How to Create Highly Effective Virtual Client Interactions

This is a Guest blog post by Chris Tully.

How to Create Highly Effective Virtual Client Interactions

In this seventh month of social distancing, client communications seem ever more remote – less accessible and a bit aloof as well as physically distant. How in the world can your sales force stay on top of their game and meet their goals? Now is the time to reassess your sales team’s online skills, and teach them how to create highly effective virtual client interactions.

Recent research about how sales have changed during COVID-19 tells us that sales teams need to adopt new skills in addition to adapting the old ones. It’s similar to losing one of our five senses – when we can’t see clients’ body language during a virtual meeting, for example, our other sales-senses have to learn to pick up on different cues.

When you are making a virtual presentation to clients in a group setting, remember:
• People have shorter attention spans
• Key decision makers often go missing
• Attendees are more reluctant to say what they’re really thinking, so you could get blindsided in follow up.

You definitely don’t want to wing it! Here are some guidelines to follow, based on Gartner’s Framework to Enable Effective Virtual Selling. These will make your client interactions more engaging and highly effective.

Pre-Meeting Planning

Iron out your rough spots. Most people’s presentations have one section that generates a lot of questions or sparks debate, maybe because it isn’t crystal clear. Role-play with sales team members acting out the client’s part until you’re satisfied you can address all concerns.

Make sure the stakeholders will be there. When you’re giving a pitch your all, you want the decision makers to be there! Check ahead of time to ensure all the stakeholders will be present during the webcast. If not, find out the designated proxy so you know whom to focus on.

Share your agenda of expectations. Give a meeting agenda to your contact ahead of time of three or four items indicating what you want to accomplish and what questions you anticipate from them. This laser-focuses your audience.

If you’re in a situation where the client also is meeting with your competitors, these focus points will make you stand out as a company that won’t waste their time.

You’ll be prepared for a very productive virtual meeting!

Client Presentations

Before the Meeting

Limit your meeting to 45 minutes, including the time for open discussion. Clients often schedule meetings back to back, on the hour, and often schedule you on the same day as your competitors. One thing I’ve learned over my career is how appreciative they are when you give them some down time!

Commit to starting the meeting 15 minutes after the hour, or ending 15 minutes early. Sharpen your presentation to 20-30 minutes and end the discussion a little early. Remember, less is more.

Insist on key players in attendance. You’ve already checked on the key decision-maker’s presence or proxy in your pre-planning. What if you log onto the meeting and they’re not there? You can ask if they want to reschedule – if the absence is last minute, they just might want to.

If it’s professional and polite to continue, then make sure to follow up directly with the person who missed your presentation to share your materials and your ideas.

Have your material up and ready to share. Make your presentation interactive by engaging your audience with questions. Encourage collaboration by using electronic white boards if you think that will help people better understand the concepts (particularly if it isn’t the audience’s main area of expertise).

Don’t be afraid to bring in “experts” via live link or a recorded testimonial – the more tools of engagement you use the better, as long as the content is relevant and not for theatrics.

During the Meeting

Test for understanding as you go. Using live polling if you can to get quick feedback or see what your audience is thinking – it works really well if you’re presenting to a large group logging in from multiple devices.

Zoom, GoToMeeting, and other platforms have a polling feature. This is a great engagement tool that lets you find out if people are tracking what you’re saying.

Call on audience members. When you get objections (expected from your pre-call rehearsal), pull out potential support by calling on specific individuals to share their perspective.

For example, “Tom, you had some thoughts when we talked last week – can you share your perspective?” This can backfire, but you should be smart enough to know who to call on and how to address any negativity.

Get consensus on next steps. Have specific next steps in your presentation and get agreement on these before you end the meeting or revise them to suit the situation. Email those next steps along with a proposed timeline to all in attendance following the meeting.

Immediately After the Meeting

Debrief with the decision maker. Ask the most senior client rep to stay for a debrief at the end of your presentation (“Could you hang out with me for a couple of minutes to clarify a few of things?”). Since you’ve kept your meeting short, you have a good chance that person will have time for you.

