You Cannot Hit A Revenue Goal Without A Trackable Plan - Part 1

1 - > SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the sales and marketing playbook 2 - > Unleashed, the premier podcast for innovative growth 3 - > strategies, hosted by two seasoned experts. 4 - > Meet Evan Poland, the president of Poland Performance Group, a 5 - > master in sales coaching with over two decades of experience. 6 - > Evan is not just a consultant, he's a force in sales, focusing 7 - > on mindset planning and skill development. 8 - > He's also the co-author of Selling Professional Services 9 - > the Sailor Women.

10 - > Joining him is Craig Andrews, partner and CEO of Beholder 11 - > Agency, an expert in growth marketing. 12 - > With 20 years under his belt, Craig blends marketing 13 - > creativity with strategy to propel businesses forward, 14 - > making Beholder Agency a leader in effective marketing 15 - > solutions. 16 - > Together, Evan and Craig are here to share their wisdom on 17 - > winning strategies, best practices, and transformative 18 - > insights that will fuel your growth.

19 - > Get ready to revolutionize your sales and marketing approach 20 - > right here on the Sales and Marketing Playbook Unleashed. 21 - > SPEAKER_01: And welcome to the Sales and Marketing Playbook 22 - > Unleashed. 23 - > I am Craig Andrews and my partner in crime, Evan Poland. 24 - > How are you doing today, Evan?

25 - > I'm doing great. 26 - > How are you doing, Craig? 27 - > I'm doing awesome. 28 - > So I'm gonna start with this as a question in today's episode.

29 - > How long have we known each other? 30 - > Do you know? 31 - > SPEAKER_02: Um approximately too long. 32 - > Uh no, I mean uh probably 15 or 16 years now.

33 - > SPEAKER_01: Yes. 34 - > And so in 15 or 16 years, we've worked together on a lot of 35 - > projects and things like that. 36 - > And I think that today's episode, which is going to be 37 - > how to build predictable revenue using the revenue cookbook, 38 - > which is something that you and I developed to kind of help our 39 - > clients when we work together. 40 - > Um, ultimately, the cookbook has value.

41 - > And we're going to go through a little bit of detail. 42 - > This is going to actually be a two-part uh series. 43 - > Uh, the cookbook has a lot of values for a lot of reasons. 44 - > And what we're doing in this episode is hopefully explaining 45 - > to everybody the value of having a cookbook, using the cookbook, 46 - > and simplifying the process of having the cookbook.

47 - > Uh, so before we really get into it, Evan, can you kind of 48 - > explain generally what a cookbook is? 49 - > Because we really got from a marketing perspective, we got it 50 - > from our exclusive training from the best sales trainer in the 51 - > industry. 52 - > SPEAKER_02: Uh, somebody I I I I I want to meet that guy. 53 - > SPEAKER_01: So explain what the cookbook is.

54 - > SPEAKER_02: Sure. 55 - > And really, today in the part two of this episode, we really 56 - > are giving you the playbook for what you should be doing to 57 - > build the kind of business you want to build. 58 - > But the cookbook is really developing a plan and developing 59 - > a formula so that you can scientifically and 60 - > systematically determine how you're going to hit your goals. 61 - > Very often when I talk for with somebody for the first time, um, 62 - > I'll ask them about their goals.

63 - > They will throw out a revenue number. 64 - > I want to do half a million, a million, ten million dollars in 65 - > sales, whatever it is. 66 - > My follow-up question is typically, geez, Craig, that's 67 - > great. 68 - > How are you gonna get there?

69 - > And I get that deer and headlights look. 70 - > Oftentimes the person just felt like it sounded like a good 71 - > number when I'm dealing with um attorneys who are going and 72 - > starting their practice, maybe bringing one or two clients with 73 - > them. 74 - > They have a number in their head, but they really have no 75 - > idea what they need to do to hit that number. 76 - > Or again, sometimes I'll talk to a salesperson and they'll do a 77 - > number and they'll just inflate it by five or ten or fifteen 78 - > percent the next year, but really had not thought through 79 - > how they're going to hit that number.

