Small Business Veteran Speaks About Industry Trends

Valerie Schlitt, owner of VSA, Inc. was invited to speak to the Camden County Rotary Club about economic and business trends. It’s been over 14 years since her last speech to the Rotary back in 2003 when her fledgling business was just two years old.

VSA, Inc. is a lead generation firm and sales support agency. Its staff of callers, called Client Associates, make telephone calls and send emails to companies across the country to set sales appointments for VSA’s clients. When it began in 2001, VSA had two employees. Today, it employs over 60 part-time callers and five full-time managers. Over the years, it has carved out a niche of high-end companies who need help filling their sales funnels but don’t want to invest in building their own lead generation and appointment setting team.

For the talk, Valerie used the data she has gathered from trends in her own business, as well as trends she has observed from her client base.

“It’s important that companies and organizations understand the landscape of the current business world. This is information that not only helps them remain relevant, but also provides a necessary context from which they can make decisions regarding their future growth,” says Valerie Schlitt, owner and founder of VSA, Inc.

The five business and economic trends Ms. Schlitt centered her talk around are as follows:

1. The Internet and the cloud have streamlined data management and sharing for all businesses, large and small, and are here to stay.
2. The healthcare industry is growing, and any changes in regulation will spur even more growth. Companies in this industry have enormous growth potential, regardless of the state of the economy.
3. This is an excellent time to start your own business. New technologies and the ability to outsource vital services such as IT, marketing, and HR help entrepreneurs lower costs and leverage experts in a way that enables them to grow and deliver for their clients.
4. The labor market has completely changed and finding good employees is a challenge all businesses face. This new trend drives up starting salaries so it is important that businesses build this into their budget.
5. Due to the technological strides in data capacity and capability, the sales process and, in turn, the sales profession itself has changed forever. “No more 3 martini lunches,” as Ms. Schlitt aptly puts it. Now, it’s all about metrics and return on investment and it starts with finding qualified leads.