Author: John Tapley

Finding your theme for success in the year ahead. Anew year and new place in time. Are you searching for new ideas to find the motivation to be your best self and drive for success in the year ahead? Do you need a fresh start? Do you need to find a different path? Or do you need something to inspire ideas for bigger business challenges on the road forward? And what is this “walk-up song,” you may be asking? If you’re not a follower of Major League Baseball, when a batter approaches the plate at home games, he may have…

Lessons in Life & Business Success Inspiration and wisdom will sometimes come our way from unexpected sources. And Jimmy Buffett might be in that unexpected category, but, when reflected in the proper context, his stories and lyrics are rich in wisdom and lessons for finding your way to a successful personal or business journey. His lifestyle as a laid back, beach loving troubadour with an entrepreneurial spirit developed into a global brand. And the music led to success with a diversified portfolio of hospitality, F&B, entertainment, and resorts. Jimmy was an entertainer, pilot, author, investor, and business owner. And he…

Sales and Marketing are two very crucial business functions with symbiotic relationships where each one’s success depends on the other. And they are typically referred to in order as sales and marketing. But why not marketing and sales? There could be unconscious weighting of importance by this order. Who comes first? But let’s talk about opportunities to build reciprocal synergies for business success as we go forward with growth strategies into 2024. While the definition of sales seems obvious, a brief description on each function follows: Marketing, as defined by the American Marketing Association (AMA), involves creating, communicating, delivering and…

Networking. It’s an art, it’s a skill, and it’s essential for high level success. You can be the best of the best at your trade but where does that lead if you don’t find ways to connect and expand to new areas for growth? Be your best self, elevate your brand and create the path to bigger successes. You could consider networking as your business agent, there to support you in winning new customers and expanding your boundaries to new levels. And there are plenty of personal growth benefits. Learning new technologies, making new friends and solving new problems, to…

Sales is a team sport. Let that soak in and repeat, sales is a team sport. Just coming out of the 2022 Winter Olympics and watching solo events where individual members are competing, rest assured there is a strong team surrounding them. Coaches, trainers, parents, and more. Nobody reaches the pinnacle of their sport alone. It does take a village. And not to be swayed that selling is a solo event, you won’t be successful as an individual, but must embrace the whole team around you and the team will win or lose together, not the individual. So where do…

“Cause I love the adrenaline in my veins, I do whatever it takes.” I know, you’re asking, what is he talking about? It’s from a song by Imagine Dragons, and it’s that song that I go to when I’m stuck. And it’s not exactly about the lyrics, I don’t think I could recite more than a couple of lines. It’s more about the beat, the bounce, and the title. It gets me going. I just love the thought that you can do whatever it takes to find your way through it, to finish, to go all out for the W,…

There are so many possibilities to open with, so many stories to tell, so many lessons learned from the unimaginable turmoil this year has turned to. Unpredictable and unprecedented are understatements. Who in their wildest dreams could have seen this coming? The business world was still and quiet for a while but thank goodness it’s picking up again. We’ve learned our lessons and discovered new ways to move forward. New customer buying habits are being created, but “business as usual,” or the way it was before, is not likely to resurface anytime soon, if ever. Virtual and cloud options have…

That phone in your pocket has more than 100,000 times the processing power of the computers used on Apollo 11. Wow, grasp that; the computing power of your iPhone is that much more powerful than the computer that sent a man to the moon 50 years ago! Granted, everything has advanced since then by exponential orders of magnitude, but it’s still impressive the technology you have available at your fingertips. If you’re not using your smartphone or tablet to its fullest capacity, you could be missing opportunities to grow your business and manage your sales territory more effectively. For the…

LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network, with more than 500 million members. Let me say that again. LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network. Why not leverage that to your advantage in finding new business opportunities in your territory, nurturing your customer base and building your brand as a subject matter expert to draw potential customers your way? The focus here is on the free version only. LinkedIn also offers paid business and premium versions with more robust search and communication features. I don’t intend to turn you into a social media expert. The sheer enormity of LinkedIn can…

Welcome to the world of an entrepreneur. The concept that failure can be okay can be so difficult to absorb. Do we really need to experience failure to learn and succeed? Maybe not, but tried and true success does come with bumps and bruises and lessons learned from the experience of failure. What is the “entrepreneurial mindset?” According to a common misconception, an entrepreneur is a bold, risk-taking, rules-breaking individual with the reputation of a riverboat gambler. Why would you want that in your company culture? But, in reality, an entrepreneur is confident and decisive, understands risk clearly and knows…