Want to increase your sales and grow your business but worried you will come across as a pushy sales person? Not sure what to do or where to start to ensure your business is a success this year? The key to success, particularly in sales, is planning ahead and always be willing to try something new.
1. Review the previous year
Did you make enough money? Did you reach your goals? Compare your sales month to month. When were the good times and when were the quiet times?
2. Learn from your successes and your failures
And reinforce the actions and tools that generated results and those that didn’t. Maximize the good times and minimize the quiet times
3. Know who and what your best source of business is
Was it client referrals or word of mouth and if so, who were your best referrers? What networking events generated the greatest amount of business or provided the best opportunity to meet your target market? How many enquiries were generated from your website?
4. Develop a sales target
Takes into account your personal and professional goals and ask “how will this be achieved?”
5. Improve your sales and business skills
Not just your Industry and product knowledge. If you would like your business to change and grow, how will you and your staff need to grow and change?
6. Know your target market
Create a profile of your ideal client including what they care about, what challenges they face or what they would like to improve. If you know what you are looking for it’s easier to find them.
7. Ask for referrals
Tell your clients and your business network what type of clients you would like to work with and ask them if they know anyone that fits that description. Reward those clients that send you successful referrals.
8. Up sell your existing clients
How many of your clients know about all of your products and services?
9. Increase your networking activity
Expand your contact sphere and go out and meet more people. Networking can be the best form of advertising for your business because you are the promoting it.
10. Follow up, follow up, follow up
The last and most important point. So many sales are lost simply because no one bothered to follow up. It’s not about being pushy and arrogant to get the business; it’s about helping that client make a decision that will benefit them in the long term.
This sales article was written by Karen Andrews, Director of Shine
Sales Solutions, a Sydney based Sales Coach and Sales expert that works
with businesses to increase their sales through strategy development,
sales coaching and mentoring.
If you liked this article, subscribe to our monthly Sales Success ezine. You will learn...
* Easy ways to increase your sales and grow your business
* Simple strategies to sell yourself, even if your not in sales
* How to generate sales easier and quicker!
Enter your details at the top of the page or click here
sales tips & articles
10 Ways to Increase Your Sales
What to do when the sale stalls?
How many stalled sales do you have in your sales pipeline right now?
You feel as though you have done everything right. You have connected well with your prospect, they have explained their business and relevant personal issues and you are working directly with the person who has the authority and ability to make the decision. They have given you all the right buying signals but the only problem is you can’t get them to sign on the dotted line and now they aren’t returning your calls.
In order to jumpstart a stalled sale, you must first diagnose the reasons behind it. The problem may not be that the sale stalls, the problem is that we just don't recognize it soon enough and waste valuable time and resources on dead-end opportunities.
Little connection to a critical business issue
How is your solution addressing a business issue for your customer or prospect? For each opportunity in your sales pipeline answer this question:
Why does your prospect want to buy this product or service?
If you cannot communicate how your solution can
- Improve revenue, productivity, qualify or efficiency
- Save time or money
- Solve a critical problem, challenge or frustration that the business is facing
Customers Are Busy
The end of a sale often becomes difficult when your customer or prospect stops returning your calls and emails, overnight. It appears as though they have lost interest and the sale has gone cold...Or has it?
Many of us find it difficult to get everything done during work day or experience unexpected problems which take our focus elsewhere and your customers are no different. In fact, the better the prospect the busier they are likely to be.
It is important not to panic at this stage and let the customer or prospect fall away or to annoy them with endless phone calls and messages.
Keep momentum by maintaining regular contact, acknowledge your client is busy and perhaps ask them when would be an appropriate day or time for you to call and follow-up.
"I Want to Think it Over"
When a customer says, "I want to think it over," this may not always be the case. Some are actually saying "thanks but not thanks" to avoid a potentially negative and uncomfortable situation and some genuinely do want to think it over or talk to their business partner. The important thing is to know the difference between the two.
Some people just need a little push and a little help to make the decision. They may find making decisions difficult and are afraid of making the wrong decision. To many, no decision is the best decision.
