Seeds

Seeds are extremely important to farmers and to you and me. Without seeds you and I wouldn’t be able to survive, we wouldn’t have any food to eat and would quickly perish.

So now that we have established that seeds are important in our lives you may be asking what “Seeds” have to do with building your business? Actually a lot more than you think.

In our prior post we asked what your customers and prospects remember about you. Now we are going to discuss why they think the way they do and what you can do about it.

When a farmer sows seeds or if you are a gardener and you sow seeds you expect a certain type of plant to grow. If you plant tomatoes you expect to get tomatoes. If you plant corn you expect corn. For some reason, people don’t think this principle applies to their business.

There is a Proverb that says you will reap what you sow. No matter what we do, we will reap what we have sown. Think about people you know that always have some drama going on around them or they are always arguing and fighting with people. Still others have good things going on in their lives and people are drawn to them.

Outside of their personalities, what is the difference in the lives of these people?

The person with the drama generally causes more drama and therefore draws the drama to themselves.

The other person that has good things going on around them generally causes good things to happen and therefore draws the good things to them.

What is another way of putting this? Sowing and Reaping. You will always reap what you sow. Now back to your business.

When you are out and about, calling on customers, meeting with employees, speaking with your vendors, etc. What “seeds” are you planting? If you are genuinely interested in others and their lives, your interest in them will naturally come across. On the other hand if you are generally not interested in others, their lives, their hopes, etc., this also will naturally come across.

People pick up on these messages, these “seeds” so to speak and they tend to never forget them. If you want to grow your business and be successful, you need to be aware of the seeds you are sowing. Now that you understand that you are planting seeds, how can you make this work for you?

Always put the needs of others first and be sincere about it. If you can show your customers and prospects how much you care about them, about their needs, their pain, etc., you will automatically set yourself apart from the competition. Let me give you a real life example of how important this is.

Several years back we were working with a company that distributed items from computers to construction products. Their customers were having a hard time with the larger vendors because the vendors would only give them quotes on the items they sold.

If a company had a list of 200 – 300 items they needed, the vendors would only quote what was easy for them. I explained to the business owners this was a huge opportunity for them. If we offered to ALWAYS quote EVERY item the customer needed we could set ourselves apart and beat the bigger companies.

My idea was met with a large amount of skepticism but we moved forward anyway. Once we got the word out that we were quoting everything, business exploded. Why? Because the customers were tired of having to track down all of the vendors they needed and then manage them all. They could come to us and get everything they needed from one company.

Think how freeing this was for the customer. No more tracking down all of the parts they needed. No more having to manage all of these orders from so many different vendors. Think of all of the time they could save, all of the money, the list of benefits goes on and on.

The seeds we were sowing were that we cared about their needs. They understood that we were trying to help them and that our caring was in fact genuine. If we were indifferent to their needs we would have sowed seeds that showed we really didn’t care and that we were only out for ourselves.

If you want to knock your competition out of the running and make sure that you reap a harvest of success, sow seeds of success. You are the farmer, you are the gardener, and the “Seeds” of your future are in your hands.

Important:

If you know one person that would really benefit and could change their circumstances with this information; be their hero and share this post with them right now!

If you would like help with this or any other business, sales, marketing, social media issues and more, contact us at:

Until our next post – we wish you all success!

Dean Marchese