Sales Strategy 101 (Part 2)

Studying the Market
It is important for you to study the market to determine the strength of demand for your product or service to find out who your competitors are and what they offer, and to identify market trends. You should also use the market to let people know about your product or service so that they can recognize whether or not they have a need for it.

Consulting with Clients
Consultation transforms a salesperson-client relationship into a collaborative relationship in which you and the client exchange value. You receive value from clients in the form of information about their problems or needs. You give value to your clients in the form of a solution, product or service.

A collaborative relationship is advantageous for you as well as your clients. As partners in solving problems and meeting needs, you establish long-term business relationships, which strengthen and expand your sales network.

Developing Solutions
People want solutions. If you cannot offer solutions, they might perceive you as part of the problem, and you won’t make sales. It is important for you determine what your clients want or expect from a solution early in the sales process.

You should choose your sales strategy based on the sales stage that you are in with a client. For example, if a client acknowledges a need for your product or service, you should use the consultation or solution strategy rather than the marketing strategy.

You’ll go through the marketing, consultation  and solution strategies with every client at some point in the sales process. No matter what strategy you use, you should remember that nobody wants to be sold to, but everybody wants to be helped, and you cannot help a client until you understand the client’s needs.

I can help!!!

Henk van der Kruit

henk@vanderkruit.co.za

Sales Strategies 101

A sales strategy ensures that you don’t overlook important details during the sales process. For example, a part of the sales process is to identify potential clients. One way to do this is to look for buying trends in marketing data, such as what people are buying, why they are buying it, and where these people live.

Using a sales strategy also helps you to use your time efficiently when prospecting for clients and preparing for sales calls. If you know that people in a specific area are not interested in your product or service, you don’t have to spend time prospecting for clients in that area.

Moreover, because a sales strategy helps you find people who are most likely to need your product or service, you’ll close a greater percentage of your sales calls.

Whether you target individual or commercial clients, you can use these three sales strategies during the sales process.
1) Study the market
2) Consult with clients
3) Develop solutions

Next few days we will focus on each strategy.
Watch this space.

Importance of business etiquette

Business etiquette can influence your ability to succeed in your career. It can elicit desired responses from the people you interact with. It also organises and shapes your behaviour into a predictable and professional identity. When your behaviour matches what people expect, they can focus on your message and not waste time and effort with interpretation.

When your behaviour contains unexpected elements, it can detract from the messages you want to communicate. As a result, you might encounter obstacles to success. Good manners are invisible, while bad manners are clearly recognizable and might be the only characteristic that others notice about you.

Good manners can effect you ability to work successfully with your co-workers, supervisors, and staff. They can also influence your ability to work effectively with clients, vendors and other professionals.

You want your behaviour to reflect positively on your organisation. You are a representative of your company, school or institution. When you interact with customers, serious missteps in etiquette can lead to a loss of respect and reputation for you and your company. In some situations, they can even cause customers to take their business elsewhere.

The accumulation of small faux pas ca be just as problematic as serious missteps. Over time, small annoyances can negatively affect your own reputation as well as that of the company. This might cause you to lose business and potentially, your job.

Business Etiquette Workshop

Duration: 1 Day

More Information: henk@vanderkruit.co.za

How important is customer service?

It is amazing how much time, effort, and money are invested in sales training alone. However, customer service is not given the same level of attention. In the selling process, the final phase isn’t closing the sale; it’s serving the customer(after sales service).
Once you have gained a new customer, it’s your customer service that determines whether or not the customer stays with you.

Customer retention and customer churn rates are constantly reviewed by upper management because of the costs associated with customer turnover. On average, selling to a new customer costs 10 times as much as selling to an existing customer. The figure alone is a reason to focus on delivering top-quality customer service.

Without customers, business will eventually fail. Customers’ perceptions are the reality for any business. This is why it’s essential to provide customer service that not only meets but exceeds customer expectations.

Customer Loyalty

Studies have shown that it takes 12 good interactions to make up for just one bad experience. At this rate, vendors could spend all of their time playing catch-up and none of their time growing their customer relationships.

When customers are treated poorly, 7 out of 10 will take their business elsewhere. On the other hand, high levels of customer service will create customer loyalty. Loyalty can overcome deficiencies in product features and even higher prices. Loyal customers are customers for life. They can also become walking billboards that continue to sell your products. To build customer loyalty, you must consistently meet or exceed expectations.

The importance of prospecting

Many people refer to prospecting as the necessary evil known as ‘cold calling’. What you will discover is that cold calling is one of the most ineffective methods for locating new customers. In addition, there are many other ways to go about finding the your next qualified prospect.

Too often a salesperson’s failed career is caused by the lack of prospecting. When times are good, many buyers are seeking new products and services, so the buyers find you. When times begin to slow down, buyers are much harder to come by. It’s in times like these that fair-weather salespeople will begin to find new logos for their business cards.

Step 1 – Define your target market
One of the most effective ways to increase your prospect-to-qualified lead conversation ratio is to target customers who are most likely to buy from you.

Step 2 – Define your customer
Depending on your product or service, you might think that everyone is a potential customer. Although this might be true, it will not provide the focus needed to reach your sales goals.

Henk van der Kruit
www.vanderkruit.co.za

The importance of visibility and allies

Making yourself and your product or service visible is essential to the success of your sales. Advertising and self-promotion help you create visibility. For example, people who provide an individual service, such as real estate brokers and lawyers, use advertising to heighten their visibility.

Running advertisements in newspapers and magazines can also generate leads. Posting fliers where people are sure to read them and radio and television advertisements are other ways of creating visibility.
If you choose a visual form of advertisement, ensure that images are memorable, not busy or cluttered. No matter what form of advertisement you choose, ensure that the message is clear and correct.

Besides creating visibility, it is also important to have business allies:
- Having regular business contacts helps you send business to one another. Suppose a person comes to you with a problem that you cannot solve, but you know someone else who can help. When you refer a client to another business person, that business person is likely to return the favor.
- Collaborating with professionals who offer products or services that complement yours can help you generate ideas about promoting your products or services.
- Speaking to professionals about how they solve problems or handle situations can help you find new ways to confront your sales challenges.

Henk van der Kruit

Take personalties into account

Look at a company’s sales force. A sales manager was an insightful woman who realised that her sales team needed some help. She called in a consultant whose expertise was both with teams and individuals. Fortunately, through that intervention, individuals in the team and the sales manager were assisted in becoming aware of their behaviour and its effects on others.

 

Teams are often dysfunctional because of personality clashes and this should be attented to as soon as issues arise as this can lead to a teams’ distruction. Employees and their managers should commit to the process for it to be sucessful. It can take more than 3 months to resolve completely.

The key insights to take home from personality trait theory are that:

1) people differ in their personalities according to regular patterns,

2) once set, personality styles tend not to change much over time, and

3) many personality preferences may be present as a result of genetic influences (known as temperaments).