80 - > The playbook is the first step to figure out exactly what needs 81 - > to be done for someone to be able to hit the number. 82 - > And then, and we're gonna get into this maybe later this 83 - > episode, next episode. 84 - > We can then look at building out a marketing plan, building out a 85 - > sales plan around that. 86 - > But if we don't know what the number is and we don't know how 87 - > we need to get to the number, yeah, well, then it's impossible 88 - > to put together a plan, and you certainly can't put together a 89 - > plan that you can track against.

90 - > SPEAKER_01: That's right. 91 - > And I want to kind of emphasize on what Evan referenced there, 92 - > you know, especially when it comes to the marketing side, 93 - > most people are uh chasing leads instead of chasing the revenue, 94 - > right? 95 - > So for our perspective, we'll get a call and say, Hey, I need 96 - > more leads. 97 - > How can you get me more leads?

98 - > And so we'll follow up with the same question that Evan has what 99 - > are your revenue goals? 100 - > And they'll go, uh well, uh well, let me get you a 101 - > spreadsheet of all the information that I have. 102 - > SPEAKER_02: I Craig, Craig, I want to do more. 103 - > SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I want to do more.

104 - > SPEAKER_02: In no more detail than that. 105 - > SPEAKER_01: Exactly. 106 - > And so we have the the fortune, I guess I'll say in a positive 107 - > way, we have the fortune of kind of looking through that 108 - > information and trying to decipher. 109 - > That's where the cookbook comes kind of comes into play.

110 - > Because a lot of times they may have the head of the 111 - > organization who comes up with this overall company goal, but 112 - > that individual from that marketing department or that 113 - > sales department of their companies, or if they may be the 114 - > same person in some cases, have to quantify how to get that 115 - > revenue goal. 116 - > And that's a value of the cookbook that we learned from 117 - > Evan. 118 - > And it simplifies the tasks so that you can understand what are 119 - > the emotions and the actions that we need to go through, how 120 - > many leads do I need to get, how many, how many qualifying leads 121 - > do we need to get?

122 - > And it'll really branch into a lot of deeper questions that we 123 - > need from a marketing perspective that if they don't 124 - > have the answer to, we got to get answered first. 125 - > Because it's very difficult for us to represent you from a 126 - > marketing perspective if you don't know who you're talking to 127 - > to get the revenue of your goals that you're trying to get. 128 - > Does that hit home for you, Evan? 129 - > SPEAKER_02: That hits home and it gets back to three of your 130 - > favorite words, which are data, data, data.

131 - > unknown: Yep. 132 - > SPEAKER_02: We can't create a cookbook in a fantasy land. 133 - > We really need to get to the data. 134 - > We really need to know what is your average sale worth, what is 135 - > your closing percentage, what percentage of first 136 - > conversations turn into opportunities?

137 - > If you don't know and understand those numbers, if you're not 138 - > tracking those things, it's really difficult to put together 139 - > a plan to be held accountable to if we have no idea what those 140 - > numbers are. 141 - > SPEAKER_01: Absolutely, absolutely. 142 - > And a lot of times, at least for us for sure, we reverse engineer 143 - > how to get to that end goal. 144 - > So if you're saying you want to be at half a million, million, 145 - > 10 million, as you referenced, we're gonna backtrack back to 146 - > the activities or create activities because marketing is 147 - > about awareness, right?

148 - > That's very important for people to realize we got to create 149 - > awareness to backtrack to get them to hit you and so you can 150 - > hit those goals. 151 - > A very important point. 152 - > Uh, as we as we move into the second part of this segment of 153 - > this episode, a key question I'm gonna ask you here is what 154 - > changes when you start to chase revenue instead of tactics? 155 - > Ooh, funny one today.

156 - > What happens when you chase the revenue focus versus the tactic 157 - > it takes to do it? 158 - > SPEAKER_02: So if you don't marry the two together and you 159 - > simply chase the revenue, you will find that you are wasting a 160 - > lot of time, you are wasting a lot of effort, you are doing a 161 - > lot of stuff without knowing what stuff is working and what 162 - > stuff is not working. 163 - > So um I can have a goal of a million dollars in revenue, and 164 - > I can work 80 hours a week and be in front of 20 opportunities 165 - > a week and work really, really hard.

166 - > I can also hit a million dollars in revenue by working 30 hours a 167 - > week, doing the things that are putting me in front of the right 168 - > opportunities, knowing exactly what works, exactly what doesn't 169 - > work. 170 - > So that's why it's so important to track. 171 - > And the other thing that is related to this, but a little 172 - > tangential. 173 - > One of the things that everybody listening to us should be doing 174 - > where they're tracking their sales activity.

