Ep. 200 Measure Your Milestones

Major goals are the ‘bones of your business’. Joe’s celebrates hitting his 200th milestone program by helping you set and achieve major goals.

Voice over:

Get ready for an unfair advantage over your competition. This is The Sales Edge podcast. Where globally recognized sales expert and trainer Joe Pici helps you sharpen your skills for booking more appointments and closing more deals. And now here’s your host Joe Pici.

Joe Pici (JP):

Well hey team, this is Joe Pici and The Sales Edge. And today we will learn about the importance of having project milestones. We should all have them and this is podcast number 200. A milestone a second milestone in our podcasting. I remember just last year when we hit the Milestone of 100 and we reset and headed to 200 and so it’s exciting. So welcome to the sales edged podcast. Once again, this is Joe Pici your host. This is podcast number 200. We want to thank our sponsors Pici and Pici which is a speaking, coaching, training, consulting company. Recapturing lost revenue for clients. And it’s exciting time, very exciting time as we are helping our clients get back on track, gain more a competitive advantage in the marketplace, capture lost revenue and clients. And also SellMoreVirtually.com. That is our membership platform where right now every Thursday night Joe is out there doing a full hour of coaching or a training and it’s exciting. We have downloads, we have e-courses and then so many thing and so let’s just get started.

You know, we want to thank you our audience, our team, for sharing this podcast. We want to thank you for the growth we’re experiencing. Want to thank you for your loyalty. You know, we’re excited to hit this mark. I couldn’t believe it you all remember this morning. I was just telling Dawn, can you believe it? You know, we’re hitting number 200 and I remember when we started number one in the closest, so it’s exciting. You know, Milestones are short-term goals that lead to the overall project objectives. So we’re going to talk about project goals and Milestones. These Milestones act as major project progress points to indicate your progress. So Milestones are those measuring blocks. They’re kind of like the along the way Milestones will allow you to say or we aren’t Course, are we staying on course? If you achieve the Milestones along the way then you are moving in the right direction to complete your project objectives. You know, some of your Milestones. Okay. I mean, there’s many milestones. We have a lot of Milestones here Pici and Pici and some of the Milestones you could be running for is, the completion of a product or service. Maybe you’re just getting started. Maybe you’re generating a new business.

Okay. So your first product or service, that’s a milestone. How about when you complete that sales process, you put it in. It’s now something you can utilize that is a milestone. Something and by the way, Milestones are so supposed to be celebrated. Your number three is your first client. I remember our first client, it was a milestone it was a big milestone too. When you got your first client, did you look at that as a milestone? Because it was one. You know, how about the Milestone of dollars? How about your first thousand dollars? You know, are you measuring the Milestone of hey, we got our first client, but how about measuring the dollars that were generated with that client? Maybe that first thousand dollars that first $5,000, that first $10,000, you know about the next one.

Do you have a profitable business model? Have you measured that and has that become a milestone? You know when we set out to be profitable. We set out to be a healthy business and we wanted that to be one of the Milestones on our way to the bigger picture. How about that first? Here’s the number 6, that first repeat client. That is a milestone. I know, you know, a one-off when you get a client to buy one time. That’s all fine and dandy, but when clients begin to buy from you repeatedly and so that very first time you had the second purchase, or that second deal, or the second Consulting thing. They called you back. They wanted more. They asked for more.

That was something to be measuered, that’s a milestone. How about, have you said as a milestone, is my lead generation effective? I know when we hit the Milestone, we were able to measure this leadership component is working. That is a milestone. That’s when you may want to measure. You’re going to have others that you want to measure and that you want to classify as a milestone. How about Your first employee? When you first hired the very first person to come along in your company with you. That’s a milestone. Maybe it’s a good one, maybe it’s a bad one. And then as you build out your team, you start building out your team. Maybe your marketing department. Maybe your sales department, your first sales manager. As I’m working with companies, whether they’re measuring their Milestones or not. I’m measuring their Milestones.

You know, how about this one. Are you measuring the milestones in your sales goals? I know that we are running right now for a major sales goal and we’re tracking it and we’re hitting Milestones along the way. How about when you launch your new website? That’s an exciting time. And that’s a milestone. Something to be celebrated when that website comes up. I know when last, golly, last March, a year ago when Dawn decided she was going to take on the project of building out sell more virtually.com as a membership platform. And her first Milestone was, to build the back end where there would be content and there would be downloads and there would be me doing stuff live even before the front end was done. That was a midpoint Milestone.

