Sunday, November 01, 2026
Four well-known ways to get help growing your business, compared on who each suits, what is publicly known about cost, and the seven questions to ask before you sign. Checked 1 November 2026.
Every SME salesperson has felt it — the meeting that goes brilliantly, the contact who says "this is exactly what we need," the deal that then goes quiet for six weeks and dies. Search "how to close more sales" and you'll find scripts for the pitch. Almost nothing addresses the real reason B2B deals stall: your champion isn't the one signing the cheque, and they were never going to be enough on their own.
Most SME sales training still centres on a single relationship — build rapport, understand pain, present the solution, close. That model works for consumer sales and small-ticket transactions. It breaks down the moment your deal size grows enough to involve a buying committee, which research on B2B purchasing consistently shows now averages six to ten stakeholders even in mid-sized companies. Your champion can carry your case internally, but they can't win an argument they weren't in the room for.
1. Map the Room — Before you invest more time, ask your champion directly who else needs to say yes, and what each of them cares about.
2. Arm, Don't Just Ask — Give your champion a one-page internal case they can forward, written in the language of the person who'll actually read it, not a sales deck.
3. Get Your Own Seat — Ask for a short call with the economic buyer or final approver directly, even fifteen minutes. A champion who can't get you that meeting is telling you something about how strong the deal really is.
"Kevin is an absolute powerhouse! He doubled our business's profits in the first month alone with lots more of his recommendations still to be rolled out."
— Curtis Hacon, Give A Sh!t
Most SME sales teams know the deal has stalled. What they don't do is go back into the account and multi-thread it, because it feels like admitting the relationship they built isn't enough. It isn't a personal failure — it's a structural one, and it's exactly the kind of pattern a sales process review with a coach catches before it costs you the quarter.
If your pipeline is full of deals that went quiet after a great first meeting, that's the pattern Kevin fixes first with you.
...and you become the owner whose good first meetings turn into signed deals.
Saturday, October 10, 2026
Managers now spend over a fifth of their working week in meetings, and senior leaders admit most of it is wasted. A fixed meeting rhythm fixes more than your calendar.
Saturday, October 10, 2026
Most SME owners set ad budgets and discount limits by gut feel. One number, worked out properly, tells you exactly what a customer is worth and what you can afford to spend to win one.
Saturday, October 10, 2026
Most small businesses pour their whole marketing budget into this week's sale. The research on 30 years of advertising says that is exactly the wrong ratio.
Saturday, October 10, 2026
Most SME owners are confident they will hit this year's goals, and most will not. The fix is not more effort, it is a plan that fits on one page and gets checked every week.
Friday, October 09, 2026
The share of owners blaming the economy for not planning long-term has tripled in a year. Here's the one-page plan that actually fixes it, not excuses it.
Friday, October 09, 2026
A new market, a new product line, a second location: most lose money the same way, by skipping the three numbers that would have told them how big the opportunity really was.
Friday, October 09, 2026
Most people picture coaching as a conversation. The sessions that actually move a business are a loop, repeated every week, until it becomes how the owner thinks.
Friday, October 09, 2026
A forty-item to-do list with none of the three that mattered finished is not a time management problem. It is a filter problem, and the Eisenhower Matrix is the filter.
Friday, October 09, 2026
A good salesperson gets four real conversations a day. A good presentation, given once, can reach four hundred. Here is why most SME sales teams never use it.
Friday, October 09, 2026
Customers do not leave because a competitor shouted louder. They leave because, in the exact moment they needed someone, your brand was not the one they thought of.
Friday, October 09, 2026
Most SME owners track one number: the bank balance. The businesses that compound track four, using Kaplan and Norton's Balanced Scorecard, and catch the problem before it ever reaches the bank account.
Thursday, October 08, 2026
Thursday, October 08, 2026
Nearly half of NZ SME owners plan to raise prices this year. Only 4 percent of companies have a value proposition clear enough to justify it.
Thursday, October 08, 2026
Revenue can climb for years while the actual value of the business barely moves. Here are the eight drivers that decide which one you are really building, and why owner independence usually matters most.
Thursday, October 08, 2026
If every session with your coach leaves you comfortable, that is the warning sign, not the proof it is working. Here is why direct feedback outperforms kind feedback, backed by Gallup's data.