175 - > I don't care if it's HubSpot, pipe drive, Salesforce, you've 176 - > got an Excel spreadsheet, you've got a Word document, whatever it 177 - > might be. 178 - > Every opportunity in your pipeline, you should be tracking 179 - > how that opportunity came in. 180 - > Or what two or three different things led to getting in front 181 - > of that opportunity. 182 - > For every piece of business that closes, you should track how you 183 - > got in front of that opportunity.

184 - > So, you know, one of your phrases, favorite phrases is 185 - > data, data, data. 186 - > One of my favorite phrases is work smart, don't work hard. 187 - > The more that we can see what is leading to revenue coming in, 188 - > what is leading to getting us in front of good opportunities, we 189 - > want to double down and triple down on those things. 190 - > And if we're looking and seeing we're spending a lot of time, 191 - > we're spending a lot of money, we're belonging to a number of 192 - > associations, doing marketing things that aren't working, we 193 - > want to be able to identify that, cut those things, and then 194 - > figure out where else we can redirect our time and money so 195 - > that we can get a better ROI.

196 - > So if we're going back to data, if we're tracking those things, 197 - > if we're building out a good cookbook, we can track and 198 - > measure all of those things in week in and week out, know 199 - > whether or not we're on and off track, where the overwhelming 200 - > majority of the population is going by a gut feeling and 201 - > doesn't really have the data to back what they're doing. 202 - > SPEAKER_01: Absolutely. 203 - > Now, I want to put a little caveat on there for the 204 - > listeners because again, this is the playbook.

205 - > We're trying to give you the direct answers. 206 - > Having the data for one month, one week, two weeks, three weeks 207 - > is not enough data. 208 - > Just to be clear, you have to do each one of these different 209 - > campaigns, whether it might be for at least three, four, five 210 - > months, then make the adjustment if it's not really working. 211 - > So I just want to be clear about that because a lot of people 212 - > will change their mind in a heartbeat, which will mean 213 - > nothing from a marketing perspective, because you 214 - > literally nobody's seen the message the first time before 215 - > you put it out.

216 - > The kind of the rule of thumb is you have to put out something 217 - > seven, eight, ten times before they even start to understand 218 - > that you exist. 219 - > So the caveat to what Evan's referencing is in terms of doing 220 - > things that don't waste time, don't have the quick trigger to 221 - > switch things out too quickly without having the data to 222 - > support is really not working. 223 - > If you went to a trade show and you had spent$10,000 on it and 224 - > you brought back$10,000, we'd have to quantify that as to why 225 - > that was important.

226 - > You were going to say something, Evan? 227 - > SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and from the sales side, typically what I'm 228 - > doing with my clients when they join professional associations 229 - > and those kinds of things, we're typically looking at that once a 230 - > year to see who are we meeting, did any leads come in come from 231 - > it? 232 - > Did we develop any relationships with good referral sources? 233 - > So, you know, as you said, I'm not joining an association and 234 - > two months later making a decision.

235 - > It's typically once a year I'm looking at where I'm investing 236 - > my time, where I'm investing my money, and then making strategic 237 - > decisions based on that. 238 - > SPEAKER_01: Absolutely. 239 - > Very important point. 240 - > We get that all the time.

241 - > Hey, can I can I do this for six months? 242 - > No, it's not even worth your effort. 243 - > It's just it's just not worth the effort to do it for a few 244 - > six months. 245 - > Some people said three.

246 - > The return is not smart in terms of doing that way. 247 - > Um, so as we transition here, but one of the things that I 248 - > want to bring up as well is the uh the unique part of the 249 - > revenue cookbook, which by the way, uh we're gonna actually 250 - > offer online. 251 - > Evan and I developed it in a way that can make it simple and easy 252 - > for anybody to use and understand. 253 - > And you can always visit it by seeing the revenuecookbook.

com, 254 - > revenue the revenue-cookbook.com. 255 - > Um, and on there, you'll be able to sign up, you'll be able to 256 - > enter in your company information based off the 257 - > revenue goal. 258 - > Um, and in a second, here I'm gonna have Evan explain the 259 - > differences of the different sizes of projects based on the 260 - > year.

