151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales

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Chapter title here

151 Quick Ideas

to Increase Sales

By Linda Sparks

Franklin Lakes, NJ

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151 Quick Ideas to ... fill in blank Copyright © 2006 by Linda Sparks All rights reserved under the Pan-American and International Copyright Conventions. This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or hereafter invented, without written permission from the publisher, The Career Press. 151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales EDITED BY JODI BRANDON TYPESET BY ASTRID DERIDDER Cover design by The Visual Group Printed in the U.S.A. by Book-mart Press To order this title, please call toll-free 1-800-CAREER-1 (NJ and Canada: 201-848-0310) to order using VISA or MasterCard, or for further information on books from Career Press.

The Career Press, Inc., 3 Tice Road, PO Box 687, Franklin Lakes, NJ 07417 www.careerpress.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Sparks, Linda, 1958151 quick ideas to increase sales / by Linda Sparks. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN-13: 978-1-56414-915-2 ISBN-10: 1-56414-915-3 1. Selling. I. Title. II. Title: One hundred fifty-one quick ideas to increase sales. III. Title: One hundred and fifty-one quick ideas to increase sales. HF5438.25.S675 2006 658.85—dc22

2006022404

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Contents How to Use This Book Introduction: Putting Sales Into Perspective 1. Business Development Is the Bottom Line 2. Marketing 101: Lots of Ways to Influence Sales 3. The Three-Phase Business Development Process 4. Trust- and Rapport-Building—It’s Still Sales 5. The Formal Sales Cycle: Parts Are Parts 6. They May Be Clients Already—But It’s Still Sales 7. Clarify What You’re Really Selling 8. Understand the Lifetime Value of Your Customers 9. Understand the Impact Business Goals Have on Prospecting 10. Understand How YOU Add Value 11. Inventory Your Business Development Assets 12. Round Up Collateral Materials 13. Get More Customers—the Good Kind 14. Uncover Your Path to Sales 15. Dump the Dead Weight 16. Do You Have Brand? 17. Share Your Bounty With the Community 18. All Roads Lead to Sales 19. Advertising Has a Place 20. Public Relations Are Rich in Paybacks 21. They Call It Earned Media for a Reason 22. Publicize Your Publicity 23. The Media Is Your Friend—Not Your Mother

9 11 13 14 15 16 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37

24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48.

The Community Wants to Know and Love You Websites Are More Than 24/7 Brochures Pricing Strategies Are Way More Than a Discount Program Cross-Promotions Can Help You Make New Friends Let Trade Shows Show You the Way Direct Sales Aren’t Always Direct Cold Calls Can Warm Things Up—or, “The Cracker Jack Moment” A Territory Management Approach Lends Perspective Direct Mail Still Delivers Publishing Your Ideas Increases Exposure Cause Marketing Takes It to Heart Speak and Grow Rich…in Prospects and Sales Customer Referrals Are Rare Birds Event Marketing Is a Hot Property Find the Synergy Inherent in Your Own Programs Develop Sales Objectives for Improved Performance Identify the Most Efficient Strategic Approach Ideas Selling More to Existing Clients Going Beyond the Transaction Quicker Closes Equal More Time for More Sales Organize a Collaborative Workplace Innovation Gets Attention Time Organize Your Business Momentum Markers Sales: It’s Not About You

38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 50 51 52 53 55 56 57 59 60 61 62 63 64 65

49. 50. 51. 52. 53. 54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66. 67. 68. 69. 70. 71. 72. 73. 74.

Create an Opportunity-Focused Strategic Account Profile Go Wide and Deep With Key Contacts Mission Possible—Mission Profitable Market Position Matters Be a Budget Bandit Are You Speaking Their Language? Customer Satisfaction Connects Us All Knowledge of the Competition Inspires Confidence Industry Insights Shine a Bright Light When Opportunity Knocks, Who Will Get the Door? Income and Expense Streams Mean Business Staffing Gaps Cut a Wide Path Interesting Fellows Short-Term Goals Are Golden Big Red Truck Tap Into the Momentum Present in the Universe Referrals Come Easier With Celebration Regulate This! Patriotism Serves Up American Consumers It’s Fair to Say Partnering With Worthy Causes Helps You Make New Friends A Mother’s Day Makeover Information Overload Meets Relevant Intelligence Be Bold: Stand for Something Be Real: Share Yourself and Your Stories Be Kind: Show Genuine Interest and Concern

67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 87 88 89 90 92 93 94 95

75. 76. 77. 78. 79. 80. 81. 82. 83. 84. 85. 86. 87. 88. 89. 90. 91. 92. 93. 94. 95. 96. 97. 98. 99. 100. 101. 102. 103. 104.

Talk Easily About Money: Pricing Talk Easily About Money: Add-On Projects Talk Easily About Money: Invoicing Understand the Value of a No-Sale Retail Stores Put Up a Good Front The Principle of the Loss Leader Convenience Stores Give You Gas Popular Brands Use Celebrities to Strengthen Credibility So Many Choices, So Little Time Inventors Use Infomercials to Tell a Complex Story Big Tickets Get Big Thanks A Chocolate on Your Pillow Independent Consultants Go One-on-One Consultants Live Their Work Home Builders Do the Work Big Business Inspires Big Ideas Marketing Is a Hard Number Coffee Shops Invite Us to Hang Out Free Cell Phones Aren’t Free A Web-Based Business Thrives on Visitors Converting From Free to Fee Affiliate Programs Multiply Your Efforts Events Accomplish Success With Grassroots Efforts Events Rally Corporate Support Not-for-Profits Get People to Help Them Sell Galleries and Museums Host Special Showings Do You Want BBQ With That Windshield? Bloggers Stir the Water The Bookstore Bonanza Scrip Bank Multiplies the Love

96 97 98 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 113 114 115 116 117 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 129

105. 106. 107. 108. 109. 110. 111. 112. 113. 114. 115. 116. 117. 118. 119. 120. 121. 122. 123. 124. 125. 126. 127. 128. 129. 130. 131. 132. 133. 134. 135. 136.

Media Outlets Take Their Own Medicine Retirement Communities Give Away Vacations Harley Davidson Builds Community You Can Do It, We Can Help! Organizations Have Long Memory Real Estate Agents Do Open Houses Buffet Style Feeds the Masses Assisted Living Assists Future Prospects More People Selling Is Better Make Sure Everyone Knows What You Sell Keep Employees Engaged Develop Your Corporate Information Bite Suppliers Can Help You Sell Customers Can Help You Sell The Community Can Help You Sell 100 Percent Participation in Intelligence-Gathering An Attitude for Business Development Skills for Business Development Everyday Things That Impact Sales How to Lose a Customer Product Category Makeover Microwave Customers Target Market Overview Plan Ahead to Keep Them Talking 5 Levels of Deep Study Solutions to Your Customer’s Problems Build Memorable Sales Presentations Daily Nourishment Essentials Stay in Front of Your Clients Every Week Invest in Yourself Become an Expert (It’s Easier Than You Think) Keep Your Promises

130 131 132 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 153 154 155 156 158 159 160 161 163 164 165 166

137. Use the Buddy System 138. Go on Retreat 139. When You Feel the Pull 140. Changing Places 141. Reality Check 101: Income 142. Reality Check 102: Target Market 143. Reality Check 103: Approach 144. We Manage What We Measure 145. Leading and Lagging Indicators 146. Measure What Matters to Customers 147. Measure What Matters in Your Business 148. Say Thank You—Often 149. Live Thankfully 150. A View of Abundance 151. Celebrate and Reward Success Appendix Index About the Author

167 168 169 170 172 173 174 175 176 178 179 180 181 182 183 185 187 191

How to Use This Book Every quick idea in this book has been selected to directly or indirectly help you gain and retain customers, create relationships, and build a successful business. Don’t try to implement all 151 ideas at once, because some won’t be a good fit right now. Read through all 151 quick ideas and select only those that can really make a difference at the moment. Don’t worry, you’ll go back and review the others periodically. Label your ideas…

Implement now. Review again in 30 days.

Pass the idea along to _________. Involve your staff in selecting and implementing these ideas, and don’t forget to give credit for their success! Invest in additional copies of this book and distribute them among your staff. Get everyone involved in selecting and recommending various quick ideas. Revisit this book every 90 days. As your business changes, you will find new quick ideas that might suit you better now that competition is heating up. Remember, all the ideas in this book have been proven in businesses across the United States and around the world. They have worked for others and will work for you!

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Introduction: Putting Sales Into Perspective Because you are reading this book, it is clear that you are looking for new ways to improve your sales. Let’s begin our work together with something that will change the way you see the role of the salesperson and the ways in which the sales team interacts with the rest of your organization. To increase your sales you need to gain a broader perspective of your organization that will allow you to increase the resources you can bring to bear on the sales function. At its lowest common denominator, sales is an individual transaction performed between the salesperson and a customer—essentially, a single action of selling. What you need to keep in mind is that each individual sales transaction is the combined effort of many people—every employee in your organization; inputs received from your suppliers; the feedback and support from customers and prospects; and the very essence of the communities in which you produce and sell your solutions. Add to this the particular place your product/ service holds in the range of possible solutions available to your customers and you are beginning to see how truly rich your new perspective should be. If all of these assets are to be understood and brought to bear in your sales efforts, then you will need to operationalize this new perspective. You will want to: Clarify the roles that non-sales employees play in the business development process.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales

Review the entire marketing mix in your organization for new and creative ways to connect with customers and prospects to make more sales. Make sure everyone in your organization is knowledgeable about and friendly toward the sales process. Recognize that the sales function is a business development continuum that ranges from indirect promotions to people you don’t even know yet, to proactive customer and account management.

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1 Business Development Is the Bottom Line If a sale is an individual transaction, then the organization’s overall sales function should embody a broader perspective that can be referred to as business development. It’s all about developing new business for your organization. Business development principles should be known and carried out in every nook and cranny of the organization, and by just about everyone in the organization. It all works in a cycle. When your organization develops new products or services, the goal is attracting and retaining specific customers. Servicing customer accounts with honesty, accuracy, and integrity closes the loop on this cycle of business development by making sure that customers have no reason to leave you and every reason Assignment to stick around and Develop a transaction map provide very valuable that tracks your products/servicreferrals. And finally, es. I challenge you to find an every strategic plan element that cannot be tied to has, at its core, goals business development. Separateto acquire and retain ly, create a process list that details customers. Almost the steps that make up your foreverything done in mal sales activities. Make this fun your organization has by picking up a new box of craya clear and practical ons and invite everyone in the tie to good business organization to come by and add development. their own contributions.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Documenting a complete business development continuum for your organization will help everyone recognize their existing inter-dependence.

Epilogue

The whole is worth far more than the sum of its parts.

2 Marketing 101: Lots of Ways to Influence Sales In order to make more sales, it’s a good idea to look at the wide range of methods you have available to influence customers and prospects. Often we lose sight of the fact that direct sales activities represent only one of many essential elements of an overall marketing mix—one tool in the Assignment business development toolbox. For some the Make a list of the eleterm sales has become ments you know of from your passé, even unseemly. marketing mix that impact The term marketing has your business development been substituted in polite success. Rank them in order conversation in order to of importance and add cateprotect sensitivities. But gories you don’t think are just substituting the word covered here. Keep the list; marketing in place of by the time you finish this sales has not changed the book you’ll be adding more! reality of the situation.

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Quick Ideas 2 to 3 Sales must be made if your organization is going to continue to stay in business. Many things influence the prospect along the business development continuum, so it pays to understand the other elements in the marketing mix and how they might help you to make a sale. Some of the elements that make up a typical marketing mix are advertising, public relations, Websites, pricing strategies, cross promotions, trade shows, special events, direct sales, and publishing and speaking.

Epilogue There are 64 colors in the crayon box, and all of the colors can help you make a nice picture. There are more elements than you think.

3 The Three-Phase Business Development Process In the grand scheme of things—business development things, that is—there exists a basic, three-phase process: u Phase One: Getting to Know You u Phase Two: Formal Sales u Phase Three: Customer and Account Management Although it is easiest to describe this as a linear process, as if the prospect/customer moves along a flat continuum from

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales one phase to the next, the fact is that all three phases represent a dynamic series of transitions and feedback. Phase One starts with the organization floating its image and message in the prospect/customer pool. When the potential prospect recognizes that your firm is one of its options for a solution to a problem, then we transition to Phase Two and Formal Sales. Once the sale is made we make the formal transition to Phase Three: Customer and Account Management. Because most organizations tend to be stronger in one phase of the business development process than they are in the other two, the sales effort can sometimes lose momenAssignment tum. It is important that everyone in the organizaMake a list of the tion understands how each strengths and weaknesses of these phases plays out you feel your organization and the impact they each has in each of these phases. have on business development success.

Epilogue Good things tend to come in threes.

4 Trust- and Rapport-Building— It’s Still Sales The first phase in business development begins with letting people get to know you. A great deal of the groundwork

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Quick Ideas 3 to 4 with prospects is laid out before you even get to meet them. They will make judgments about you based on your “brand.” Your brand is who and what you are in the eyes of others. Assignment How, when, and what prosBecome active in a pects learn about you, your professional, business, organization, and your soluor community group tions in this early stage can that will put you in proxhave a dramatic impact on imity of your future your success at moving them prospects, and let them to sales. get to know you. For example, in a professional services environment, being known as a forwardthinking, approachable professional who participates openly in a local business association may be the perfect groundwork for this phase. You and the future prospect may not even know each other yet, but you have begun a path of trust by sharing a common interest and “bumping into each other” professionally. Most small businesses don’t have unlimited funds to perform expensive marketing activities. Choosing how you promote your organization in this phase will say a lot to potential prospects. Do you value similar things? Do you speak their language? The goal is to be well known to them by the time they need your particular product or service.

Epilogue Time is money. Be truly present in the community you wish to serve.

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5 The Formal Sales Cycle: Parts Are Parts The formal sales phase of the business development continuum is triggered when the prospect admits a specific need and recognizes your firm as a potential supplier of the solution. This is the point when a lead turns into a prospect. You will close more sales if you recognize the distinct components of this phase and keep your actions on track. Discovery: Develop a systematic approach to gathering the customer information you need to develop a solution. Proposal: The proposal represents your offer of services or products in response to the prospect’s request for assistance. If you have performed a discovery process, you will be able to speak to the situation much more completely than your competition. The proposal represents the technical aspects of the solution you propose. Presentation: The presentation of the proposal Assignment document (or your product) is your opportunity to conThink about creative vince the prospect to choose ways to present your soyour solution. Treat the prelutions to prospects. Think sentation as an important as a stage manager, an orappointment with your proschestra conductor, or even pect regardless of whether it a high school teacher prewas pre-scheduled or not. paring an important lesson Build a case for your solufor a group of preoccupied tion by demonstrating that teenagers.

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Quick Ideas 5 to 6 you understand the prospect’s situation, the desire for this type of product or service, and why your particular offer is the one that offers maximum satisfaction.

Epilogue What you have to offer is not nearly as important as what your prospect thinks of it.

