"The choices are simple - either you cut costs or increase sales."
ValiantCEO Magazine had the pleasure of interviewing Karen Green, the founder of Buyerology Ltd, a boutique sales consultancy based in Europe. Karen shared with us her experience of running two successful businesses and becoming a bestselling author of two books.
Her Buyerology framework is helping SMEs deliver consistent profitable sales growth, and Karen is using her expertise to offer bespoke training and coaching programs.
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Table of Contents
We are thrilled to have you join us today, welcome to ValiantCEO Magazine’s exclusive interview! Let’s start off with a little introduction. Tell our readers a bit about yourself and your company.
Karen Green: I am a successful entrepreneur running two businesses
- Training and coaching consultancy – Buyerology ® which helps SMEs to grow their sales through my 5-step BUYER process
- Property rental business – Chez-Antibes – I have two waterfront rental properties in Antibes, south of France, which I rent on a short and mid-term basis
I am best selling author of two books – “Buyer-ology® – Know Your Buyer, Sell More and Sell Better” and “Recipe for Success – The Ingredients of a Profitable Food Business”
I use these books to market my business and also to underpin my expert status in the retail space
I moved to the south of France in 2015 and have never looked back! I bought a mansion in a mountain village about 45 minutes drive from the coast. It had not been lived in for 30 years and so needed a complete renovation to my taste – totally proud of it!
If you were in an elevator with Warren Buffet, how would you describe your company, your services or products? What makes your company different from others? What is your company’s biggest strength?
Karen Green: We help SMEs deliver consistent profitable sales growth through training and mentoring their sales teams to think differently about their customers and create effective sales pitches that work
Our company stands out from the rest for two reasons – we deliver sales growth training by professionals who have a unique background – not just vast sales experience but also having been retail buyers or procurement managers so they have sat on both sides of the table for a 360-degree understanding of what works – and what doesn’t.
The second standout is the unique Buyerology® framework on which companies can build their route-to-market strategy to ensure they achieve profitable sales growth; based on the no 1 bestseller.
We are a boutique consultancy offering bespoke training and our biggest strength is our network of industry experts who are on call to provide specific training modules, whether that is the fundamentals of Buyer-ology® or key elements of expertise such as Linkedin, trade PR and much more.
What advice do you wish you received when you started your business journey and what do you intend on improving in the next quarter?
Karen Green: It is difficult to know when I started my business journey as I have had several businesses over the years.
But the one piece of advice that has stayed with me is “focus works,” and if I had focused on one project at a time, I might have been more productive and delivered more. I am inclined to start several projects and am not a natural completer/finisher.
However, I am very proud to have completed and launched my second book – Buyer-ology®, and to have run a good marketing campaign that delivered a number 1 best seller in Kindle marketing and sales category.
During the next quarter, I am going to focus on monetising this with the launch of new training and coaching programmes using the book as the lead magnet.
I am going to work hard at not being distracted by shiny object syndrome and also giving myself plenty of downtime to allow the creativity to flow.
Here is a two fold question: What is the book that influenced you the most and how? Please share some life lessons you learned. Now what book have you gifted the most and why?
Karen Green: The book that has influenced me the most, honestly changes with every new recommendation that people share with me. I am a compulsive consumer of business books and always have one on audible and often one by my bed.
Currently, I am currently still loving “Buy Back Time” by Dan Martell, as it really has enabled me to identify ways to literally buy back time and become more efficient. The tips that he shares are so practical that you cannot help but get started right away.
However the one that probably influenced me most during my life has been “Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway” by Sue Jeffers – it has been my life mantra and often I am so grateful to have quietly repeated it to myself as I am thinking about running away from a project because it seems too scary.
However as I have a high appetite for risk, I have learnt that sometimes it is best NOT to feel the fear and do it anyway, but to actually listen to those gut feelings that warn of running in too soon. I have made a couple of serious life mistakes because I ran into an opportunity.
The best example of this was when I bought a local health club on credit card, secured my house against the business debt, and was personally bankrupt within 3 years. I now do have a fear of losing it all again, and honestly, I don’t always “do it anyway” anymore on big decisions!!
Christopher Hitchens, an American journalist, is quoted as saying that “everyone has a book in them” Have you written a book? If so, please share with us details about it. If you haven’t, what book would you like to write and how would you like it to benefit the readers?
Karen Green: I have written three books. The first was a recipe book for my two children when they went to university – I wrote the recipes, a guide to store cupboard ingredients and had it professionally designed and printed – 5 copies for the kids and a couple spare!!
In 2017, I wrote my first business book – “Recipe for Success – The Ingredients of a Profitable Food Business,” which became an Amazon bestseller and was shortlisted for the Business book awards. It helped to start my business Food mentor, where I worked with food and drink SMEs, enabling them to go from concept to 7 figure businesses.
As mentioned earlier, this year, I have written my second book, “Buyer-ology® – Know Your Buyer, Sell More and Sell Better”. It combines all my experience as a retail buyer, commercial director and business coach and teaches exactly what it says on the title.
It is also a number 1 best seller, and I am sure will be the basis for many interesting business adventures over the next few years
2020, 2021, 2022 threw a lot of curve balls into businesses on a global scale. Based on the experience gleaned in the past years, how can businesses thrive in 2023? What lessons have you learned and what advice would you share?
Karen Green: 2023 has been a challenging year so far due to the fall out from the pandemic. We are facing into significant inflation, banks failing and social unrest as people struggle with the difficult financial situation they find themselves in.
The key focus for 2023 is working out to continue to be a profitable business, The choices are simple – either you cut costs or increase sales. And at the moment, cutting costs is really not viable – it is more about mitigating the increases that we are facing.
As a result, we need to work out how to sell more of our products and services so that we can fuel growth. The successful companies in past recessions are those who have continued to invest the same or even increased marketing budgets.
They have outstripped their competitors who have “tightened their belts,” and I am sure this will apply again in 2023 – whether we have a recession or not, it is tough times that are going to be overcome by lean businesses who trade their way out
On a lighter note, if you had the ability to pick any business superpower, what would it be and how would you put it into practice?
Karen Green: I think the business superpower of choice would be the ability to clone myself, so there were two of me!!! Not because I am egoistic, but I am sure many CEOs feel the same way; there are so many things I would love to get done but just don’t have the time.
As this is not possible (although with AI technology who knows!), then my superpower is to be able to delegate and enable others. We cannot do it all ourselves, and knowing what needs to be done and the right people to do it is totally game-changing.
Jerome Knyszewski, VIP Contributor to ValiantCEO and the host of this interview would like to thank Karen Green for taking the time to do this interview and share her knowledge and experience with our readers.
If you would like to get in touch with Karen Green or her company, you can do it through her – Linkedin Page
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