261 - > Um, but you'll be able to put that information in and it'll 262 - > output exactly the type of legwork you need to do to hit 263 - > your revenue goal. 264 - > It's very simple to use, it's very easy to understand as long 265 - > as you have an idea of your overall revenue based on client. 266 - > Am I saying that correct? 267 - > Correct.

268 - > Okay, based on client size. 269 - > Based on client size over the course of the year, right? 270 - > That's that's how you measure it. 271 - > SPEAKER_02: Correct.

272 - > So when we're talking about client size, you know, a mistake 273 - > that I find that people make all the time is when they're 274 - > tracking how many clients they're bringing in, they're 275 - > creating all clients as equal. 276 - > And that's absolutely not the case. 277 - > Sometimes I'll talk with folks and they'll come and initially 278 - > meet with me because they're running around like a chicken 279 - > with their head cut off. 280 - > They've got a thousand clients, but they're not making any money 281 - > because all of those clients are really small revenue clients.

282 - > So, with my clients, what I suggest is they break their 283 - > clients down into three sizes of clients, and to make it simple, 284 - > typically use a hunting analogy. 285 - > When I'm talking about the revenue size of the client, all 286 - > we care about is the revenue to you. 287 - > So it could be a Fortune 500 company. 288 - > If they're doing one teeny tiny project with you, that's a small 289 - > client, not a large client.

290 - > So the three client sizes that we have in a way that the way to 291 - > make it simple rabbits are those small little clients. 292 - > And for each of you in your own personal business, you need to 293 - > identify what a small client is worth. 294 - > Deer are those bread and butter clients. 295 - > If you could identify the ideal product people are buying, the 296 - > ideal service they're utilizing, the ideal dollar amount of that 297 - > engagement of that customer, that's your deer size client.

298 - > And then elephants are those really, really big ones. 299 - > Those ones where if you bring in two or three or four over the 300 - > course of the year, they're gonna absolutely make your year. 301 - > In that revenue cookbook, part of what you'll do is you'll put 302 - > in for yourself in your own business what would you qualify 303 - > as a rabbit, what's a small client worth to you. 304 - > Yeah, maybe maybe it's yeah, $500,$5,000, whatever it might 305 - > be.

306 - > You'll quantify yourself what for yourself, what a deer-sized 307 - > client is worth. 308 - > Yeah, maybe it's$25,000, yeah, well, whatever it might be. 309 - > You'll then quantify what an elephant-sized client is worth 310 - > for you in your personal business. 311 - > And then what we want you to think about, and you may want to 312 - > go back and look at historical data, look at what your ideal 313 - > mix is, is then determine for yourself and your business what 314 - > percentage of your uh of your income, what percentage of your 315 - > revenue do you want coming from rabbits, from deer, from 316 - > elephants, and then the cookbook will populate the numbers so 317 - > that you know exactly how many clients you need in each of 318 - > those categories.

319 - > And then from there we can build out the plan. 320 - > But if you're not strategic, if you're not thinking through that 321 - > up front, it's going to be really difficult to put together 322 - > a good trackable plan. 323 - > SPEAKER_01: Yeah. 324 - > And the beautiful thing I love about the cookbook when Evan 325 - > explained it to us 15 years ago, is where you could ultimately do 326 - > your focus.

327 - > Um, when we first started our business several years ago, 328 - > 2001, I believe, um, we were in a position we were just getting 329 - > a bunch of rabbits. 330 - > And then once we introduced the cookbook to us, we realized that 331 - > we were putting a lot of work into a bunch of small people. 332 - > Um, and then as we began to implement this, we went and got 333 - > quite a few, a couple, not quite a few, a couple, two or three 334 - > elephants, which was stressful to say the least, because those 335 - > bigger, bigger clients have a lot more demands and eating up 336 - > all of our resources so that no one else could really uh 337 - > infiltrate into the work profile that we're doing.

338 - > And so I'm sorry, go ahead. 339 - > SPEAKER_02: And I was gonna say, to that point, you know, a lot 340 - > of times people you look at the dollar size for the elephants 341 - > and they really want to go after the elephants. 342 - > I have a lot of folks come to me because they have 80% of the 343 - > revenue coming from one or two elephant clients. 344 - > And if one of them goes away, they're scrambling and they're 345 - > in really, really big trouble.