6 They May Be Clients Already— But It’s Still Sales Once a sale has been made with a new customer you have triggered the third phase of the business development continuum: the customer/account management phase. It is important to note that this is not the end of the continuum. Customers represent the best source of add-on sales and qualified referrals, and the level of operational feedback that drives innovation and fuels public relations efforts. They may be customers, but some of your most productive sales activities will occur in and around these accounts. Contracting: The prospect becomes a customer at the moment of agreement. Whether you have a retail transaction or a written agreement, or simply do business with a handshake, this represents an important transition in the relationship. The prospect has chosen you and can reinforce his or her own decision by inviting others to choose you as well.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Add-On Sales: If Assignment you effectively engage your customer and do Analyze your customer your job well, there will base and determine what peroften be new opportunicentage of your sales comes ties to serve. This is a from repeat customers or rebeautiful thing, but you ferrals from those customers. need to be prepared to handle it. Plan ahead for the potential needs of your customers and develop a proactive approach to recognize, quote, and close add-on business. If needs fall outside your offerings, be prepared with a thoughtful referral. Customers as Champions: Nothing can help your sales more than customers singing your praises, providing you with qualified referrals, and simply being a good partner. This final element in the business development continuum brings you full circle and places new leads directly into the trust and rapport phase of your program.

Epilogue Treat customers as if they are your best prospects— because they are!

7 Clarify What You’re Really Selling A pile of rocks is just a pile of rocks, right? Why should we get all sentimental about a pile of rocks? What if this particular pile of rocks was going to become a stone path in the Johnsons’

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Quick Ideas 6 to 8 backyard? What if the purpose of the path was for Mrs. Johnson while she carried her infant son? The Johnsons need help choosing a product that Assignment will be appropriate for this Develop simple quespath. They may need intions that you can use with stallation tips to make sure qualified prospects to estabthey get the best possible lish a productive dialogue. results. Many retailers Your goal should always be would simply load the prodto learn enough about their uct with no concern for situation to help deliver the helping the customer make best possible solution. the best choice. Customers rarely need the products or services you sell. What they are really looking for are solutions to problems and new opportunities. Understand this simple truth and you will increase your sales.

Epilogue Silence is not golden when it comes to your customers.

8 Understand the Lifetime Value of Your Customers In order to make the sales you desire, be prepared to make the necessary investment. If there were a store that sold customers—good customers—how much would you be willing to spend? Consider this example.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales A local ladies’ department store wants to attract more professional women. These women spend an average of $150 on each visit to the store. The store’s cost of goods sold is about 50 percent, so its gross profit is $75 on each sale. On average, these women visit the store four times per year, so these particular shoppers are each worth $300 in gross profits per year. If a client remains a regular for three years, she has a lifeAssignment time value of $900. Perform the kind of How much can the deanalysis discussed here partment store afford to spend on a low, medium, and to acquire one of these highly high value account from desirable regular customers? your list of customers. How much advertising, direct See how much you can mail, or sales perks should it afford to spend. invest?

Epilogue Make new friends, but keep the old—they are gold.

9 Understand the Impact Business Goals Have on Prospecting There was a marketing team for a statewide professional association that was suffering from a constant barrage of new ideas and demands from their president. As a thought leader in the industry, he was constantly asking the marketing staff to work on new projects. This might have been fun and exciting if

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Quick Ideas 8 to 10 the old demands went away when the new arrived—but Assignment they didn’t. Instead of picking a The boss was unwilling sales goal, try this backto set clear business goals, wards planning approach. but the marketing team had Look at your budget and figto make a few assumptions ure out how many more to maintain their sanity. customers you will need to They needed to set baseachieve it. line goals for each of the organization’s key income streams in order to keep their work in perspective. The team established the following baseline factors relating to sales growth to help them to determine how much time and attention needed to be invested in acquiring new customers: u What are our primary revenue streams? u What does our account (customer) retention look like?

Epilogue There are only so many hours in the day. Use a little creativity to determine the activities that will give you the best payoff.

10 Understand How YOU Add Value Every salesperson has a role in business development, and you’ll likely make more sales when you fully understand yours. A salesperson at a value-added reseller (such as a computer store) helps the customer make sense of all the options.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales He or she may find people willing to drive an extra distance to buy from someone with special skills and knowledge. If you find yourself in this type of role, keep yourself sharp and tuned into the options, and you will retain your competitive edge. A salesperson for a contractor may have the Assignment role of managing deadlines Take a close look at the relating to a request for probusiness you’re in and write posal and demonstrating to down the ways you add valthe buying committee that ue for your customer. doing business with his firm is the best option. It would be wrong for him to get so caught up in the technical aspects of the proposal document that he lost track of his primary role as the salesperson. If you are a person who wears many hats inside the organization, you will need to take special care when you shift into your sales role.

Epilogue Knowing how you make a difference for your customers will keep you focused on important issues.

11 Inventory Your Business Development Assets Every organization has major assets that can be leveraged toward developing new business. Instead of starting with the

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Quick Ideas 10 to 11 sales goals and performance shortfalls, take a look at some often-overlooked assets and see how they can lead the way in your sales strategy. Consider leveraging assets such as existing customers, your staff and facilities, and your company’s reputation. A marketing company that has a staff of subject-matter experts can develop a strategic approach to share information with the business community and allow qualified prospects a chance to sample the type of expertise they could expect from this organization as paid counsel. White papers, articles in the local business publications, and informational Websites are just the beginning. A hardware store with a busy street-front location and filled with on-trend inventory can host a home-improvement program on a local radio station and let walk-in customers supply some of the program content. A celebrity shopper would add some fun. An event with a strong charity cause and a large Assignment spectator following can inMake a list of your orcrease participation or ganization’s greatest assets. attendance by developing a Consider how you can bring grassroots effort encouragthem to bear on the business ing experienced spectators development goals. to attend again, invite a neighbor, and help double the impact on the charity.

Epilogue Leading with your best shot just might help you win the round.

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12 Round Up Collateral Materials Communicating with your key audiences will inAssignment crease your sales. To lay the Get a three-ring binder groundwork for developing and a set of tabs and collect a communications strategy, your samples. This will bestart by gathering samples come a reference guide of all the tools, tricks, and when you sit down with othtales that have been used in ers to establish a strategic the past to communicate inapproach to increasing sales. formation to your audience. For example, organizations that develop detailed proposals as part of their approach often create works of art that never find their way into routine sales collaterals. Retailers tend to reminisce about that one record-breaking sale, but often fail to capture the principles of the offer, the details of the sales results, and the potential environmental factors that played a major part. Look for: existing customers lists; profiles and buying histories; market potential reports; internal and external newsletters; mission, vision, and value statements; business and marketing plans; PowerPoint presentations; advertising copy; competitor analysis; annual reports; employee lists; organization charts; and financial statements. Nothing compares to sitting in a planning meeting and being able to provide a voice of reason because you have the facts right in front of you.

Epilogue There’s no place like home to find the things that matter most and are most effective.

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Quick Ideas 12 to 13

13 Get More Customers—the Good Kind As a salesperson, you make a big investment in developing new business, so why not target more of the customers you want? It’s easier to acquire good customers when you know what you’re looking for. Retailers with point-of-sale technology and customer-loyalty programs lead the pack in customer intelligence. Small professional services firms know their customers as well as the Assignment back of their hand. Work through your cliLook for the natural ent list and make notes in two sorters in your customer columns. List what you like profiles and their buying about them in column one pattern. Don’t be worried and what you don’t in colabout what you don’t umn two. When you are know; focus on what you finished, highlight the acdo know about your cuscounts that you’d like to tomers and highlight the replicate. Complete the aselements that will help you signment in Idea 14 to help reach out to prospects target more of the customthat mirror your favorite ers you desire. customers.

Epilogue All customers are not created equal. It’s up to you to go after the type of customers you want.

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14 Uncover Your Path to Sales Would you like to put yourself on a better path to sales? An industrial builder reviewed all their new customers for the past two years. These prospects learned that a high percentage of their business was related to local business owners looking for a new building site. They would drive into small industrial parks near their present site and see one of the builder’s small construction signs at a work site. These signs are practically free and single-handedly represent the company’s best element in the path to more sales. They had no idea! Needless to Assignment say, they now put them Examine your customer everywhere possible— list and trace the path backgetting them up early wards. You’re trying to and leaving them as long uncover the elements that inas possible. They also fluenced them along the way. enhanced signage on all If they came from a customthe firm’s trucks and er referral—consider how the trailers. The result was referring partner came into increased sales! the fold before them.

Epilogue Knowledge of the past can greatly enhance the future.

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15 Dump the Dead Weight Here’s the harsh reality: A customer pays you for your products and services or you pay them for the privilege of serving them. You decide. A restaurant that has been overusing coupons to increase traffic may find that it has attracted the wrong type of customers: customers who won’t visit without combining coupons and low-cost menu items (to the point of eliminating profitability from the transactions) are not helping the business. Promotional strategies, such as the one in this example, can be a legitimate element in the marketing mix, if the promotion helps you to attract profitable customers. BeAssignment cause the coupons were Determine the customconceived as important to ers or the categories of business development, the customers present in your restaurant needs to considmix of business that are holder every dollar it is not ing your business back from charging these customers respectable profitability. against its marketing budNow decide if you want to get. This has not been a eliminate them or dilute their good investment of its marinfluence by strategically keting dollars, and the balancing your mix. restaurant needs to make a change.

Epilogue

Don’t forget to consider the future impact of low- or noprofit accounts.

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16 Do You Have Brand? Branding 101 tells us to brand through repetition, consistency, and fulfillment. This includes the way we perform our sales efforts. If you’ve set your sights on increasing sales, it pays to take a look at your brand to ensure it represents who and what you truly are in the marketplace. There are many organizations that present Assignment themselves one way in their corporate marketing proDo you maintain your grams and then establish a branding strategy across completely different peryour marketing mix? Does spective in their sales the message in your curactivities. Make sure you rent brand represent your and the company sales primary value proposition? strategies are in alignment Does your brand message with the brand strategy. connect and resonate with If you have a strong your audience? brand then consider it an asset in your business development efforts and leverage the heck out of it. If you have a weak brand, work to make it stronger while hanging onto the good parts. If you have no brand at all, you’re starting with a clean slate. Get some professional help to get started.

Epilogue If it walks like a dog, smells like a dog, and barks like a dog, people will likely assume it’s a dog.

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17 Share Your Bounty With the Community One of the best ways to position you and your firm in your target market is to share what you can with your community. A franchise hardware store receives a lot of market information from corporate relating to the community around its store. They routinely invite groups of local merchants to the store, coordinate a sharing of market intelligence, and help to develop promotional programs to benefit the entire group. A training and consulting firm has a large conference Assignment room it uses for training and Take inventory of the client projects. The firm things you have that you makes this room available for could share with your board and committee meetcommunity—consider ings after hours. They would time, talent, treasure, and be attending the meetings facilities. anyway, and having other community-minded professionals in their place is good for business. The firm displays project profiles in the common areas as a way to help guests understand the kind of solutions the firm provides. Many new customers have come through the channels these visitors represent.

Epilogue

Sharing is caring. Research has demonstrated that most people prefer to do business with people who show they care.

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18 All Roads Lead to Sales Don’t let anyone tell you that marketing is not about sales. If you can’t draw a straight line from your organization’s marketing efforts to the closing of sales, then you should reconsider the investment you are making in marketing. When establishing your business development programs, you should always take time to devise your own business development continuum. (You will find an example in the Appendix of this book.) Every single marketing-related strategy and tactic should be linkable to the moving of your prospects and/or customers along the Business Development Continuum. It’s a simple concept. If you are planning to invest in advertising, take time to make certain the advertising will lead to results. What results? It must provide leads in the community who may not know you yet, or, move qualified prospects to action. And it should Assignment lead existing customers to Examine a selection of provide referrals or repeat your planned or previous sales. You can maximize the promotional elements and potential of every marketing trace them systematically investment by considering back to how they can or did the broader potential impact impact sales. on sales.

Epilogue

Make sure you are on the road to someplace good.

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19 Advertising Has a Place An event with broad public appeal often relies heavily on paid TV and radio advertising to tell consumers who, what, when, where, and how much fun they will be missing if they don’t attend. Events have the timed “call to action” that makes advertising such a good fit. Promotional budgets for events often range from 10 to 20 percent of sales. By definition, advertising is a public announcement in print media, radio, TV, or Internet in order to attract or increase interest in a specific product or service. Advertising also has the distinction of being one of the most expensive promotional elements you can use. Therefore, it should be used only when you know who your prospects are, where they can be found, and what message will resonate with them. As is the case with every element in the marketing Assignment mix, advertising works best Draft an advertising apwhen integrated into a busiproach with no initial concern ness development program. for budgets. Focus on develKnowing the lifetime value oping a where and why—a of your customers and how wish list of sorts. Later, this many customers you need approach can be scaled until to acquire this year will go you come up with a program a long way in helping you you can afford. to make wise decisions.

Epilogue Advertising is one of those things it’s hard to live with or do without.

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20 Public Relations Are Rich in Paybacks When you read a story in the newspaper about a business, you probably believe every word you read. It was written by an objective journalist, right? If you see an ad in the same newspaper, you view it as a paid commercial and probably discount the message it contains because it is just a sales pitch. This reality positions public relations (PR) as an important element in the marketing mix, because the journalist who wrote that first story probably got his or her idea from some public relations effort. By definition, public reAssignment lations is the practice of establishing, maintaining, and Make a list of your key improving a favorable relapublics and consider infortionship between an institution mation you have access to or person and the public. that they would find valuBusiness initiatives that conable. Then develop an tain material useful for approach to provide it. development of a PR campaign might include: u New products representing a new twist on a longstanding product category. u Potential solutions to a public problem that has been well discussed in the mainstream media. u Significant anniversaries, such as 100 years serving a community. u Involvement in some worthwhile cause or event. Public relations should be an ongoing priority in your business development program.

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Epilogue A key element in consistent sales levels is consistently supporting your key publics.

21 They Call It Earned Media for a Reason When a particular company gets a lot of positive mentions in the media it’s a sign that the organization has probably undertaken a focused PR campaign. This means the company has developed a list of informative topics that it believes the public will be interested in hearing. Executing a successful PR campaign without makAssignment ing a pest of yourself with Make a list of elements the media and the public is of your business that could hard work. That is why sucgenerate content to be recess in this promotional area packaged for distribution to is called “earned” media. the public through a strateWhat are you doing or gic PR campaign. learning in the natural course of your work that could be shared with others? Would being seen as a source of this information help you to build your business?

Epilogue Instead of talking louder so people will hear you, try coming up with interesting things to say so people will pay attention.

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22 Publicize Your Publicity When you receive earned media, you should put it to work helping you sell. Promote it with abandon by reproducing the story and making sure that each of your key audiences gets the opportunity to read it. Here’s how: u Get permissions to reproduce the story. u Post the mention on your Website. u Post it on the message boards at work. u Include the mention in your newsletter. u Buy quality reprints. Assignment u Frame the stories to Imagine that the hang in your offices. newspaper has just u Include the mention in written a story about any of your customer your business. List all communications. the people you wish u Include the mention in could see it. Make sure mailings to suppliers. they do. u Highlight the story or accomplishment in your e-mail signatures and link back to the Website for complete story. u Include a copy in employee paychecks.

