Sales Conversations

Matrix Key:  Financial Viability - Marketing and Sales - Sales Conversations

"To succeed in sales, simply talk to lots of people every day.  And here's what's exciting - there are lots of people!" Jim Rohn

The topic of sales shows up again and again throughout the WholeLife Matrix.  If you want to sell something, you've got to have sales conversations.  Some people need a lot of persuading; others just need a quick explanation for how your product fits their needs.  Some form of interaction must take place to transact business and that is usually a conversation.  The more conversations you have, the more sales you will close.

A successful sales conversation has four distinct parts:

1. Identifying the Opportunity
2. Presenting the Proposal
3. Follow Up
4. Closing - Asking for the Sale

When you start to think of your sales conversations in this way, you become more efficient and effective.  You present how your product meets the client's needs and you close more sales.  You also gain the confidence necessary to keep on talking and winning deals.

Are you ready to win?

Managing Sales & Marketing Actions

Matrix Key:  Financial Viability - Marketing and Sales - Managing Actions

"Sales are contingent on the attitude of the salesman, not the attitude of the prospect." - William Clement Stone

If you are going to be successful at marketing and sales, your actions must reflect your commitment to the sales process.  You must have a disciplined approach to managing your sales and marketing actions.  Sales requires a lot of constant effort in order to keep clients moving along the sales cycle and to keep new opportunities coming in to your pipeline.  If you're not careful, you can easily drop something out and lose an important deal.  You can use the WholeLife Matrix as a guide to managing your sales actions.

The most successful salespeople know that these four attributes are essential to an effective sales process:

1. Training
2. Attitude
3. Setting Goals
4. Time Spent in Sales and Marketing

The best salespeople understand that they need continual training to stay on top of trends and technology.  They set specific goals so that drive their actions.  They spend time every day in sales actions, and they know that a good attitude shows through to prospective clients and keeps them in the game when times are tough.  There will always be days when you want to throw in the towel, but if you focus on consistent sales and marketing actions, you will soon find yourself in the winner's circle.

Are You Ready to Win?

Opportunities For Sales

Matrix Key:  Financial Viability - Marketing and Sales - Opportunities For Sales

"Ability is of little account without opportunity." - Napoleon Bonaparte

We talk a lot about sales because sales is the heartbeat of every business. On the WholeLife Matrix, sales is a key component of Financial Viability. It doesn't matter if you make widgets or provide services, you must focus on getting people to buy.  Sales don't just show up on your doorstep.  In order to create sales, you must know how and where to create opportunities for sales, and you must consistently take action to create those opportunities.

Here are the four best ways to create opportunities for sales:

1. Referrals
2. Social Networking
3. Upselling Current Customers
4. Re-engaging Prior Customers

Sales is a process of having conversations with people who have a need for your product or service.  The more conversations you have, the more sales you have.  If you put together a plan for creating sales and use these four tools for finding opportunities, you will soon have a wealth of possibilities for winning in a competitive marketplace.

Are you ready to win? 

Individual Sales Objectives

“A salesman minus enthusiasm is just a clerk.” – Harry F. Banks

Sales and Marketing plans need to reflect both company-wide objectives as well as the individual salesperson’s goal numbers. Both corporate and personal goals should align with the company’s profit intentions. Last week’s blog spoke to the company objectives. This week we will look at how to craft a sales and marketing plan for the individual salesperson.

Here are some key elements of a personal sales plan:

Marketing Tasks – Marketing tasks are things like networking, sending e-newsletters, blogging, and doing internet research to find prospects who have a high likelihood of buying your product. Without this kind of legwork, salespeople are hard-pressed to find those ideal clients.

Sales Actions – Sales actions include setting appointments, meeting with clients, preparing proposals, presenting the product, closing deals and following up. Each of these actions must happen consistently, and they must be scheduled into the calendar. Sales people who present proposals, but don’t follow up or close the deal are not going to meet their objectives. Break your sales effort into specific actions like these, and determine where those are going to appear in your calendar.

Accountability System – Salespeople need accountability systems if they want to stay on track to meet their goals. Who holds the salesperson accountable in your company? Is there a sales manager? A production manager? Who is responsible for tracking the progress and offering support to the sales staff? Is that chain of command clear to the salesperson?

