Welcome to episode 203 of the Business Development Podcast.

And on today's show we're talking all about the modern business developer.

What are the techniques and skills they must master in order to have success in 20, 25 and beyond?

And what are seven tools that are absolutely required as we move forward in the world of business development?

Stick with us.

You are not going to want to miss this episode.

The great Mark Cuban once said, business happens over and years.

Value is measured in the total upside of a business relationship, not by how much you squeezed out in any one deal.

And we couldn't agree more.

This is the Business Development Podcast, based in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada and broadcasting to the world.

You'll get expert business development advice, tips and experiences and you'll hear interviews with business owners, CEOs and business development reps.

You'll get actionable advice on how to grow business brought to you by Capital Business Development, CapitalBD CA.

Let's do it.

Welcome to the Business Development Podcast.

And now your expert host, Kelly Kennedy.

Hello.

Welcome to episode 203 of the Business Development Podcast.

And today I have an incredible show for you discussing the skills, characteristics and tools of the modern business development developer.

But before we do that, I want to genuinely thank you, our Rockstar listeners, for your support on this journey.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, podcasting can be an extremely lonely endeavor, guys.

Most of us are sitting in studios or basements talking to our walls.

And so to know that you guys are out there is an absolutely incredible feeling.

And from the very beginning of this show, one of the things that has kept me motivated and kept me coming back week over week is hearing your success stories.

So guys, if you have success stories and you have not yet written into me to let me know how this show has affected your life, if it helped you in any way, shape or form, my gosh, I can't tell you how much it means to me and any other podcast that you listen to when you write into them and let them know that you are listening and that what we do is actually making a difference in your lives.

I've been so blessed from the very beginning to have so many people reach out to me, let me know what's happening, let me know about your journeys and how this show has made an impact in your life.

And so I just wanted to say thank you so much.

Thank you so much for your Support up to 200 plus episodes.

Thank you for the messages, the incredibly kind messages that you guys have been sending from the very beginning and thank you for your contributions to our business community, to our rockstar community.

Guys, whether that be our LinkedIn, whether that just be the people that you tell, your friends, your family, your co workers, thank you from the bottom of my heart for helping me grow this show, for helping me reach a bigger audience, and for just being a part of our rockstar community that we are building day by day, month by month and year by year on this show.

The demands of business development professionals are continuously evolving and that is no different in 2025.

But like I have said from the very beginning, while the tools may evolve, the job is still the same.

Build new relationships that lead to revenue, repeat business, and mutually beneficial relationships over time, guys, no matter what, no matter what's happening, AI, social media, you name it, yes, we have to learn how to play in these playgrounds.

Absolutely.

But remember, the job of a business developer is inherently human.

We have to ultimately be great at building authentic human connection.

Asking for meetings that lead to relationship creating marketing materials and interest in a product and service that can ultimately lead us to a face to face meeting where we can build relationship.

Everything that we are doing in business development is about creating eventually human connection that can lead to trust, rapport, opportunity, repeat business over time, and mutually beneficial relationships for both us, our companies and our clients.

This is what it's all about, guys.

And no matter what, no matter what tools we have to learn, no matter the social media skills, the personal branding skills, the AI features, the fancy CRMs that are coming out these days, no matter what, that at the end of the day is kind of all fluff.

And at the end of the day the job is inherently human.

And so we're going to go over a lot of characteristics of business development.

Yes, there are skills, now we just have to know there are things happening that we have to adapt to.

But it is important to remember that no matter what comes up, no matter what the world is asking you to do, the job of a business developer is always going to be to create human to human connection.

If you can build human to human connection and you can do it in an authentic human way, you are inevitably going to be more successful long term.

The modern business developer is evolving, mixing the old with the new, and has never had more tools available to achieve their growth goals.

Guys, we live in a time I can't.

It's almost hard to believe, honestly, like at this point, guys, I've been doing business development, sales and account management for 18 years.