Epilogue

This type of bragging is good for business and is not what your mother warned you about.

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23 The Media Is Your Friend— Not Your Mother The media has routine deadlines and an insatiable appetite for information. Imagine the amount of information it takes to produce a daily newspaper or TV newscasts; this demand for information creates a great opportunity for organizations with an organized approach to public relations. If promoting an event, you will focus on entertainment editors and community calendars. If you have something relating to health and wellness you may focus on the journalists on the health beat. A retailer introducing a new product should tie the use of the product to some significant consumer problem. The media is not your Assignment mother! Don’t expect the Create a list of media media to care about your outlets. Capture the media needs—and don’t confuse representing the local busiPR with a paid advertising ness community as well as program. Be confident and industry-specific outlets. respectful, and build relaWhere do customers and tionships with the media that prospects get their industry will last a lifetime. The reand community news? turn on investment will be exponential.

Epilogue An attitude of sharing versus selling will take you a long way with the media and other key audiences.

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24 The Community Wants to Know and Love You Every organization is part of a larger community. If you’re too busy trying to rack up sales to make friends in the community, you are missing an important opportunity to leverage success. Nothing compares to community when it Assignment comes to sharing your Document the various comchallenges, expenses, munities in which your business and troubles. Think participates. Become involved in about how important those communities. Become a community is when leader in them where you can. there is a natural disasDevelop name recognition for ter; doesn’t it also your company. follow that a community can be helpful during less-traumatic times? Participate in community initiatives and inspire a dialogue between neighbors that is productive for business development. Be a community leader. It may be extra work at first, but will become a routine that gets results.

Epilogue There are a lot of people out there who have a stake in your success—those willing to do big things to build and maintain the thriving business community that you participate in. Make friends with them!

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25 Websites Are More Than 24/7 Brochures One way to view your Website is to think of it as a file cabinet where you keep all of your best information. This information should include details about your products and services, background documents, and anything that helps the prospects decide to do business with your firm. A Website can no longer be a last minute add-on in the marketing mix, and everyone in the organization should have accountability to keep the site’s information content up to date. Your Web Assignment presence serves as the Take inventory of the inproposal for prospects formation content items from who have not made themyour Website. Review each selves known to you yet. element and note how it supDoes yours reflect the ports leads, prospects, and same quality of production customers. that an important proposal would?

Epilogue A Website can perform the same way a well-qualified sales assistant can—only better, because it never needs a day off and it can remember everything you can remember to tell it.

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26 Pricing Strategies Are Way More Than a Discount Program The Elbow Room is a restaurant icon on the near north side of Tucson. Its claim to fame is its daily menu specials. Friday is fish night, and the special is all you can eat for $4.95. Other days, it offers similar deals on other meals. The place is always packed, and you have to squeeze in. In this case, the pricing strategy is not just a discount—it’s the primary promotional strategy. It’s not a coupon advertised in the paper or a two-for-one deal in the Entertainment Book. The Elbow Room does a robust business six days per week, 52 weeks per year. Word of mouth carries this message Assignment of value. Examine your pricing as Whether or not pricing it compares to others in the is one of your primary promarket relevant to the range motional elements, a of quality you offer. What relevant pricing strategy is role does pricing currently something you should seriplay in your business develously consider. By offering opment process? service across a wide range of price points you make it more difficult to leverage pricing as a promotional strategy. This approach serves everyone poorly, and no one especially well.

Epilogue I like the old saying: You can be cheap, fast, or good. Pick two.

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27 Cross-Promotions Can Help You Make New Friends A great example of cross-promotions comes to us from event marketing. A grocery store acts as a ticket reseller for a major local event with proceeds going to charity. The event organizers want to sell tickets to the grocery store’s shoppers, and the grocery store wants the opportunity to draw in the event customers who don’t normally shop there. Both entities want to increase traffic and sales. Don’t worry about acquiring cross-promotional partners with compatible products. The most important consideration is finding partners who have matching customer demographics. Assignment Once you establish partnerships you can concentrate on Take what you know how to productively interact. about your customers and Cross-promotions prospects, and think about should offer valuable busiwhere else this type of cusness development outtomer may go to spend time comes. In the grocery store and money. Consider what example, the store has a speyou have to offer that would cial interest in the goodwill it be of value to potential partreceives by being associatners. Then, approach them ed with the event’s charity with some ideas. of record.

Epilogue Sometimes the best way to help oneself is to find a way to help someone else.

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28 Let Trade Shows Show You the Way Trade shows are an important promotional resource for many businesses. But others continue to rely on trade shows long after they are productive. Trade shows do not represent a quick-hitting sales strategy. In fact, without the implementation of a well-thought-out strategy you should consider skipping this type of promotional approach entirely. To determine if trade shows can be a productive tool in your promotional tool kit, consider the following ideas: u Who will you be coming in contact with, and where are they in your business development continuum? Consider the conference participants, other exhibitors, and organizers, and whether or not they represent your true target markets. u How many qualified prospects or Assignment signed deals do Consider how the trade you need to acquire shows can support all phasas a result of this es of business development. show, and is there Always consider your prosome other way to motional approach when interact with these making decisions about spesame customers cific tactics and strategies. and prospects that will have greater impact or represent a better use of time and financial resources? u How will your trade show presence compare to your competition? Can you afford to spend as much as necessary to present yourself well?

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Epilogue Deciding not to invest in a trade show you have historically participated in may be the best decision you make all year.

29 Direct Sales Aren’t Always Direct Direct sales are an important category in the promotional tool kit, but they might not always be as direct as you think. A manufacturer may have a direct sales force on the payroll, or it may sell its products through some sort of reseller. Many choose to sell their products through well-positioned distribution companies, which bring an existing customer base to the table. This Assignment distributor adds the manuBrainstorm about the facturer’s product to its ideal sales force for your existing product selection. product or service. What and This gives the distributor who would these salespeosomething new to talk ple know, do, and be that about with existing cuswould make them a great fit tomers and often opens up to sell your products? new target markets for the manufacturer. Distributing your product or service through a well-positioned distribution company could help you get your product to market much faster than going direct.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Epilogue Sometimes the shortest path to success has a few curves in it.

30 Cold Calls Can Warm Things Up—or, “The Cracker Jack Moment” To most people, the concept of cold calling is not a pleasant one. But aren’t there times when a cold call is welcome? Such as when you’re at a ball game and the Cracker Jack vendor comes up the steps with his big tray of Cracker Jacks, yelling out to the crowd, looking for customers—right at the very moment you were craving a snack. By definition, a cold call is a sales-oriented contact with a prospect with whom you currently do not have a relationship. You can make cold calls for a variety of purposes, such as: u Introducing yourself and pre-qualifying prospects. u Scheduling an appointment. Assignment u Making a sales Document the condipresentation. tions that make for perfect Under what circumtiming to introduce your stances would someone product to prospects. Now welcome an unexpected build this knowledge into phone call or visit from a your promotional approach. representative of your product or service?

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Epilogue Nothing warms a prospect better than their genuine desire for your product or service.

31 A Territory Management Approach Lends Perspective One of the best ways to make more sales is to carve out a sales territory. It may seem exciting to say that the entire universe is your market area, but without established territories, you will have trouble getting and staying focused. A sales agent for a new promotional product had the entire city as a market area, but she decided to focus her initial sales effort on a small area of town. She declared this area her Local Trade Zone (LTZ) and established major streets as the physical boundaries. She then developed a list of merchant types that she’d like to secure (four pizza places, five hair salons, and so on). The goal was to secure 50 customers in the initial LTZ. Every day she worked in a defined geography, with Assignment a limited number of busiCreate your own LTZ ness types as her priority by sorting your existing cusprospects. It was easier to tomers or prospects into prepare for the day belogical territories. cause she was learning the ins and outs of the selected

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales prospect’s industry. There was less drive time between appointments, so time use was more efficient. Once she worked through this initial LTZ, she selected another, and then another, and so on.

Epilogue

Focusing your efforts will greatly increase your learning, your contacts, and your sales.

32 Direct Mail Still Delivers Contrary to speculation, direct mail is still a very strong promotional tactic. The category has been expanded to include mail sent through e-mail, U.S. mail, or any number of special delivery options. By definition, direct mail is a communiqué sent directly to a customer or prospect and may include any type of message. One-to-one marketing is a phrase that has been coined to describe this most effective sales approach. If a person feels that your message speaks directly to him and is extremely relevant to his situation, it has an excellent chance of getting a favorable response. E-mail distribution has made direct mail an affordable and flexible tactic for more organizations, but it still requires a thoughtful approach to make sure your messages get delivered and read. A salesperson who sends a follow-up e-mail message after phone calls and appointments has an opportunity to set him or herself apart from the competition. Keep messages brief,

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Quick Ideas 31 to 33 but include a bit of helpful information, a link to a Website of interest, or an important reminder in each and every message. Your customers will associate you with useful information and are far more likely to open and read all of your direct mail messages.

Assignment Map out a year’s worth of communication to your prospects and customers and consider the scenarios that are best suited to the use of U.S. mail or e-mail.

Epilogue Reaching out to touch your customers and prospects in a meaningful way will keep them thinking about you.

33 Publishing Your Ideas Increases Exposure You’ve probably heard the phrase “knowledge is power.” It’s true! Regardless of your field, having and sharing information about important or interesting topics will increase people’s interest in doing business with you. No matter how much is already written about your areas of expertise, there is always a demand for new and timely information. Your customers work every day to try to make sense of the world around them and publishing your ideas can help.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Professional service firms require individual Assignment team members to author Take inventory of the articles about topics relattopics you invest time keeping to their profession as a ing up with, and determine condition of employment. how your customers and Articles are incorporated prospects could benefit from into routine communicathem as well. tions with the organization’s customers and prospects. Although it is helpful if you get your articles published in trade or local business publications, you can effectively publish them yourself in the form of white papers and corporate newsletters (or as e-mails or even Weblogs). Make them available on your Website for added value. Use contract resources if you need help getting the content into good form.

Epilogue “Sharing” your knowledge is power!

34 Cause Marketing Takes It to Heart Cause marketing is the practice of incorporating a community cause into your promotional approach. This process allows you to co-op your prospect’s interest in the cause to encourage them to buy from you. The goal is to increase sales to new

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Quick Ideas 33 to 34 customers and increase brand loyalty among existing customers by touching their heart and their interest in the greater good. Starbucks sells an expensive bottle of spring Assignment water called Ethos and on the label it reads “Helping Consider what new children get clean water.” target markets you would Starbucks gives 5 cents like to attract and choose from each sale to support a cause that will resonate several humanitarian water with them. Groups repreprojects, with a goal to dosenting potential causes nate at least $10 million by should have useful info on end of 2010. Starbucks has typical supporters. received quite a bit of publicity for this project, including a strong in-store promotional program. The degree to which you integrate your cause into your marketing program will impact the benefits. Consider the following ideas: u Choose a cause that will resonate with your target markets. u Incorporate the cause tie-in into all your promotional elements. u Devise an outreach to prospects who may be aligned with the cause. u Proactively share your reasons for involvement with the cause. u Make certain your cause will not alienate another client or customer base.

Epilogue Ties to a cause show the caring side of your business.

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35 Speak and Grow Rich... in Prospects and Sales Speaking on topics you care about is an excellent way to make yourself and your business known. Service clubs such as Kiwanis, Lions, Sertoma, Rotary, and Jaycees meet every week in your city and often invite guest speakers from the community to come to their meetings. Most groups you speak to can provide a range of exposure that goes well beyond the number of people who will hear your talk. Whenever possible, provide the following: u A short article or series of articles for inclusion in

their newsletter. u A brief written in-

troduction for the Assignment person who introMake a list of the groups duces you. in your community you u Business cards. could speak to. Then identiu A session handout fy a list of topics you would or brochure. enjoy sharing and begin getIf your particular busiting the word out that you ness does not lend itself well are willing and able to speak topically to a speaking cirto groups. cuit, then identify a community cause you care about and offer to be a spokesperson for it. If the topics you choose to speak about are not directly related to your business, you will want to take special care to get the proper mentions for your business.

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Quick Ideas 35 to 36 Be sincere in your interest in sharing this information. The rest will follow. It is not necessary for you to be a professional speaker to use this tactic, although it is a good idea to prepare yourself well and practice your presentations thoroughly.

Epilogue Give and you shall receive.

36 Customer Referrals Are Rare Birds One of the best ways to increase sales is to cultivate customer referrals. It is also common for a high percentage of referrals to spring from a small number of existing customers. The problem is that most businesses build a development program around acquiring more referrals. Yes, they may make the observation that a high percentage of their business actually comes from referrals, but then they spend all their marketing resources on more expensive and less effective promotional programs designed to bring in new customers—not get referrals from existing customers! Many firms have found a way to mine these precious customer referrals and you can too. Consider the following: u Customers who appreciate your products are likely to know others who would. u Many customers will help you if you ask them. u Understand what inspires your customers to refer you business. (Ask them if necessary.)

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Invite customers to participate with you on com-

munity/charity projects, pay their way, and ask them to invite a friend. Assignment u When you send a Set specific goals for special offer to the number of new cusyour customers, tomers you want to send a duplicate acquire, the number of exthat they can isting customers you assign to a friend. expect to participate, and Be sure to use a how much of your markettracking number ing budget are you willing for tracing your to invest to inspire an insuccesses. crease in referral activity.

Epilogue Investments in customer interaction can be part of the marketing budget if they systematically net you more profitable referrals.

37 Event Marketing Is a Hot Property Event marketing is one of the fastest growing promotional categories. Many industries have shifted dollars away from traditional advertising in lieu of the flexible and exciting world of event marketing. A financial services company is a sponsor of a major outdoor event that attracts 50,000 spectators. It makes a

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Quick Ideas 36 to 38 contribution and in return receives promotions from the event, such as having its name mentioned in the event’s paid advertising, recognition in posters and publicity, and on banners and in multiple exhibit spaces at the event. The company actiAssignment vates its sponsorship by inviting a large number of Identify an event that its customers to participate would be a match for your as volunteers. It also enterdemographics. Brainstorm tains volunteers and staff in how you might involve staff, its corporate chalet. The customers, and suppliers. promotional activities leading up to the event provide countless opportunities for meaningful dialogue among its customers, prospects, and partners. Participation in this event is a major business development strategy for this firm.

Epilogue If you can’t find an event that is a good match for your demographics, consider creating an event for your own promotional purposes. And it doesn’t have to be an event that draws 50,000, just one that brings in the right people in reasonable numbers.

38 Find the Synergy Inherent in Your Own Programs If you want to make sales without a lot more work, consider the synergy inherent in your own systems. By definition,

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales synergy is the working together of two or more things, with the result becoming greater than the sum of their individual effects or capabilities. Think about it this way: if you perform no sales specific activities today, there is still potential synergy among the various departments. Each day customers are being served, supplies and components are purchased, bookkeepers manage payables and receivables, products are being developed, inter-office e-mails are flying, and important decisions are being made. A manufacturer buys a Assignment lot of components and supplies from vendors. List the functional When the purchasing agent departments for your busiinteracts with these venness. Identify at least three dors, they have many activities performed in each opportunities to gain and department that could dishare information that rectly or indirectly impact could ultimately impact sales. the firm’s standing in the industry. Interaction with suppliers is an opportunity to impact your prospects, customers, and distribution channels. Is your purchasing agent fully aware of your product line? Can he or she talk about it to vendors who might also be customers?