Email your “leave-behind” of the presentation after the meeting. Many clients will ask for a handout ahead of time, but don’t do it. You want them to listen to your emphasis and elaboration, not follow along on the handout and perhaps miss the point. Emailing the material after the meeting also gives you a chance for an extra touch point with clients.

Follow Up

Within 24 hours after your presentation, do these three things:

Thank the client for the meeting in an email. Include a recap of your key points and the agreed upon next steps.

Confirm the next meeting date. Also confirm who will be attending and the objectives for the meeting.

Include a specific call to action to continue their engagement with you. An example might be to, “Please complete a 1-3 question survey about our discussion.”

100 percent of your sales team’s time is trying to influence others or engaging with someone trying to influence them.
Your job as a leader is helping them get good at handling both of these roles with a focused, genuine manner. Then they will be able to create and participate in virtual client interactions that are highly effective, as well as productive for your company.

Chris Tully is Founder of SALES GROWTH ADVISORS. He can be reached at (571) 329-4343 and ctully@salesxceleration.com“For more than 25 years, I’ve led sales organizations in public and private technology companies, with teams as large as 400 people, and significant revenue responsibility.I founded Sales Growth Advisors to help mid-market CEOs execute proven strategies to accelerate their top line revenue. I have a great appreciation for how hard it is to start and grow a business, and it is gratifying to me to do what I am ‘best at’ to help companies grow faster and more effectively.Let’s get acquainted. I am certain I can offer you an experienced perspective to help you with your growth strategy.”

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Value Proposition and Covid: Is Your Premise Still Valid?

This is a Guest blog post from Ines LeBow.

 

Five hundred and sixty (560). That is how many commercial Chapter 11 filings occurred in April 2020, a 26% increase from the same time the year prior.

That is 560 data points proving that creating a value proposition is not a one-time deal, unless you want to be left behind as the market shifts and your business changes to meet those new market needs. Just consider the year 2020 as a microcosm for these shifts. The economy, technology, consumers, and nearly every market in every industry have changed significantly in a few short weeks because of the Covid pandemic.

Some of the companies are large brick-and-mortar retailers like J. Crew, Neiman Marcus, and JCPenney. The market had been trending to online sales for quite some time, yet they got complacent and continued with their legacy brick-and-mortar retail strategy. Coronavirus simply accelerated the consumer transition to e-commerce apparel shopping, leaving these iconic stores behind.

Earlier this year…January to be exact…which feels like a different time and a bygone era, I wrote an article on the essentials of the value proposition to tell an epic fundraising story (“Is Your Fundraising Story Epic? Blueprint: How to Open Doors to Funding Starts with the Value Proposition”). The fundamentals to create or reshape the value proposition still apply. After all, your company culture, your product, and, most of all, your why constitute the raw material for the destiny of your company. But how many of the 560 companies who filed for Chapter 11 in April could have avoided bankruptcy proceedings if they revisited their value proposition and evaluated some of the following questions:

• What is your “why”?
• Why is it your “why”?
• Is there still a need for your product or service? What problem does it solve for customers?
• Is there a better way to deliver your product or service for today’s market?
• Is your product still unique?
• Do customers inherently understand what your product is and how it helps them?
• Does your value proposition compel your target audience practically AND emotionally?
• Can your product or service transcend a crisis?
• The numbers tell the story…have you paid attention to your bottom line?

To learn more on how to create a winning value proposition at any company stage or as part of an effective 1-page executive summary and pitch deck, contact me for a complimentary consultation by phone at 314-578-0958 or by email at ilebow@transformationsolutions.pro.

Ines LeBow is the CEO, Transformation Executive for ETS. She is a known catalyst for business operations, bringing 30+ years of hands-on experience. Ines has a long history of being recruited into senior executive roles to improve the execution of business operations and to drive revenue growth. You can see her LinkedIn Profile at www.linkedin.com/in/ineslebow, view the ETS website at www.transformationsolutions.pro, or email her directly at ilebow@transformationsolutions.pro.

