Hello, this is Laura Lee Rose – author of TimePeace: Making peace with time – and I am a business and efficiency coach that specializes in time management, project management and work-life balance strategies. Steve Wynkoop and I talk a lot about designing and managing our professional careers on a weekly interview on SSWUG TV.
At the end of the day, I transform the way you run your business into a business you love to run.
Today’s comment came from a busy entrepreneur:
With a business that is not quite working, is it better to start new or to pivot?
If your business is not working well enough, should you change directions or start a new business? I have been reading up on pivoting your business in a new direction, but how is this different than just starting over? Is starting over with a new brand better? How do I figure out which option is better?
The phrase “working well enough” – is a very abstract and vague. I had a client that “felt” her business wasn’t growing “fast enough”. “Fast enough” and “working well enough” are not business owner terms.
When I asked her what her growth goals were, how many clients or products she needed to sell to accomplish her yearly income, or how many leads does she need to convert to sales to make those numbers – she admitted that she didn’t have those types of plans in place.
Know Your Numbers
My recommendation is to know your numbers:
- How much money/income do you want to make yearly?
- How much income do you want to make quarterly? ( A/4)
- How many products/services do you need to sell to make your quarterly numbers? (B/Price of products)
- What is your lead to sales ratio? (How many people do you need to talk to or network with to make one sale?)
- How many people do you need to network with to sell the right number of products to make your quarterly goals? (D*C)
Once you understand the numbers you need to accomplish your goals, you can start tracking your progress and make the necessarily adjustments.
Pivoting doesn’t have to be a big thing
After you understand your numbers and have a better idea of where you are falling short, you can pivot or change directions in only the areas that need tweaking. You may find that your lead to sales ratio is 25 to 1 (meaning that you need to network with 25 people to sale 1 product or service). To meet your goals, you need to sale 5 products/services a month. This means that you need to get in front of 100 people monthly. Some things you may consider doing are:
- You may decide to add monthly speaking engagements to your marketing strategy to increase the number of people you meet in a month
- You may decide to increase the price of your products and services to lower the number of monthly sales needed
- You may decide to improve your salesmanship to reduce your lead to sale ratio
Conclusion:
Without understanding where you want to be and where you are today, it’s going to be difficult to decide whether you need to start new, pivot or tweak. Knowing your numbers is the first step in deciding your next step.
For more information or help on this topic, please contact LauraRose@RoseCoaching.info
Or sign up for a complementary one-on-one coaching call, just use this link https://www.timetrade.com/book/WFSFQ