Epilogue Bringing all that you are to the sales table creates synergy.

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39 Develop Sales Objectives for Improved Performance I think it was Walt Disney who said that “a goal is just a dream with a deadline.” Many people like to dream about sales success, but fail to take the necessary steps to put them on the right path. Setting goals without considering where the growth will come from is equivalent to dreaming. Sales objectives divide the work up in an organized way and allow you to develop approach ideas for each objective. They also make it clear to the entire organization how elements such as customer retention, product development, and Assignment Website functionality Examine your sales goals and can impact the atdevelop specific and measurable tainment of sales objectives to achieve them. Chalgoals. lenge people outside the sales Sales objectives department to be part of the proshould identify a specess of achieving these goals. cific key audience, volume targets, and a date for achievement. When you string all of your objectives together they should create a straight line to your goals. You’ll know if you reach them or not. Let’s say a Web-based computer back-up service has set a goal to increase sales revenue this year by 10 percent. That means it must achieve some combination of the following objectives in order to be successful. Once objectives are set, unique marketing and sales approaches can be tailored to each one.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales 1. Retain at least 80 percent of existing customers at current rates. 2. Acquire a minimum of 25 new annual subscribers, each quarter. 3. Acquire a minimum of 20 new month-to-month subscribers, each month.

Epilogue How do you eat an elephant (goal)? One bite (objective) at a time!

40 Identify the Most Efficient Strategic Approach Ideas Developing marketing programs that help achieve multiple goals or objectives at the same time increases synergy. A fee-only financial planner was in a situation where she needed more clients to round out her practice. She didn’t want to spend a lot of time and money in marketing and sales, as she felt it took valuable resources away from her work on behalf of her clients. What she did want was to: u Acquire a few more quality clients. u Increase customer referrals. u Leverage her interest and involvement in community projects.

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Quick Ideas 39 to 41 The strategic marketing approach she chose included Assignment involvement in a series of Develop a strategic community events. She invitapproach that will help ed a group of her preferred you achieve at least three clients to participate alongside unique goals or objecher in these community tives. Include elements projects and asked each cliyou are passionate about. ent to bring along at least one guest/referred prospect. She paid all of the costs of participation and everyone received a special team T-shirt. There was a meal included, so there was plenty of time for getting acquainted. These community involvement outings have become a trademark for this professional and a great approach for building her practice with like-minded clients. Her clients approve of this practice-building strategy and participate willingly.

Epilogue You get more than you give when you do it with a willing spirit.

41 Selling More to Existing Clients One of the most undervalued sales assets is the synergy to be gained through your existing customers. Many businesses focus so much energy on the acquisition of new customers that they leave a lot on the table regarding their existing customer

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales base. Some organizations even go so far as to set existing customers aside, forcing their sales team to concentrate solely on new customers. Let’s face it: customers already know you, they’ve demonstrated trust by buying from you, and they’re giving you some of their hard-earned money. They are the ideal prospect. Interaction with existing customers can provide: u Insights leading to breakthroughs in quality and innovation. u Retained sales. u Add-on sales. u Referrals to like-minded prospects. When a local information services company periodically reassigned sales territories, it almost always found that the newly assigned reps could increase volume Assignment from existing clients, even in the mature terConsider how your serritories. Newly assigned vices fit in with their needs. reps reviewed records, If you can’t periodically reconducted informationassign accounts, get a gathering sessions, and challenge partner to help exuncovered needs simply amine potential opportunities by looking at the comwith existing customers. pany’s accounts with new eyes.

Epilogue It’s typically easier to expand with existing customers than to attract new ones.

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42 Going Beyond the Transaction There is tremendous synergy in the common ground we share with customers. If someone is your customer, there is at least one topic the two of you have in common. Find a productive way to interact beyond your typical sales process. An organization that provides case management nurses for workman’s compensation cases has insurance agents as customers. The agents as well as the nurses have a common interest in getting the patients to maximum medical improvement. The agents are located across the country, so the case management firm has to get creative with long-distance communication. One favorite tactic is to send each agent a gift card for a coffee shop along with a white paper featuring a treatment overview written by one of the nurses. A note invites the agent to have a cup of coffee and take a few minutes to read the paper. This interaction supports this firm and its nurses as authorities on maximum improvement—a subject that they both have an interest in—and opens the door for dialogue. Assignment Energize your customIdentify ways (specific er interaction and let it help tools) to positively interact you make more sales. Prewith your customers outside paring for these customer of the formal sales and serinteraction events will make vice delivery activities. you better at your work.

Epilogue Develop a common bond beyond the transaction.

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43 Quicker Closes Equal More Time for More Sales Nothing gets the prospecting juices flowing the way a quick and profitable sale does. You say to yourself, “Why can’t they all go like this?” The better question to ask is, “What can we do to make more of our transactions move this fast?” Energizing your sales process and closing sales faster leaves you with more time to spend doing more deals—achieving your sales goals. Let’s take a closer look at the quick-close deal and see what it’s made of. Attributes of a quick-close prospect (the customer) include: u Has an immediate need. u Is confident that your solution is adequate. u Is prepared to make a decision. Attributes of a quick-close supplier (that’s you) include: u Effectively recognizes and clarifies customer needs. u Provides information Assignment that supports proOutline a sales cycle for posed solutions, right your business. Be bold in amount—at the right your expectations and then time—always keepidentify the specific supports ing in mind that for each phase that could people receive informake it possible. Then tarmation differently. get some prospects and go u Knows how to recafter them. ognize and support a quick decision.

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Quick Ideas 43 to 44 One way to attract the quick-close sale is to participate in promotional strategies that put you in the mix with your best quick-close prospects. These strategies may look to be a bit more costly on the surface, but when you factor in the time and energy savings of the quicker sale, they are a bargain.

Time is money!

Epilogue

44 Organize a Collaborative Workplace Whether you work downtown or at the dining room table, you can benefit from developing a collaborative workplace. Collaboration is achieved by working with others. Entrepreneurs are pretty good at this; traditional business could take a lesson. By exchanging information, sharing resources, and passing business leads, you can create a network that can lead to increased sales for your organization. You are all out there doing business, and the day-to-day stuff can get in the way. Turn these day-to-day challenges into opportunities for collaboration. Assignment A small company Describe your commutraced a high percentage of nity. Make certain these its business to people they connections know about you have interacted with around and what you offer. their office location. In fact,

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales one of its largest clients came from a referral from its landlord, a businessman who had recently sold a company he’d founded and invested in local real estate. Some business was traced to other professionals who had office space in and around its building. The single largest influence on business development came through connections to its local professional association.

Epilogue

When you raise the water in the harbor, all boats rise.

45 Innovation Gets Attention One of the best ways to increase sales is to create new or improved products people can only buy from you. Every organization should be investing resources in innovation each year. For some organizations, these investments may be largely time and attention, but for others it could include significant financial resources as well. To maximize an investAssignment ment in innovation, you must strategically incorporate it Identify some form of into other functional areas of innovation that will be occurthe business. ring in your business this year. Consider how to leverA financial software company offers an 800age this investment by number for its customers. connecting it to at least two When they finish solving a other major functions. customer problem, they ask

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Quick Ideas 45 to 46 the customer if they’d be willing to answer a couple of questions for the research and development team. They then proceed to ask carefully crafted questions designed to assist the developers and strategically supply the marketing department with information needed to mount a promotional campaign for the new products. The investment made on customer support is now providing an exponential return with its added contributions to innovation and sales and marketing.

Epilogue New is good. New sells.

46 Time Organize Your Business Plotting marketing and sales activities, along with operationsoriented tasks, will lead to an increase in sales. If you’re planning to hire additional staff in conjunction with a new product line, plot it. If your team is attending a national conference, plot it. If you’re rolling out a new product, plot it. Plot everything that consumes time, money, or energy resources and show it on the time continuum for your business. A retailer planning to attend a merchandise market can initiate talks with customers months before the trip. What are they going to be looking for or need in the future? What should you be looking for to help them? This also increases dialogue with customers beyond just the typical sales and service delivery talk, and demonstrates that the retailer has an interest in the customers’ success. Use market-talk to get them to talk about products

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales they may have an interest in purchasing. This also sets them up for follow-up when they get back from market. The main point is to plot the things you’re going to be doing to run your business anyway and look for the business development potential in each one. Time organizing makes it real.

Assignment Draft a 12-month development time line. Include primary business development activities and major operational tasks.

Epilogue Don’t try. Do. (Thanks to Yoda.)

47 Momentum Markers Increase sales by leveraging your organization’s momentum markers. Momentum markers are events, work projects, or seasonal influences unique to your business that have the power to propel you toward your business development goals. You’ll know them when you see them, because they tend to take on a life of their own. One of the best places to look for them is the document discussed in Idea 46, where you plotted your marketing activities along with operational functions on a 12-month time line.

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Quick Ideas 46 to 48 A food bank knows that the public’s attention to food donations is at its peak Identify the momentum during the Thanksgiving markers in your organizaand Christmas holiday seation. Ask people outside the son. It’s also a time when sales department to help. food bank personnel are They know stuff you don’t. busy with operational activities and don’t have time to think about how to parlay this increase in activity into its marketing strategy. New supporters emerge that were previously unknown; offers of volunteers that could be better utilized in other time periods must be recognized and captured for future contact. The food bank will experience the force of this momentum marker for months. Impacts can be anticipated, planned for, and leveraged into maximum outcomes—especially with the right planning and organizing. Momentum markers are by nature predictable, and maximization strategies must be in place long before they occur if they are to lead to increased sales.

Assignment

Epilogue We can’t control some forces, but we can anticipate and use them to our advantage.

48 Sales: It’s Not About You Most people who find themselves in a selling situation spend so much time defining, refining, and understanding the features

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales and benefits of their own products they forget to notice what’s going on in the life of the prospect. This is crazy, because research tells us that people buy because of some problem or opportunity that exists in their world—not ours. This may be a shocker to those who Assignment still believe in the theory of build it and they will Gather the background come. files you have on your faThe next several quick vorite customers. See what ideas will help you focus you know about them, and your attention on a range note what you wish you of customer-oriented eleknew, so they can be more ments. By considering easily replicated. these elements you will find it much easier to develop a sales and marketing approach that will help you meet your business development goals by helping your customers meet their goals. Look for one or two to stand out as relevant in your particular business. The first step is to find out what you know about your customers and prospects. There are many automated customer relationship management (CRM) tools available to support this process. Your work here will be identifying the information elements that should populate the CRM tool for maximum impact.

Epilogue Sales: it’s not about you.

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49 Create an Opportunity-Focused Strategic Acount Profile We owe it to our customers to understand a great deal about them in order to provide them with the products they expect from us. This same understanding will allow you to select the promotional approaches that will help you make sales. The opportunity-focused strategic account profile is an information-gathering tool that you can customize for the purpose of capturing customer information. A professional services organization serving businesses (B-to-B), will want to create a very detailed baseline profile and turn it in to a template so that it can gather information as thoroughly as possible on all customers and prospects. This information will be very useful for building insightful proposals and winning presentations. A retailer in a business-to-consumer situation (B-to-C) may choose to develop a few key profiles that represent their primary customer types. Regardless of the type of Assignment business you run, the info Create your own gathered in the development of customized account an opportunity-focused strateprofile. Choose a client gic account profile will that you know pretty well improve your promotional tarto use as your sample geting and help you make along the way. more sales.

Epilogue What you don’t know CAN hurt you.

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50 Go Wide and Deep With Key Contacts One of the key factors that cause unwanted turnover in our customer base is loss of the “in-house champion.” Every time you lose an existing customer you go in the hole in your client-attraction process. Now you need two new clients instead of one. Build a range of contact information into your account profiles by gathering the following: u Whoever else is involved in the decision to purchase from you. u Detailed contact information. u Background information that will help you understand your customers such as annual reports, number of employees, and locations. u Who else will be benefiting from your service. Account profiles are dynamic and should evolve over time. Everyone in your organization who comes in contact with the client has an opportunity to learn something of value. If you manage your contact information and deliver Assignment excellence, you have a good Review your existchance of adding to your cliing accounts and work ent base. You keep your to build a relationship existing client, and your chamwith additional contacts pion brings his or her new within each account. company into the fold.

Epilogue

If they know you, they can love you. P.S. It’s your fault if they don’t know you.

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51 Mission Possible—Mission Profitable A small IT company provides troubleshooting and network support for businesses. When they gather information about prospects and customers, they make it a practice to understand the client’s growth plans. Does this firm intend to grow? How will this vision be supported by the firm’s IT infrastructure? How does the customer’s mission impact recommendations? The IT company includes references to its customer’s mission and vision as it develops recommendations for upgrades and services. Estimates include three scenarios: reasonable patch work (good), room to grow (better), supporting your vision (best), giving the client options with an eye on helping Assignment the client achieve its vision. The Take a look at your company knows it is helping its prospects and test your clients get where THEY want knowledge of their orgato go, and it keeps this front and nizational mission. Note center. how your products help Many customers are so them support this mission/ busy doing the day-to-day work vision. Build new knowlthat they lose site of their viedge into your routine sion. They will appreciate the interactions. Add this to fact that you are there to help your account profile. them stay on track.

Epilogue If you are taking people where they want to go, they will ride with you longer.

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52 Market Position Matters Understanding where your targets fit into the market can be useful in developing an approach for winning and retaining business. We’re talking about whether they are attempting to climb the ladder of notoriety, fame, or market share. Maybe they simply want to make more money or at the very least not lose ground. Even if your customers are individuals there should be some sense of position. Not many people want to remain static. Assignment A commercial landTry to determine the scape company knows that market position of your key a key prospect is sitting on accounts. Think about how a 50-percent vacancy rate your product can help them at a property and its primaimprove, and build that into ry competition is only at your promotional approach. 10-percent vacancy, so it Your boldness should be knows there is opportunity driven by their concerns to help close a gap. It can about market position. Add present its landscaping prothis element to your acposal using a potential return count profile. on investment based on increased leasing fees that will result from improving the look of the property. By bringing the market position factors to bear in the sales process you can demonstrate that you understand the situation and how your service can help the prospect to achieve the market position he or she desires.

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Epilogue Once you know what matters, you matter.

53 Be a Budget Bandit It pays to understand what budget category your customer uses to purchase your services or products under. This allows you to uncover other categories where your costs could be allocated. Offering suggestions can make the difference in making the deal—especially when you are coming in mid-year and budgets are well established and depleted. A local charity event has packaged its promotional inventory to appeal to a variety of organizational goals/departments/ budget categories: u Sponsorships typically come out of the marketing budget because it includes advertising. u Chalet sales can be paid for by employee organizations or individual departments for hosting company picnics or customer appreciation events. u Vendor spaces can be paid for by HR to promote job openings to the community. Even those with what is known as the beg-for-budget have routine categories for bookkeeping purposes. (The Assignment beg-for-budget means that no Uncover the budfunds are actually earmarked get categories for for certain purchase in advance. your products. Ask Managers simply have to beg your customers. for the things they want to buy.)