 

 

 

Caring is Sharing: Show your compassion for others during this very challenging time

This is a guest blog post from Shellye Archambeau, humanitarian, author, speaker, tech CEO and Fortune 500 corporate board executive.

 

“Noel, caring is sharing!” my five-year old granddaughter reprimands her three-year old sister, who doesn’t want to share her toy.  It’s a mantra my daughter uses to teach her children. As I witness this exchange while I “shelter in place” with them in Tampa, Florida, it strikes me that the whole world needs to be reminded of this simple concept.

What do we need to share? Compassion. Simply said, demonstrating compassion means to show kindness, caring and a willingness to help others.

Each of us is being affected in very different ways.  For some, it is a real inconvenience, but work and life for the most part continue. Our meetings have turned into video conference calls. Our normal support infrastructure has vanished, childcare, school, household help, etc…  We aren’t able to gather for celebrations such as weddings, birthdays or a friend’s successful battle against cancer. Worship, gym exercise and self-care routines are being disrupted. Our travel is curtailed. These impacts are a nuisance, but frankly not that hard.

At the other end of the spectrum in addition to the tens of thousands of people battling the virus itself, there are many people out of work or whose businesses are fighting for survival.  They are facing real hardship and there are a lot of them: hairdressers, retail and restaurant workers, performers, event planners, housekeepers, etc. The federal reserve reported last year that 40% of Americans don’t have $400 in the bank for emergency expenses. I know the government is also working on stimulus packages for Americans and business owners however the ramifications of now several months without pay will be felt significantly. If we all can take some measure to support, help, comfort and lend the proverbial hand – it will make a difference.

I had the honor of meeting and speaking with the Dalai Lama several years ago.  Compassion is one of the key tenets of his teachings.

“Compassion brings inner peace and whatever else is going on, that peace of mind allows us to see the whole picture more clearly.” Dalai Lama

Research backs up the Dalai Lama statement.  The Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley has conducted research that supports the premise that leading a compassionate lifestyle improves both mental and physical health.  “The reason that a compassionate lifestyle leads to greater psychological well-being may be that the act of giving appears to be as pleasurable as the act of receiving, if not more so. A brain-imaging study led by neuroscientists at the National Institutes of Health showed that the “pleasure centers” in the brain—i.e., the parts of the brain that are active when we experience pleasure (like dessert, money, and sex)—are equally active when we observe someone giving money to charity as when we receive money ourselves!”

Now is the time to help where you can.  A couple in my Mountain View neighborhood literally started knocking on doors of neighbors who they didn’t know to see if people needed anything.  They met several elderly people who indeed needed help with grocery shopping. Another person in my Nextdoor Whisman Station community reached out to offer to talk on the phone with anyone who needs to talk to someone, to rant, combat loneliness or for any reason at all.  I’m continuing to pay my housekeeper and my hairdresser for my regularly scheduled appointments even though the services aren’t being provided. Their income is being severely impacted by the necessary Shelter in Place policies.

So, find ways to show your compassion for others during this very challenging time.

1. This can be done through donations to charities that support the most vulnerable in our society.  Such as the American Red Cross who is facing massive blood shortages due to blood drive cancellations, your local food bank, Meals on Wheels who feeds the elderly, No Kid Hungry which deploys funds to ensure that kids don’t go hungry especially with schools being closed, etc.

2. You can also financially support the Arts or your local businesses.  For those not in a position to help financially, you can give the gift of time or effort.  For example, there are thousands of people in nursing homes whose families can’t visit. Call one and offer to speak to residents on the phone.  Many high-risk people are afraid to go to grocery or drug stores. Offer to do their shopping when you go.

3. Use your influence as a leader in business, offer free coaching, support, or tools that can be readily provided to help struggling small businesses and entrepreneurs. Not sure how to get started. Check out organizations such as Score.org and businessadvising.org, both of whom provide confidential business advice through a network of volunteer business people.

4. Now is a time more than ever to be a mentor within your company and community. For example I launched online “Ask Me Anything” live sessions to provide perspectives and support to people working through professional or entrepreneurial issues.

