We are Omaha’s only Speaking Roses licensee who can use their technology to print personalized messages, pictures and logos on Live Fresh Roses.

These roses are not only ideal for personal events, they serve as beautiful centerpieces for corporate dinners, customer or employee appreciation events and Christmas parties.

Hotels can use these roses as a part of welcome package for Honeymoon couples who stay in their hotels.

Every hospital has a gift shop and fresh roses with a message “Get Well Soon” can be a best seller.

The possibilities are endless and we are excited to bring this unique business to Omaha.

The best part: The method of transferring images and messages onto fresh-cut flowers does not shorten or harm the life of the flowers.  The emotional response of receiving these personalized roses can only be experienced by seeing the twinkle in the eyes of the receiver.

Surveys consistently tell us that 70% or more of the leads you give sales people are not followed up on effectively.

• A new study just released byThe Luxury Institute echoes these findings from the perspective of the high net worth consumer, stating that approximately 73% of the time, luxury consumers felt that sales people did not do an ineffective job of following up on products and services marketed to them.

• CMO Council’s new report, “Calibrate How You Operate” …reveals that global marketing executives are challenged by a lack of corporate mandate for alignment and integration. Some 41 percent of the 400-plus marketers audited point to siloed data and limited cross-functional feedback loops as major internal challenges subverting the marketing operational process.

To protect your investment in sales & marketing, make sure that your processes are optimized so that this 70% does not apply to your budget!

10 Simple Things You Can Do To Optimize Lead sales follow-up Right Now

Sales and Marketing Follow-up

1.     Believe this to be true of your sales follow-up operation. Sales people when it comes to follow-up will not do what’s expected but they will do what’s inspected. Survey after survey supports this statement. Put a weekly inspection process in play by your leadership for your sales team today.

2. Time is of the essence when performing follow-up. Leads have a limited shelf life and the leads you are working never stay in neutral they are either moving closer to or further away from a sale. Leadership must show sales teams that the timeliness of follow-up on their leads is important to your organization.

3.     Keep your sales lead flow-up process simple in the lead follow-upstage. Leads can only be in one of the following three categories : Purchased, Not Interested or In-progress.

4.     Make sure you have follow-up policies for not interested and purchased. Ensure your leadership focus on leads in progress. Leads in progress is where you will find the majority of your lead marketing investment and represents your biggest potential return on that investment.

5.     You need a software program to help sales and leadership keep track of each of these three leads categories. Make sure your system is easy to use and can produce effective lead follow-up reports.

6.     Your software and reports must reconcile and account for every lead that your sales team has been assigned. For example If a sales agent received 40 leads for the month and 5 were not interested 2 purchased and 33 were in progress your reports most reflect this. Ensure that your sales team has been directed as to next steps on each of these categories. If you do not take the time to do this sales will have leads you have given them unaccounted for and with little or no follow-up. Remember leadership must do this at least once a week.

7.     Leads in progress should be in a report in categories so leadership understands what is holding the customer back from purchasing. (In our software reports we use 13 categories) Leadership should be able to guide sales on their next follow-up steps based this important information.

8.     With this report mentioned above when you review the details with your sales team you can see the leads in-progress updated each week. Making sure there is progress each week for every lead is the key. If there is little progress on the leads from week to week, I would recommend you stop giving that sales agent new leads until they catch-up with the follow-up on the current leads they have been assigned.

9.     Weekly performance reports that are reviewed on the leads in-progress should have three or four written key follow-up areas that you as the leader will be looking for when you meet with this sales person next week. This type of leadership follow-up will help your sales agents improve. Make sure you write down what you will be looking for next week and then next week record the action the sales agent took against these requested steps.

10.     Recognize and celebrate great lead follow-up in front of the entire sales team. Set the tone for the importance of this process. Coaching and counseling with poor follow-up agents should be done one- on one and will also send a message to your team on the importance of follow-up.

Important note.     This is such an important part of your sales and marketing success, I would highly recommend if you are not completely sure how to do this you get full information and details on the people, processes and programs needed for effective follow-up. In my book lead domination chapter 20 is fully devoted to teaching you everyone of these essential steps in detail. These are steps I have perfected over 30 years of lead follow-up. This chapter alone will get you on the right track.

Bio

In his new book “Lead Domination”, Jamie Klein covers in detail the 10 topics above - as well as other applicable strategies!  Jamie has over 30 years experience in the lead management sales and marketing profession.  He has launched luxury ownership business enterprises, lead management initiatives, and sales and marketing operations for luxury brands including the Marriott , the Four Seasons, and St. Regis.  He speaks frequently at national conferences and is one of the premier real estate sales and marketing experts in North America.

• If you have not visited Change.gov or Whitehouse.gov, do so and check out the Agenda and see how you can help?
• Try to put few hours towards community work (read an article by Susan J. Elis of Energize Inc.) Also visit USAService.org to find volunteering opportunities in your local area.
• Love your work and work harder. If you don’t, then consider this: If you won’t do it, there are lots of unemployed people who will gladly do it.