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Epilogue Showing your customers that you know how to help them get things done puts you higher on the list.

54 Are You Speaking Their Language? Many sales are missed because the salesperson did not communicate with the prospect in a productive way. The solution may have been perfect and the pricing good, but somehow they just didn’t connect. When you identify a new prospect or customer, ask questions to determine his or her communication preferences. Does he prefer phone calls or e-mails? How hard is it to get a faceto-face meeting with her? Will he read detailed documents, or should you focus on briefs and outlines? Does she return calls? If you are working through an administrative assistant, you can ask about some of these things casually. Keep the Assignment following in mind: u A customer known Consider the communifor reading and cation preferences of your sending after-hours top three accounts and come-mails is more pare this to your routine likely to read longmethods of communicating. er messages sent Be sure to make notes in later in the day. your strategic account profile about the communication u A prospect who preferences you uncover. uses sight words to describe non-visual

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Quick Ideas 54 to 55 elements (“You should have seen what they said.” ) likely has a visual preference. These people may do better with written communication to support all verbal interaction. u Don’t leave endless messages for a customer who isn’t returning phone calls. Try something different, such as sending a print document special delivery. u Don’t forget to speak the language of their business, not yours. Customizing communications will increase sales success!

Epilogue

If you’re not talking with customers, does that mean you’re talking without them?

55 Customer Satisfaction Connects Us All One way to be successful selling your service is to understand the customer satisfaction benchmarks facing your customers. You know who your prospects are, but now you need to explore their situation a bit more deeply. Who are their internal and external stakeholders that could be affected by your services? What satisfaction benchmarks already exist? Consider this: u A mother wants to plan a vacation that satisfies the interests of the entire family.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u A purchasing agent needs a component that will

fit seamlessly into the finished product. u A business owner wants to contract Assignment with an IT firm that can keep his expenCreate simple tools sive staff running at that allow your prospects full speed without to gather and document sending the CFO the needs of their own into budget overload stakeholders. Let them and ensure that his know that you understand external clients can their role and that you are access their online here to help. support tools 24/7.

Epilogue Your job is to help your customers do their best work.

56 Knowledge of the Competition Inspires Confidence Gathering background information on your prospects and customers includes a solid understanding of their competition. Buying from you needs to help them compete more effectively in their marketplace. So find a way to leverage your understanding of their competition in your sales approach as well as your customer service. For example: u When the yellow page advertising rep comes to see your clients, he always knows what size ads their competition has run in the past.

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Quick Ideas 55 to 57 u An employee benefits company will want to know

as much as possible about the benefits its competition offers in order to shape a competAssignment itive package. Think about your top u When a marketing two accounts. What do you company is pitchknow about their competiing services, it will tion? Now, determine how benefit a great deal your product or service can by knowing how help them be more competthe prospect’s itive. Does this help you to competition is preshape a winning pitch? senting itself in the marketplace.

Epilogue It’s easier to be original when you know what everyone else is doing.

57 Industry Insights Shine a Bright Light Take some time to investigate your prospects’ and customers’ primary industries. Looking at trade and professional publications and information from industry associations is a great way to gain a broad view. It’s especially interesting to review the advertising inside these publications. See how other marketers are approaching your customers with their products. Notice the topics of feature articles, as they represent issues of current importance in the industry. A large city library will

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales have copies of many of these trade pubs. And of course many are available on the Internet as well. When a training company was asked to quote on the development of a presentation for a product rollout, industry research uncovered useful information. By scanning trade journals targeted to hotel executives, the training company learned that hotel executives made major purchases (such as Assignment the product in question) shortly after being bought Ask some of your cusout by a new investor. tomers about their favorite Armed with this potential publications and trade target marketing insight, the groups. The next time you company made changes in have a hot prospect, do some its proposal that provided the industry research and get training company an edge in inspired about ways to help being chosen for the project. them shine. The information you gather combines with what you already know to create a unique view. Build your insights into the sales and service approach for increased sales.

Epilogue Remember: sales is not about you!

58 When Opportunity Knocks, Who Will Get the Door? Pop quiz! Do you know the biggest opportunities facing your customers right now? Do they? The fact is, with all this

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Quick Ideas 57 to 58 work going on around us, we sometimes forget that opportunities exist to do bigger and better things. Taking time to understand the major opportunities available to your customers and prospects gives you both an edge. By showing awareness and even encouragement you can add value in your relationships. A forklift company owner has, as one of its customers, a medium-sized airport. During a sales visit the salesperson learned that the airport was targeting corporate jet traffic and corporate hangar rental. Some weeks later the equipment salesman was talking with one of his distribution center customers and learned that it was considering the addition of a corporate jet. He was able to make a great connection with his two customers. He built great goodwill with both customers, and they are now two of his best. The biggest challenge to adding this level of engagement to your sales Assignment approach is that most Go see one of your fasalespeople can’t get vorite customers and learn enough time with their about his or her opportuniprospects to get past the ties. See how you can add features and benefits prevalue. Add this info to the sentations. Concentrate account profile. more on being interesting to talk to and you will get more time.

Epilogue If someone knocks on the door and no one hears, does that mean that there was no knock at all?

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59 Income and Expense Streams Mean Business Your relationship may not make you privy to financial information about your customers, but it pays to understand their financial landscape. You probably don’t really need to know Assignment the exact numbers, but it would be useful to know the top inGo to BizStats.com come and expense categories and do some free reand their percentages. search on the industries There are issues customof your customers and ers are vocal about, but they prospects. See what may also have little impact on you can learn about their decision-making process their financial picture as it relates to your products. that may influence the However, there are other isway you service them sues that customers quietly in the future. invest in. Those are the financial issues you want to be tuned into. Consider the following: u High expenditures for legal and professional services may indicate an opportunity to assist with risk management. Can you help mitigate risk? u A high percentage of expenses in advertising indicates that the company is interested in growth. Can you provide exposure in some creative way? u Low investments in salaries may indicate an appreciation for contractors who get work done. Do you have a way to minimize the overhead?

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Epilogue As Deep Throat said: Follow the money.

60 Staffing Gaps Cut a Wide Path Payroll is often one of the top three expenses facing your customers, and yet most companies are significantly understaffed. Many more lack the expertise needed to be top performers in their field. You have an opportunity to help close that gap. If you can show how doing business with your organization eases the staffing gap, you will make more sales. Can you: u Supply employee training? Assignment This could be expertise you Consider what have in house or something you have to offer in you contract for and prosupport of a staffvide as a value-added ing gap. service. u Show how your services will make its existing staff more productive and therefore minimize the need to add staff? u Share some of your in-house expertise, such as an in-house marketing professional who could have an occasional lunch with their in-house, but non-professional, marketing coordinator? A mortgage insurance company that wanted to make more sales to mortgage companies hired a training company to provide time-management workshops for loan originators. This

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales was its way of adding value in the eyes of its prospects and clients. The mortgage companies appreciated the gesture and in return funneled a higher percentage of business to them.

Epilogue Make buying from you a bonanza of value.

61 Interesting Fellows What do football, kids, and beach vacations have in common? They are the three things your next new prospect likes to chat about when not talking business. Increase your sales by learning more about the outside interests of your Assignment prospects and customers. Enhance you account When you learn about their profiles to include a space for outside interests you will outside interests. Write down also: what you know about their u Identify avenues for interests. If you’ve been in your promotions their office you probably rewhere you can atmember a lot. Take a tract more custommemory tour of their space. ers similar to them. Photos, trinkets, and general u Learn about causclutter will give you clues. es they care about that could be made part of your own community involvement programs and invitations for them to participate along side you.

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Quick Ideas 61 to 62 u Uncover elements that make them unique and that

can be incorporated into your approach to working with them with increased results. When an interior designer found out that the doctors involved with the building of a new cancer center were also musicians, she organized a concert as part of the opening ceremonies and parlayed the event into a PR bonanza. Her clients were thrilled with her ability to leverage the project in support of their marketing efforts for the new facility.

Epilogue It’s interesting how much more interesting you are to your customers when you are interested in them.

62 Short-Term Goals Are Golden Nothing compares with the shine reflecting off the shortterm growth goals of your prospects. It can nearly blind you. In fact, they haven’t been able to see for weeks—maybe months. But you can bring a new set of eyes to the situation. Assignment Be bold. Ask prosTry this tactic at your pects what their short-term next meeting, either with a business growth goals are customer or a prospect. Enand how they are doing in joy the process of learning achieving them. It’s usualabout what’s important to ly good conversation, and them, and the information that’s always a good start will take its natural course. when you’re in the trustand rapport-building stage.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Don’t be concerned about what this has to do with your products. Just learn! Find out what inspired them to establish these particular growth goals in the first place, and you will begin to get a useful perspective. There’s also a good chance that you will uncover an important tidbit that will be useful in positioning your product when it’s time to make the pitch.

Epilogue Attaching yourself to a rising star can have an uplifting effect on your business.

63 Big Red Truck How many times have you had to say to yourself, “That was so obvious. How did I miss that before?” Call them senior moments, call them mind bumps, call them whatever you want, but begin the process of documenting detailed information about your customers inside your opportunity-focused strategic account profiles. Revisit them often for insights and updates. This is also your insurance against the big red truck. You know, the one you could get hit by someday, taking all of your firm’s customer intelligence along with you to your manAssignment sion in the sky—where, I might add, you will have no Review the last several use for it. Ideas and customize your It’s all about increasing own opportunity-focused knowledge to increase strategic account profile. sales. You must make your

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Quick Ideas 62 to 64 own decision about how much time, money, and energy you can afford to invest in acquiring customers. These decisions should be made once you understand the lifetime value of your customer. If your average transaction is high dollar and/or your customers are with you generating income for a long time, then investing resources in your customer acquisition process makes sense.

Epilogue Prepare to share. Prepare to care. Prepare to prosper.

64 Tap Into the Momentum Present in the Universe There’s a lot going on out there in the universe—and an abundance of resources being applied to moving ideas along. People are hosting events, celebrating accomplishments, and creating strategic alliances to accomplish the greater good. This momentum is an awesome force of nature, and you need to tap into whatever you can to help make more sales. Momentum is the speed or force of forward movement and everyone in sales wants more of that. For every kind of product or service there is a range of marketing strategies. A statewide CPA society wanted to ratchet up the level of interaction it was having with its members and prospects in the community. It was hard to get accountants out of the office for conferences and routine association meetings. So the society

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Assignment Gather a group of employees or peers and identify a range of elements that bump up against your industry/ enterprise and possess a momentum of their own.

organized a wide selection of certified educational sessions timed to match the state’s periodic requirements for continuing education units (CEUs). Build it and they will come works when external forces help propel them.

Epilogue Tap into the energy present in the universe. Supercharge yours!

65 Referrals Come Easier With Celebration As a society we crave celebration. In fact, we’ll celebrate nearly anything. Just this week there was a story in the newspaper about how to host birthday parties for dogs! You can tap into this craving to celebrate to increase your own sales with just a bit of creativity. A financial services organization established a marketing objective to gain 36 new clients per year, specifically through referrals from existing customers (mostly 40-somethings with young families). It created an approach that included a connection to Grandparents Day. The program included e-mails linking to info on its Website about the origins of Grandparents Day, a contest

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Quick Ideas 64 to 66 for kids to nominate their grandparent for awards, ideas for honoring parents, and, of course, information about financial services such as long-term care insurance and a prominent link to have this fun information e-mailed to a friend. The key to increasing sales with this type of stratAssignment egy is relevance. The Revisit your marketing financial services organizagoals as they relate to intion knows instinctively that creasing referrals from your leveraging its customers’ existing customers. Tap into feelings and responsibility the energy of a nationally toward both their children recognized celebration to and their parents is a good enhance your communicaway to: tions strategies. u Increase interest in financial services. u Enhance trust and rapport with the organization as provider. u Provide a reason and simple method for customers to provide referrals.

Epilogue Enriching the lives of others can have many benefits. (Oh, and yes, they did gain 36 new clients.)

66 Regulate This! Most industries, communities, and organizations are influenced heavily by government regulations. Regulations may

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales change quickly and unexpectedly or they may be in Assignment the works for years. Expected or unexpected changes Make a list of some of in regulations typically enter the regulations that have an the world with a force of impact on your business or their own, generating some the business of your custommomentum that savvy marers. Develop a system for keters can tap into. staying updated on pending changes, and routinely conThere are a variety of sider how this might impact ways to leverage the mosales. mentum of regulation changes for increased sales. Here are a few: u Acquire/develop reference materials explaining details and impacts of the new regulations and become an expert source with your key audiences. u Develop new products, features, or services that may be results of new or changed regulations. u Provide counseling relating to compliance—either as an income stream or value added. The state of Indiana is eliminating its commercial inventory tax. Local economic development groups will see great improvement attracting businesses with a reliance on inventory. Contiguous states lose an advantage they have treasured for years. This change creates a momentum of its own that many in Indiana are using to attract new customers.

Epilogue Change is inevitable—why not look forward to it?

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67 Patriotism Serves Up American Consumers Memorial Day kicks off months of patriotic celebrations. Patriotism is a grand example of an ideal that carries its own momentum. Tapping into red, white, and blue is a good way to add color to your various Assignment sales programs. Identify a promotion A locally owned group of that supports a downtime in restaurants found themselves your business. Pick somehurting for business on holithing that brings its own day weekends that include momentum. outdoor celebrations, so they developed an approach to celebrating the holidays with customers, employees, and suppliers. They did not have a big advertising budget so they needed to spread the word in a creative way. Here’s what they did: u 12-Month Planning. Identified the dates for their campaigns around three summer holidays: Memorial Day, Fourth of July, and Labor Day. u Leveraged Interaction. Ask customers, employees, and suppliers to help collect interesting facts for trivia questions and items for the prize packages. (They got gifts, too: free food and American flags.) u Cross-Promotions. Displayed the rules and prize package (a picnic kit including items from other merchants) along with advertising for local holiday celebrations.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Cheap Advertising. Placed flyers on the tables

inviting customers to play the game and eat here at least one day the week of the holiday and receive extra chances at prizes. u Free Publicity. Contact local media with the story.

Epilogue Fly your flags with pride.

68 It’s Fair to Say We’ll never know the real reason for the gravitational pull to fairs and festivals—but the facts speak for themselves. People love them! We haven’t been citified all that long, so maybe we’re relating to our basic need to gather in the town square. Festivals can nurture our need for community, and expanded community is exactly what salespeople need in order to increase sales. Remember the rule of momentum. A fair is going to happen whether you get involved or not. It’s going be advertised, attended, and exciting. In fact, many from your own groups of influence are probably planning to attend. 1. List the primary groups with which you routinely communicate. 2. List your main communication goals for each group. 3. List common features of your fair. 4. Brainstorm ways to leverage a fair feature to help you achieve communication goals with each group.

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Quick Ideas 67 to 69 Here’s an example of something you might send to key prospects: “To prove to you we are fun to work with we are hosting a pie-eating contest on Tuesday. Y’all come on by and have some pie.”

Assignment Plug local fair dates into your 12-month communications calendar. See how it fits in with other plans.

