I spent some time with a friend this week who is a world-class business developer “offline” but who hasn't managed to make an impact online (despite spending a small fortune trying to do so).

He's got some brilliant online courses too. More than just the usual slides and audio, but live training with exercises, online quizzes, all sorts.

He just hasn't sold many of them.

The problem is that he's a bit of a “seat of the pants” person.

He's great live. Huge personality, loads of people love him. And because he's smart and hardworking he make time to follow up with key prospects.

But he's not a great systems guy. He thinks in terms of presentations and meetings and calls. Each one is a one-off event.

What he doesn't do is think of the big picture. How leads flow into a pool of prospects you then nurture and make offers to. And how you can tweak each stage to get more leads, more conversion into prospects, more conversion into clients.

Over the years my business has become more and more online focused and I think it's this ability to think in systems terms rather than seeing everything as a one-off event that has stood me in good stead.

Not that I'd say I'm a natural. It took a long time with a whiteboard and pen (and most importantly a whiteboard eraser) to figure out and simplify how the pieces fit together best.