Sales Information |
Never Stop Selling
The question: "When should a growing company slow down its sales function and focus solely on delivery?" The answer: "Never!" When fast growth is the focus of your company, the only constant is that you will always, and I mean always, need more sales. It doesn't matter how full the sales pipeline looks, you need more sales. It doesn't matter that you have no idea how you're going to deliver the order you just took, you need more sales. And it doesn't matter that you're booked for the next year, you need more sales. To understand why you must keep selling in the face of certain income, I will introduce you to "Murphy's Law" of Sales which states that "whatever business can be lost, will be lost!" Customers will change their mind, cancel orders, and in some cases just go out of business altogether. There are numerous snags that can stop your sale before it hits accounts receivable and unfortunately most are beyond your control. The good news is you can protect yourself against this uncertainty by filling the sales pipeline at all times, no matter how good things get. Enlarge the Pipeline A great way to protect your sales future is to increase the expectations of your sales pipeline. If you think you need to put $1 million in the pipeline try moving that number to $2 million. I'm not suggesting that another million dollars worth of sales are going to magically appear just because you updated your Excel spreadsheet. Instead I'm suggesting that you raise the bar on your projections so that you can absorb the inevitability of losing sales along the way. It's far better to be over prepared. Spread the responsibility Because small companies typically cannot afford to hire several salespeople they often rely upon the founder or another single person to do the job for the entire company. The problem with this approach is that there is too much reliance on one person to feed the entire organization. Sometimes people run into a cold streak, get distracted, or just aren't the right fit at the right time. Any one of these factors can cripple your sales pipeline. Instead of relying on an individual to bear the company's entire sales load, spread the responsibility across all members of the organization. A great way to do this is by giving other people in the company an opportunity to participate in the sale process as well. Allow others to help prepare presentations, give them responsibility for "up-selling" existing customers and ask them to use their professional networks to identify new opportunities. When you're hot, stay hot Another mistake growing companies tend to make is celebrating their victories and resting in the spoils of sales. You've just won that huge account and now you don't have to sell for six months while you rake in the dough, right? Wrong! The worst thing a company can do when it's hot is to stop selling. The confidence and positive energy behind a big win is a force you cannot possibly replicate with bonuses, company meetings or sales team pep rallies. Harness the positive momentum from big sales to make more phone calls, setup more meetings, and close more deals. It's much easier to call that next client after you've made a big sale than when you're on month three of a cold streak. Keep your sales team in sales, not delivery Now your winning sales team is landing customers left and right and it's time to start delivering on the promises they made over those expensive dinners. Since the customer naturally expects the sales team to be along for the delivery, your top salesman should be along for the ride, right? Wrong again. The sales team is there to sell, not deliver. And any time that they spend servicing your existing customers is time they aren't spending finding the next customers. As soon as the shoe salesman becomes the cobbler he's doing the wrong job. Get your sales team right back into the field as quickly as possible and let the people in your organization responsible for delivery service your customers. Watch the Horizon It's easy to get distracted today with a big win and all the obligations that come with delivery. All of a sudden you need to worry about staffing, office space, equipment and of course satisfying that customer you just spent all your time wooing. While you don't want to miss delivery, you simply can't afford to lose sight of the next sale on the horizon, which means it's time to pick up the phone, schedule a meeting, and close that next sale. The only thing more important than your last sale is your next sale! - Wil Wil Schroter is a serial entrepreneur, author, and public speaker. Wil has been recognized as U.S. Small Business Person of the Year, twice as the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year (1999 & 2004), and is a member of the Business First Top 40 under forty. Connect directly with Wil at wschroter@yahoo.com. Visit http://www.goBIGnetwork.com.