18 years.

And it is absolutely astonishing.

Astonishing how different the world is how much business development has changed the way we used to do it, the way we used to find connection, discover prospects, things along those lines.

We used to have to go door to door guys.

We used to have to like drive to an office site, drop a business card, grab a business card, make a phone call.

If you're lucky, they'd give you an email and then you could send them, you know, your marketing materials or whatever else.

And if you were really lucky, maybe they'd even give you a meeting.

The ease of business development has gone through the roof, I would say, since COVID Covid has really kind of changed everything and we're going to get into that today because social media has really become a non negotiable in business development, which before it really was negotiable.

We're going to chat about that today.

But I guess what I'm trying to say here is it has never been easier to do effective business development than it is today.

It has never been easier to create incredible marketing materials.

It has never been easier to track down ideal customer profiles.

It has never been easier to connect with the right buying positions.

And frankly, it's never been easier to find the contact details to reach out and book that face to face meeting either.

So we live in an incredible time to grow a business.

Let me just start by saying that right now we may live in the best time ever in human history to grow a business.

So before we start today, take that, think about it, chew on it, but understand, if you are trying to grow a business, you have almost every advantage possible.

And we're going to talk about some of the things you're going to need to do that today.

We're going to talk about some of the tools that you absolutely need to learn how to use.

But ultimately you absolutely can be successful at business development like never before here in 2025.

What are some of the qualities that a modern business developer has to have or has to work on?

I'm not even going to say necessarily has to have.

You can develop any skill.

You can develop any skill you like.

So I'm going to go over 10 qualities of a modern business developer.

You may not have all of them at the moment and that is completely okay.

Every single one of these qualities is something that you can ultimately work on.

You can identify where you might need to grow in it.

And I will explain to you why these things are important as we go along as well.

All right?

Quality number one.

A modern business developer has to be confident.

Okay?

Confidence.

Oh my gosh.

I, we've all struggled with this.

I'm right there with you guys.

I still at times struggle with confidence.

But you know what, if you see me in person, I probably look like the most confident person in the room.

You know what, Confidence isn't an absence of fear.

Understand that confidence is not an absence of fear.

It is being scared, but doing it anyway and then realizing once you start doing that thing that the thing that you were afraid of probably wasn't going to happen anyway.

And so the funny thing about confidence is the more that you challenge yourself to be confident, the more confident you actually become.

Because you start to realize the things that scare you, the things that you maybe were feeling a little lack of confidence on, probably weren't that major to begin with.

And most of the time, once we're exposed to that scary situation and we see that nothing happens, it makes you that much stronger the next time that you're in that exact same situation.

So over time, I probably look pretty confident.

You know, I do a lot of interviews, I look confident on my interviews, I look confident, you know, my business meetings, I always look fairly confident.

There's plenty of times where I'm maybe feeling a little bit anxious inside or I'm feeling a little bit not self assure, but I try not to ever let it go through.

And confidence is kind of one of those things where ultimately you really can fake it till you make it.

So understand, one of the qualities we have to have is we have to be confident because we have to speak with authority.

We have to speak with surety.

Okay, you can say something wrong, right?

And I don't mean wrong.

I don't mean like you can like say the wrong thing.

I mean your tone and the way you say something is everything.

The way you say something matters, guys.

The way that you express something matters.

You can say two sentences the exact same way and have two completely different effects.

Yeah, this product will work for you, or yeah, this product will definitely work for you, right?

You can say those two things and one sounds a little unsure and the other one sounds very confident.

The way you say something really does matter.

So confidence in the way that you speak about your products and services, confidence in the way that you hold yourself, the way that you walk into a room.

Are you slouched?

Are you looking down?

Are you chin up, back straight.

Confidence is something that ultimately is earned over time.

So you have to, you have to believe in yourself and you have to put yourself in situations where you have the ability to grow confident.

Okay?