Existence System – This is something the salesperson needs in order to be disciplined about performing the sales and marketing actions that will result in sales. The most common and best existence system is a calendar. Scheduling sales and marketing actions into an Outlook calendar gives one a picture of future results. A weekly sales meeting is another kind of existence system, as is a visual chart or graph that plots the salesperson’s progress toward his goals. Existence systems require some discipline, and it’s best if they have visual components that are easy reminders of where you stand.

Proposals – What kind of proposals do you need to have to present to clients? Maybe yours is a simple pricing sheet that you discuss over the phone, or maybe it is a highly detailed and customized PowerPoint presentation that you will deliver to the board of directors. Either way, it’s essential to have your materials prepared and be able to articulate how your product or service will be able to answer the prospect’s concerns.

Ongoing Training and Support – A salesperson should never feel like an island, separate from the company and colleagues and left to sell without direction. Salespeople should continually receive training on product capabilities and new ways to reach out to the marketplace. Salespeople also need to understand where to go for support when customers have complaints, questions or special requests.

The salesperson is often the embodiment of the company’s brand and reputation in the marketplace. Salespeople need clear individual objectives and well established channels for support. Businesses need to manage for personal and corporate objectives so that salespeople can distinguish themselves in the marketplace and deliver on the company sales intentions. A winning plan will yield winning results and will keep your business on the leading edge of the game of sales.

Are you ready to win?

Selling to the Company Objectives

“You were born to win, but to be a winner, you must plan to win, prepare to win, and expect to win.” – Zig Ziglar

When you’re designing your sales and marketing plan, you have to be mindful that the plan has you on the path to deliver on your intentions. But whose intentions are we talking about? The individual salesperson? Or the company as a whole?

A good salesperson must work a marketing plan for both sets of objectives. It’s important to stay on top of our personal goals and sales targets. But in so doing, a responsible salesperson will align his actions with the company’s intentions. And management has a responsibility to clearly communicate the corporate intentions so that salespeople can deliver.

Here are some examples of company objectives that should be part of every sales and marketing plan:

How many clients do we want? - Depending on your product or service and the resources you have available, companies can determine how many clients they can accommodate and still provide a good level of service. The company should be looking to grow, but within the realm of what they can handle.

What are their industry characteristics? – Companies need to identify the characteristics of their ideal clients and make it clear to the sales staff what kinds of prospects they should pursue. There is such a thing as a bad sale. You don’t want to chase clients that will be high maintenance and not be a fit for your company’s business model.

What is your product or service offering? - Be clear about what you can provide. Do your salespeople understand how your product or service answers the concerns of your target market? Are they selling the right thing to the right people?

What research are we going to do about those prospects? – Can we track their purchasing history? Who they currently buy from? Any “impending events”; mergers, downsizing, or product launches that change the landscape for potential sales? What do you need to know about your prospects in order to successfully sell to them? Where do you find that information?

How are we going to approach these prospects? – Phone calls? Emails? Newsletters? Bumping into them at networking events? Depending on your line of business, the approach may vary by customer. Determine the most appropriate approach for your targets, and be sure your sales staff is well versed on how to reach out.

A winning sales and marketing plan blends the vision of the company with that of the individual salesperson. The plan needs to be a win-win for both, providing clarity and creativity that will set your company apart from the competition. If you need help aligning company and individual objectives, give us a call. We’ll support you with proven, successful techniques that will get you closer to your intended result.

Are you ready to win?

Designing Your Sales and Marketing Plan

“Before everything else, getting ready is the secret of success.” – Henry Ford

In previous blogs, we’ve talked about the key elements of a sales and marketing plan, and how to start designing one. In this post, we will look at the nuts and bolts of designing the plan, so roll up your sleeves and let’s get started!

Create a List of Potential Clients - You have already defined your conditions of satisfactions for who you want to do business with. Now take that list and find companies that fit those characteristics. There are numerous online resources like Jigsaw, Manta and ZoomInfo where you can learn more about company revenues, number of employees, locations and industries. Individual company websites are obviously full of information. Put together a list, preferably on an Excel spreadsheet, of your potential clients, and rank them in order of their probability of buying your product. Try to put 100 names on this list.