MORE RESOURCES: Unable to open RSS Feed $XMLfilename with error HTTP ERROR: 404, exiting |
RELATED ARTICLES
Lance Has What It Takes Lance has what it takes and then some.Did you know . Peddlers, Hucksters, & Empty Suits Ever feel like you were "just a salesperson"? I think anyone who has been in sales for awhile has thought or felt this at sometime in their career. In some fields, sales is such a dirty word that they've created euphemisms to try and reclaim some dignity. Powerful Words Hi,I'd like to discuss the most powerful words you can use during the selling process.Quote: Words are the most powerful drug used by mankind. The Anatomy of a Sales Letter When Dr. Frankenstein exclaimed "it's alive. How to Buy Wholesale Store Fixtures for Your Business It may sound funny, but honestly, if you're opening up your own retail store the last thing you'll ever want to do again for the rest of your life is buy anything retail -- especially if it's for your own store. Buying your store fixtures wholesale is not only mandatory it's a last resort after you've tried buying antique fixtures at a fraction of the cost. The Doors Of Opportunity Alexander Graham Bell once said, "When one door closes another opens; but we often look so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one that is opened for us." If you're in sales you gotta remember this one. Recommending Products Vs. Selling Them Some of the best sales people I have ever met, were able to meet all of their sales goals without ever selling a thing. They simply recommended their products to their customers. When the Nose of the Camel is in the Tent My new job was to sell Commercial Service Agreements. It was a fine company. Successfully Selling Your Professional Services As a professional service provider you face special challenges promoting yourself to potential clients. You may have certain restrictions on how you market or advertise. Creating Intense Emotions That Motivate People Ever wish that your presentations could be as much fun as a cool TV commercial? Come late January every year network TV treats us to America's finest and most expensive commercials - Superbowl commercials. You may remember some of these even now, 2 weeks later. Overcoming the Fear of Selling For many of you the Fear of Selling is a huge challenge and obstacle for you from day to day. The first thing you need to do is find out exactly what it is you're afraid of. Count Down To An Advert There are hundreds of books available to teach you how to write a good sales letter/advert. If you were to read them all it would be possible to distil all of the recommendations into a 'What to do list' similar to the one below. The Answers (1 - 5) Are Here !!! - Challenge Yourself - Evaluate Your Selling Skills "THE ANSWERS (1 - 5) ARE HERE!!!"Question 1) List the top five most important steps in the selling process?Answer: 1. Rapport. Create a Magic Connection with Clients, Leads, and Business Associates Part II Part I of this article explored how strategies of Neuro-Linguistic Programing (NLP) can be used to gain instant rapport with clients, leads, and business associates, and more specifically, how to use physiology, matching and mirroring, to create instant magic communications.Now, how can tonality and words establish rapport?TONALITYWhile physiology accounts for 55% of communication among humans, tonality accounts for 38%. Why There Will Always Be High Paying Sales Jobs With the dot.com revolution crushing once solid business models on an almost daily basis, the question surely crosses one's mind "am I next?". Focus on a Trade - Not a Discount Smart buyers will always ask for a better price. Unfortunately, too many sales people and business owners automatically think that reducing their price is the most effective way to respond to this request. Grow Your Business By Increasing the Value of Each Sale - 29 Ideas to Spur Your Brain There are 3 ways to grow any business:- Get more customers- Get more from each sale- Sell to each customer more frequently.That's it - everything else boils down to some variation of these 3 activities. Referrals: Getting Good Business By Doing Good Business Whether you're a conventional sales person, a professional - such as a dentist or lawyer or doctor - or a business owner, you've got to have clients to stay in business. There are several ways to do this: either continue to find new customers, keep all of the customers you've ever had, get old clients to return, or get customers to send in referrals. What is Lead Generation? Lead Generation is vital to all businesses. All companies try to attract new customers, and this is a kind of lead generation. Closing Sales Is Not A Problem, It's A Process In my opinion, the most overrated topic in sales training is the subject of closing. In year's past, it seems the object of most sales training courses was to fill the heads of participants with as many closing techniques as possible. |
home | site map | contact us |