If there's things that you're afraid of, or if there's things that you feel are holding back your confidence, try to address them.

If maybe dressing nicer would help you feel better, then try that.

See how it works.

If practicing in the mirror would help you feel better, then do that.

If saying a prayer before you go into a meeting, like many of us, then do that.

Find the things that will help boost you up, help boost your confidence, and you will 100% be more successful.

But ultimately, in business development, we have to come across as confident.

We have to come across like we know what we're doing, like we know what we're talking about.

Because we are ultimately providing solutions for people.

We're ultimately trying to show people that we can help them, that we have a product and service that can help them.

And so we have to be not just confident in ourselves, and we don't just have to come across as confident, but we also have to be critically, guys, critically confident in our products and services.

And I've talked about this in earlier episodes, but if you are not confident in the product and service, if you don't think the product and service that you are standing behind right now is good for the world, you don't believe in it, you can't get behind it, you're not confident in it.

You are selling the wrong product and service, and you need to get out of that and find something that you can be confident with.

But guys, confidence comes from within.

It comes from putting yourself in uncomfortable situations and succeeding.

So hold your own in a room and believe in your self and you can absolutely build your confidence.

Skill.

The next skill is you have to be adaptable.

Okay?

You have to be adaptable.

Business development is changing all the time.

The things you need to learn are changing all the time.

The tools and techniques are changing all the time.

And guys, unfortunately, we work with humans, right?

In business development, we're primarily working with humans.

Well, unfortunately, humans go back and forth.

They're not always on point.

Things don't always go to plan.

Meetings are going to get canceled, people are going to be late, people are not going to show up.

Be adaptable.

Roll with the punches and make adjustments on the fly.

Guys, trust me, it's okay.

Right?

If a client doesn't show up for a meeting, it's okay.

Just send them an email.

Just say, hey, sorry I missed you.

I hope you're okay.

Right?

Always give them the benefit of the doubt.

If things aren't going to plan, take a breather, right?

It's life.

Things don't always Go to plan, find the next best action to take and start taking it.

Being successful at business development has a lot to do with our own self control of our own emotions.

Okay?

And being adaptable is a big part of that, right?

We work in a job where a lot of people are going to tell us no, right?

A lot of people are going to say, nope, I don't need that.

No, I don't want to have a meeting with you.

No, I'm not interested.

Right?

That is the job.

Like most of the time, nose is what we get, right?

But ultimately over time, we have to build strength inside and adaptability is a big part of that.

Being able to roll with the punches and keep on going is a big part of our success in business development.

Number three, we have to be likable.

I talked about this very early on in the business development podcast.

I think it was one of my shows where I was saying, what are some of the traits that you should look for when you're hiring for business development?

I think I said trait number one is you like them in the first five minutes of sitting down and talking with them.

And that is still just as important today.

Guys, being able to connect, build rapport, be a likable person is a really massive advantage in business development.

I'm not going to say that you necessarily have to be the most likable person on planet earth to be successful at business development.

But you know what, it really does help if you are a likable person if you can build rapport and connection really easily.

Because ultimately the job of business development is to lead things to a meeting, right?

Which eventually leads to an rfp, repeat business over time and hopefully a long term future customer.

Well, a big part of that initially of getting those initial meetings is building enough rapport and trust that they actually want to meet with you.

And so being likable, working on our likability is an absolutely critical part of being a great business developer.

And guys, you know, there's a lot of great books on this particular subject, but Dale Carnegie's how to Win Friends and Influence People is basically all about being a likable human being.

The entire book is basically, here's how to be a more likable person.

So first off, if you're feeling unlikable, that is an incredible book to read.

But second off, try to be kind, try to be authentic.

Don't pretend to be somebody that you're not.

Be authentic, be yourself.

And I think for the most part people are going to like, yeah, number four, we have to be a great listener, okay?

Oh, man.

I.

I only got good at business development, guys.

When I shut up, when I just shut my mouth.

