5 Ultra Life Lessons

I ran a 100K on New Year’s Eve: Here’s 5 lesson I learned to take with you to the workplace this year.

1.       Don’t let the fear of DNFing keep you from starting.

In the weeks leading up to the longest race I have ever attempted, I was constantly second-guessing myself. My wife and I debated the pros and cons of traveling out of state during the holiday season to participate in a race we had already paid for, but not thoroughly trained for, and so on. In the end, I toed the starting line. I wasn’t convinced I had what it took to make it to the finish line, but I sure as hell wasn’t going home without trying. Whatever it is that you’re afraid to start, or try, or create, because you’re not sure how it will turn out – take the journey and see where it ends.

2.       Take regular check-ins

Our bodies tell us a lot if we take the time to listen to them. Somewhere between mile 45 and 50, I intentionally did a head-to-toe check-in. I consciously zeroed in on every muscle group, every joint, and decided whether it was in danger or if it could go another few miles. What I realized is that everything hurt. But slowly down, stopping, walking, none of that would make it hurt any less. So I kept going. Regular mental and physical check-ins, individually or team-based, are crucial to continued health and productivity in every part of life. They allow you to determine if you’re moving forward at a healthy pace, if you need to throttle back, hit the gas, or throw on the brakes altogether.

3.       Proactively pursue a healthy R&R cadence

In October, I made the classic mistake of many a newbie-ultrarunner: I hydrated and refueled reactively. When I felt thirsty, I drank. When I felt hungry, I ate. This led to a massive crash and burn, and a much-too-long recovery process afterward. During my 100K on New Year’s Eve, I was hyper-sensitive to maintaining a regular nutrition and hydration cadence. This intentionality is probably the only reason I was able to finish the race. Don’t wait until you’re sick to take a day off. Don’t wait until you’ve gone postal to turn in your notice. Don’t wait until you’re tense to get a massage. Schedule a regular massage. Pick up a hobby and pursue it religiously. Take up yoga. Proactively pursue a healthy mental and physical rhythm.

4.       Eventually, new speeds become normal

Like I mentioned above, somewhere in the final fourth of the race, I realized that speeding up or slowing down didn’t affect how much my legs and joints hurt. Everything hurt as much as it could possibly hurt – and I was still running. Similarly, at work recently, my team and I have been working faster, harder, and longer than ever before to grow a new division. Last time we checked in, we all agreed that we never knew before that we could work that hard, and still be okay. Don’t be afraid to take on another project. Beat the deadline by a week. Come in 20 minutes earlier. Skip your Facebook break. Whatever it is, start to push yourself, and pretty soon you just might realize that what you previously thought was an unattainable level of productivity is now the new normal, and it feels okay.

5.       Finish on purpose

If I’m honest with myself and all of you, I enjoy the spotlight. There’s enough of a freak-factor to running ultramarathons that I ended up having quite the real-time Facebook following by the end of the twelve and a half hour race. I also knew going into the last mile that my mother was going to get my finish on video. So what did I do? Thanks to my wife running beside me and barking orders at me like a coach, I kicked it in. I gave everything I had left, picked up my pace, burned every ounce of fuel I had left and sprinted to the finish line. And that’s not all… when I got there, I jumped and slapped the “FINISH” banner. Whatever you’re working on, finish it strong, and go out with a bang. It matters. People remember.

Why Should You Consider Fractional Inside Sales?

What kind of benefits come from partnering with an inside sales organization like InceptGrows? Caleb has the answer:

Ohio Inbound Marketing Day

Ohio Inbound Marketing Day is coming up in just a few weeks! On December 9th, we'll be travelling down to Columbus, Ohio to spend the day learning from industry experts about inbound sales and marketing. If last year's #OIMD is any indicator, it's sure to be another day filled with big learnings and fun people!

Topics We're Excited To Learn More About

Inbound Marketing

Fresh off a trip to Inbound, we're hungry for more!  Isaac Moche, Principal Inbound Professor with HubSpot Academy, will be sharing Hubspot best practices for marketing automation, email marketing, and lead nurturing.  These are all strategies that help to enable our fractional inside sales activity on behalf of our clients and things we are working towards becoming experts on ourselves. 

Social Media

One of Gary Vaynerchuck's most actionable pieces of advice during his keynote at Inbound was for companies, specifically B2B companies, to invest in Facebook sponsored posts. This is something we've tested and seen promising results from, especially when using video, so we can't wait to learn more from Stephanie Carls and her expertise in that area.

Content Marketing

If you've ever been to Content Marketing World or heard Joe Pulizzi speak, then you've definitely heard about this guy. Marcus Sheridan is the poster boy for content marketing.  He used it to keep River Pools and Spas afloat during the recession in 2008 and is the Founder of The Sales Lion, an inbound marketing agency. His advice on how to attract leads, no matter your budget, will be beneficial for all of us.

