Little Motivations Turn Into Big Deals

While customers everywhere are scrambling around trying to find the perfect gifts for family members, small business owners are starting to feel the strain of maintaining their schedules. The constant battle of making product, updating the website, shipping packages, dealing with irritated customers on the phone – it all can become extremely exhausting and wear the most hardy business owner down.

That’s why it’s very important to look for the little things each day that motivate you to keep going. When you start feeling like you’ll never be able to survive another second with the insane amount of work you have at the moment, a little motivation can turn into a huge deal – in more ways than one!

Maintaining Your Cool

The absolute last thing you want to happen right now when you’re so busy is to lose your cool. If an angry customer emails you about an issue and you blow up at them, you could potentially be losing a lot of business. That’s because it’s not just that customer you’re mad at; you’re simply letting the situation get out of control.

So when you blow up at someone who just needs a problem resolved, you’re acknowledging that you’ve lost your cool. This can quickly translate into a continued change of attitude throughout the rest of the season, as it’s difficult to come back from a blow-up like that.

Even worse, if your explosion is big enough, it could quickly go viral across the web. It may be totally out of context, but readers won’t care – they just see a business owner losing their mind. You can do some quick damage control, but it’s most likely too late, especially with how close it is to the end of the holiday season.

Finding that “calm center” in yourself can prevent these types of situations from ever occurring. When you have something you know will soothe your frayed nerves, you can turn to it even when there seems to be no end in sight.

Connection

Half of running a business (possibly more, really) is connecting to your customers on some level. When you’re selling something to a stranger, you have to quickly determine why this person needs it. Notice the word “needs”, not wants. A want is something you might buy – a need is something you MUST buy.

If you figure out what your motivation is, you can use it to connect with your customers on this base level. For example, let’s say what keeps you going is to take 5 minutes every hour to do breathing exercises. Obviously you’re not going to be the only person on the planet who does this, so when you tell your base about this pattern they’ll relate to you.

You can use this connection with your customers to gain ground on your relationship. In fact, you can even relate the products you’re selling with said breathing exercise. If your big product this year is a new kind of seating pad, perhaps you could tell everyone how great it works when you’re doing your relaxation method. Boom, instant sales!