When the prospect says, "I want to think it over," it is important to acknowledge and respect what the client says. Smile and say "that's a good idea, this is an important decision and I completely understand your need to think about it" which will help the prospect to relax.
It important now to leave now or you will lose this person as a prospect and being the never-ending game of phone tag and follow-up.
Ask the prospect "Obviously you have a good reason for wanting to think it over. May I ask what the reason is?”
This gives you the opportunity to see how genuine the prospect is and to uncover their real concerns and objections and say “If we could do this, would that solve the problem?"
Fear of Rejection
A major obstacle to selling is the fear of rejection or criticism. This fear can jeopardize all your hard work as your sales simply slip through your fingers and go cold.
Fear of rejection is a genuine emotion that many people in sales experience at one point or another and can be overcome through practice and by changing your mindset about sales and follow-up. Sales is not about being pushy and arrogant, it is about you communicate your ability to help and solve problems.
Did you know that one of the biggest complaints consumers have about salespeople is that they don’t follow up?
Your customers are busy too, so making a quick courtesy call to see how the decision is progressing may actually be doing them a favour. Who knows, they may have been meaning to call you all along but have simply been too busy.
This sales article was written by Karen Andrews, Director of Shine Sales Solutions, a Sydney based Sales Coach and Sales expert that works with businesses to increase their sales through strategy development, sales coaching and mentoring.
If you liked this article, subscribe to our monthly Sales Success ezine. You will learn...
* Easy ways to increase your sales and grow your business
* Simple strategies to sell yourself, even if your not in sales
* How to generate sales easier and quicker!
Enter your details at the top of the page or click here
Tips to Kickstart your Sales in 2012
Did you come back from the New Year break invigorated and inspired to make 2012 your best year yet?
I love the saying "if nothing changes, then nothing changes" so in order to achieve bigger success this year, changes need to be made, and remember, it's not just the business which might need tweaking, ask yourself what you will do differently to achieve your goals this year.
Use these 5 quick tips and get motivated, get active and start taking the steps toward building your success this year.
Set Yearly, Quarterly and Monthly Goals.
What do you want to achieve each and every month? It can be related to sales figures, client numbers, performance, units sold or even the number of networking events & client meetings you would like to have. Ask your salespeople to write a one page plan and list their goals, what they plan to do differently and how they plan on achieving monthly and quarterly targets.
Regularly review progress
If you aren't already, hold weekly sales meetings to review the activity
and performance of your team and ensure they are on track with their plans and sales achievements.
Have you got a 'consistent' process in place to know where you are each month, identify red flags and ensure your salespeople are accurately estimating their potential? Receiving weekly forecasts and a pipeline from each person in the team provides much needed visibility into the future and allows you to provide feedback and take corrective action, if required.
Review your sales process
How easy is it for customers to buy from you? How long does the process take from first meeting to signed order to implementation and how many people get involved? How many leads or customer orders fell out half way through?
The sales process begins when you start discussing a potential opportunity with a new or existing customer. Review each step to streamline the processes and remove unnecessary steps or delays that may have caused the sale to stall or be lost.
Knowing you are different just isn't enough. You might have the best
product or the best servcie in the world but if no one knows about it,
it's worthless. Additionally, staff who deal with customers tend to
become bogged down in a world of negativitiy, never ending issues and
complaints and will lose sight of all the benefits and positives that
the business has to over
Analyse customer base and improve customer loyalty
The simplest and cheapest way of increasing sales is to look through your client base. Analyse your customer database to discover what percentage of sales
each customer contributed to the overall revenue. Classify your
customers into A, B and C level depending on the spend, percentage or
value to the business.
With particular focus on your A and B class customers, how loyal do you think they are? When things start to get tough and your competitors are knocking on their door offering savings, will they pay more to stay with you?
How will you demonstrate or communicate the value you bring, over and above what they are paying for?
Dig deeper and analyse what products or services each of your A and B customers haven't bought and what else they could get some value or benefit from.