I know there's a lot of you laughing at that right now, because now I just yap on this most of the time.

But I really didn't get good at business development until I essentially stopped talking.

And what do I mean by that?

I used to get into a business meeting with somebody and I would just be like, oh, here's all of our products and services, and here's this and this and this and this and this and this and this and what do you think?

And they'd be like.

They'd be like an analysis paralysis, right?

Like, we don't do well with that.

That's not building rapport.

That's not building connection.

I didn't ask them anything about themselves.

I didn't ask them anything about their needs.

I didn't ask them about their kids, about their vacation, about anything that they do for fun.

Like, I wasn't building connection in the beginning when I started doing business development for.

And like, as stupid as that sounds, I just wasn't thinking about it.

Like, to me, I thought, well, my job is just to sell this product and service, right?

The part that I missed with that was you can't sell a product and service until you've won the trust of that person first.

And guess what, guys?

You don't build trust in product pitches.

You build trust in the conversations before and after them.

So I always say this.

If you're in a meeting with somebody, just go in and try to make a friend, right?

If there's an opportunity there, trust me, it'll present itself.

I've never once been to a business meeting where at some point business didn't come up, even if we didn't start there.

But understand business is not the place to start.

When you guys are having initial meetings, right?

Learn a little bit about them.

Talk, laugh, ask great questions.

Listen.

Ask more questions.

Listen.

Ask more questions.

Listen.

If they then lead it into tell me about your products and services, great.

Take it into that.

Talk about the products and services, and then listen.

Almost everything about human interaction comes down to how good did you listen?

Because guess what?

Nine times out of 10, your customers tell you exactly what their challenges are.

Nine times out of 10, they tell you exactly what their needs are.

But if we're too busy yapping, we're not listening and we will miss the entire thing.

So huge, Huge.

Huge, huge, huge, huge.

One of the biggest characteristics of a great business Development person of a modern business developer.

We have to ask great questions and be great listeners.

Okay?

Number five, we put authentic human connection first.

Okay?

Social media is not where you're building relationship.

Digital advertisements are not where you are building relationship.

A business developer's job is to get ahead of the need.

Okay?

We have all of these tools at our disposal.

Digital advertising platforms, social media strategies, you know, CRMs that give us all the contact data, but none of that matters if we don't pick up the phone or send those direct emails.

Okay?

We have to be focusing on building an authentic human, human connection.

And there is no more authentic way for you to do that than for you to pick up your phone or simply drop by the office and try to have an actual interaction with somebody where your voice can be heard, where your body language can be heard, right?

I always say at the end of the day, business development is most effectively done by utilizing active marketing principles.

And active marketing principles rely on a direct human to human interaction.

That can be a direct phone call, that can be a face to face meeting, that can be a direct email, assuming you know for a fact that that's going to the right person's inbox.

But using the most direct means necessary ultimately does put authentic human connection first.

Why?

Because you can leave a real voicemail that shows emotion, that shows a smile, that shows care.

And guys, trust me, you absolutely, absolutely, absolutely can hear a smile through a phone.

You absolutely can.

You know, the most success that I have is always when I get people on the phone a hundred percent.

You get me on the phone with somebody, nine times out of 10, I'll book that meeting, right?

And it might take you 10 or 11 direct calls to get there.

You might have to leave five voicemails or 10 voicemails before they even call you back, if they do call you back.

But understand every time you do that, you are building rapport through your voice.

Okay?

It is powerful.

It is incredibly powerful.

It is more powerful than social media.

It is more powerful than digital billboards.

It is powerful.

Trust me on this.

Make direct connection and watch your business grow.

Number six, we're just going to lead right into it.

Measure success in meetings, okay?

Modern business developers understand it doesn't matter if we can't get to the meeting, everything else is fluff.

Understand that right now all your ad spend, everything is a waste if you cannot get it to a meeting, if you cannot get it to a place where a trusting relationship is being built.

