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Ep. 064 – At the age of 13, Adriana Cecere decided she would own a business. She opened her 1st business at 17, and since then she has started, developed, and sold at least 10 businesses.

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Adriana Cecere Show Notes

Adriana Cecere runs an alignment and growth consultancy for leaders across the globe, based in Sydney, Australia.

The methodology has been proven and developed by modeling strategies Adriana used whilst starting, developing, and selling more than ten companies over the past two decades.
The programs have depth and are outcome focused. Bespoke. Not limited.

The extensive experience and seasoned skills developed, allow Adriana to quickly identify core issues in the business and the client’s strengths and weaknesses. Adriana’s approach helps her clients with empathy and measured accountability.

Entrepreneurs, high achieving successful leaders, board members, and industry professionals call Adriana for help.

Labeled “the Back Pocket CEO ”, Adriana is the author of an Amazon #1 best-selling book. She works with business and industry leaders on their development, business alignment, transformation, and growth.

Her big picture is to make a positive impact by helping leaders across the globe and to make a difference in their lives their businesses, and the greater community.

As an Advisory Committee member of The Buttery Foundation Board, she supports and promotes development of their programs, which are designed to rebuild and empower people recovering from substance abuse.

Most passionate about

  • I’ve always been passionate about developing businesses, since I was 17 years old. I bought an hair dressing business, developed it, and then I turned it into franchises. I had this formula happening. So since then, for 19 years I started, developed, and sold at least 10 businesses in different industries.
  • And then, people started to approach me and ask me to help them develop their businesses.
  • I started helping entrepreneurs and small business owners to develop their businesses, and in time, we started to scale and work with more and more businesses, all based on this method I started with when I was 17.
  • A simple snapshot of the journey that we walk the client through:
  • Attached is the growth alignment process image.
    The middle (core) is the fundamentals, which is identified in the initial and discovery and alignment phase of any consulting and coaching program I run.
    The square then represents the transformation phase.
    The outer area represents the optimization phase.

  • A year ago, my team and I wanted to approach more businesses around the globe, so I remodeled the formula into an online structure. Allowing more businesses to go through my formula step by step, helping them to develop, get good results, and reach the next milestone. We launched the online model and it’s become a huge success.
  • So now, we are scaling globally and helping business leaders develop their businesses and get good results.
  • I always thought of writing a book. A few years ago, an author approached me and asked me to work with him to launch his book. After that, I decided to write my own book. And I wrote my first book called, Simple Strategies To Success; it went live a couple of months ago. The book is doing well and getting really good reviews and I’m a best selling author now!
  • The book is a base for a new webinar course of six weeks for entrepreneurs and business leaders. The course will be launched this coming August.

What is the base behind the structured formula you created that works so well?

  • Gathering the information up front is key, and then go into the system where we do the analysis of the business, understand where the business stands, and diving to where the core issues are.
  • Then I put together a formula and score things and during the next 3 to 6 months (depends how long we work with the specific business), we go through a process that translates to excellent results.
  • What I noticed when I started to help other businesses is that one of the biggest obstacles is that a consulting or a coaching business is invisible; If you need a car or a milk from the supermarket, you go in, you buy it and you see what you’re paying for. With a consultant, even when the customer thinks it’s working well, they still don’t see what they are paying for.
  • By developing this methodology, it made it easier for the client to embrace what they are paying for and engage with us, and since I felt that we also should prove what the results are to the customer, I added a section where the customer can see the actual steps and the results as they come into fruition.

Adriana best advice about approaching customers

  • I’m going to keep it simple; I think the best advice to anybody starting out is that if they got an idea they believe in, they need to run with it, rolling it out and achieving what they want to gain from this launch with their whole soul and body.
  • They should surround themselves with good people and keep open doors until they will achieve what they want to with that business.
  • Keep your eye on the vision. Keep your eye on the end game. You need to keep your eye on the end results and then opportunities will come across your path.

Biggest failure with a customer

  • Because I’m so tenacious and so determined, I didn’t realize that sometimes, it’s needed to put the break on and change direction.
  • It’s really important as a consultant or coach that you don’t hang around for too long. I was called into a very exciting project by a president of a board that was of a national body; I was called in to fix this business. And when I got in, it was a massive, messy business but with all my experience I thought it would be quite simple to find a solution.
  • The President and Vice President wanted me to lead this process, and I went to work, there was a lot of work to do there, and within six months, I was ready to give the business back to the people, because the process was successful.
  • But then, because of problems of national bodies, they couldn’t put the new CEO in just yet, so they asked me to stay as an interim CEO. But then the national body came in and they didn’t approve the new CEO; it took more than 17 months to figure out.
  • And what happened was that because of the time that has passed and the board members that were replaced, I felt that although the project was successful and the results were amazing, all the time spent and changes diluted the impact of the results.

Biggest success due to the right customer approach

  • As I said before, when we started to scale and we wanted to help more businesses, I decided to step back and rebuild the model, so we could serve people remotely.
  • When I did that, it felt a bit strange, because working online was new to me, but when we started to get rolling it was an amazing success. I was nominated for a reward by a consulting magazine in New York; I got this email and I thought it was a joke. I was recognized in London and was invited to London to get the reward for the Global Leader for  Excellent Innovation. I went to London on December 2017 to receive this reward.
  • That made me feel like, “Yes, I chose right and I made the right decision to help people more with the online model.”

Recommendation of a tool for customer focus, marketing, or sales:

  • Anything that can help a business, especially starting out, to systemize and get teams working together in a cost effective way is good. A lot of my clients use Trello to help them start working together.
  • For companies that are more established, I think the best will be to look at customizing all the different departments to work together.

Adriana’s key success factor

  • I think that something that has been consistent since I was 17 is  the ability to connect with people and deliver a positive outcome.
  • I think  it’s part of my values, and every business that I have had has mirrored these values. It’s my key to success.
  • Also surrounding myself with great people that support those values and have skills that I don’t.

The best way to connect with Adriana

Adriana’s book

Recommended tool

  • Trello – “lets you work more collaboratively and get more done.”

More resources for Entrepreneurs

  1. Don’t Miss – Customer Focus Strategy & Execution: Market Analysis for Fundraising
  2. Hayut Yogev’s Latest post: The three free, most practical steps to researching and locating your market
  3. Former interview: Over the last 10 years Hayut Yogev has worked with more than 120 startups and entrepreneurs on their strategy, marketing, and sales approach. Their success rates are exceptional.

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