5. Give your teams the ok to share their concerns, etc..  Sometimes people just need to be heard and know someone cares about them. There’s also a lot to be learned by just listening to the challenges and issues faced by team members.

We are in this together and together we will get through this just as we have overcome past crises.  I believe that most of us are compassionate people. Let’s all take at least one action to demonstrate it.  As my granddaughter said, “Sharing is caring”.

Reference link – https://ceoworld.biz/2020/04/10/caring-is-sharing-show-your-compassion-for-others-during-this-very-challenging-time/

APRIL 13, 2020

Shellye Archambeau is a humanitarian, speaker, author, technology company CEO, and Fortune 500 Board member.  She is the author of Unapologetically Ambitious and a leading figure in Silicon Valley. She sits on the boards of Verizon, Nordstrom, Roper Technologies, and Okta. She is the former CEO of MetricStream and former President of Blockbuster. Please follow her at http://www.shellyearchambeau.com

The Success Formula: Success = BD+GM+F+C+P

Almost 9 years ago, I published this, my first Blog post on WINNING IDEAS. As I work with students, mentees, and other business colleagues of late, I find myself reverting to various “Fundamentals” in our conversations, this one perhaps being the most important of all.  Please enjoy and let me know what you think!

What does it take to be Successful? Everyone has an opinion on this for sure.

Success is Winning, and everyone loves Winning.

Having been a student and analyst of the subject of Success for over 40 years, I think I have boiled down the formula of what creates Success:

SUCCESS = BURNING DESIRE + GOAL MANAGEMENT + FOCUS + COURAGE + PERSISTENCE

Each of the great thinkers and each successful person has their own personal take on what it takes to achieve success, but these are the 5 essential elements.

 

Of course, I left out a couple of other important elements like Serendipity, Luck, Sacrifice, Hard Work, and others, but I believe that these “sub elements” are a part of one of these 5 essential ingredients.  For example, if you have a Burning Desire (passion), then you will make the sacrifices and work hard.  Goal Setting includes goal review, and is the roadmap to the destination.

Courage is an interesting one and we don’t hear it mentioned often, but to me, Courage is all about taking action, and stepping up and going outside your comfort zone to make things happen.  Without Courage, thought cannot easily be transformed into Action.

And what about luck?  Well, the more persistent you are, the luckier you get.  By never giving up and hanging in there, opportunities will inevitably come your way.

Persistence is my favorite, and I conclude this, my first ever Blog Post with my favorite quote:

“Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never–in nothing, great or small, large or petty–never give in, except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”   – Winston Churchill

 

 

 

 

 

 

You don’t know how good you have it!

This is a Guest blog post from Todd Youngblood, These thoughts are more applicable today than when he first published this almost 2 years ago.

Is there anyone alive today who did not hear the words, “You don’t know how good you have it,” from one or both parents during childhood? I seriously doubt it. I heard it so often growing up that I swore I would never say it to my own kids. I failed. The fact of the matter is they didn’t know how good they had it. And to be honest, I didn’t either.

Is the world today awash in problems and injustice? Yes! Is the U.S. in particular, awash in problems and injustice? Yes! Are there more, bigger, more complex, thornier problems than even before in human history? Yes!

My contention is, that’s good news!

In fact, it’s downright bizarre to me that only 6% of the U.S. population thinks the world is getting better. Seriously? Think! Of course we have lots of problems today, but they are due to the unanticipated, unintended consequences of the amazingly dramatic advances in standards of living that have alleviated or eliminated the problems of the past.

Are the problems we’re dealing with now real? Yes! Are they tough, horrifying, heart-wrenching, unfair, unethical, immoral and just-plain-wrong? Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes and Yes. So what? Let’s look at a few facts about the relentless, positive progress in our world, courtesy of Our World In Data

First, world population:

• 1800 – 0.9 Billion
• 1900 – 1.7 Billion
• 1960 – 3.0 Billion
• 1980 – 4.4 Billion
• 2015 – 7.4 Billion

That’s an increase by a factor of more than 7. Are 7 times more people alive because the overall average standard of living has been going down? I don’t think so. How about the % of world population living in extreme poverty?

