Ep. 01 - Top 6 Trends for Business Success in 2022

Markets are continuously changing!  Here's What’s HOT & what’s NOT in trends for 2022!

REFERENCES MENTIONED

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Transcript

Carl Richards: Welcome to the Grow Equation Podcast, a training podcast for service-based business owners who want to hashtag work less, earn more. Your host, Diana Lidstone has been working with businesses for more than three decades to help them get known as the undeniable authority in their industry, ramp up their profits and optimize their resources with the end goal that they work less and earn more. So if you're ready to implement simple steps to banish the hustle and to do business differently, then stop!  Stop folding laundry or running on your treadmill. Grab a pen and paper, and let's dive into today's episode. 

Diana Lidstone: Hello, welcome to the very first episode of the Grow Equation Business podcast. Hello, I'm Diana Lidstone, and I have been a business owner for more than 35 years. And what I wanna share with you during this podcast series, as we go forward are step by step strategies that you can actually implement now, today's podcast is all about the trends that I am seeing in business. The top six trends that you might wanna keep top of mind, as you're thinking and creating your annual grow plan you see, as we head into the new year, it is quite clear. I think to everyone that the pandemic has certainly changed the business landscape forever. Early, when the pandemic hit, I was calling this the new economy little did I know we were going to be in, here we are year three and we've seen such dramatic changes.

It continues to impact everything in our lives and in our business. I mean, it's a common joke here in Canada, and we all get a chuckled to think that we're now wearing masks even to the bank. And we all know how to use zoom, whether it's for business, whether it's for family gatherings, funerals and weddings. I was part of a vision board party with a bunch of young women, not too long ago. And probably for the first time, we all know this term supply chain problems or supply chain shortages, for most of us we'd never heard that terminology before. We all probably know someone or a business owner who is experienced dramatic challenges. And maybe even the benefits of working from home businesses that have survived and grown in the last few years and businesses that have had to shift to this online presence, but what will we see going forward?

What does that truly mean for those of us who are service-based business owners? How will the changes in consumer behavior impact our businesses? The question is how can you take advantages of these changes and how can you make some adjustments in your annual grow plan to take advantage of these trends? So let's dive into these six trends and I'm sure it's no surprise. The first big trend is what I call connection; so many people are feeling isolation that they are craving some kind of connection. Now, while they are craving personal connection that we may not be able to give them what can we give them so that they feel closer to us? And I think that's why we're going to see video increase in strength and increase in us being able to connect with our clients. Because video just like I'm doing here today is another way that our prospects, our employees and our clients can connect with us by seeing our faces.

So how can you include more video? Will it be that you will do video trainings for your employees? Will you do more videos on Facebook live? What is it that you can do to increase the number and the effectiveness and this dramatic crave for connection? Now, another way that I've been hearing, improving this feeling of connection is to offer more personalized touches, like sending handwritten cards, like sending a book, like sending your employees or your clients, something physical and that's another great way of increasing that connection. I come from a background in retail and there was nothing like that feeling that somebody got, they showed interest in a product. Let's say it's a candle, I had candles in my store. And if I took the candle off the shelf and put it in their hand and they took that candle, that actual touching of it, that made the connection with that product.

So sending your clients, sending your employees something where they can actually touch it, a third way of increasing connection is by creating an amazing experience. Now, while certainly here in Canada, live stages are not what are happening, but you can do a live training. You can do a challenge, you can do something that will build connection with those people. I do live trainings and it could be just on Facebook, it could be in your Facebook group. What could you give them? And especially if it's in video format, especially if you are interacting with them that will strengthen their connection to you. And another one of the things that I'll be doing this year is hosting what I'm calling client appreciation events once a quarter. So this is where I've invited some other, maybe coaches or consultants to teach to my followers.

Typically someone who would teach something that I don't teach, but is definitely impactful for your business. And in fact, I have one coming up in February. So if you're on my email list, just keep checking in that events box down at the bottom. So the first trend was connection and that was a trend we saw last year. And I think it's just going to keep moving along in the new year, the second trend is differentiation. Now what do I mean by differentiation? Well, we all know that more and more businesses have gone online and so there's more competition online. There’s no room in your prospect's head, mind, eyes, whatever for boring messaging. Or as some coach, I heard said they are all messaging; there's no room for vanilla messaging because there is noise out there in the marketplace. Your clients, your prospects won't hear you unless you stand out unless you differentiate yourself and interrupt that noise.

