1.) Dramatically Reduce Your Sales Cycle Time
Nothing improves cash flow and revenue more than reducing
your sales cycle time. And an important technique to dramatically reducing it
is to use synchronous communication throughout the sales process.
This starts with NEVER presenting a sales proposal to a
customer without being on the phone or in person with them. Emailing a proposal
to a customer ahead of a meeting doesn’t give you the opportunity to react
immediately to potential concerns and objections that might arise as they read
through your proposal. And the more time the customer has to ponder an
objection and potentially pollute their colleagues with negative reactions (or spouse
if it’s a business to consumer sale), the more difficult it will be to move the
sales process forward.
Even if the customer is adamant about receiving a proposal
ahead of a physical meeting, suggest it will save them time if you can review
the proposal over the phone and that you’ll email it to them a few minutes
before a scheduled phone call. What you and your sales people want is the
opportunity to see, hear, or at least sense specific objections, as you review
the proposal, so you can react immediately. And then you want to continue to
utilize synchronous communication for the rest of the sales negotiation process
i.e. if a customer emails back a question, pick up the phone and discuss with
them vs. simply emailing an answer back – it gains you more clarity, builds the
relationship, and avoids misunderstandings that come with email. This single technique can reduce sales cycles from months to weeks and even to days.
2.) Price with Confidence
Of the four P’s of marketing, Price is the only one which
directly puts money in your pocket. Yet I find companies setting price with
very little strategy behind their decisions. And panicked decisions about
pricing in turbulent times can be costly in both the short and long run.
Too many firms have gotten caught flat-footed and are using
price discounts in a panic to try to keep demand that is going away no matter
what they do. The firms that do this are creating two very significant long-term problems. First,
they are destroying the integrity of their pricing and the value of their
brands. Second, they are training their customers to negotiate for every last
penny thus undermining their most valuable asset – trusting customer
relationships.
Both of these ideas make it extraordinarily difficult to roll-back
prices back up when the economy finally does turn. In addition, it will take
much longer to bring prices back up to a level that reflects the true value of
the goods and services being sold.
Look objectively at pricing as a strategic tool that must be
managed systematically based on value, market demand, cost structure, product
lifecycle, and capabilities. This view leads one to make decisions on the basis
of preserving and gaining pricing power be it through reducing capacity to match demand, introducing
low price – low value offerings, or making systematic adjustments to price
lists so that list and street prices are more in line.
3.) Multiple Channels
“Place” is one of the other four P’s of marketing. Companies
with more sales channels trump competing firms with less.
This means setting aside all the debate about protecting
various territories and giving your customers as many options for purchasing
your product as you can. In the end, you can’t dictate from whom and how your
customers will purchase your products and services. They all have different
preferences and will find competitors who give them their desired options.
In turn, it’s up to your various sales channels to earn
their right to distribute your services. If the customer wants high touch,
value-added consultative help in purchasing your product, they’ll utilize that
channel. It starts with doing a thorough job of researching the benefits of
your product or service.
4.) Half the Customers; Twice the Attention
You need to identify your best customers and shower them
with twice the attention. Focus on your Best Buyer/Client and then create a
nurturing marketing campaign that touches these customers 10 to 15 times with ‘educational’
information
It starts with doing a thorough job of researching the
benefits of your product or service. For example, take one major roofing company,
they found that a large percentage of the time a roof is replaced when it only needs
repaired. In turn, greater than half of all building maintenance problems start
with the roof. The company structured an educational campaign that reached out
to the owners of large facilities every two weeks over a period of months,
which dramatically improved warm leads in the Sales Funnel for the sales team
to close.
5.) Web 2.0
The third P of marketing “Promotion” has taken on a new
twist given the power of the Web to reach customers. Add the frustration of
business owners with the confusing array of terminology and options including: News
Releases, Blogs, Podcasting, Viral Marketing and Online Media.
KEEP LEARNING
More than ever, the field of sales and marketing is
undergoing a transformation while getting back to basics that have always been
critical to driving revenues. It’s a mystery to me why companies cut back on learning
and training in down times. Now is when more focus should be put on training
and capturing all opportunities.
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