Epilogue The world is a carnival—buy a wristband and ride all day!

69 Partnering With Worthy Causes Helps You Make New Friends Causes such as children’s hospitals, humane societies, housing programs, and cancer research each have a following. This following generates a type of momentum advancing the cause. Adding some type of cause-related component to your marketing approach is good way to energize your sales. To benefit fully from your involvement, you must plan and act strategically.

Assignment Think about a cause that would match up well with your business. Consider causes that would resonate with your preferred customers and your employees. Perform some Internet research to see what’s going on globally in the category you choose.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales A locally owned hardware store champions a Habitat for Humanity home build project. Every aspect of this cause relationship is relevant to its business. It doesn’t get much better than this: u Customers are engaged when a clerk asks if they’d like to donate $1 to help build a home. They write their name on a special house-shaped card and hang it on the wall. u Building supplies are provided to reduce the cost of the build and suppliers get involved by making price concessions. u Prospects learn of the opportunity to support the cause through mailings to promote the store. u Employees, customers, prospects, and suppliers are invited to participate as volunteers in the home build project. u The community hears about the store and the project through the media.

Epilogue You can’t have too many friends.

70 A Mother’s Day Makeover The true value of a quick idea to increase sales is how it combines with other quick ideas to build a goal-oriented sales improvement program. If you want to improve your routine

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Quick Ideas 69 to 70 communication with your key audiences, consider tapping into the interest and emotion surrounding holidays. Mother’s Day cards are one of the industry’s top sales categories. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that the only practical way to communicate with your customers and prospects is sending sales offers. Consider these suggestions: u Employees, customers, prospects, and Assignment suppliers are invited to Treat Mother’s Day participate as volunand Father’s Day as opteers in a home build portunities to use the project. momentum of an existu Develop a list of creing event to approach ative ways to celebrate customers and increase Mother ’s Day and relationships. send it to your contacts. It will surely touch their hearts, and it just might keep them out of trouble this year. u Include a footer message on each sheet mentioning some current product-related news. u Get employees or suppliers involved by soliciting creative ideas. u Plant trees or flowers near your office in honor of mothers. Make an event out of it. Making more sales is about improving and increasing your relationships. Let Mom give you a hand!

Epilogue Touching hearts is always good for business.

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71 Information Overload Meets Relevant Intelligence Information overload is a topic getting a lot of attention. Your customers and prospects are feeling the crunch of trying to keep up with their daily work and demands of staying informed. The Internet is making it easier to get information, but it isn’t necessarily providing useful insights to make their lives easier…today. This is a special opportunity for you to provide value-added service. Would a more informed customer and prospect pool help you increase sales? Challenge yourself to name at least three types of information that, if your prospects knew they would be more willing to make a buying decision for your service. Then go about establishing creative ways to share this information. Using third-party references will help your cause the most. Become known as a good resource. Assignment A company that sells behavioral testing for job List the publications that screening has trouble conyour customers read. Crevincing companies to spend ate a practical framework $225 per candidate on its infor gathering and sharing strument. It is constantly news and ideas relevant to frustrated by not having these customers. enough sales. But a major reason the company doesn’t close deals is that prospects don’t understand the total cost of employee turnover. This situation is a ideal one to connect cause and solution.

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Epilogue Read to share.

72 Be Bold: Stand for Something Whether you’re a salesperson who is doing your life’s work, or someone picking up a paycheck, you need to figure out what you stand for. It starts with you personally, grows to include the products you sell, and then encompasses the customers you serve. You must decide how you fit into the company and the industry you’re working in and decide in advance what you stand for. Your personal stand should not conflict with the corporate position. The flip side to standing for something is admitting what you don’t do. Be prepared to rule out some customers. Be bold in your screening and you’ll have time to pursue those who match your stand. A sales rep worked for a sign company. The owner taught him to quote the type and size of the signs based on key variables. The company presented itself as a cut above by standing its ground on its recommendations—not just giving the customers what they want. They occasionally lost deals to othAssignment er companies willing to sell a Figure out what you poor solution. The company stand for. See if it matchbecame known as a principled es your current gig. company.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Epilogue Stand for something or fall for anything.

73 Be Real: Share Yourself and Your Stories You will get more results—sales and otherwise—if you figure out a way to bring your whole self to the job. Whether you are looking to inspire referrals from a networking group or trying to convince an existing customer to move your firm up to a primary supplier position, your best achievements will come when you apply yourself 100 percent. Assignment Getting acquainted is an important part of the trustConsider how each one and rapport-building phase of your roles contributes to of business development. the whole you and how it Transparency is highly valbetter prepares you for the ued in the formal sales professional role serving phase. Customers often your customers. come to cherish friendly supplier relationships that stand the test of time. Each phase of business development brings new opportunities for sharing our stories and will provide you with tangible benefits, including: u When customers know and trust you, they naturally share more information, making it is easier to provide them with the solutions they need.

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Quick Ideas 72 to 74 u When you share a story about something that chal-

lenged you, it opens a door for them to reveal potential challenges that they face. u Interesting people get referred more often.

Epilogue Be real; it’s easier than pretending.

74 Be Kind: Show Genuine Interest and Concern The gift of kindness is one of life’s great blessings. Thinking more about others than yourself can have an amazing effect on your own well-being as well as your sales. Start this interest and concern before you even know your clients personally. Make some choices about the niches to serve, gather information, and develop an understanding of their needs. A sales rep for a large print shop has carved out a niche, callAssignment ing on businesses that produce a Whether you are a variety of business publications. startup or an established His customers appreciate the business, decide to idencombination of speed and qualitify your best niche. ty. One of his customers was Most business people struggling with the demands of are not brave about her employer. There was a lot of choosing. forced overtime that was making it impossible for her to manage her family life.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales The sales rep contacted his other customers in search of a position for this woman. His solid standing with them influenced the recommendation and he did this with full knowledge of the risk that her replacement may not choose to use his print services. The woman was able to change jobs to a more family-friendly work environment and, as it turned out, he didn’t lose the business at the original account.

Epilogue

Caring comes from knowing.

75 Talk Easily About Money: Pricing People like doing business with confident individuals. One way you demonstrate confidence and increase sales is by not avoiding money talk. The three places many sales people get tripped up in money talk are premature pricing questions, recognizing add-on work, and details on getting paid. How to Manage Premature Pricing Questions: Tip 1: Tell your prospect in advance when you’ll provide a price. “Today, I’m gathering information about your situation. My next step will be to bring you a price quote.” Tip 2: Discuss key variables that impact pricing structure. Several should be embedded in your discovery process anyway. “One of the elements that impact our project is your time line. Tell me about your expectations around timing.” Tip 3: Plan in advance what you’ll say if the prospect asks what you charge. “My price is typically a project price. I’ll outline what the work looks like and run it by you. Once we

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Quick Ideas 74 to 76 agree on the work, I’ll be able to price it for you. Are you working from some pre-set budget numbers you’re concerned about fitting the project into?” Assignment If you’re being transList elements that have parent in your money talk impact on your pricing stratand the prospect still seems egy. Develop three phrases anxious about pricing, try you can use early in the proasking specifically what’s on cess that demonstrate a his or her mind. It’s best to transparency about pricing. know.

Epilogue Confident money talk builds trust, and trust is the basis for relationships.

76 Talk Easily About Money: Add-On Projects Talk easily about add-on work. Methods for add-on work should be addressed early so customers are prepared for candid assessments and quotes when needed. What isn’t included in your initial project can be just as important as what is. How to Manage Project Add-Ons: Tip 1: Proposals should include references to other phases, even if you’re not quoting them at this time. Develop initial scope to show how your piece fits into the larger customer

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales situation. “I’m quoting this initial phase of work. After it is complete, we’ll have the insights to quote the next phase.” Tip 2: Customer work agreements should include a statement about add-on work. “Investment is based on work detailed in the proposal. If during our project additional work is identified, it will be clarified and quoted separately.” Tip 3: Talk with your customer as soon as you Assignment recognize add-on work. “John, I’d like to talk Use a basic work plan about the new product to scope out all details of line you’re introducing your work. Make sure to and how we might incordocument transition of phasporate it into the work es and estimate the time for we’re doing on the xyz each activity. project. Would 2:00 work for you?”

Epilogue

If the customer isn’t getting what he or she wants and/or you’re not getting paid for what you do, then you have a lose/ lose deal going on and you’re bound to crash.

77 Talk Easily About Money: Invoicing Getting paid should not be an Olympic event. Establish your own expectations and always find out what your customers expect. It’s that simple.

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Quick Ideas 76 to 77 How to Get Paid Without a Fuss: Tip 1: Project agreements should clearly state dates and amounts. “Investment for the work described in proposal will be $10,000. Initial payment of $4,000 is due upon acceptance of agreement, with monthly installments of $1,500 due on July 1, August 1, September 1, and October 1.” Tip 2: During the same conversation, when the deal is approved clarify procedures for getting paid. u “John, who do I need to speak with for instructions on invoicing? I want to make sure I know what you need from me so we can stay on track with billing.” u “After my initial payment, my monthlies are due on the first. Do they need to be in accounting by a certain day for that to happen?” u “If there’s ever an issue with payments should I come directly to you or would you rather I spoke with someone else?” Tip 3: Send your invoices as instructed and expect to get paid on time. If not, use the Assignment remedy prescribed by your Draft a sample customer. “John, I haven’t restatement for your ceived my July 1 payment as proposals/agreements expected. I’m pretty sure we about how you expect followed procedures. Will to be paid. Be confident you check on it and let me in your money talk. know what needs to happen to get us paid?”

Epilogue Confident money talk is important, so practice as much as necessary.

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78 Understand the Value of a No-Sale No matter how tough they talk, most salespeople hate failing to make the sale. Although it’s understandable to be disappointed, a no-sale response still has a financial value. Once you’re able to put a value on the no-sale you will likely increase your sales, because you will move on with more ease. Perform an analysis using a specific service or product line. Look at the last 12–24 months and count the number of sales you made. After determining your average sales amount, divide it by the number of nosales and you will have the value Assignment of a no-sale. One of my favorite phrasUse the formula es on the subject comes from presented here to deterZig Ziglar, sales guru, author, mine the value of your and evangelist. I’ve shared it no-sale transactions. countless times over the years to encourage small business owners and it bears repeating here: “Thank you for the $100*!” (*Insert the value of your no-sale here.) Putting a real dollar value on your no-sale transactions will help you to appreciate their place in the continuum. That doesn’t mean that you should just accept them. Tell prospects in advance that you’ll want to understand the details behind their decision—either way.

Epilogue

If everything has a price, then everything should also have a value.

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79 Retail Stores Put Up a Good Front There is something excitAssignment ing about setting up a new Go to a store that carstore—with street traffic, disries products you enjoy and play windows, shelves, and take in the storefront and racks holding just the right comthe attributes you see bination of merchandise. Even there. Perform a comparthe crowded back room has a certain charm. ison using the elements listed here. Though an increasingly smaller percentage of sales occur in a brick-and-mortar store environment these days, it still provides a great visual model for you to examine your own selling scenarios. Consider these ideas: 1. Merchandise: What do you sell? It takes a very special store that can sell at both ends of a product continuum. What’s your niche? 2. Location, Location, Location: It’s shocking how many businesspeople do not clearly select their locations. They would not dream of opening a store in some of the areas they try to sell in. What’s your target market? 3. Storefront/Curb Appeal: How does the business look as people walk up to it? First impressions mean a great deal. What’s your image? 4. Sales Clerk: How will you help your customers find the right size? What’s your sales process?

Epilogue Go shopping and find out what’s in store for you.

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80 The Principle of the Loss Leader My husband loves it when a new electronics superstore opens in our city. They tend to bring in truckloads of neat items that they sell at very low prices—presumably at a loss (hence the nickname “loss leader”). What makes this a viable tactic is that people go there to get the neat, cheap items and walk out with other not-so-cheap items. Better yet, they have sampled the store and will likely return again to make future purchases. u A loss leader is not a free gift. The customer must make a purchase. You just don’t get to make a profit on it. u The loss leader should be offered in a product category that represents target customers you want to attract and therefore lead easily into a Assignment profitable relationship. Consider the range (For example, an IT of products you offer consulting company and see if it makes sense should not offer a disto carve out a loss leadcounted toaster as er that could lead you to part of its new clienta profitable relationship. attraction program.)

Epilogue The loss leader tactic is not a silver bullet. It is a clientattraction strategy that must be incorporated into a thoughtful sales process.

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81 Convenience Stores Give You Gas Did you know that convenience stores make little profit on their gas? I know we like to beat them up because of the price swings, but they make very little money on their gas. So you could say—in a way—that they give you gas. The convenient store profit model is based on getting customers into the store. One chain in our town offers a free candy bar with every fill-up. Now, I know what you’re thinking: How can an 89¢ candy bar inspire me to spend $70 to fill up my SUV? The fact is, their prices are as good/bad as any station and it’s a nice gesture. But wait, there’s more. Assignment Do you think they bring it out and say thank you for buyLook at your products ing our expensive gas? No, and services. Do you have of course not. They want/ one of those got-to-have need you to come in to the product lines that carry a high store to collect your free canpass-through cost with little dy and hopefully buy an ice room for making your own cold slushie, which, by the profit? What could you offer way, is likely to be one of the in your store that levels the largest profit centers in the playing field? store.

Epilogue While your customers are filling up with what you think is your core product, is there something else you should be selling them back in your store?

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82 Popular Brands Use Celebrities to Strengthen Credibility The goal of celebrity endorsement is to use the star power of the celebrity to gain approval for the product, transferring the consumer’s admiration for the celebrity to the product. But it’s expensive, and therefore becomes the purview of the bigbudget advertisers. If you think that you could increase your sales with some sort of celebrity endorsement, consider the following ideas: u Imagine that you have an unlimited budget to acquire a celebrity to help you tell your story. Who would you pick and why? Is there a local celebrity who could accomplish this same visibility? u What would you want the celebrity to say or do on behalf of your product? These ideas will show how Assignment endorsement could help you inWork through these crease your sales as well as ideas and keep boiling highlight an advertising apyour responses down proach for your products. Is it until to get to solution possible that you could gain the you can fit into your impact you seek with a more budget. Think local. affordable tactic?

Epilogue The bottom-line principle of celebrity endorsement is to get prospects’ attention so you can tell them about your product.

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83 So Many Choices, So Little Time When thinking about ways to increase sales it pays to look at the dining-out craze. Many people eat restaurant meals several times per week. There are literally hundreds of places for them to choose from, but research indicates that most people frequent around five to eight different places. Some would say that it’s advertising that keeps folks coming back. But many restaurants that have been around for a while don’t advertise much. Established restaurants achieve their best traffic by consistently preparing good food; providing quality service; and maintaining a clean, safe, and pleasant atmosphere. Operational excellence is their best promotional tactic. Their goal: Bring them back for more! Don’t over-spend to generate new customers; concentrate on keeping your Assignment old customers. If you sell a product or Develop sales objecservice that is considered tives that start with the consumable, perhaps opernumber of transactions ational excellence will be you need to reach your your best promotional tactic. goals. Now identify how Allocate resources in supmany new customers you port of this approach as if it need to achieve your were as tangible as advergoals. As you demonstrate tising. The promotional plans retention, be sure to shift for a start-up should look promotional resources tovery different than that of a ward the retention goals. mature business.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Epilogue Operational excellence is a viable promotional strategy.

