Insight: The importance of persistence in business

And extract from an interview with Paul Essery. Full interview available here

Success in business comes from persisting and learning!

What I mean by that is one of the things I got wrong and indeed I've seen other people get wrong, is to keep grasping at new things. 

Sales and marketing people, including me, are guilty of causing this. We sell things as if "this is going to be your magic answer! This is the thing that's going to solve your problems." This is going to generate loads of leads, loads of interest.

It very rarely happens like that. These bright new things never work straight away.  So don't expect that. 

But also the mirror image. Any of them can work if you spend the time understanding how to make them work for you. 

So to illustrate that, our most successful growth period was using email marketing when everyone was saying, that's not going to work, that's not going to work, email marketing's dead. People don't read emails, too much spam around, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Well, it does work, but only if you understand how to make it not look like email marketing and to approach people personally. 

I see the same again and again. I've got a client who still generates all their business through cold calling! Can you believe that? 

In today's world, cold calling. But it still works because they know how to do it really really well for their client base. 

So for me it's about stick to something, learn how to make it work, and then keep doing it rather than keep grasping at this magic solution the salespeople are trying to sell.