That’s about as direct a measurement of improvement in living standards as you can get. From virtually all human beings living in extreme poverty to less than 10% in just 2 centuries. For perspective, humans have been around for something like 2,000 centuries. So that’s virtually everybody in extreme poverty for 1,998 centuries, and now only 10%.

How about the % of world population that is illiterate?

 

That’s from 88% illiterate to 88% literate. …along with the immense value of literacy.

How about global child mortality?

That’s 43% – almost half – of children dying before their 5th birthday to only 4%.

How about freedom – the % of global population living in democracy:

That’s less than 1% of people living in a free, democratic society to 53%. Amazing progress!

These statistics tell the story of a remarkable, inexorable and MASSIVE increase in quality of life. Let’s take a look at some numbers that put a totally different spin on this supposed problem of having so many problems. Is all the stuff we can buy to make our lives easier and better getting more or less expensive? Inflation and different currencies and exchange rates around the world can make answering this question quite difficult. So forget about how many dollars it takes to buy something. Look at cost in terms of how many hours you need to work to buy whatever it is you want.

Light, for example. Every time the sun goes down, we’re switching on the lights. What does that actually cost in terms of hours worked?  In 1994, Yale economist William Nordhaus answered the question. He calculated how much light could be purchased for 60 hours of work. Here’s what you could buy:

• 88 minutes of light from your oil-burning lantern in 1750 BC
• 10 hours from your tallow candle in 1800
• 16 hours from your gas-burning streetlight in 1810
• 72 hours from one of Edison’s early incandescent bulbs in 1880
• 1,200 days – over 3 years – from a fluorescent bulb in 1950
• 51 years from a modern compact fluorescent bulb

How about some other modern conveniences?

And these prices do not reflect the dramatic improvements in quality. In ‘59, the “big screen” TV was 21 inches. Are you old enough to remember complaining about too much “snow” in the picture? Today, not only is the fuzzy “snow” effect gone, you can see every pimple on an actor’s face as it marches across the 6 foot wide screen.

How about travel? To cross the U.S. by horse takes 70-80 days depending on the weather. Or you could hop on a jet and do so in less than 5 hours for less than $200. And for the record… I gripe and moan A LOT about my discomfort in those teeny-tiny airplane seats. It’s a bit embarrassing to contemplate the pain in my seat that would be caused by sitting on a jostling horse all day, every day for 2 1/2 months…

Forgive me for bringing some mathematics into the mix, but it’s a really good way to think about what happens when a problem gets solved. Think about a circle. A line through its center, the diameter, represents all the problems that have been solved by your society. The area inside the circle represents your standard of living. Around the circumference is where all of the unsolved problems facing your society are lurking, (Take a look at the show notes for this episode at IntentionallyVicarious.com to see an example of this and where I’m going with the idea…)

OK, here comes the math. Let’s say that the diameter of your circle is 10. Again that means your society has become aware of and solved 10 big problems. The area, your standard of living, is π r², which works out to about 79. Around the circumference, which is π times that diameter, is roughly 30, meaning your society is aware of 30 big, ugly problems.

Now… Your society functions pretty well, so it goes about solving every one of them. The diameter of your circle is now 40 – the 10 problems that were already solved plus the 30 you just knocked down. Your standard of living, therefore, jumps up to 1,275! But uh-oh, you can now see 125 new problems around the circumference you didn’t know about before.

Your society attacks those, and solves every one. Your socienty has now successfully solved 165 big problems, which rockets your standard of living up to 21,382. But here’s another uh-oh… You are now aware of yet another 450 new problems.

I think you get where I’m going with this. It’s one of those glass half-empty or half-full things. Your society has solved 165 of the earth’s biggest problems, and all you see and hear on the news and social media is how you – you greedy, selfish SOB – have screwed the needy by “creating” 450 ugly problems and inequalities while only solving 165.

NO!!!!! Wrong perspective!

So what that you’re now aware of 450 new, ugly problems and inequalities? The vastly more important point is you did in fact solve 165 old, ugly problems and inequalities and ratched up your standard of living from 79 to over 12,000. That’s cause for celebration …and more work, more effort, more achievement. Dare I say more fun?