346 - > So we don't want to put all of our eggs in one basket by just 347 - > going after elephants. 348 - > We also don't want to be running around after a thousand rabbits. 349 - > So it's really important to have a good mix of the three, 350 - > otherwise, you can get yourself in a lot of trouble. 351 - > SPEAKER_01: As you said that I had a visual of me running 352 - > around after a bunch of rabbits.

353 - > That's not a good look. 354 - > SPEAKER_02: I can't if we can get video uh that to put up on 355 - > our YouTube page, that that would be fantastic. 356 - > SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that video will never exist as far as I'm 357 - > concerned. 358 - > But anyway, the importance of this is to understand how the 359 - > cookbook puts things into place for you.

360 - > Um, and so as we kind of wrap up here in terms of this particular 361 - > episode, and again, stay tuned for episode two, in which we're 362 - > going to break down even deeper the revenue cookbook. 363 - > The important thing to understand about this cookbook 364 - > is it helps the organization as a whole understand where they 365 - > need to put their resources, how much time they need to put into 366 - > prospects and clients. 367 - > And as we talk about the uh stuff going forward into the 368 - > playbook in terms of what the ideal client is and so forth, 369 - > it'll the cookbook helps mold that vision for you a little bit 370 - > better.

371 - > Uh, we've introduced this to all of our clients, and you'll be 372 - > amazed at the number of reactions people have gotten go, 373 - > wow, I can't believe I spent so much time on people who really 374 - > don't help me. 375 - > SPEAKER_03: Yeah. 376 - > SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I believe that. 377 - > Or I now see my revenue differently, is some of the 378 - > comments I've gotten back after they got me.

379 - > And then all of a sudden, here's the beautiful thing about the 380 - > revenue cookbook: they began to create multiple plans for 381 - > multiple departments for multiple cookbooks that they 382 - > then culminate all of those type of projects, in a sense, or type 383 - > of service lines into one big cookbook to allow them to 384 - > understand how they can make their individual departments 385 - > move forward. 386 - > Uh, have you had a scenario like that, Evan? 387 - > SPEAKER_02: Yeah.

388 - > Unfortunately, before we introduce this, a lot of times 389 - > the salespeople, the attorneys, they all have their individual 390 - > plans, but those plans don't add up to what the overall 391 - > organization wants to do in terms of overall revenue. 392 - > Um, and that's a big red flag and that's a big challenge. 393 - > So, yes, we need to make sure if there's multiple practice 394 - > groups, there's multiple departments, there's multiple 395 - > service lines, that all of those are adding up to the 396 - > organization's goals.

397 - > The other thing that I find, and Craig, I don't know if you find 398 - > this as well, is when I start to ask people about their numbers, 399 - > I will get a deer in headlights look. 400 - > When I ask them what their average client's worth, when I 401 - > ask them what their closing percentage is, when I ask them 402 - > what percentage of first conversations turn into 403 - > qualified opportunities, we get that. 404 - > So homework for all of you listening to this episode, go 405 - > back and start to dig into the data.

406 - > SPEAKER_03: Yes. 407 - > SPEAKER_02: Let's look at where you've been historically so that 408 - > we can base this cookbook around some kind of reality and not 409 - > around fantasy numbers. 410 - > SPEAKER_01: And Evan's famous lines, which I'm going to 411 - > butcher here, is uh walking into this process without a plan is 412 - > like not having a plan at all. 413 - > Am I butchering that too much?

414 - > How do you say it? 415 - > SPEAKER_02: Yeah, well, I I mean, uh there's a couple of 416 - > sayings that I like to have when it comes to this. 417 - > One is if you fail the plan, you are planning to fail. 418 - > So if we don't have a plan in place, chances are we're not 419 - > going to accomplish our goals.

420 - > SPEAKER_01: That's right. 421 - > SPEAKER_02: The other thing I find for those of you who are 422 - > multitasking, the other quote that I find is really helpful 423 - > for people to focus is you either have a plan or you're a 424 - > part of somebody else's plan. 425 - > SPEAKER_01: Good one. 426 - > SPEAKER_02: So if you know developing revenue is part of 427 - > one of your responsibilities, if any of your income is tied to 428 - > the amount of business that you're driving, we really need 429 - > to be crystal clear in terms of what our plan is and what we 430 - > need to do week in and week out.