So here's a couple of ways that you can take to stand out, to differentiate your business. The first is what I call using different language. When we explain what it is we do, you have all been to networking events or standing in the grocery store, or maybe at a cocktail party. And somebody says, so what do you do? And how many times have you been tempted to say, or maybe you have said oh, I'm a real estate agent, I’m a financial advisor, I'm a business coach because your prospect subconsciously in their head is going, oh God, you know another one of those, how can you change the way they are hearing you? So for instance, instead of me saying, I'm a marketing strategist or a business coach, I have rebranded myself under the bis grow master, I've taken the word grow I'm a business grow master.

I am a master at helping people's grow their business. So it makes people kind of stop and think for a moment, I have a client who's a financial advisor and he has rebranded himself in a different way using different language. And he says, he's a legacy builder. So what language could you use that would make your prospects go, that’s different or I never thought of it like that before, using different language is one way of helping you stand out in the marketplace. Another way to differentiate yourself is to have a strong point of view. yes, having a strong point of view can be very polarizing, you're going to push some people away and other people are gonna say, hell yeah, I wanna get to know her better. That's exactly what you want, you need to embrace your strengths and be a better you the best version of you.

So what is your point of view? My point of view, my soapbox that I stand on is that even though I grew up in a culture, I grew up in a time and a work ethic where success meant we had to work hard. I don't believe today that in order to earn good money, you have to hustle. So hustle is passe, and that's why I have the hashtag work less, earn more. So decide on your point of view and share more of that. That is what is going to differentiate you. The third way of differentiating yourself would be to develop assets such as and you're gonna hear lots of this on this podcast about intellectual property. And in fact, in a couple of episodes, you're going to hear my interview with podcaster, Carl Richards and we'll discuss how his intellectual property, the global authority builder helped him stand out and make more money.

I have my grow meter and my grow equation nobody else has these. These are mine and it's what makes me different, it makes me appear to be different in the minds of my prospects. Anyway, if you would like some help developing your own intellectual property or IP, that's exactly what I help my private clients do. And it helps them attract high-paying clients so differentiation was number two trend. The third trend that I see it's nothing really new, but I'm seeing more and more of it and I really didn't know how to classify it. So I'm calling it new opportunities, building a sustainably successful business. We all know it takes time, it takes work, it takes commitment and that's exactly why so many businesses fail. Why? Because there are big opportunities out there for the entrepreneurs who are willing to do what others aren't willing to do.

Most people just take the easy road, they won't put in the hard work and they won't invest the time so let's go back to differentiation where I talked about creating your own intellectual property. It's not easy to do, It takes time, It takes energy, takes hiring somebody else to help you do it, It takes testing and then tweaking and then testing again. And truthfully most people won't put in the time, but if you're willing to do what others won't do, there are things that will give you the competitive advantage, new opportunities. I've seen it in my own programs, teaching intellectual property after an initial course, a couple of people said, this didn't really work because they didn't work it, but those who did work it, those who put in time, they tweaked it, they just kept at it they had this drive.

They were the ones that saw tremendous improvements to their businesses so that's number three, three trends so far: connection, differentiation and opportunities. Let's look at trend number four, and I'm calling this value. Value is different than cost, it's different than price, today customers are seeking value so how can you maximize the value that you're giving your customers? And here is where we see sort of connection and differentiation come together. Give your clients, give your employees that connection, get known by being different. And I know then that you'll have customers for life. As we look forward to the new year, how can you give more value to your clients and your team and value doesn't necessarily mean more time. I recently attended a conference of Canadian association of professional speakers and my Caps friends there were seeing something that was probably shocking to them. Companies were actually requesting shorter timeframes for the delivery of keynotes, for the delivery of training they wanted that same value, not in an hour or 90 minutes, but in 20 or 30 minutes.

They want the value. So it's time to eliminate the fluff and what is an essential and focus on those core things that are going to give your clients value and give them results. Trend number five is what I call simplify. Now it's true the online world has become more and more crowded our customers, our prospects have become less and less tolerable for fluff. I call it but waste for anything that's superfluous they have no time for fluff, they just want the bare bones, they wanna get at her as they say. Now while our prospects are less tolerable, what does this mean for your business? What does this mean for your offerings? What does this mean for your trainings? It means that you have to trim things down to just the bare bones about value, stop thinking about your business offerings as well if it doesn't work I'll just create another. No, look at your offerings and say okay, which were my most profitable.