84 Inventors Use Infomercials to Tell a Complex Story How many times have you been flipping channels and landed on an infomercial that caught your attention? I’ll bet many of you have ordered something. An infomercial is an excellent way to tell a complex story or show dramatic results. This is why they are used so frequently by innovators and inventors to introduce their new products. Produced by combining a collection of elements such as customer testimonials, product descriptions, and live demonstrations, the infomercial becomes a versatile asset. Infomercials can be viewed on a Website or at trade Assignment shows, or burned to DVD and distributed along with other Is your product an inpromotional materials. And novation? Would an with all of the cable channels infomercial help you inavailable, TV is more affordcrease sales? What would able than ever. your key message be, and who would you like to see One of the biggest comit? Remember: It has viaplaints from people who sell ble uses beyond television.

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Quick Ideas 83 to 85 complex products and services is that their prospects and customers just don’t get it. Either they are presenting to the wrong people and/or they need to tell a better story. If they say, “It’s too expensive to make an infomercial,” I ask, “How expensive is it to go out of business?”

Epilogue Maybe if you did an infomercial and sent it to your parents they would finally understand what it is you actually do.

85 Big Tickets Get Big Thanks Businesses that have high dollar transactions and/or longAssignment term agreements often give big Consider what thank-you gifts to customers and transactions would influencers shortly after a deal is warrant a special gift. signed. Reasons include: Try not to believe that u To show the customer the customer would that they and the translove something with action are important to your business name them. plastered all over it. u To mark the transition from prospect to customer and celebrate the trust they have established. u To encourage the influencers to continue to provide positive influence.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u To leave a reminder of the relationship around

the office, especially if your service is not a visible one. A thank-you gift should always include a personal note of gratitude for what’s been accomplished as well as a spark of what’s to come.

Epilogue Gift responsibly. Don’t overspend. Try to avoid gifting during holidays when everyone will be getting in on the act, as your gift could be lost in the shuffle and therefore minimize its impact.

86 A Chocolate on Your Pillow A nice hotel turns down your bed at night and, if you’re really lucky, places a chocolate treat on your pillow. The really good ones also know if you have special dietary needs and you may get something sugar-free. They’re showing their customers how happy they are to have them as guests and that they care about their comfort. Assignment An IT consulting comTake time to identify a pany may be all about practical and relevant way to network security and pershow care and concern for formance. Routine e-mails you’re customers. Clue: it to groups of registered usdoesn’t have to include chocers at customer locations to olate, but don’t rule it out. remind them to perform

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Quick Ideas 85 to 87 some routine check could be highlighted by some personal tidbit about healthy living, where to get cheap food, or tips for keeping the peace at home. Or it could include a great tip on computer use. These activities routinely get your company in front of an important customer audience and remind them of the services you are providing. And it positions you for further work later.

Epilogue If comfort and care is the bottom line at a hotel, what is your bottom line? Establish an approach that further supports the kind of partner you want to be with your customers.

87 Independent Consultants Go One-on-One The practice-development habits of independent consultants provide a great study in the collection and use of customer knowledge. Consultants often evolve into their “independent” role through a series of jobs and projects, allowing them to finely tune customer and project preferences along the way. Because of the close working arrangements these Assignment professionals have with clients, Choose two elements they gather a great deal of perfrom the independent consonal and business information sultant model that you can about them. This intelligence add to your approach to can be used to create compelincreasing sales. ling project quotes containing:

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Solid situation analysis—restating customer goals

and demonstrating the consultant’s competence. u Project approach ideas for achieving success, including phasing and timing. u A fee structure that provides fairly for the client and the consultant. Independent consultants are also likely to be: u Clear on how many projects they can handle effectively (workload). u Working on projects for which they have relevant experience (niche). u Working with clients that they know they can truly help (good testimonials). u Working on making the next sale by simply doing their job well (referrals, niche).

Epilogue Figure out how to break your customer/prospect pools into narrowly defined subgroups. This should allow you to develop stronger profiles that can be used in selecting more effective targeting and servicing strategies.

88 Consultants Live Their Work Call them thought leaders. Call them advocates. Call them crazy! But call them when you need the products and services they offer because they instill a confidence that comes from

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Quick Ideas 87 to 89 absolute knowing. It’s not that they are obsessed with their work (although some probably are), it’s that their work is often an extension of who they are. An independent conAssignment sultant may have a gift for Identify the core gifts planning and organization. and talents that create the Combine the gift with spefoundation for what you do. cific industry knowledge Think about how you can and access to prospects and share your gifts and talents they become very good at more in your day-to-day life. making sales. Access to prospects often comes from active involvement in the community as consultants also tend to share their gifts in service clubs, church, neighborhood associations, school, and so on. What can you take from this case in point to increase your sales?

Epilogue If you can’t figure out how sharing your gifts and talents can help you make more sales, you may be in the wrong job. Perhaps it’s time to consider an income strategy more in alignment with who you are. Then people will call you crazy!

89 Home Builders Do the Work Home builders are bold. They go into the neighborhoods where they’d like to sell and build homes and then—gasp—

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales they build homes! What a great idea. It’s the “doing the work” strategy. The next step is to put in place a follow-through strategy to convert your “work” into customers. Home builders staff their model homes with cheerful souls hired to lead customers through the home selection and buying process (a much easier mission when you have an actual home to show off your trademark features). Assignment Even better, a model home is How can you develnot really a marketing exop a “just do the work” pense: Eventually they sell strategy? What condithe home and recoup the origtions have to exist to find inal investment plus a profit. a place to do what you How many other industries do—as a self-marketing can actually sell their marketapproach? ing investments later for a profit? Another industry that lends itself well to the “doing the work” strategy is the field of consulting. A local organizing consultant wanted her fellow business networking group to begin referring clients to her, but she wasn’t getting any business. To help them better understand her services she offered each one of them an introductory package for his or her home or office. Now they understand how she can help.

Epilogue If seeing is believing, then demonstrating is convincing, and doing the work is inspiring.

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90 Big Business Inspires Big Ideas No matter how huge big business gets, the little guy always seems to find a way to carve out a niche. In fact, the niche often evolves out of a gap left in the market by the big boys or out of a surplus of demand created by the big boy’s big marketing machines. In an effort to see what you can learn about promotions from the big boys, you are challenged to consider some market information: u Major retailers invest heavily in market intelligence before selecting building sites. Other retailers are content to follow them into markets. u Big brands produce expensive commerAssignment cials (think of the Consider the big busiSuper Bowl). Their ness players in your industry. entrepreneurial What type of promotional counterparts co-op activities are they doing that that momentum to you wish you could afford? catapult their own Broaden your view to all inbusiness. dustries. Now see what kind u Big business has lots of scaled effort is possible. of departments and If you ARE the big boy entrepreneurs have in your industry, then you lots of hats. might find it useful to do this If you are a smaller busiexercise to see how the ness taking on a big company smaller guys are nipping at you will think bigger by simyour heels. ply keeping it in your sights.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Epilogue Following the leader is not such a bad idea as long as the leader is going someplace you want to go, too. Allow yourself to be inspired, not oppressed.

91 Marketing Is a Hard Number One quick idea to increase sales comes to us from Corporate America. Those folks routinely establish marketing budgets with strong funding. Earmarking a percentage of your income to reinvest in Assignment marketing assures that Find out what others inyou will have a business vest in marketing. Public to come home to year afcompanies file annual reports ter year. that include financials. Check Three to five percent out some that you think might of sales is a common marhave a similar style of busiketing budget, while ness. The dollar values may organizations in growth be different, but the percentmode invest more. Online ages should be useful. operations selling highmargin products invest up to 50 percent of their income in marketing, most of which goes for customer acquisition. A financial commitment to marketing is critical to increase your sales.

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Epilogue If you were serious about going on vacation, you would not just think about it. You would actually ask for the time off from work, buy a plane ticket, reserve a hotel, and arrange for someone to feed your dog and get the mail. Why is it that many organizations only dream about marketing?

92 Coffee Shops Invite Us to Hang Out Coffee shops tend to lean heavily on the hospitality model of promotions. It is sometimes hard to tell how they make enough sales to keep the places going. Their gestures relating to hospitality are so overt there is no mistaking their intent. For example: u They install free Wi-Fi so you can retrieve e-mail and visit Websites, and you don’t really have to go to your office at all unless Assignment your boss is old school. What can you learn u They also provide from the coffee shop indusnewspapers and try that might help you magazines just in increase your own sales? case you did not What would make your cusbring enough of tomers interested and your own work. comfortable hanging around Some shops have you or your business? a lending library.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u They offer free coffee refills and will even make

you lunch. u More and more coffee shops are staying open

later in evenings and offering entertainment from local musical talent. The coffee shop theme is pretty consistent: Come early. Stay long. We love having you around. Why? Because while you are there, they have a chance to sell more.

Epilogue Maybe the takeaway here is that you should spend some extended time in your favorite coffee shop and see what the hospitality model is all about.

93 Free Cell Phones Aren’t Free Repeat after me: My cell phone is just a tool. And: A free phone is not really free. Introducing the “upgrade or die” strategy for business development! Consider these facts: The free cell phone doesn’t do anything for you until you add basic service. The basic service only teases you with all those great features your friends use until you upgrade to include unlimited photos, text messages, and e-mail. And then, once you embrace the great features, you will need an upgraded phone for full enjoyment.

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Quick Ideas 92 to 94 Cell phones have become mainstream—a necessity to most. The business model is conditioning the consumer population to allow, embrace, and even appreciate the “upgrade or die” sales strategy, essentially paving the way for other businesses to tap the approach to achieving more sales.

Assignment Consider aspects of your business that could be delivered to your customers on a month-to-month basis, for example in a subscription style, either in addition to your typical relationship or as an entry-level service.

Epilogue Take time to allow this model to spark some creative thinking. It has not been that long since cell phones were only sold in specialty stores. Now you can get a phone and pre-paid minutes at all the big box stores.

94 A Web-Based Business Thrives on Visitors Web-based business models are writing the book on building traffic to their doors, and it’s a book the rest of us need to read. There are a lot of factors that make the online business models different from brick-and-mortar business, but here we’re

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales going to concentrate on the traffic building illustration. Assignment Some of the tactics they In Web-based busiuse are: ness fashion, uncover ideas u Offering quality to increase traffic to your content that bebusiness. Imagine your orcomes highly ganization as an online forwarded to othbusiness if that helps you ers (such as viral get in the groove. Heck, marketing, aka maybe you ought to be a word-of-mouth Web-based business! marketing!). u Advertising/linking from sites that cater to their prospects. u Routinely performing search engine optimization (SEO) to become highly visible to consumers who are actually looking for their products or services. u Advertising in targeted traditional ways. Many Web-based businesses don’t expect to see their prospects face to face or even talk with them in real-time. Therefore, they tend to work harder than the typical brick-and-mortar business to create useful collateral materials and decision-making tools that engage prospects in the decision-making process.

Epilogue Visitors alone are not the answer, but once you build the machine to increase the traffic, it can be tweaked until you’re getting the best prospects.

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95 Converting from Free to Fee Conversion is a change in the nature of the relationship between the online business and the prospect. The number-one goal is to impress the visitor enough to get his or her name and email address. Once that is achieved your chances of turning them into a paying customer go up dramatically. Now I ask you, “What business wouldn’t benefit from the opportunity to send information or samples to lots of interested people?” One element that makes the online model worth copying is that visitors are encouraged to subscribe to newsletters, e-zines, or topical news blasts. This conversion to subscriber is Assignment huge because it allows Ask yourself what part of them to pitch subscribyour process to move prospects ers each time they send along the buying continuum the requested content. could be infused with converNext is conversion principles from online? Visit sion from free to fee. some of your own favorite sites Offers of fee-based specifically to observe converproducts and premium sion techniques. content are expertly presented with every issue of the routine communication. The rate of conversion to paying customer is worthy of great attention.

Epilogue Conversion, by definition, is a change in nature, form, or function of something. Is it time for conversion in your business development approach?

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96 Affiliate Programs Multiply Your Efforts Affiliate programs increase sales of core products and provide a second business with additional income streams. This promotional approach, popularized by the online business model, is worthy of our study. Consider this example. An online business selling cheap airline tickets wants to increase its sales. Here’s what it does: u Identify other online merchants with comAssignment patible products and good traffic. Whether you are brick-and-mortar or onu Establish a commisline, consider the benefits sion program, which is of an affiliate program to perfect, because you help increase sales. Who pay only after a sale might make good partis made. ners? Look online. u Set up a link on the new partner’s site so its visitors can click through and buy cheap tickets. u Enjoy increased traffic and sales through the use of affiliate programs. Because this has become such a popular approach to increasing sales, it has spawned a class of businesses that specialize in matching up affiliates.

Epilogue Test the water. You might be surprised who else is thinking along these lines.

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97 Events Accomplish Success With Grassroots Efforts A grassroots approach for promotional purposes is Assignment based on maximizing volunIdentify someone teers in the promotional who represents a “grasscampaign. When promoting roots” promotional team events, this technique of infor your business or volving grassroots volunteers cause. Consider what can dramatically increase your they could help you acpromotional impact. complish in their own Grassroots efforts in unique way. event promotions often take the following forms of support from the volunteers: u Selling raffle tickets. (Asking people to sell a minimum number each often ends up in many being sold directly to the volunteers.) u Selling event tickets. u Putting up posters in public locations. u Word-of-mouth marketing. u Handing out information cards driving people back to the event Website. Grassroots efforts need to be organized so that volunteers can be well supplied to make it super easy for them to activate.

Epilogue There is safety in numbers. Consider forming a herd!

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98 Events Rally Corporate Support One goal of every corporation is to connect with its key audiences, including employees, customers, prospects, suppliers, and community. Depending on size, industry, and market, many organizations find it challenging to make these connections. Assignment Event promoters understand this corporate reality and Are there any eleleverage this knowledge to ments you can borrow garner support for their events. from either the corporate In fact, for many events, corside or the event side? In porate involvement is the order to sell, you have to primary income stream, with reach the right people. spectator ticket sales and onsite sales coming in second and third, respectively. Here is a sampling of promotional elements events used to make money while helping corporations communicate: u Corporate chalets for hosting employee picnics or customer-appreciation events. u Big-screen advertising provides an outlet for the company to show its latest advertising. u Exhibit spaces are available for sampling and oneon-one interaction with prospects, customers, and potential employees.

Epilogue Linking your approach to the needs of prospects makes life so much easier.

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99 Not-for-Profits Get People to Help Them Sell You probably know that major not-for-profits such as the United Way, the March of Dimes, and the Children’s Miracle Network garner lots of corporate support for their annual campaigns. Here are a few program elements that make them so successful at getting all this help raising money: u Well-organized system for corporate involvement. u Campaign materials (videos, brochures, promo items) that will inspire people to give to their cause. u Borrowed staff program where employees are temporarily assigned to the cause in the role of champion and often make up informal speaking bureaus. u Champions also get opportunities to participate in high-quality volunteer training and can be incorporated as part of the organization’s staff Assignment development. u Public exposure for Take time right now to their contributions. take an inventory of the collateral materials and system u A rallying point for supports you have that employees can be would be useful for somevery powerful. one willing to be an I am continually shocked influencer on your behalf. by the number of small business people who ask for help promoting or influencing on their behalf that don’t have the basics in place that would allow others to help.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Epilogue Being prepared to receive help from others is the least you can do.