Once again, for my newer listeners, understand I'm very much talking B2B relationships here I am not specifically talking B2C.

B2C is not as personal, relationship is not as required.

But in B2B you are hoping for long term, repeat business over time relationship is required.

And so we have to measure our success in our ability to generate relationships.

We generate trust and relationships and opportunity in meetings.

So a modern business developer measures their success not by how many calls they're making, not by how many emails they sent out, not by how much ad spend they spent on digital ads.

They are measuring their success by how many real human to human interactions did I have this week?

If you start measuring your success in meetings, you are going to be infinitely more successful than ever before because you will start to figure out how to get to meetings in as short of a time span as possible.

Number seven, a modern business developer knows what success looks like, okay?

I can't tell you how many people, how many companies I've worked with, how many people I've coached where they have no idea what it actually takes to get to their arbitrary growth goal.

And I say arbitrary because you can put any number on a whiteboard and say, here's our growth target for the year, but what does it matter?

What does that growth target matter if you have no idea what it actually takes to get there?

And so I always say the first thing that any business developer needs to do in a year is identify how many meetings is it going to take to close enough business statistically to achieve our targeted growth goal for the year.

Okay?

And this isn't very challenging.

At the end of the day.

It's a little bit of basic math and you can figure out based on what your growth goal is for the year, what an average customer value is and what your estimated closure rate is on new meeting opportunities.

But if you can figure out what these things are, you can actually identify the exact number of meetings that you will need to achieve to achieve your growth goal for the year.

And guys, if any of you are hearing this right now and you're like, I would like to figure this out, shoot me an email, send me your growth target for the year, your average customer value for the previous year, and your estimated closure rate on new meetings.

If you give me that, I will.

For any one of you who email me, I will send you back a response email giving you an estimate on how many meetings you will need to accomplish your growth goal.

But guys, this will change everything because if you're measuring your success in meetings, you know how many meetings statistically it's gonna take for you to achieve your growth goal, you know, if you're on track or not, you know what you need to do.

This is like step one to being successful in business development.

You have to know where you were going, you have to know what it takes.

Number eight, a modern business developer never stops learning, okay?

They prioritize self improvement.

Guys, I'm learning all the time.

Like I'm an expert in business development.

Absolutely.

But I'm only an expert until today.

Guys, tomorrow is a brand new day.

New technology, new skills, new ways to connect with people, new ways to generate those meetings, right?

We have to always be growing.

We always have to have our ear to the ground on what's new, what's coming, how can we develop, how can we do better?

For me this year, 2025, I'm evolving massively on social media.

I'm working to grow my social media presence, I'm growing my personal brand.

I'm hopping into video, I'm learning video skills.

I've already kind of mastered audio editing skills and podcasting.

How can I get better at videos?

How can I get better at educating through that form of content?

Figure out what is next for you, what is the next logical step and start embracing it.

And never stop.

No matter how great you get at business development, no matter how high on the entrepreneurial ladder you get, trust me, there's always a new skill to learn and there's always something new that you're going to have to learn.

So get on it, figure out what those things are and don't get stagnant.

A modern business developer never lets themselves get stagnant.

You never get too comfortable.

You're always looking for how can I do this job better, how can I become more efficient and how can I book more meetings?

And just an add on to that, guys, we have to also be open to new ideas and concepts.

And this is something that business development has struggled with for a long time, right?

Being open to like new ways of doing things.

Being open that processes might work better than just winging it like many of us do.

Being open to understanding that even if we have lots of connections with people, there's still a lot that we can learn on how we build new connections.

Many business developers rely on pre existing relationships, right?

And you can only leverage pre existing relationships so long until you have to find new people.

And so understand, understand what you are strong at, understand what your weak points are and double down, double down this year on committing, on working on those weak points.

Because the weak points guaranteed are the things that are holding you back the most in your business growth.