Identify Your Prospects’ Concerns - Why do the people on your list need your product? One of my contacts recently told me that she looks for people who have “imminent events” on the horizon, things like a move, downsizing, a new product launch, an expansion, etc. Those are the things that cause companies to re-evaluate suppliers and needs. Maybe they need more phones, more computers, more file cabinets. If you sell those things, you can find companies in transition who have needs for those services. For every contact on your list, make a note of why they need your product or service.

Determine How Your Product Solves the Customer’s Concerns – This is the logical next step in the process. Next to each customer, make a note of which of your products or services fit their needs and why. The “why” is important because it is the thinking behind what distinguishes you from your competition. It’s not just why they need file cabinets; it’s why they need your file cabinets.

How Will You Approach the Prospects? – Look at your list and determine the best way to reach out. Is it a phone call? An e-newsletter? A LinkedIn invite? Some of this work may require educated guessing, but it pays to plan your strategy in advance. Think about the industries you are targeting and how they tend to deal with vendors. Your approach may be another way to set yourself apart, but if you are working with clients who have very set rules about dealing with vendors, it pays to follow those rules.

Review Your Budget – Now that you have a list of potential clients and ideas for approaching them, do you have the resources to execute your plan? It’s not just money; it’s time and energy as well. Do you need additional staff to reach out to your prospect list? Review your marketing budget to make sure it aligns with your list of actions. If not, decide where you can delegate tasks or add resources to deliver on your plan.

Your marketing plan should be a living document, not just ideas in your head. You should constantly have a visual track record of who your prospects are, what you are doing to meet them, and how your company is a fit. Find time in your calendar daily or weekly to review your lists and keep pressing toward your objectives. Before you know it, you will have a viable, targeted pool of possibilities with a high probability of doing business with you. And that is a winning proposition!

Are you ready to win?

Keys to a Sales and Marketing Plan

“Everyone lives by selling something.” – Robert Louis Stevenson

Over the past couple of months, this blog has focused on helping you develop specific and measurable intentions for your business. Now we want to shift gears, and talk more about delivering on those intentions. What actions do you need to take to create more sales, which will increase your revenue, which will ultimately increase your profits and keep your company viable?

The first step is to have a sales and marketing plan. It’s important to take the time to create a plan for where and how you are going to generate sales. Otherwise you will waste valuable time and resources throwing darts at a vague map on the wall instead of finding the prospects who have the greatest likelihood of buying your product.

There are some key elements of any sales and marketing plan that are essential guidelines for your strategy:

The Sales and Marketing Plan must align with your intentions. You have put a lot of effort into creating specific intentions that are going to drive your company to your desired results. Your sales and marketing plan needs to tie into those intentions. Design your marketing actions so that you are pursuing the kinds of clients that will give you what you want. When you look at your sales and marketing plan, ask yourself, “Will this plan be the path to me achieving what I set out to do?”

The plan must include both sales and marketing actions. You simply can’t have one without the other. If all you do is sell without spending time researching the best prospects or the best approach, you will waste a lot of time and effort on people who likely are not a fit for your product or service. Likewise, if all you do is marketing research, and never go out to make a sale, well it’s easy to see where that will lead…no sales.

Marketing is the process of creating opportunities for sales. It’s important to remember that sales and marketing are two distinct actions. Marketing is the set of activities that help us find good potential clients. Marketing includes networking, internet research, sending newsletters, hosting webinars; any action that can put you in proximity to the people who have a need for your product or service.

Sales is the process of having conversations with people who have the possibility of buying your product. Sales involves talking with pre-qualified prospects, listening to their concerns, and creating a vision for how your product or service answers their concerns. Sales is not an intrusion. Sales is your opportunity to solve someone’s problem, and show how your company is the best choice now and in the future.

Sales and Marketing must both be scheduled in your calendar. You schedule dentist appointments and plane flights and you show up. Likewise, sales and marketing actions need to be firmly programmed into your calendar, and you have to show up! Just thinking about sales and marketing is not going to yield results. Those who spend time every day on sales and marketing are the ones who have the highest probability of delivering on their revenue and profit intentions.

We will delve deeper into sales and marketing plans in upcoming blogs. But don’t wait to take action. Start designing your sales and marketing plan today and finding where in your calendar those actions will show up. Because those who plan for success will be the ones who win the game of business.

Are you ready to win?