While the economy is problematic it is not ‘the’ problem. If you identify the economy as the problem you will never find the solution. The problem today is businesses have become unable to sell their products without the aid of incentives, easy credit and free money. For decades businesses and individuals became overly dependent upon artificial stimulus and quit training their people how to effectively sell their products and services. Selling skills and sales training lost out to advertising and gimmicks.

Sales is the name of the game again and must be relearned from the CEO to the sales teams. The company will be forced to break its reliance on incentives, gimmicks and government stimulus. Easy money, free credit, special terms and incentives are gone from the landscape requiring each of us to learn the most basic of abilities. Selling skills are the fundamental backbone to the solvency of every company. It is time companies quit blaming the economy and start training the company how to sell, promote, market and assist in revenue generation.

I was recently interview by The World News Journal for making a claim that I can make any company regardless of the market conditions profitable. This is not just meant to blow my own horn but to give people some hope, do the right things, focus on the things that count, and insist on market share and you will succeed regardless of the economy. A few examples; one our clients in Georgia up 150% over last year, another one in the Midwest up 28% in the first month and another one in the Rust Belt up 23% in just six weeks.

For any company it must start with the CEO and management deciding to gain market share, then push all initiatives at developing new skills and the insistence that all become unreasonablewith the execution of these new actions and ideas. The companies that are moving the needle have decided four basic things: (1) gain market share, (2) not use market conditions as an excuse to settle for other results, (3) to disagree with the actions and thinking of the majority of the market, (4) get help from outside to hold the company accountable for taking new actions.

The economy itself is not the problem because I can show you companies, individuals and entire industries failing long before the current economic contraction. The problem today is that those that make up the economy lack the skill set, determination, work ethic, creativity and willingness to do whatever it takes to resolve the problems of the market.

It is impossible to be in business for any length of time and not experience an economic contraction. Some will be long, some short, some very painful and some just a blip. The good news is twofold: (1) there are exact and precise actions that you can take to counter any contraction, and (2) contractions are excellent opportunities to gain market share. Remember the economy may be problematic, but it is not the problem. The solution today is to make sales training, sales skills, and selling the priority of every post in the company starting with the CEO.

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