Let's eliminate the others. Let's get down and let's simplify our business. That's at the fun end. At the back end what else needs to be simplified? It's really essential today for business owners to really double down on what's working. Well, I call that replicating and eliminate complexity or anything that isn't working well so release it. I'm gonna do a whole series on simplifying your business. And I have five areas where that you can simplify. So keep listing, maybe you actually wanna subscribe. So you known when these are coming out, in order to simplify, doesn't matter what it is. You need data; you need to be measuring not only key performance indicators, but what drives those key performance indicators. You need to have good reporting, the right statics, you need to be monitoring and questioning those stats where they are, where they're going and what they mean.

You gotta learn to love your numbers. And I know that's really hard for some people, but that's okay. So we're onto number six, number six was kind of surprise for me, but not really, here it is Selling has become different. And I want to give kudos to my fellow Caps friend, Colleen Francis, who's the sales expert. You can find her on LinkedIn and she wrote an article about how selling has changed and it really made me think that this was a trend worth including here. So in the B to B space, especially think about this there really isn't a need any longer for a salesperson mic drop. With the recent shift to digital and online, your customers are now more than ever comfortable purchasing online, they research everything online. And in fact, there's kind of a trend called the Amazon [inaudible17:25] Amazon [inaudible17:28] in other words, they research online.

They compare online, they purchase online and they get it delivered directly to their home, Amazon and in the B to B space, our customers that's exactly what they do. So what does this mean for your business? How does this impact your business? If they're researching you online, social media, what about your website? Is your website giving them what they need to gather the information? Okay selling, selling is different because your prospect doesn't need you to gather information. Think about the last time you purchased a major appliance, a car, even a fricking book you researched online before you ever spoke to anybody. However, what your prospect does need you for is to help them make smart decisions, they need to be able to trust you so here's where the impact comes, how will you build trust in your business for your prospects? Education marketing is one sure way.

And what I mean by that is content, blogs, newsletters, mail, podcasts, videos, to let your prospects know that you are the true authority on that service or product. Your prospects are gonna search your digital footprint to verify whether you and your business are the real thing I've seen it so many times in my own business. Just this week, I had numerous reach outs from people that I had met two and three years ago at a speaking event, guess what? They're still in touch with me, they're following me on social media, now they wanna work with me. So make sure that you are still visible and you are still putting up a good education based so that you are presenting yourself as this authority. So here's another really a cool thing that Colleen Francis shared in a recent LinkedIn poll. She asked her audience, how much of your 2022 business will come from existing clients versus new clients.

Existing versus new here was how they answered 60% of respondents, answered that more than 75% of their business will come from existing clients. You don't need to be out there and worrying so much about new clients, but perhaps in your growth plan, as you're building it, you need to be looking at how can you get more sales from those people who've already bought from you. They've already trust you, so how much of your business in 2022 will come from existing clients? How can you increase those sales to existing clients? So my friends and listeners and Watchers, if you're watching the video there you have six trends for you to monitor for the new year and to incorporate, or at least give consideration when you're building your annual grow plan, connection, differentiation, new opportunities, value, simplification and selling. Now it's true that the last two years have not only been life altering, but life changing.

We certainly understand that. And we have to continuously be looking at the market place to see what we need to be changing in our businesses so that we can continue to build a sustainably profitable business. If you'd like help growing your annual grow plan, I have a new program called the grow accelerator network, we're a small group of dedicated business owners who come together throughout the year. Not only to create their grow plan, but to monitor and tweak it to the marketplace throughout the year. This program was built to help business owners fall in love with their numbers one more time, feel confident that they're measuring the right numbers for their particular business and be excited to see the progress as their business moves forward to their definition of success. Whatever that might be If that's something that you might like head over to Diana Lidstone.com, click on the button in the top right corner and schedule a call.

Let's make your new year stellar. All right, this is the end of episode one. Thank you so much for joining me on the Grow Equation Business podcast, which one or more of these six trends, will you be sure to incorporate into your business this year? I'd love if you take a moment to leave us a review, and if you have any questions on today's episodes or on how to hashtag work less, earn more head. Head over as I said to Diana Lidstone.com hit that button on the top right hand corner and schedule the call, talk to you next week bye for now.

Carl Richards: Thanks for listening to the Grow Equation business training podcast, where it's all about hashtag work less, earn more! Before you go, please take a moment to leave us a review. If you enjoyed this and want more of Diana, you're invited to join her private Facebook community for live trainings, articles, and Q and A.  Head over to facebook.com/groups/think like a CEO with Diana.  Until next time, thanks for listening.