Arrange to visit your customers and discuss their plans for 2012 and what they hope to achieve. Is there any products or services that you have that will assist them or make it easier to achieve? Use the visit to update them on your plans for 2012, how you plan to 'love them' this year, new products or services being introduced or talk about a product or service that they aren't buying that you feel they might get benefit from.
Lastly, let them know that your plans are to grow in 2012 and you would welcome any referrals or introductions.
Be different and yell it from the rooftops
Knowing you are different just isn't enough. You might have the best product or the best servcie in the world but if no one knows about it, it's worthless. Additionally, staff who deal with customers tend to become bogged down in a world of negativitiy, never ending issues and complaints and will lose sight of all the benefits and positives that the business has to over.
Hold a staff or sales meeting and review the successes and positives from last year. Have a discussion on the differences between your business and the competition, as a group analyse your strengths and weakness vs their strengths and weaknesses. How can you use your strengths to highlight their weaknesses and how will you combat their strenghth over your weakness?
Keep focussed on the positives and discuss what is possible and what can be achieved when everyone stays positive and focused. This will help staff to forget the negatives of last year and see the potential opportunities of the future.
Assist staff who aren't comfortable talking about themselves by discussing ways these benefits and differences can be introduced into the conversation or how they can be used to overcome objections and negotiate.
Understand and identify what new business you want
In the end, it all comes down to prospecting. When we know what we want, we know how to find it and prospecting is no different.
Don't leave it up to the salespeople to decide what customers your business should have in 2012. Share the new business strategy to the team and discuss what the business plans to do to support them and make the job of prospecting easier and more successful.
And remember................ if nothing changes, then nothing changes. Here's to great selling in 2012.
This sales article was written by Karen Andrews, Director of Shine
Sales Solutions, a Sydney based Sales Coach and Sales expert that works
with businesses to increase their sales through strategy development,
sales coaching and mentoring.
If you liked this article, subscribe to our monthly Sales Success ezine. You will learn...
* Easy ways to increase your sales and grow your business
* Simple strategies to sell yourself, even if your not in sales
* How to generate sales easier and quicker!
Enter your details at the top of the page or click here
Improving sales team performance
When dealing with clients, a common situation that I come across is lack of activity and lack of accountability in sales teams which leads to lack of sales. The business is owner is stressed and frustrated not just because the sales aren’t coming in but because they simply don’t have the time to spend with salespeople or effectively manage the team. In some cases the business owner simply doesn’t know what to do.
- Does any of this sound familiar to you?
- I don't know what my salespeople do every day
- They keep telling me the same thing every week but no sales are being closed
- My sales people are meeting their weekly or monthly sales targets
- There is no new business coming in, it's all from existing clients?
- No one seems to picking up the phone and cold calling
- I'm not sure what to say to them or how to manage them
- I don't have time, nor want to manage them
- Our sales meetings seem to drag on forever
- We create the change
- We save you time
- We have the tough conversations, and
- We are the bad cop
If you’re not in a position to utilize a service like ours, here are some tips that might help you:
Ensure that each salesperson clearly understands what is expected of them each and every week in terms of new business activity (cold calls/meetings), customer visits, quotes generated or sales made.
Hold weekly sales meetings and discuss what meetings/calls were made the previous week, what is planned for this week and what sales can be expected.
Bring up and discuss objections or stalling that the sales team may be experiencing with customers and brainstorm solutions as a team.
Provide coaching and mentoring support in any form and suggest that you visit customer or prospects together.
This sales article was written by Karen Andrews, Director of Shine Sales Solutions, a Sydney based Sales Coach and Sales expert that works with businesses to increase their sales through strategy development, sales coaching and virtual sales management.
If you liked this article, subscribe to our monthly Sales Success ezine. You will learn...
* Easy ways to increase your sales and grow your business
* Simple strategies to sell yourself, even if your not in sales
* How to generate sales easier and quicker!