Her next Milestone was to get the first, the front-end build out, the sell more virtual e.com website. By the way, she started in March and August. She hit her first Milestone. This September she had her second milestone, incredible. How about this, turning your business into a franchise? I got a long time great friend and we probably talked four times a week and he has built multiple businesses and a business. That is his biggest business right now. He just set a milestone and he just started the project and will launch at the end of this month turning his business model into a franchise. What a milestone. That’s a big project folks,one to be celebrated.

You know, how about this? How much you have in your savings account? Do you have a number, a milestone number that you’re setting and running for? Another Milestone may be paying down debt, whatever your debt load is, maybe it’s on a credit card? Maybe it’s a line of credit. Whatever, a milestone is, how are you going to pay it down? How are you going to measure it? And every time you pay it down and get closer to your goal and you’re hitting certain Milestones along the way, those are to be celebrated. And how about this?

How about the Milestone of developing strong presentation and speaking skills. I have a client, a couple clients, a great clients and and and one of their their milestones and goals, is to become more effective speakers. To use to grow their brand and grow their company. And their coming to the speaker boot camp at the end of April and that will be the beginning of them achieving that Milestone. And how about if you decide you’re going to develop a new product? A new service? Once you complete it, that is another Milestone. So when you look at goals, are destinations. When you look at setting goals, the goal is a destination, but the Milestone folks are measuring tools along the way.

So when you look at the projects that you and your company are working on right now and you have say a short-term goal, a long-term goal. Well, what along the way do you have in a way of measuring momentum? Measuring achievement? These are the Milestones that I recommend you get in order and place them out there. You now, the benefits of Milestone. Let me give you a few. One is you’re going to achieve better and faster results. By not defining what you want to achieve, rather than hoping that someday you’ll achieve something provide you with no impetus to take action. So there’s no motivators, you know setting clear written goals and Milestones helps you focus on how you’re going to achieve them. You change your mind to focus on how rather than the why.

And so take action even in the smallest way on a daily basis, progresses you toward your goals and these actions add up to big results over time.

You know, as you start to achieve your Milestones, you’ll experience increased motivation to achieve what makes you more productive and effective, driving you to completing those goals, objectives, but these Milestones kind of help you along the way. You know, having clear goals in in Milestones give you something to focus on. Tt gives you a clear marker in the ground the Run for. The benefit of that is it You can clear the way of any distractions that don’t add value to the achievement of the goal. Having a goal, having Milestones, you’re going to work harder and faster. More importantly if you’re in a position to see yourself progressing towards your goal as you do when you’re paying off debt, whatever your more likely to work even harder. So without goals and Milestones and nothing to aim for, you simply, aimlessly float around.

I mean you don’t have a direction. The second thing is you’re going to increase positive attitude and it’s an achievement. You know, when you’re looking at goals and you’re looking at Milestones they provide you with a sense of purpose. You know, they place you firmly in control of your future. You know, you know, since the goals are born in in in your own desire, you know inside of you you decide on some goals you feel really positive about.

Well, those Milestones help to keep the momentum going as you’re pursuing it, as you work hard to achieve your goals in your milestones and start to see some positive results you encounter positive cyclical effect on motivation. Our brains are just wired that way, you have to see achieving along the way. You can’t keep hitting your head against the wall and see no forward progress and keep going. Very few people are wired. Okay that they don’t see some success but they keep going. Another one is you’re going to create a sense of purpose. That’s number three. Everyone needs purpose. You know, there’s no way you can go through life without having a purpose and when you’re setting goals and Milestones, it’s a great way to identify what your purpose is.

I think it was Yogi Berra, you know you before most of your time. He was a catcher for New York Yankees way back. He was funny guy saying he had quotes. He said if you don’t know where you’re going, you’re going to end up somewhere else. How about that one? So if you want to end up somewhere in life decide what it is you want. Okay what it looks like and write it down. You’re not going to reap any benefits folks of goal setting it and you know Milestone setting unless you decide what you want, when you want it, why you want it, and have a Clear Vision. The number four thing is setting clear intentions to focus on.

And this why the Milestones help because they’re the benchmarks. Those are they are the guideposts. Those are the in between segments between your goals. So when you’re setting up your goals in your motivators, you want to be very definitive on your intentions and your desires. And this is going to give you tremendous Clarity to focus on. You know, you may have a broad idea and want to achieve something but how clearly articulating these benchmarks,, these Milestones, these goals. You’re not going to be able to continue on, you’re going to struggle because you can get sidetracked so easily. And some of the people I’m speaking to right now are not lazy, but they can get sidetracked because they haven’t really clearly defined. So, you know, when you do your planning you want to set out with the guideposts which are your Milestone. Now number five is let’s maintain Focus.