Number nine, a modern business developer recognizes a personal brand is no longer an option.

2024, guys, 2024 was the year of personal branding.

And I would say, I would make an argument at this point that in order to be truly excellent at business development, we have to also be building our personal brands alongside our corporate brands.

What does this mean?

This means you are going to have to be more active on social media and specifically LinkedIn.

And if you haven't taken that time to start to build up your LinkedIn profiles.

Guys, 2025 is the year.

It's time to start being more active on your social medias.

It's time to participate in these communications, it's time to start building your follower account.

Because guess what, at the end of the day, it is credibility.

And the currency of this new world is credibility.

We are going from a time where it's who you know, and I think we are shifting into a time that it's who you know knows you.

And I think that's going to be reinforced more and more and more as we head into these subsequent years.

2026, 2027.

But trust me, if you have not started working on your personal brands, 2025 is the year to do so.

There are a thousand books on it, there are a thousand influencers that you could learn from.

There are incredible brand builders on LinkedIn like Amelia Sordell, Marcus Chan, Nat Berman.

Follow them, see what they're doing, learn from the best and start to emulate it.

But trust me, trust me, trust me, trust me.

Building your personal brand is no longer negotiable.

Social media is no longer a strategy.

It is genuinely part of the business development job.

Okay?

It is no longer something you did.

It is something you absolutely need to be utilizing to have long term success in business growth in 2025 and beyond.

Your personal brand and your corporate brand are being built in unison.

So it's not one or the other, it's both.

Okay?

And building your personal brand, if you're an entrepreneur, building your personal brand equally builds your corporate brand right alongside you.

It's a win win scenario.

Okay?

And the benefit to building your personal brand in 2025 as a business development specialist is that you carry that brand to every single company that you work work for, making you that much more valuable as we head into the future.

Number 10, a modern business developer knows how to leverage AI and when not to use it.

Okay?

This is a, this is a double edged sword.

AI is incredible.

We can use it to Improve pitches, proposals to evaluate things, to give us data.

AI is incredible for the right use cases, but it can be very negative in other use cases.

Let me talk to you about social media.

Okay?

I have a prediction that in 2025, your social medias are gonna be just slammed.

They're gonna be slammed harder than they've ever been slammed before with AI created content.

Okay?

And the challenge with this is it's twofold.

One side, companies look at AI generated content and think, oh, well, we can do that really easily and we can up our social media game.

And so they just put it out there.

They don't edit it, they don't think about it.

They just pump the world full of social media content trying to get eyes on their brand.

But AI generated content has this challenge.

We don't resonate very well with it.

Humans don't resonate well with AI generated content.

Why?

Well, it's polished, it's pretty, it's perfect, right?

Humans, we're not polished, we're not pretty, we're not perfect.

We have flaws, we have spelling mistakes.

We are just.

We're a mess, right?

Like, we're humankind.

We're a mess.

But the great thing about that is, is that 2025 has never been a better year to be an authentic human mess.

And I mean that in like the best possible way.

But, like, ultimately, don't be afraid to just like type something up quickly and put a picture of yourself and shoot it out there.

That content is going to resonate like a thousand percent better than like the best AI generated content.

Why?

Because AI is just too polished and perfect and we spot it and it sticks out like a sore thumb.

And if we in this modern day now counter that by putting authentic human posts out there, by sharing videos, by sharing pictures of us with our family, or doing things we love to do, by having an authentic comment, by having an authentic message in.

In our captions, guys, it goes like.

It's unreal.

It's unreal.

The power of a personal brand, of a personal human messaging in 2025 and beyond.

So don't just hear me on this.

Try it.

Try it.

Put out a corporate post, put out a personal post and see which one does better.

But trust me, I can pretty well guarantee you that personal post is going to blow the AI post right out of the water.

All right, so We've talked about 10 characteristics, right?

You know, they're not too challenging.