Enter your details at the top of the page or click here
Smooth Sailing or Storms Ahead ? How to use the Sales Pipeline to predict your future
I've spoken in the past about the Sales Pipeline and how to use it to increase sales but now it’s time to review it again to see just what the next couple of months will look like.
A sales pipeline is simply a forecast that you or your salespeople prepare monthly which lists the customers that are likely to buy in a given time frame, the value of the sale and when it is likely to close. It is an essential tool for business owners and sales managers to identify where you are and where you need to be in order to meet budget.
Even if the forecast is well below where you need it to be, at least you are aware of it and can take steps to improve it and stay on track. Don't wait until the 2nd or 3rd week of the month when you realise that sales are slow to come in and you need more because it's usually too late.
Typically, I usually ask for a forecast at the beginning of the month and then again on the 15th of the month to see how we are tracking.
The important thing to remember is to use a 'weighting'. You may $500,000 in your pipeline but it's very unlikely that you will be successful in winning 100% of them so the forecast will be inaccurate. A weighting is simply a % that you apply terms of the likelihood of winning the sale. Here is an example of how to calculate:
Using this example, the salesperson needs to add more sales into their pipeline to ensure they reach their sales target of $100,000.
As a guide to the Probability you could use
Initial Communication - 10%
First Meeting/Presentation - 20%
Proposal Given - 60%
Negotiation/Verbal Commitment - 80%
Closed - 100%
Most CRM/Database packages (I use ACT or Salesforce.com) include Sales Pipeline management but it can be as simply as listing them on an Excel spreadsheet. Here are a couple of examples from Excel to get you started
Solutions Sales:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-s/templates/TC011457101033.aspx
Product Sales:
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/templates/TC011457181033.aspx
This sales article was written by Karen Andrews,
Director of Shine Sales Solutions, a Sydney based Sales Coach and Sales
expert that works with businesses to increase their sales through
strategy development, sales coaching and mentoring.
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tweets
Business Networking Tips
Networking has been good to me over the years. Apart from referrals, it has been the single most successful way of generating new business and building my professional network. It must be the salesperson in me, but there is nothing more rewarding than meeting and connecting with new people who end up as friends, associates or clients.
I just love the randomness of networking and the fact that you never know what fantastic people you will meet.
However, networking can be a very time consuming and very costly exercise if your not maximizing the opportunity you have in front of you. I often tell the staff of clients that networking is not about putting a beer or wine in your hand and talking to people. It’s about talking with a purpose and seeing what common interests or common ground you have.
As my good friend Maurice Gilet from BNI says ‘it’s called net-working for a reason – it’s not ’not-working’!
Here are some tips and information that you might find useful - so get out there networking !
Tip 1
When choosing an event think about what type of companies are likely to attend (large or small) and the position of the person that will attend. It is well known that Senior Managers of most medium to large companies won't engage in business networking (because they think they don’t have to) unless it is for a specific industry event or because the guest speaker and topic are of interest to them. Typically, they send their junior staff or sales staff but, don’t be put off by this because you can still get a lot of the information you need you just need to get them talking and ask some questions. For example:
- What do you do?
- How’s business?
- Is it a large company? How many people do you employ?
- Do you have more than one office?
- What kind of clients do you deal with?
- How do you find new clients (i.e. marketing, advertising or direct sales)
- If I was to contact your company, who would be the best person to speak to regarding……
If you want to get the most out of any networking group, you will need to attend more than once so that people get used to seeing you and talking to you. When you have been about three times you should notice that people will start to recall your name and business name. Using the service of a new contact or sharing business referrals is based on trust and credibility and trust takes time to establish and build.
Tip 3
Have a goal for each event, i.e. two new contacts, one meeting, or two potential candidates. This way you can judge whether the event was worthwhile and whether it’s worth doing again.
Tip 4
If the thought of networking and walking into a room full of strangers is intimidating for you, ask a friend or colleague to join you. This way the event will be more enjoyable and you will always have a ‘safe haven’ for those times when you are on your own or looking for people to talk to. Just make sure that you don't just talk to each other!