431 - > Otherwise, we're gonna be really unhappy come the end of the 432 - > quarter, come the end of the year. 433 - > SPEAKER_01: That's right. 434 - > And Evan's also very good at telling you don't wait to the 435 - > end of the year to realize you're not gonna hit your 436 - > revenue goals. 437 - > Do not wait.

438 - > We had one of our best years last year following this 439 - > cookbook, which is one of the reasons why we wanted to make 440 - > sure we deliver again another product to you guys that will 441 - > help you generate revenue without a doubt. 442 - > Now, this is not a foolproof plan. 443 - > You do have to do the work behind the plan. 444 - > That's very important.

445 - > It's not just make a plan and then the plan works. 446 - > No, you have to do the work behind it. 447 - > And in the next episode, um, we're what we're gonna do is 448 - > we're gonna literally go into the software, we're gonna break 449 - > down each step for you, similar to what we went through here in 450 - > an overview, so that you can see exactly how I can input my 451 - > information. 452 - > But again, go back and do, I went the wrong way, go back and 453 - > do Evan's homework, right?

454 - > Know your general numbers, and we're probably gonna try and do 455 - > is open up some sort of free trial for you guys. 456 - > So you can go in there and play with it a little bit and 457 - > understand how I can use this cookbook. 458 - > Um, and it's a nominal fee. 459 - > Once you guys get into it, it's a nominal fee, but it's very 460 - > important because it'll completely give you a guideline 461 - > to how you're going to move forward in your business.

462 - > The year just virtually started, so it's not too late to get 463 - > going on it, but it's very important that you guys start 464 - > the process of setting up a strategic plan with each one of 465 - > our services. 466 - > It comes with it. 467 - > So now you're in a position that you can now work with us through 468 - > it to kind of get a good idea how to use it from a marketing 469 - > perspective. 470 - > Sorry, wrong way, and then a sales perspective, um, to make 471 - > sure that you guys are moving forward and getting a better 472 - > year this year than you did last year.

473 - > Evan, explain to everybody before we get out of here in 474 - > terms of where they can find the playbook, please. 475 - > SPEAKER_02: So, well, you can find the sales and marketing 476 - > playbook unleashed uh on YouTube and please subscribe. 477 - > You can find us on Apple, Spotify, wherever you find your 478 - > podcast. 479 - > In addition, we put clips of the podcast up on LinkedIn.

480 - > So go and check out the sales and playbook, uh, sales and 481 - > playbook unleashed on LinkedIn, uh, sales and marketing playbook 482 - > unleashed on LinkedIn, and you will find us there. 483 - > Please drop us some comments, any questions, anything that 484 - > you'd like us to cover on the shows, you can drop those 485 - > comments there. 486 - > SPEAKER_01: And you notice how everybody that he tried to cut 487 - > the marketing part out of there. 488 - > That's the sales guy.

489 - > Be careful with those guys. 490 - > Like he tried to cut out the marketing piece. 491 - > No, we're where we work together, okay? 492 - > We're important that we work together.

493 - > All right. 494 - > So, anyway, stay tuned for episode two, in which we're 495 - > going to break down this the uh uh revenue cookbook a little 496 - > deeper. 497 - > Uh, and if you guys are interested in taking a look at 498 - > it, you can go to revenue-cookbook.com and sign in 499 - > and be in a position there where you guys can begin to work 500 - > through the process.

501 - > We're here to help you. 502 - > We're here to help you understand how to make more 503 - > money year after year. 504 - > I'm Craig Andrews, my partner in Crime Evan Poland, and we will 505 - > talk to you guys next time. 506 - > SPEAKER_00: Thank you for joining us on this exhilarating 507 - > journey through the world of sales and marketing.

508 - > Remember, the playbook is in your hands and the possibilities 509 - > are limitless. 510 - > Keep exploring, experimenting, and innovating, and watch as 511 - > your business reaches unprecedented levels of success. 512 - > Don't forget to subscribe to the Sales and Marketing Playbook 513 - > unleashed on all major podcast platforms and follow us on 514 - > YouTube, Facebook, and LinkedIn for even more exclusive content. 515 - > Until next time, keep hustling and keep winning.