The other day I was driving home from a client meeting and I noticed a left sneaker on the road just sitting there.  I wondered to myself, who owns this sneaker and are they aware that the sneaker is missing?  If you were walking along and all of a sudden your left foot got cold wouldn’t you look down and think “hey where did my sneaker go?” or would you just keep walking? Even if this person lost it out of a gym bag then went home and saw they were missing their sneaker wouldn’t they re-trace their steps to try to find their sneaker? (Sounds like something from Seinfeld.)

Many business owners are missing their left sneaker as well when it comes to business.  Things were working fine; they are making sales and all of a sudden business starts to slow down.  There was a change but they just didn’t notice it. Something just slipped. One of the reasons they don’t notice is simply because they are too busy working their business and really can’t take the time to research what happened or look for their lost sneaker so they keep walking without it since they just can’t handle one more thing to do.

When you keep working your business to the point when you can’t make a move without losing control of your senses then it is time to bring in the professionals and outsource.  There are many highly qualified persons that can help you so you can run your business more efficiently and become more profitable.

Some easily outsourced services are marketing and advertising, bookkeeping, phone answering and message taking, lead cultivation, commissioned salespersons, etc.  Most of the time these services are low cost.  Just make sure you ask for at least 5 references.

For example, a big problem is when a company tries to do all of their marketing themselves.  Even if they, by some miracle, do the creative correctly there is the matter of where they send their direct mail, how they advertise on the radio, what newspapers, magazines and websites to place their ads, etc.

It’s usually not their fault, as many business owners don’t understand the role of a good marketing and advertising agency.  They might understand the traditional role of a corporate “Marketing Department” but not the intense concentrated effort they receive from an outside agency.  In addition to creating business identities, marketing campaigns, websites and collateral they could also find you leads, build relationships, public relations, trade show design, marketing surveys, competitive analysis and more to help the company make attract more customers and thus increase sales.  Now having an in house Marketing Department is great but many companies large and small also use an advertising agency to help expose their brand.  So why shouldn’t you?  Especially if making the cash register ring more is your goal.

So the lesson of the lost sneaker is simple, don’t waste time looking for it, just buy a new pair.