What’s the REAL “secret” to MSP marketing and sales success? I can boil it down to ONE thing that will drive your results like nothing else.

But first, a true story that reveals the secret. See if you can identify it before I deliver the punchline…

Many moons ago, I hired a tenured sales rep to sell sponsorships for our events. He had all the experience and qualifications I was looking for. But before I handed him the offer letter, I sat him down and laid out his quota, our sales process and the “formula” for success: reach out to 56 prospects a week, using this script and cadence of calls, emails and LinkedIn outreach. He said he got it. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

That formula wasn’t a guess because I’d already run this play a hundred times and knew what it produced: 5 to 10 real conversations, 2 good opportunities and, like clockwork, 1 closed sale. It would also begin building the pipeline and accounts he needed to continue meeting and exceeding quota.

After a week of training, I loaded the first 56 prospects into the CRM and told him to get after it. He agreed and left the meeting full of promise and excitement.

At the end of the week, we had our one-on-one meeting. I asked, “How many prospects did you reach out to?” He’d worked 20. Not 56. Twenty. What the HELL was he doing all week? The excuses appeared like a Vegas magic act — computer crashed, couldn’t get into his email, he’s new (as if “new” is a medical condition that prevents dialing a phone).

Fine, I said, roll the other 36 into next week so you can get back on track. He agrees. No questions, no problems. End of week two, we’re having the same conversation. He did better but only got to about 40. Now it’s his sick dog, his dead car battery — I kept waiting for a grandmother to die, because at that rate we were only a week or two out. This time, I’m not as forgiving. He should have been at 112 prospects worked with at least 10-20 conversations and 1 or 2 interested. He was at about half of that and NO bites.

I tell him he has to hit at least 70 next week because he’s behind and remind him that the process I mapped out when I offered him the position wasn’t a suggestion – it was the job I hired him (and expected him) to do. I go through the process again to make sure he’s “got” it. He does. He agrees to do it and promises this week will be his breakthrough week.

Can you guess what happened? We get to the end of week three and we’re having our one-on-one. Same non-performance, different excuse. I fired him on the spot. No severance pay, no “let’s try again.” People told me that was harsh. I disagree. In three weeks, he SHOWED me exactly who he was, and I believed him.

Here’s the secret:

If you want to hit any sales, marketing or growth goal, hold your team accountable to LEADING indicators, not LAGGING results. THAT is how you get a marketing plan to work: you drive the INPUTS that will produce the OUTPUTS you want.

You know this from your own experience. Sales don’t magically appear after weeks or months of half-assed efforts and zero prospecting. If the sales guy I hired wasn’t going to put in the activities, the results weren’t going to be there. It’s not difficult to comprehend, and I didn’t need to keep him on the payroll for 6 months to figure this out.

Had he been doing the activities and NOT getting the results, I wouldn’t have fired him. In my org, if someone is not hitting a goal but is putting in the work and giving it a solid effort, I’ll keep working with them. But if they’re NOT getting the results and NOT putting in the work, they’re gone.

After 25 years of working with MSPs to grow sales, this is the real reason behind almost every “my marketing doesn’t work” complaint that lands on my desk. Strategy is important, of course. You want to make sure you’re targeting the right type of prospect with a great message and good offer.

But EVEN IF those strategies aren’t “perfect,”  a mediocre plan that is fully and aggressively implemented beats a brilliant one you’re still “working on” or thinking about because the mediocre plan put in play at least teaches you something. It gives you data so you can adjust your plan and approach.  You can’t steer a parked car.

Most MSPs are sitting on a graveyard of good ideas: workbooks from my events with three inches of dust on the cover, a folder literally named “Marketing — TO DO” that hasn’t been opened since Obama was president. None of that is a strategy problem. That’s a we-talked-about-it-instead-of-doing-it problem, and there isn’t a guru, training program or app on earth that fixes it.

So, if your sales aren’t where they need to be, you don’t need a new marketing plan or “hack” to succeed in this “new AI economy.” Start counting the LEADING indicators. Chances are, they’re insufficient. By a LOT.

Stop setting goals based on lagging results and start setting goals for the LEADING indicators and the activities that will produce those results.

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Are you struggling with execution? Need someone to help you build the leading indicators and show you how to hold your team accountable to them? My one-on-one consulting builds you the plan with the backwards math behind it, then helps you drive the LEADING indicators every single week until you get results.