How To Register

#OIMD will take place at Quest Conference Center, located on the north end of Columbus, Ohio near the Polaris Shopping Center on December 9th. Whether you're a Hubspot customer or not, we invite you to join us if you have any interest in inbound marketing, sales enablement or growth-driven design.

Join Us At Flight!

Launch League is hosting their first conference dedicated to midwest startups called Flight. Entrepreneurs, investors, and supporting partners will all be convening in downtown Akron on December 1st and 2nd to learn from experts about startup marketing, fundraising, business operations, hardware development, design, and development.

We're excited to be sponsoring this year's event, sharing our story about InceptGrows and dedication to supporting the startup community. We'll be attending sessions, talking sales and marketing at our exhibitor table, and networking at the VIP cocktail hour and after party.  

Are you an entrepreneur? Working on a startup? Need help perfecting your sales and marketing? We invite you to join us at Flight on December 1st and 2nd. For more information and to register, please click here or on the 'Register To Attend' button below. For 50% off, use code: INCEPT50.

Integrating Email Into Your Inside Sales Strategy

Integrating email into your inside sales strategy is essential for sales success. Gone are the days where prospects pick up the phone and willingly chat about their business problems. While that can still a great place to start your strategy, most prospects need to be nurtured through other channels before they are ready to trust you and your solution. Email is one of the best channels to start with.

Below you'll find a few best practices for getting your inside sales emails opened, read, and compliant.

Subject Lines

Using the right subject line for your follow-up inside sales email is extremely important.  It is one of the only things that determines if the email will be opened or not, so you have to get it right. 

We always follow voicemails with an email to the prospect, so we make sure the subject line reflects that. We also want to humanize ourselves, so we typically add the sales person's name as well.  One of our favorite subject lines to use and the one with the highest average open rate is as follows:

Subject line: Voicemail from Sarah Nelson

There are so many variations that could and should be tested in terms of subject lines, but try to keep to these best practices - keep subject lines short, direct, and personalized if possible.  

Content of Email

Once the reader opens the email, you have to provide the right content to peak their interest and encourage a reply. We take the challenger approach to all of our sales interactions, including email.  The Challenger Sale Model let's you use your deep understanding of the prospect's business problems to push the customer’s thinking and teach them something new about their business and/or industry so they can compete more effectively.

By using this model, you position yourself as business advisors and thought leaders for the prospect. Even if they don't need your service today, the email will serve as a bookmark in their mind for when that prospect does run into the business problem you outlined.

Even if the content is right, you have to format the email in a way that allows the reader to skim and scan. Bullet points, bolding, and italics are your best friend - but please don't go overboard.  There is a very fine line between making an email easy to read and coming off as spammy. 

Sales Cadence

Did you know that 44% of salespeople give up after one follow-up but 80% of sales require five follow-ups? Determining your sales cadence past this initial call and email is extremely important. 

Sales Hacker CEO, Max Altschuler, revealed to RingDNA that his ideal inside sales cadence is as follows:

• Day 1: Email/Inmail
• Day 3: Email in the morning, Call in the afternoon
• Day 5: Call in the morning, Call with a voicemail in the afternoon
• Day 7: Email in the morning, Call in the afternoon with a voicemail
• Day 10: Email and call in the morning

Notice that the integration of phone call and email is the cornerstone of this inside sales workflow. I suggest that you use this as a starting point, but test other variations for your sales cadence.

Email Compliance

Even though the name would lead you to believe it only applies to bulk and spam mail, the CAN-SPAM Act applies to sales emails too. There are seven very important requirements you must comply with in every sales email you send out:

1. Don’t use false or misleading header information. 

2. Don’t use deceptive subject lines. 

3. Identify the message as an ad. 

4. Tell recipients where you’re located. 

5. Tell recipients how to opt out of receiving future email from you.

6. Honor opt-out requests promptly. 

7. Monitor what others are doing on your behalf. 

If you choose not to comply with each of these requirements, there are penalties.  Each separate email in violation of the CAN-SPAM Act is subject to penalties of up to $16,000.  

If you have questions about your email compliance, please seek the assistance of a lawyer and review the CAN-SPAM laws here.

Conclusion

There is no magic bullet for inside sales and email marketing.  There are best practices we've learned while working with several industries on behalf of our clients, but it doesn't mean it's going to be right for you and your business.  

Always remember to test, measure the results of each test, make adjustments, and test again. As you get deeper into your inside sales strategy, you'll get closer and closer to finding the subject line, email content, and sales cadence that's best for you and your prospects.