Tip 5
Arrive early so you can look at the name tags on the registration desk and see what type of people will be attending. There may be someone attending from a prospective client; by standing near the desk you can save time searching for them by watching who picks up the nametag.
Tip 6
Stand near the registration desk when people are arriving; people may think you are part of the event and will feel more comfortable talking to you.
Tip 7
Most importantly, always remember to follow up the contacts you have met within 24 hours. A simple email to those who just briefly chatted with or a phone call suggesting a meeting to those who expressed an interest. If you don’t follow up the people that you have met, you are wasting the time and effort you put into going in the first place.
Don't forget that I also run a Networking Skills Workshop (in your office or mine) so if you or your team would like some personal attention, click here or call me on 0294376500
This sales article was written by Karen Andrews, Director of Shine Sales Solutions, a Sydney based Sales Coach and Sales expert that works with businesses to increase their sales through strategy development, sales coaching and mentoring.
If you liked this article, subscribe to our monthly Sales Success ezine. You will learn...
* Easy ways to increase your sales and grow your business
* Simple strategies to sell yourself, even if your not in sales
* How to generate sales easier and quicker!
Enter your details at the top of the page or click here
Common Characteristics of High Achievers in Sales
Following on from my article "Solving the Salesperson Puzzle", I thought I would look at some of the characteristics and attributes that high achieving salespeople tend to have over their mediocre and poorer performing salespeople.
Many people believe great sales-people are born, not made but I disagree. Sales is a process that can be taught to anyone and it is simply how the process is applied that separates good from great. Success in sales comes from skill development, attitude, confidence and behaviour.
Personally, I recommend you spend more time interviewing on attitude, behaviour and whether someone has an achievement mentality rather than focusing on skills.
The following list has been compiled based on my own sales experience, observations in dealing with hundreds of sales people and my what I have always known to be true.
- Believe you can
- Have a great attitude and great environment
- Surround yourself with successful, like minded people
- Continue to learn and grow, learn something new every day
- Plan for the day
- Become known as an expert who has valuable knowledge and is willing to help
- Have the answers your customers and prospects need, before they ask
- Recognise and act on opportunities
- Take responsibility for your actions
- Stop talking, start doing. Take Action !
- Make mistakes
- Be willing to take risks
- Stay focused on your dreams and goals
- Ensure you have balance in your life
- Be persistent, don’t give up
- Have a positive attitude, every day
- Avoid negativity and negative people
Do you agree with what I have listed, disagree or have I missed some things? I would love to get your feedback.
This sales article was written by Karen Andrews, Director of Shine Sales Solutions, a Sydney based Sales Coach and Sales expert that works with businesses to increase their sales through strategy development, sales coaching and mentoring.
If you liked this article, subscribe to our monthly Sales Success ezine. You will learn...
* Easy ways to increase your sales and grow your business
* Simple strategies to sell yourself, even if your not in sales
* How to generate sales easier and quicker!
Enter your details at the top of the page or click here
Tips on how to present a Proposal or Quote
Many people in business and in sales find discussing price very confronting and very uncomfortable, yet it' one of the most important aspects of the sales process and can be a significant indicator as to whether you will be successful in winning the business. Whether you prepare a written proposal or a simple one page quotation, whatever you do, don't try and avoid discussing the number that is on the page or skip over it onto something else. It's is one of the most significant factors that influences the buying decision and you want to make sure that your prospective client understands what tangible and intangible benefits they are getting for their money.
I have compiled a list of tips that will help you win more sales and to win them quicker but also to help reduce any anxiety or discomfort when talking about price.
- Avoid nasty, uncomfortable surprises when the price is discussed or when you ask for the business. Before you start discussing the proposal, ask if anything has changed since your last meeting.
- Insert a “Current Situation” or “Executive Summary” to the beginning of your proposal. A short summary of the first meeting to demonstrate your understanding of the business and what they would like to achieve
- Where possible, present your pricing in person rather than sending via email. It may seem like a waste of time but it gives you the ability to read an immediate reaction to your proposal and your price. It also saves you the time and hassle of having to phone them later and ask if they would like to proceed.