Run through the cycle again and your living standard will be nearly 300,000. Are you going to gripe and moan about how society is sooooo much worse because you now have 1,900 ugly issues instead of only the 450 you had before? Go ahead and whine if you want to, but stay out of my life.

The fact that I, you or anyone can identify an ever-growing number of examples of pain, suffering, injustice and horror is good news. It means that all of us have collectively solved a boat-load of old problems and made life on earth better – MUCH, MUCH BETTER – than it was before. The more problems we solve, the more – and uglier – problems we can identify. Get over it!

The instant any one of us as an individual, or all of us as a culture, a country, a species; stops identifying the huge and growing number of agonizing problems that cry to solved, is the instant we are doomed.

Recognizing – KNOWING – about the pain, suffering and inequality of outcome that exists; and about how much MORE needs to be done, means that we have the opportunity to get better – MUCH BETTER – all the time.

So again… As we solve more and more problems, the more we will increase the world’s standard of living, AND the more terrible and agonizing problems we will identify. Lets get over it! And let’s get busy – stay busy – and continue our 2,000 century long habit of improving everybody’s quality of life.

 

Todd Youngblood is Executive Producer and Host of Intentionally Vicarious, which is dedicated to help you have more fun than anybody else you know! He is also Managing Partner and CEO of The YPS Group, Inc., a management consultancy focused on sales and sales management. Check out Intentionally Vicarious at   

https://intentionallyvicarious.com. Todd can be reached at todd@ypsgroup.com.

 

 

5 Steps to Marketing Success Post COVID-19

This is a Guest blog post from Sandy Barger, Partner and CMO of Chief Outsiders.

 

You guessed it, digital marketing will reign supreme once retail business resumes.

A February Market Trends 2020 survey of chief marketing officers (CMOs) with experience across both Fortune 500 and emerging brands shows the strong continuing trend toward digital advertising, with 80% of CMOs expecting to increase digital spending this year. A few weeks later, COVID-19 hit and digital became even more of an influence. Social distancing and working from home forced people to accelerate their movement to digital across all walks of life—from personal to work to social. Zoom alone grew to 300 million daily participants versus only 10 million back in December. As marketers continue to increase their focus on digital marketing, the top priorities will be on tactics that provide additional information, including organic searches, email marketing, paid search, and content marketing.

Most businesses know digital marketing and providing customers with information is important. In fact, these are usually the first marketing actions companies take. However, “lack of information” is not a problem. Studies show customers are bombarded with information, receiving up to 10,000 brand messages a day, according to the American Marketing Association. Rich content doesn’t just deliver information but provides the right information. The Digital Age has made for a more sophisticated and informed type of customer. While slogans and taglines may still catch attention, customers are looking for details and, in this competitive landscape, brands must get their stories right.

To break through the clutter, creating the “right” story must include what people are looking for. At the core of failed marketing tactics is a lack of WIIFM, an acronym that looms large in the storytelling paradigm and stands for “What’s in it for me?” It’s an essential question the answer to which can make or break the connective tissue that bonds your marketing story to the customers. Luckily, there are steps you can take to create a compelling brand story with a successful WIIFM.

5 STEPS TO COMPELLING DIGITAL BRAND STORIES

1. Understand Your Target Audience

We see it all around us today, the many different and often polarized points of views. We see it in our political system, our news, and our tastes—onions or no onions. To create the right story, it is important to consider the unique needs and interests of your target audience. For that, sound research—both qualitative and quantitative—is needed. While data from an expert research company yields the best insights, it is not the only option. Lower investment options such as customer interviews or surveys through online tools such as Survey Monkey provide valuable insights.

2. Understand Pain Points or Motivations

While companies are currently providing lots of information, it is usually about the company and focuses primarily on the product or service features. In doing so, companies often require customers to make the leap to the “WIIFM” themselves. To effectively communicate “WIIFM” it is critical to understand your customers’ pain points or motivations. Addressing pain points such as likes, wants, needs, and fears makes for the most compelling content. That’s referred to as the Persuasion Code.