You know, goals and and milestones give you single point of focus by which you drive your time and energy into. Once you place all your attention on that point. You can take action. You’ll start to move forward. Here’s a book. I’d like to recommend The One Thing. Okay, it’s a little white book with red print or black print. But anyway, the one thing you can’t miss it. I recommend you read that book. It’s going to help you with this. You know the goal or the Milestones kind of a funnel between your efforts and your results. And without this funnel you can so easily get off course and and you don’t want to become overwhelmed with this.

Now number six is overcoming procrastination. So those Milestones will help you overcome procrastination. It’s going to help you maintain your focus and destroy procrastination. Procrastination is one of the most dangerous things we can have in our life. And as a friend of mine used to say put off, putting off. You know, if your goals are specific enough and your Milestones are in front of you. It’s going to help you and it’s not going to allow you to get distracted.

Now number 7 is Milestones is going to help you better manage priority and time Management. This is just clear. You know when you’re setting your goals and your Milestones, it’s going to manage your time in to a maximum benefit. You know, it’s going to give you a Clear Vision for where you’re going and the things that you shouldn’t do. You know what you’re constantly saying it will is that the best use of my time towards my objective? Now, your objectives are your goals, but those Milestones along the way keep you on track.

And so as you see here Milestones are becoming more and more important. Number eight is clear decision making. Your decision making will become clear because knowing what you’re trying to achieve means every action is getting me closer to my Milestones. Which get me closer to the goal. It’s going to be number nine it’s gonna drive motivation. You see motivations the primary ingredient for achievement. To achieve goals, we have to have motivation you’re going to find enough motivation if listen, your end goal comes from the heart. It’s coming internally and you’re going to, it’s going to see those milestones. Because you win little battles. Okay, sometimes you can’t see the goal down the street.

Before you tell you I’ll no way you see those little wins. And you know number 10 is just gonna be a measurement for Progress. Along the way we measure. I know I’m looking at my white board and I have a number goal for how many deals I want to close in the first quarter. Milestones are every week. I’m looking at it every week, that I’m looking at it every month. Then we’re looking out. What do we want to accomplish in 90 days? That’s a long-term goal, but their short-term goal. The Milestone is, every Sunday afternoon. I look at what happened from Monday morning to Sunday afternoon. Those are my milestones.

And number 11. It makes you accountable and accountability is really tough to find. You know for me, this is the most important benefit of goal setting. Milestones and goal-setting I believe, creates a stake in the ground and it helps you become accountable for yourself. And I think when you’re managing a team, I’m talking to some of my clients about this very thing. And in fact last week’s podcast was on measuring in metrics, but as I was talking to Daryl Dixon yesterday from 360, and they collect data and they are incredible company. But we are both agreeing, if nothing is done with the data, if accountability is not put in place, then it’s a waste of time.

Number 12 is it it’s going to help you set boundaries and boundaries are something like what don’t you do? What are you saying no to? So you can do say yes to a greater yes. In a book good to Great five years from now where you will be, is based more on what you say no to than what you say yes to. And those Milestones will I’ll keep you on course. It’s going to reduce stress number 13. Because if you have your adopted goals if you have your milestones, and if you’re pursuing that and you’re not getting distracted, and your boundaries are set, you’re going to have less stress in your life. It’s going to be easier to maintain and at the end of the day, milestones and goals keep everybody on track it helps you bring your projects in on time, on scope, on budget.

You know. Hey, I got a gift for you. And because today is Milestone 200 for us. We have two e-courses that normally are a $197. And two people out there are going to win them. And all you have to do is like this podcast, share this podcast, and write a positive statement after you give us a five star review and you’re going to get put into a drawing. Whereby we’re going to pick two out and they’re going to get a $197 ecourse. One is on Linkedin, one is on sales. That will be your choice for only $1. So thank you for being part of this podcast. Thank you for being loyal. We’re headed to number 300 as our next Milestone. Just have a great day.

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Thanks for listening. New episodes will air each Tuesday and Thursday. So make sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts and give us a five star review. The Sales Edge is sponsored by Pici and Pici Incorporated. A firm which provides training, consulting, and keynote presentations. Empowering corporations and individuals to attract and retain quality clients, for higher revenues and growth. Make more money in sales, speak with Joe in person by calling 407 947 2590 or visit www.piciandpici.com