• Our White Papers & Articles

  •  If Your Salespeople are Relying on a Low Price to Close the Deal… Their Training Didn't Have These 9 Steps!

    Almost every time SPIA meets a prospective client, one of the first questions out of their mouth is "what can you do to help us grow sales/revenue/profits? Our answer? If you share with us some of the processes that you have in place now for the salesforce to follow, we can take a look at them and see if there's a way we can help! What do we more often than not find? That there isn't any process in place at all! So NOW WHAT? Is there a reasonably easy way to establish a process that actually works? Yes there is.

  •  How to Play the Game! Develop & Implement a Business Strategy to Reach your Financial Goals.

    In order to understand why some companies grow and others were erratic in their revenues, we set out to understand if there was something that truly distinguished the business. Was it the industry they were in? Was it the economy? Did they have a niche that no one else had targeted? Did they have a knack of hiring sales super stars? Was it great management – from a real leader who led by example and his/her ability to mentor? What exactly was it?

  •  The Changing Face of Executive Recruitment

    By Dick Pensker | Executive Selection Consultant & Managing Director of the Transitional Career Center.
    In an ideal world, when there is a need to hire an executive or professional, you would select someone from your back ‘bench' database of pre-qualified candidates. Cost and time to get this person on board would be negligible compared to initiating a standard recruitment effort. Now, cost containment of executive recruitment can be a reality.

  •  Making the Wrong Decision has Gotten More Costly

    By Jeanne Colachico, Esq.
    There have long been IRS and Department of Labor regulations that set forth the requirements for determining the appropriate categorization for an employee and an independent contractor. There have also been monetary penalties that could be assessed to an employer that incorrectly categorized its contractors. For Massachusetts employers and companies with Massachusetts-based employees, that landscape has just gotten much more difficult to navigate.

  •  Analysing a Business Opportunity - Is It a Winner or Something Else?

    Whether you have a wonderful business idea – or – you are investigating business opportunities for yourself or a client, it is critical that you put each idea through a “reality check” – an analysis to determine if they are truly valid and worthy of further effort. All of your ideas must have a demonstrated need, ready market, and ability to provide a solid return on investment.

  •  Why saying "I'm so busy" is not a badge of honor – it's a sign of trouble

    More and more the term "I'm so busy" seems to be used by people who consider it to be a legitimate reason why things (always the important things) can't be done. The brutally honest truth is that it isn't a legitimate reason. Business is supposed to be busy – things happen – fires need to be put out. That's business! What would happen if we replaced the words so busy with (pick one) so unfocused/so unprepared/so scattered/so afraid to make changes? I don't think you'd hear the phrase quite as much.

  •  How to Keep Online Visitors Coming Back for More

    Be honest! Some things never change. A website's success is all about answering that famous question: What's in it for me? In order to capture someone's attention (and keep it) you have to offer them something they want today!!! And they must feel enough urgency to act on it today.

  •  Why Would I Want To Distinguish My Company From The Competition

    I don't have to tell anybody in business that competition today is stronger, more aggressive and less sensitive to the impact it has on local competition. We only have to look at category killer stores (BestBuy, CompUSA, Linen N Things) together with big-box stores (WalMart/Target/etc) to get a sense of how different today's marketplace is from that of even as recently as 20 years ago.

  •  20 Top Questions You Need To Ask Yourself For Surviving In Business

    Companies fail for a host of reasons. Bad luck plays a role, sure, but disaster usually strikes because of a more fundamental flaw--in the original idea, the strategy, the execution or all of the above. What entrepreneurs can do is ask the core set of tough questions that govern the fate of any enterprise.

  •  A Person Just Came to Our Website - Now What?

    The Webmaster just told me someone purchased one of our products online and also downloaded a complimentary white paper. This is great news and a nice first step, but the real marketing starts now! A significant factor of having a website that sells is the ability to properly and effectively create and manage relevant Autoresponders to go along with your website.

  •  Win or lose - You Choose

    By Karen Whitman, Vice President of SPIA
    While business cycles up and down, you don't have to settle for whatever comes your way. You can choose the outcome for your business. Too often business owners find themselves in a "box," which impairs their vision to the possibilities. They think, "I've always done it this way…" or "I'm not the only one experiencing problems in my industry…"

  •  What Being In Business Really Means

    Ever thought you'd like to be in business? Lots of people do! Many of these same people perceive that being in business really means 1) making the big bucks; 2) working fewer hours; 3) building up equity in your business; 4) being able to sell the business at some point in time for millions. Nice idea – theory or reality?

