s top 5 tips for writing well – maybe it’s because I’m not a writer, but I find almost every post I read on this site (and there are a lot of posts) to be really helpful, extremely thoughtful and generally very entertaining – it’s the best of the web as far as I’m concerned.

What are your favorite blogs?  The best of the best?  Share your ideas here – I’d love to hear them and add some more color to my inbox!

Shawn Kinkade  Kansas City Business CoachSimilar Posts:

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