Most of it is be a human, but also be willing to learn, also be willing to make genuine human connection but don't be afraid of utilizing technology.

We have to know the technology guys, business development isn't going to change.

At the end of the day, it's always going to be about human to human connection.

The tools that will come available to us to hopefully facilitate making that easier.

Well, I welcome that.

If there's tools that come available to us that hopefully continue to make that process easier, I AM Absolutely, absolutely 100% on board for that.

Right.

But remember, at the end of the day, the most powerful tool you have is literally your phone.

It's your phone.

It's your phone and your voice and your ability to pick it up and generate genuine human connection.

That is your superpower as a modern business developer, no matter what other technology you embrace.

What are some of the tools that we're using, guys?

I'm just going to list out like seven tools that at this point I would say are absolutely mandatory to get good at.

And so if you're not utilizing one of these right now, don't feel bad about it.

It's no big deal.

It is something though, that you absolutely should get some lessons on.

It is something that you should absolutely start to incorporate though, into your weekly and if you need some help with it, maybe start looking for some lessons on it.

But ultimately, here are the tools of the modern business developer.

You need one, obviously, a phone, right?

Your cell phone is going nowhere at the end of the day.

Your phone is your most powerful tool as a modern business developer.

Your email, your second most powerful tool.

At the end of the day.

We can send our marketing materials, we can book and schedule meetings on our calendars.

Your email is absolutely powerful and I think we all know that.

Number three, mandatory now.

Mandatory LinkedIn.

You have to have LinkedIn as a business developer in a modern world, whether you're a business owner, whether you're a business development specialist, or somewhere in between, you absolutely, absolutely not just have to have LinkedIn.

You have to be actively utilizing it on a daily basis, building your followers, building your connections and posting content both professional and personal.

We have to be building both our business brand and our personal brands in unison.

But trust me, there has been no better tool ever invented than LinkedIn for business development.

And if you are not utilizing it, you absolutely will be falling behind.

Number four, you may find this interesting, but Canva, you absolutely, as a business developer, now have to learn how to utilize a tool like Canva.

Why?

Because we need to be able to create content on the fly real quick sometimes.

But it can be creating personal photos, it can Be creating really cool corporate content that we can share on our, on our personal pages and our corporate pages.

But learning how to utilize a design program like Canva at this point is non negotiable.

Guys, you need to figure out how to utilize them.

Canva is amazing.

It's probably one of the coolest, coolest tools.

It's inexpensive.

It absolutely serves an incredibly wide gamut of needs for a business developer, for anybody who creates content.

So learning how to use Canva, guys, trust me, if you haven't been utilizing it, I know there's a lot of you out there that are still on the fence about it.

Grab yourself a canvas subscription, Start learning how to utilize it.

Start putting out weekly posts that you guys build in Canva.

You will be impressed by the incredible, incredible stuff that you can make in Canva.

Number five, you need a camera.

Okay, this one's brand new.

I never in a million years thought that I would say that as a business developer, you absolutely need a camera.

But guys, in 2025 and beyond, video is currency.

It really is.

Why?

We talked about it before.

In a time of AI and robots, in a time where everything is so polished, so perfect, there is no more authentic way to connect with your clientele and your customers and build rapport and trust than by seeing your beautiful faces in your social media posts.

Okay, I want you guys to start learning video.

And I know it's a weird ask, and I know right now it probably feels like, oh, my gosh, I don't want to do that.

I get it, I get it.

I felt the exact same way.

But I told you at the very beginning, 2025, I am doubling down on video.

I'm tripling down on video.

Why?

Because I can create trust and rapport with people 24 hours a day by releasing video content to the world.

And you, as a business developer, as a business owner, as an entrepreneur, you can too.

And so there's going to be a gap, a gap that's going to start to widen.

And that gap is going to be the people who embrace video and the people who don't.

Mark my words, guys, the people who embrace video are going to win 2025 and beyond.

Trust me on this.