  •  Positioning Your Business For Sale & And Selling It

    At one point or another in any business owner's career, the question arises as to whether or not the business should (or can) be sold? Typically this question is combined with three others: 1. What is the business worth? 2. And if the value isn't where I expected (or needed) it to be, what can I do about it? 3. Finally, the BIG QUESTION: Is now the right time to sell?

  •  Systems That People in My Company Can Follow

    Can you imagine anything worse in business today than to have internal operating/sales-marketing or financial management systems in place that everyone knows and understands, and can use? Yes, the kind of systems that helps make the company more efficient and better able to compete? What a thought.

  •  Do I Really Need a USP?

    A USP? What exactly is that? That's what I said when I first learned about this wonderful tool that will help distinguish you from the rest of the office equipment marketplace. The phrase was coined by Rosser Reeves in 1961 and it breaks down in a three-part definition.

  •  Are You Poisoning Your Employees and Shooting Yourself in the Foot?

    Poisoning an employee? What does that mean? I've never hurt anyone anytime in my life! Deliberately yes – likely what you think is the case may not be true! Why? Because poisoning an employee means you've removed one or more employee's sense of empowerment and ability to positively impact the efficiencies/effectiveness of what they do for the company.

  •  What is Matrix Pricing & How Can It Benefit My Business

    There is a trick to being successful and making sure that your retail margins are high enough to cover your "nut" (the cost of opening your doors) while leaving enough on the bottom line to reward you for your investment and for your efforts to build your business. That trick is called MATRIX PRICING.

  •  Do You Have A Network Of Chickens Working For You?

    Which came first – the chicken or the egg. Or to put another way, what does chickens and eggs have to do with business development and building a successful business? A lot – an awful lot! When we say "chickens", we're referring to people who are capable of delivering to you referrals – regularly on an on-going basis. They "lay a lot of eggs" (referrals). Eggs, as we define it here, are the referrral'ees (smile).

  •  e-Marketing On Steroids

    There's marketing and there's sales, and each has its pros and cons. To ensure your marketing and sales people work in concert with one another as teammates, like they should, you need a Marketing Machine. A Marketing Machine combines the strengths of marketing and sales to create a powerful business development system – a combination of technology and process!

  •  A BIG Trade Show Problem - How to Fix It

    Attending or exhibiting at a trade show, conference or convention can be one of the most productive and successful vehicles to introduce yourself and products to new clients, touch base with existing ones, and so many other possibilities. However, we find that exhibitors or attendees frequently shoot themselves in the foot by not preparing a show project plan.

  •  Are Your Margins Not What They Used to Be?

    You could be the best financial planner out there or the smartest realtor, however, if you're perceived as just another salesperson, any future client won't pay much attention to you and that's not good, to say the least. What's happened to real salespeople?

  •  Automating Sales Campaigns

    Ever heard the ol' story that there are many ways to skin-a-cat? There are. And there are also many ways to stay connected and build relationships and sales revenue with prospects and customers alike. For example: There's the traditional way and there's the new way of using sales campaign generators (automatic events) combined with the above.

  •  Thoughts On Compensation

    Savvy companies understand that the best compensation program "IS" a well-written job description. A large percentage of larger firms utilize this technique and unfortunately, this is less so with smaller firms who may not have grasped the important of a well written comp program.

  •  Why Market Research Is Something I Should Do

    Keeping your company aware of positive or negative trends in your industry/profession can make the difference between prospering and something far less desirable. Remember KNOWLEDGE IS POWER and the more "power" you have, the stronger will be your company/firm. So what can market research do for your company?

  •  Managing Cash Flow - Trucking Companies

    Cash flow is defined as the balance of the amount of cash collected (revenue) and the amount of cash paid out (expenses) during a given period of time. During times of reduced revenue, even profitable trucking companies can fail from a lack of positive cash flow. Managing cash flow becomes even more critical when credit markets tighten up and access to cash reserves (borrowing) becomes increasingly restrictive.