I had breakfast today with Jeffrey Stewart, noted entrepreneur (Mimeo, among others) and angel capital investor. Among the many things that we discussed was his notion that the business owner should not be selling. His reasoning is that it is impossible to focus on building a company and making sales at the same time. Despite my actions to the contrary (I do sell), I wholeheartedly agree. So given the fact that the business owner is typically the best performing sales person in a company, how do you get to a position where you don't have to sell? First, make hiring the most important thing that you do. Second, train them really, really well. That includes documenting and sharing all of the things that make you, you.
By the way, some time ago I read an article in Inc. that said business owners can be terrible salespeople. The reason was that as an owner, you are used to being in control. In sales, you lose that control so you do a lot of things to avoid losing control and often, put yourself in a position to miss the sale in order to save face.
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