If you right now do not have a great camera, I would highly, highly recommend you go and pick yourself up something like a dji, OSMO pocket, something along those lines of vlogger camera.

Just something that you can record things quick, edit quick, and get out to the world.

But trust me on this video, a camera, a good camera, it is absolutely going to be a differentiator for you in 2025.

And it is time to start working on your video skills.

And number six, to coincide with that, descript, okay, you guys can use any editor you want.

Riverside does something similar.

But Descript is like probably the best AI video editor out there with regards to editing quickly, with regards to creating high quality video content, with regards to cleaning up your sound quality as well.

If you're going to be doing video, highly recommend that you also get yourself a subscription to descript.

And it is essentially a transcriber and a video editor.

And you can literally edit it, guys, by just deleting the words.

So if there's a part that you say that you don't like, great.

Delete those words and that part of the video is gone.

It's like magic.

And you will be creating incredible video content faster than you could have ever thought possible.

Get yourself to script, start learning it.

It is no longer optional.

Guys.

Learn how to do video.

Learn how to edit your video and find tools to help you do it faster.

Okay?

And last but never least, and you guys know this with me, never least, you need your CRM systems, okay?

CRMs are epic.

They are required.

They keep you on track, they keep you organized, they keep everything in one place, they keep your data.

CRMs are absolutely mandatory in business development here for the modern business developer in 2025 and beyond.

The modern business developer is in some ways stuck between worlds.

But it is important to remember that the job is about creating opportunity through authentic human, human connection.

While we have much technology at our disposal these days, building authentic human connection is going to require just that authentic human touch.

In a world of AI and robots.

Remember people, be human.

That takes us to the end of our show today.

Guys.

I absolutely love this one.

I hope that you guys loved it too.

If you, if you're hearing this show and you want support in business development, you're a business owner, you're a business development specialist and you want a level up, you want a plan, you want a process on how to tackle business development more effectively.

Guys, I have my own three month business development mastery program and you absolutely, absolutely, absolutely need to do it with me.

It is incredible.

We are going to work on identifying your ideal customer profiles, we're going to work on your marketing materials, we're going to work on building our personal brands.

And we are absolutely going to create a process that is effective and successful for you and your business and any business you work at from this point forward.

You can book a free discovery call at www.capitalbd.ca or directly from my LinkedIn page and I hope to see you there.

If you love this show and you operate a business and you potentially want to sponsor with us, we are opening up our show to additional sponsors.

Feel free to reach out to me directly over LinkedIn and I would be happy to send you any details on our current sponsorship packages.

And last but not least, rate and follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify wherever you listen.

Guys, I can't tell you how appreciative I am when you guys leave me a written review on Apple Podcasts.

It really makes all the difference in growing this show.

So if you have not done so and you have some time today, I would greatly, greatly, greatly appreciate written reviews wherever you listen.

Shout Outs this Week Jillian Shecker, Colin Harms, Nate Simpson, Adam Kimmel, Justin Tome, Vajran Swaminathan, Sile Kerr, Daniel Sonnenberg, Jamar Jones, Lauren Graff, Tash Jeffries, Sean Neals, Brian Hayes, Brad Warren, Susan Pasaka, John Pelly, Rich Cohen, Cruz Gamba, Jack Dyer, Matthew West, Jermaine A.

Ricardo J.

Flores, Jason Chakalakal, Gary Noseworthy, Daniel Jarris, Michelle, Sammy Wieb and Nathan Plum.

Until next time, you've been listening to the Business Development Podcast and we will catch you on the flip side.

This has been the Business Development Podcast with Kelly ken Kelly has 15 years in sales and business development experience within the Alberta oil and gas industry and founded his own business development firm in 2020.

His passion and his specialization is in customer relationship generation and business development.

The show is brought to you by Capital Business Development, your business development specialists.

For more we invite you to the website at www.capitalbd.ca.

see you next time on the Business Development Podcast.