Finally, remember what Obama said about cynics in his speech today. The ground has shifted. It really has!

If you are laid off, share your thoughts here. If you had a say in your company, would things be different? Would you have alternative solutions that would help companies sell more products?

•   Economy
•   Education
•   Energy & Environment
•   Ethics
•   Fiscal
•   Foreign Policy
•   Healthcare
•   Homeland Security
•   Immigration
•   Rural
•   Service
•   Taxes
•   Technology
•   Urban Policy
•   Women

You may share a story or a vision , perhaps apply for a job .

I come from a culture that has many archetypes. One of them translates success as acceptance in the society and failure - total rejection and facing ridicule. As a result, the children are groomed to be competitive with a picture of success pre-painted for them and nowhere in this picture can one find failure. This sets them up for a big surprise when failure hits and shatters this picture of success. Bounce teaches us to bounce back from failure in a balanced and graceful manner. Bounce also guides us to define and achieve success on our terms and conditions. Bounce provides us a process to create a path, define steps to achieve success with predetermined criteria that suits our situation.

Takeaways

1. Maintain a balance between humility and ego. The knowledge of how one’s ego can bring productivity down in a business environment will certainly help me in future hiring process.
2. Be a smart risk taker. Defining preferred outcomes and possible failures will be always on my agenda when I get into a new venture. Every entrepreneur must include both preferred outcomes and possible failures in their pitch to the Venture Capitalist!

He makes a very strong case when he explains wikis to business owners:

What if you could harness some of that collaboration within your own organization? What if you could pull in the contribution of not only of your employees but also of your customers and vendors? Wikis give you a forum to help you collaborate and innovate giving you a competitive advantage. Just thinking of answering those questions alone would want to make me get to know how wikis can give my company a competitive advantage.

Read more on Denise’s Blog.

1. Capital Hill politics on agreeing to disagree on bailing America from a financial disaster.

2. Another casualty, Washington Mutual, a largest bank failure ever and shareholders left high and dry.

I see this note from my credit card company indicating that they have increased my credit limit and suggesting to take a vacation! How Ironic!

While I do not wish to discuss politics, economy is surely in shambles. As an entrepreneur, as an employee and as a taxpayer, I am certainly worried  about my future and what type of future we are providing for our kids. What we can do to minimize the impact on future generations? We cannot continue to live beyond our means. We cannot continue to elect representatives who are actually representatives of the lobbyists with special interests in mind.

The committed Americans like Warren Buffet are doing their part by investing in companies like Goldman Sachs, but in current crisis we need 10 or more Warrens to rescue the American Dream! Is bail out a strategy or a blank check? Where are Alan Greenspans when we need him? I know, I am not providing a solution but I am angry that I am helpless!

Lets do our part! Lets be fiscally responsible. Borrow wisely. Hold our representatives accountable. Question them when they want to give away our money to bail us out from these “extraordinary”situations! Ask our representatives whether they will bail us out when our Social Security System is bankrupt?

Starting a new business especially if you are doing it for the first time, can be chaotic to say the least. There are some many considerations to be made that it can become overwhelming quite fast. However, once you have begun to establish yourself in the business world, it will become easier to understand how to do things the right way the first time around.

One way to help make the difficulties of business a bit more manageable is by using a credit card that has been designed to help small businesses succeed. Here are several ways using a business credit card can help calm the calamity of the start up business phase.

Higher Line of Credit

Most personal credit cards tend to offer a lower line of credit than do business credit cards. This may be an essential element for new businesses that don’t yet have the cash to finance every aspect of their business. Credit cards can help free up some of the cash of the company, as long as there is a definitive way to pay the balance due on time each month. Running a new business into debt is a big mistake but utilizing a credit card responsibly can help ease your financial concerns until you begin to regularly make a good profit. Also, new businesses often run into unexpected expenses and having a business credit card on hand can help relieve some of the stress of new business bumps in the road.

Expense Tracking Ease

Many business credit card companies offer a service to help you divide and categorize business expenses so you don’t have to do it yourself when you already have a lot going on. Utilizing one credit card for all of the company’s expenses also helps you keep track of how much you are spending and what you are spending it on in one convenient place – your monthly statement. Tracking accurate expenses is a necessity during tax time and when it comes time to review your initial business plan to make sure you are on track with your financial projections.

Establishing a Solid Credit Foundation

Most new business owners already have an eye for the future expansion of the company and understand the value of establishing a solid credit history in the very beginning. Using business credit cards wisely from day one will help afford you the privilege of being approved for much larger loans when you need the at a later date.

Free Advice for Business Owners

Credit cards have changed a lot in the past few years and business credit cards are no exception. Credit card companies need to remain competitive and one way they try to retain customers is by providing free services and valuable resources that may become somewhat of a lifeline for new business owners. Such services can include assistance in securing reservations for travel, 24/7 account access, and the ability to have multiple credit cards under one account.

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Tisha Kulak is a writer for Creditorweb.com, where she writes about credit card offers, business credit cards and small business finances.