Here’s a case in point: A technology company recently developed a new innovative service solution. The launch of the service generated a significant amount of awareness, but it did not convert into sales. The reason is the messaging failed to identify current, compelling pain points. It ultimately was able to drive sales by retooling the messaging to focus on its attention-catching innovations and how they could address target customers’ existing pain points.

3. Develop Authentic Claims 

Customers are very vocal about their satisfaction with products, which is helpful for brands. In fact, word of mouth referrals and reviews are the most compelling source of information for customers. With the Digital Age, customers, both satisfied and dissatisfied, can amplify their points of view. A study in 1983 found that 85% of customers dissatisfied with a clothing item told an average of five people. (Richins 1983). Now a dissatisfied customer can tell thousands—instantly.

Over two-thirds of business customers rely on reviews and 67% of survey respondents said that the reviews they saw online made an impact on whether or not they purchased a product. Companies and businesses can lose as much as 22% of their customers with just a single bad review or article. (Moz.com study).

Reviews are not always fair. In fact, 39% of reviews are false (Best SEO Companies), but someone reading that review does not know that. So to get positive reviews and avoid negative ones, your marketing message needs to make use of authentic, clear, and truthful claims.  You then need to deliver on the expectations the messaging is setting.

4. Provide Competitive Points of Differences 

Now that the brand has developed the messaging that will create an action, the customers must understand that action should be with your brand. New technology and factors such as globalization have resulted in fewer barriers to entry and more competition across all industries. A compelling story needs to include the brand’s unique value proposition and/or how the product or service is different from the competition. Otherwise, the brand has created the demand for someone else to capture.

5. Provide Proof

Customers are skeptical of brand claims. In fact, 63% of customers say they trust what influencers say about brands much more than what brands say about themselves in their advertising (Edelman 2019). Given this lack of trust, it is important to provide proof. There are several ways of doing so from statistical data, case studies, demonstrations, and of course, social media influencers.

Today’s customers are digitally savvy and have endless access to information. To get them to move from awareness to action requires more than just information. It requires a consistent, compelling story…and that requires a step-by-step development of “WIIFM” messaging.

 

Sandy Barger is Partner and CMO with Chief Outsiders, an American fractional CMO group. She works with B2B and B2C companies on product development, go-to-market strategies, and lead generation. Find more info at http://www.chiefoutsiders.com

 

How Innovation Companies Find Liquidity in the COVID-19 Economy

This is a Guest blog post from Ling Zhang, Senior Manager at Dixon Hughes Goodman LLP. She covers a lot information which is extremely valuable for small businesses. 

“Cash is King” for businesses, especially when they are drifting in the rough currents due to COVID-19. What can technology, services, and life science companies do to survive the challenges and thrive through oppotunities in the current economic conditions? Here are a few considerations for innovative companies to manage cash flow since the pandemic’s inception.

 

Utilizing the CARES Act and New Laws and Legislation

Businesses have been following new legislation closely and, when possible, taking advantage of cash flow assistance from the federal government to increase liquidity. The following is a list of programs created by the CARES Act that support small businesses:

1. Paycheck Protection Program

As part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, Congress had appropriated $349 billion for the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), providing loans of up to $10 million to certain qualified small businesses, and also offering forgiveness for
all or a portion of the loan. As the first round of PPP funding has been utilized, a new funding package has been approved for the PPP for $480 billion, which appropriated an additional $320 billion for the PPP.

The new funding package, passed on April 24, 2020, also includes $60 billion for the Disaster Loans Program and Emergency EIDL Grants.

 
2. Small Business Debt Relief Program

This program will provide non-disaster Small Business Administration (SBA) loans, specifically 7(a), 504 and microloans not made under the PPP. Under this program, all payments on these SBA loans, including principal, interest and fees, are covered by SBA for six months.

 
3. Economic Injury Disaster Loans & Emergency Economic Injury Grants

The program provides loans up to $2 million and emergency advances up to $10,000 that are not required to be repaid.