- Take a copy for each person in the meeting, however, have ONE copy that is not stapled or bound.
- Present one page at a time to the person or the group, taking the time to reinforce the key points in each section. This allows you to talk about the value you can offer and the benefits of dealing with your business, before it gets to price.
- Close the sale. Don’t let the opportunity go by because you feel pushy or are worried they might say no. If you don’t ask, you don’t get. Besides, they might have been meaning to call you but have been caught up.
- If you are uncomfortable asking for the sale, use an Assumptive Closing technique. For example: “to get started all we need to do is” or “if you could send over the files, I can go through them” or “I’m free on Wednesday, if that works for you”.
- Read a book on Body language. Having the ability to read a person’s reaction through their body language is very useful when presenting pricing and negotiating. You can immediately see a positive or a negative reaction to the price.
If you liked this article, subscribe to our monthly Sales Success ezine. You will learn...
* Easy ways to increase your sales and grow your business
* Simple strategies to sell yourself, even if your not in sales
* How to generate sales easier and quicker!
Enter your details at the top of the page or click here
Why isn’t my salesperson selling - solving the salesperson puzzle
Hiring salespeople is a time consuming and costly exercise, so it’s important to get it right and keep it right. Unfortunately, not all salespeople are equal and managing poor performers is a common (and stressful) problem for many businesses, no matter what their size.
There are many reasons why sales people stop selling and why some just don't work out and it’s usually not the ones that they are telling you. Personally, I think the main reason salespeople fail to perform are due to lack of direction and little to no accountability. Salespeople, no matter how professional or how experienced need direction and need and expect accountability.
Salespeople can be your best asset or your worst asset depending on how you manage them. If you have a salesperson that is not performing, here are some reasons that might shed some light on the situation:
All care, no responsibility.
This is where you as the Manager or Business Owner don’t take responsibility for the success of your sales person and you simply dump everything into your salesperson's lap, hoping they will miraculously turn things around. You provide no leadership or support to the salesperson – just set and forget which is an extremely risky thing to do. I see this a lot in smaller businesses where the owner has little to no interest in sales or salespeople. If you employ salespeople, you need to be ask questions, be interested and be involved.
The Business Saviour.
Many business owners secretly hope that a salesperson will be the answer to their prayers; the saviour who will quickly start generating sales and increasing profits. While a good salesperson can make an enormous difference, it won’t happen overnight. You still need to invest considerable time and resources to market your company and to manage and develop your salespeople.
Not communicating expectations.
Salespeople need direction and they need to know exactly what is expected of them. Unfortunately, many Owners and Managers fail to communicate expectations clearly to their salespeople. When that happens, it's common for salespeople to think they're doing fine, whilst the Manager/Owner sees them as under performing and starts to get very frustrated. Communicate expectations (also known as KPI’s, key performance indicators) in writing from day one. Setting KPI’s on sales activities, customer meetings & networking events in addition to sales revenue, will ensure that sales remain consistent month to month.
Lack of Accountability.
When you are reliant on your salespeople to generate sales, why would you risk your business by not knowing how much and when the sales will come in? Holding a weekly team meeting to discuss the sales pipeline and sales activity is a simple way to introduce accountability. If your salespeople aren’t making sales at least your aware of it and can do something about it. Don’t wait until it’s too late. At the beginning of each month, have a performance review with each individual salesperson and discuss their performance for the previous month against expectations. If you have poorly performing salespeople, ask them to achieve specific revenue targets or tasks within a specified time frame. It will help you know whether to keep them or get rid of them.
Remember, if no-one cares what the salesperson is doing or whether they are making sales, why would they?
Hiring the wrong type of salesperson
There are two types of salespeople: those who can win new business (Business Development Manager or Hunter) and those who grow existing accounts (Account Manager or Farmer).
