Professional athletes do not simply suit up and walk out onto the field and hope they do well. These individuals spend countless hours working on developing the appropriate mindset, as well as working the body to be strong and responsive. Working sales for any business is much the same. A salesperson cannot walk into a business unprepared and expect to close a deal.
Unfortunately, far too many companies fail to properly prepare for the very important sales pitch. We all know that networking, referrals, and word-of-mouth are key elements to a successful business. While they are important, sales is the lifeblood of the business. Every business, whether large or small, virtual or traditional will have to engage in sales. Developing a lead takes time, effort and money so it becomes critically important to gain the highest possible close ratio. A salesperson must be prepared by researching a potential client, being a great listener and problem solver, knowing proper marketing strategies, and being real when telling a potential customer about the product and/or service offered.
Often those that are comfortable with selling will believe that they can simply wing it based on their knowledge. This leaves the outcome to chance and often does not meet with the desired result. Therefore, it is imperative that your sales staff think of themselves much like that of a professional athlete, realizing they need to develop the right mindset about being a winner, and taking time to prepare to make a sale.
Today’s market can be described as hypercompetitive. Small and large businesses continually seek ways to differentiate themselves from the pack and obtain competitive advantage. Great salespeople can not only impact your revenues but can provide you with competitive advantage.
To be successful in business, your sales efforts must include strategy and tactics. The strategy phase involves planning. You must identify your opportunities, threats, challenges and the ways in which you will take advantage of all. Your tactics are the actions that you take to achieve your strategies, and include prospecting, follow up, pricing and more.
Some of the advantages you would enjoy with a solid, selling strategy include:
- Higher closing ratio by knowing key elements of your customer and the business
- Better client loyalty by knowing and addressing customer needs
- Shorter sales cycle
- Better solutions, thus outselling the competition
One of the most important aspects of selling is research. Unless you know information about potential customers, as well as the appropriate way to address this customer’s needs, you will struggle. Gaining insight into each customer will enable you to deliver customized solutions and identify potential objections in advance. Therefore, you need to conduct research to learn about your customer’s business, their competition, and other influences that have an affect on the business.
There are a number of ways to gather intelligence about your customer. You can review their marketing materials, including annual reports and 10k statements or their website to gain insight as to how they present themselves to the market. You can talk to other customers within their industry to gain a better understanding of their needs. You could also identify non-competitive suppliers selling to your customer so you have a better appreciation for challenges. You will of course then connect directly with the potential customer, learning about the things important to them, their audience, and future goals.
All of these sales strategies combined show customers that you are serious about helping their business grow. When you take time to develop the right strategy, and execute the right tactics with a well prepared sales team you are guaranteed to have more wins than losses!
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