The CARES Act also has the following tax provisions available:

1. Employee Retention Credit

A refundable payroll tax credit for up to 50 percent of wages paid to certain employees is available to eligible employers during the COVID-19 crisis through Dec. 31, 2020. This credit is not available to employers receiving

 

2. Delay Payment of Payroll Taxes

Taxpayers can defer paying the employer portion of certain payroll taxes during the period beginning on the Act’s date of enactment and ending on Dec. 31, 2020. Half of the deferred amount is due on Dec. 31, 2021, and the other half is due on Dec. 31, 2022. For PPP loan recipients, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) FAQs1 clarify that taxpayers may defer the employer portion of Social Security on wages paid between March 27, 2020, and the date which the lender issues a confirmation of loan forgiveness for the recipients’ PPP loan.

 

3. Other Tax Provisions to Accelerate Cash

Other tax provisions include correction of Qualified Improvement Property depreciation; use of excess business loss and Net Operating Losses; and use of Corporate AMT Credits. Consulting with a tax professional may help increase cash flows through maximizing tax refunds and tax planning for the business. Please reach out to your tax advisor to evaluate possible solutions as these may be complex decisions.

 

4. Main Street Lending Program to Provide Liquidity to Small and Mid-Size Businesses

These four-year term loans are for companies that have less than 15,000 employees and $5 billion in revenue and have a minimum loan size of $1 million. The loans are generally available even if you have received a PPP loan and there is currently no indication of “affiliation” rules that disallowed many private equity portfolio companies from eligibility for the PPP loans. The loan size is generally based on a multiple of 2019 earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA), which can be adjusted as permitted by lending institutions, and includes existing debt.

The Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA) also provides refundable tax credit as follows:

Eligible employers are entitled to refundable tax credits for qualified leave wages that are paid, during the period beginning April 1, 2020 and ending Dec. 31, 2020, for specified reasons related to COVID-19 under the FFCRA.

Federal and state governments are continuing to evaluate
additional assistance to businesses.

Turning Challenges into Opportunities

Many leaders of technology, life sciences and service companies, including technology giants and small businesses, have pivoted during the pandemic in different ways by identifying opportunities, and taking immediate action to generate cash to secure a future for their employees while contributing, in their own unique way, to find a vaccine.

Examples include life sciences and medical device companies developing and selling antibody or COVID-19 testing kits; tech manufacturers making ventilators; SaaS software companies offering free HR applications to help manage the health and safety of employees; cyber security information technology services companies developing tracing technologies and providing services to help mitigate cyber security and privacy risks of work-from-home arrangements; services firms providing assistance on the interpretation of new legislation; and more.

 

Managing Cash Flows

Tech and life sciences companies should also assess key performance indicators (KPI), monitor budget versus actual analyses more closely and frequently, and deploy a plan to manage cash flows through the pandemic and beyond. Companies can consider the following areas to manage internal cash flows in response to the current environment:

1. Accelerate accounts receivable collections through active collection efforts and/or evaluating new technologies to allow customers new payment methodologies;

2. Manage vendors by initiating dialogue and negotiations with extended or delayed payment terms;

3. Classify expenses by variable versus fixed, and consider plans to cut spending on variable expenses where possible. Seek concessions on fixed expenses such as rent abatements, delay in payments, or extended payment terms;

4. Evaluate plans to reduce salary expenses including furloughs, salary reductions, and/or a reduction in force;

5. Seek additional financing opportunities through loans or use of availability on lines of credit;

6. Revise and develop new cash flow forecasts from operations for various scenarios – three-to-six months or even longer if necessary.

 

As a Senior Manager in the DHG Technology practice, Ling Zhang works closely with client management and C-suite executives to provide audit, financial accounting advisory, and risk advisory services to multi-national publicly-traded corporations and private companies with revenues ranging from $10 million to $50 billion. She advises clients on SEC filings, complex debt and equity transactions, merger and acquisition, new accounting guidance implementation, internal control system design and implementation, and financial statements reporting and disclosures. She can be reached at ling.zhang@dhg.com.