Most businesses want to employ salespeople who can generate new business, because they're already good at developing relationships with current clients. They want the type of salesperson who can make cold calls, build new relationships, and close a deal with a new client. This is much harder to do, requires different skills and has higher salary expectations.Be clear on what you want your salespeople to do so you can match the skills, experience and salary accordingly. If your salesperson isn’t selling, ask them what they have done in the last month to add to the sales pipeline and generate sales. This is where the majority of mistakes are made with salespeople – hiring an account manager find and close new business sales. They rarely have the desire or the skills to do so.
How much is enough?
Coming up with a fair and equitable commission scheme that works for everyone can be challenging. Giving away too much, too easily can make salespeople lazy and lose their hunger (not to mention frustrate the business owner or manager). Others can be too stingy or hard to achieve which does nothing to attract or keep the best performers. Remember, salespeople that win new business should be paid more than those who manage existing accounts. A commission scheme with an emphasis on commission rather than just a base salary will help to retain, reward and motivate ‘hunters’ whereas the security of a higher base salary will retain, reward and motivate ‘farmers’
Poor marketing and tools to support the salesperson.
Study after study shows that having a single approach to sales (such as cold-calling) won’t work on its own. Salespeople need solid marketing collateral, messages and campaigns that get prospects interested to meet with them. A well-ranked & effective website, email marketing and social media are great tools to generate leads that are completely free. They also need training and a solid understanding of the services and benefits you offer. The more time you spend training them and supporting them with marketing efforts, the quicker you will see them succeed.
If you liked this article, subscribe to our monthly Sales Success ezine. You will learn...
* Easy ways to increase your sales and grow your business
* Simple strategies to sell yourself, even if your not in sales
* How to generate sales easier and quicker!
Enter your details at the top of the page or click here
Build your Sales Pipeline and Boost Your Prospect Numbers
Do you get frustrated constantly searching for prospects and contact information? The traditional methods of building a list of people that you can market and sell to such as purchasing databases, driving around business parks and noting the tenants of buildings that you walk past are great, and they do work, however, they are costly and time consuming. If your looking for something quick and effective that you can do from the safety of your desk, try these:
1. LinkedIn
If you do an advanced search on LinkedIn you can search for contacts in a particular industry, location, position or a mix of all three (e.g. All Sales Managers in Sydney). It will give you their name and tell you if anyone in your network is connected with them, so you can ask your contact for an introduction.
2. Google Earth & Google Maps
Google Earth and Google Maps are great tools to find concentrated areas of business and to avoid having to drive around or randomly call through the yellow pages. If, for example, you have a client in Building A and you would like to find out who else is in that building that you can sell to (always smart to sell to their neighbours, it’s known as sandwich selling) or that location, a quick search on Google Earth or Google Maps will give you a list of the businesses in the building, the street and the suburb. Google Earth will also let you pan around the area and see other buildings and other streets.
3. Industry Association Websites
I have used these for years and it has been a great way for me to target an industry sector and get new appointments. Quite a lot of the Association websites will list their members by location or profession. A quick search will give you a list of their name, address and phone number.
4. Franchise Directories
Selling to franchises can be a very successful and very lucrative way to increase sales and help you to consistently meet your sales targets. This is where volume sales come in and when you have a critical mass of franchisees as customers, they tend to do the selling for you and promote your business through word of mouth and referrals.
5. Your Website
This one is mentioned a lot these days but I’m still amazed as to how many people don’t utilize their website to generate new enquiries or build their contact lists. Offering free tips, e-books or access to free resources and tips is a great way to build a marketing and prospect database. I send out information every 2-3 weeks on sales techniques, sales tips and free resources just like this blog article! It has been a great way of accessing people I would never normally come across as well as building my profile.
If you liked this article, subscribe to our monthly Sales Success ezine. You will learn...
* Easy ways to increase your sales and grow your business
* Simple strategies to sell yourself, even if your not in sales
* How to generate sales easier and quicker!
Enter your details at the top of the page or click here
This sales article was written by Karen Andrews, Director of Shine
Sales Solutions, a Sydney based Sales Coach and Sales expert that works
with businesses to increase their sales through strategy development,
sales coaching and mentoring.