100 Galleries and Museums Host Special Showings Retail art galleries make an interesting business model. Galleries are retail in nature, because of the storefront, but with a social style closer to that of a community center. A successful gallery becomes a hub of activity for artists and their customers. A primary promotional strategy for galleries is the “Special Showing.” Special showings give the gallery and their artists great flexibility in target marketing. They can pick Assignment their crowd by their choice for the show and pick their Visit an art gallery this show by their crowd. It is a week and see if you get an unique opportunity for tarinspiration. Consider if you geting both product and could benefit from having a prospects. group of people milling about Here are a few of the your place, having fun, eatelements that galleries have ing good food, and being a for leverage in their promocommunity. Then come up tional approach: with your own “show” idea.

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Quick Ideas 99 to 101 u Location, facilities, image. u Art in general/certain artists in particular. u Artist style or topical themes that lead to other

target pools. u Community of other artists and their customers. u Knowing how to throw a theme party.

Epilogue Would your products stand up to a special showing?

101 Do You Want BBQ With That Windshield? Some businesses seem to be a commodity. That is, there doesn’t seem to be much to separate one supplier from another. Though it may be technically untrue, it’s the general consensus among consumers. That leaves promotional approaches as the key variable in separating the winners from the losers in the competitive world of retail. One pair of clever retailers in Arizona fights the Assignment good fight. Empire Glass partners with El Paso BarConsider whether a joint B-Que to offer free BBQ marketing venture makes with every new windshield. sense for you. Who would The restaurant provides the you like to partner with?

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales glass company (six) two-for-one coupons, each good during one particular month of the year (a $60 value). Every person who buys a windshield at Empire gets a gift in the form of free BBQ. Empire does not pay the restaurant cash for the gifts, and the restaurant does not pay to have their promotional coupons delivered. Both merchants have multiple locations in the market area, so there is good synergy. This is joint marketing.

Epilogue Joint marketing can make a meal out of a broken window.

102 Bloggers Stir the Water Blogging has become one the latest forms of free expression. This online form of information-sharing is fast becoming a communication must-have for a variety of purposes, such as: u Creating marketing buzz about new products or new uses of old products. u Allowing employees (who are often subject-matter experts) to share information conversationally with users of your products and services. u Presenting political views and reactions to proposed public policy. u Providing an open platform for fact-sharing on issues where the mainstream media may not be offering the news objectively.

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Quick Ideas 101 to 103 One thing that’s exciting about blogging is that basically anyone with something to say (and even those who seem to have nothing useful to say) can be the proud owner of a personal blog within minutes. Starting a blog is free and simple online, just as lots of other online promotional opportunities are inexpensive and easy to use.

Assignment Could you increase your sales by starting a blog? What kind of information do you wish you could share more freely? Go online and check out blog search engines ww w.technorati.com , www.pubsub.com, and www.feedster.com to see what else comes up under your topics.

Epilogue With the world of marketing being so sound bite oriented. Blogging may be a good way to tell...the rest of the story (thanks to Paul Harvey).

103 The Bookstore Bonanza It cracks me up to think about how many stories predicted that book sales on the Internet would surely put brick-andmortar bookstores out of business. It hasn’t happened yet! In fact, bookstores are more awesome than ever.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Here’s how the threat has helped reshape their business model and make more sales: u Most bookstores now have a very nice coffee shop/café, creating a space for customers to enjoy their books and hold meetings. u Music offerings have increased exponentially, adding new target markets. u They’ve incorporated spaces for Assignment authors to interact Go to a bookstore. with customers. Check out the periodicals u Most have their and sample the business own online stores, magazines and those relathelping them hang ing to your products and onto loyal customindustries. Walk through the ers who wish to place and take it in as a busibuy online. ness model. Now go to the u Many have creatcafé for some refreshments ed membership and ponder what you can and loyalty proborrow from the bookstore grams featuring emodel that will help you inmail communicacrease sales. tions that offer discounts.

Epilogue Being in a bookstore reminds you how much more life you have left to explore. Get busy. If you were selling more, you could afford more vacations.

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104 Scrip Bank Multiplies the Love Here’s the market situation: 1. Consumers need to make their hard-earned money go as far as possible. 2. Merchants need a flow of new and repeat customers and have a limited amount of money for promotions. 3. Not-for-profits need to raise money for their causes and are looking for creative ways that don’t burden their supporters. 4. Scrip Bank wants to sponsor a business model that builds wealth in the community by helping others get what they need. Here’s the Scrip Bank multiplier: u Consumers purchase scrip in the Scrip Bank merchant program. They spend the same money budgeted as usual on food, car care, furniture, and so forth. They allocate 20 percent of their purchase to the charity/cause of their choice. u Merchants receive new and repeat customers coming to redeem scrip. They receive free advertising services (via Scrip Bank). Their only cost is the cost of goods sold on the scrip portion of the transaction. u Not-for-profits receive major donations by encouraging their supporters to buy scrip and choose them for their 20 percent charity allocation. These charities drive large numbers of supporters to the program.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Scrip Bank runs a

profitable business. Assignment They provide: adverInvestigate opportunitising for merchants ties in your community to at no cost until they acquire free advertising in make a sale; not for exchange for a percentprofits with a high age of your typical sales yield method of fundincome. raising that is no burden on anyone; and a way for consumers to make their expense money go further.

Epilogue

Sometimes the best way to make money is to spend money. Sometimes it’s not!

105 Media Outlets Take Their Own Medicine The media offers us a good study in valuing our product. When there is unsold media inventory (advertising space) late in the cycle, many outlets bundle it and sell at a discount, getting as much cash as possible in the short term. This may seem to be a good way to disperse all their space, but it sometimes plays with their value proposition. There are advertisers who wait in the wings to pick off this unsold inventory at belowmarket prices. These advertisers rarely pay market rates and often openly disparage standard pricing models.

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Quick Ideas 104 to 106 Many top-performing media outlets don’t discount their unsold inventory. Instead, they reinvest it to promote their in-house specials, marketing projects, and community involvement programs. This reinvestment proves they value the product. You see evidence of this type of reinvestment when you see a billboard or a bus stop bench that says, “People read these signs. You are!” If you’re having a Assignment problem with the financial Decide if you’re willing portion of your deal, conto discount your value or resider cutting back on the invest your time more project, not on your rate of proactively in things that will pay. Find out what amount have a higher payoff. the customer is trying to achieve and, if it’s possible, trim the work accordingly.

Epilogue Sometimes a sale is a way to fail. Find ways to reinvest excess inventory in support of your business goals.

106 Retirement Communities Give Away Vacations “You Win!… A FREE all expense paid vacation for four! All you have to do to collect your prize is….” We’ve all heard the pitches—on the phone, in the mail, in the mall. But the fact

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales is that one of the best ways to sell you on a retirement community is to get you there to experience it. Giving away a free three-day vacation as an incentive is probably a good marketing investment. First of all, free or not, most people Assignment won’t waste the time unless they are: Consider the pieces and u Hoping to actually parts here. Is there a way retire someday. to incorporate travel elements into your promotional u Still unsure where approach? Is your sale a they want to retire. big-ticket item worthy of a u Curious-types who big incentive? are always up for an adventure. These elements can add up to a legitimate target market. This method works pretty well, and I do know people who have taken and enjoyed many of these promo trips.

Epilogue Trips are good. Adventure is inspiration.

107 Harley Davidson Builds Community Harley Davidson has become an American icon, in the business community as well as with the general public. Great intention and significant PR restored Harley from its earlier bad-boy image.

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Quick Ideas 106 to 107 The story of Harley Davidson’s business rebirth has been told many times, and its promotional strategies are worth examination. The rebirth began in the 1980s when a group of executives bought the business back from AMF. The fight back from quality issues and a failing corporate infrastructure has definitely made the company stronger than ever. Since the ownership change in the mid-1980s, Harley Davidson has: u Achieved membership of more than 90,000 in its Harley Ownership Group (H.O.G.). u Celebrated 25 years of support for the Muscular Dystrophy Association (M.D.A). u Mainstreamed the availability of its branded apparel and merchandise. u Celebrated its 100th anniversary in Milwaukee with 250,000 visitors in 2003. u Expanded its services by offering rental bikes, tour packages, and customized bike building. u Enhanced relationships with dealers. Harley Davidson has managed to penetrate every Assignment aspect of the bike ownership experience with its business Go online and visit and promotional strategies. www.harleydavidson.com The company has a remarkfor a look at communiable history of community ty-building as part of a work, and is worthy of our legitimate business destudy. Its cult-like following velopment strategy. makes it nearly impossible for a competitor to get to its customers.

Epilogue What doesn’t kill us, surely makes us stronger.

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108 You Can Do It, We Can Help! Home Depot, one of the premium players in the big box home improvement segment, has a slogan: “You can do it. We can help.” And Home Depot does. The promotional element we’re highlighting here is the do-ityourself workshops that Home Depot offers its customers. It has a running selection of clinics and workshops on topics ranging from tiling your own bathroom to getting ready for grilling season. It offers clinics in every store, every week. A quick look at the Website (www.homedepot.com) will show you how Home Depot interacts with its range of key audiences. It has an online catalogue that can ship just about anything you can buy in a store. So if you’re fixing up that dream cabin in the woods, Assignment you can go to an in-store Think about how you clinic near your home to currently help your customlearn the techniques, go oners and prospects achieve line to place your supply their goals. Is there a way order, and have your supfor you to provide a clinic or plies shipped to your cabin. workshop that will help them Then all you have to do is interact better with your core show up next weekend and products? go to work. You can do it— Home Depot can help.

Epilogue Helping your customers achieve their dreams is not too lofty a goal.

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109 Organizations Have Long Memory Business organizations, such as chambers of commerce, provide us with a useful illustration of member retention. In addition to the work they do all year to acquire new members, they have to be diligent in hanging on to existing members. Because the highest percentage of their member base is small companies with one to five employees, the annual dues expense gets great scrutiny. When the Greater Indianapolis Chamber of Commerce sends its renewal for membership, it includes a member benefit report that can be pretty impressive—it always surpasses the investment made by the business. Some report items are: u Number of people Assignment who attended netWrite a sample “cusworking functions, tomer renewal notice.” with the total value of Say all the things you wish the member discounts. you could say about how u How many clickyour product helped the throughs there were customer throughout the to the member’s year. Now see what you Website. can do to make it true. u Major accomplishments on behalf of business members (legislative, regulatory). If you believe that your product or service adds value for the customer you ought to be letting them know.

Epilogue Help people understand the value you add.

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110 Real Estate Agents Do Open Houses Some real estate agents do open houses and some don’t. The reason most agents give for not doing them is that they almost never sell a house as a result of an open house. They complain that visitors are mostly curious neighbors and drive-bys who can’t afford the house or aren’t in the market for a new home anyway. Therefore, the open house is a waste of time. The Realtors who do host open houses have the same experience relative to making a sale: they rarely sell by open house. The difference is that these pro-open house Realtors consider open houses part of their marketing approach—not their sales approach. As part of a marketing Assignment approach the open house provides the Realtor with: How could you make a customer support transacu Opportunities to tion (such as this open house) show listing cusperform double duty as a tomers his or her marketing strategy? willingness to go the extra mile. u Access to neighbors with future interest in listing (listing prospects). u Access to early-stage lookers not yet working with a realtor (buyer prospects) with whom he or she can build rapport. u Downtime used to complete marketing busywork (communicating with all prospects). There’s nothing quite as nice as having prospects present themselves to you.

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Epilogue Look beyond the surface to see the true value of an opportunity.

111 Buffet Style Feeds the Masses For a flat price, the allAssignment you-can-eat buffet restaurant is an interesting market modExamine your product el. These restaurants always or service range to see if seem to be busy and many there is potential for a flatstay in business for a long rate, all-you-can-use kind time, indicating they must be of pricing model. making adequate profits. Their claim to fame is you can eat as much as you want for the same money. From the restaurant’s perspective: u They don’t need expensive chefs. Low-paid cooks follow basic recipes. u There’s less worry about specific items. They put out what they have. u They have economies of scale, purchasing the same items all the time. From the customer’s perspective: u It’s an easy group choice with lots of options. u They can choose what looks good. u There are refills on favorites. u The price is a bargain.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Some professionals have trouble choosing a service niche. Some customers don’t want to carve out a project—they just want your help. The solution could be a buffet-style approach including: u A flat-rate, monthly fee (retainer) for a specified amount of help. u Availability on regular and on-call basis to assist as needed. u A range of services deployed on demand. If you did all of your business based on retainer accounts, how many would you need to make your income goal? It’s not for everyone, but it might be perfect for you.

Epilogue Take as much as you like, but use all you take.

112 Assisted Living Assists Future Prospects The demand for assisted-living facilities is growing steadily along with our aging population. With early growth comes more competition, and therefore facilities have to become Assignment more creative in their proIdentify one thing you motional approach. can do to leverage the operSome of the more exational aspect of your pensive facilities have begun business inside your marketto offer a unique service ing programs. as a method of attracting

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Quick Ideas 112 to 113 future customers. They offer short-term stays for people who need special care while their regular caregivers take vacations or just get away for a long weekend. Marketing these shortterm stays allows the facility to: u Actively market to its best prospects without the awkwardness of selling long-term stays. (This is huge.) u Showcase its continuum of concern to both the potential resident and his or her current caregivers. u Transfer some marketing costs to operations. u Add an income stream to the business.

Epilogue Make room in your business for a natural link to future prospects.

113 More People Selling Is Better It’s pretty hard to argue with the idea that more is better. And in the area of business development it’s almost always true. If your company is set on the ideas of growth and longevity, then work at getting more of the team involved in sales, because business development is everyone’s business. Business development can mean a lot of different things to different companies. Some consider business development to be more marketing-related activities such as networking, brand development, and lead generation done in support of the sales

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales function. Other companies Assignment hire a business development person to be the salesperIdentify a few people in son, finding and closing new your organization who you business. think would be immediately It won’t be possible (or responsive to the idea of an practical) to turn your enexpanded definition of busitire staff into sales or ness development. Ask marketing people, so the them to read Ideas 114–123 best place to start is with and then brainstorm ideas an expanded definition of for getting other employees business development. involved. Business development is the positive and active representation of your organization to everyone with whom you come in contact.

Epilogue It should be your goal for sales to increase awareness of business development throughout the organization.

114 Make Sure Everyone Knows What You Sell If you want to give your sales efforts a boost without adding overhead, educate your entire staff on the products and services your company provides. Staff orientation programs should contain the following information: u History of the company.

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Quick Ideas 113 to 115 u Company income

Assignment history and current financial picture. Gather up a collection of u Mission, vision, and collateral materials to create goals. your version of the orientation packet mentioned here. u Sales and marketAdd other items that you ing strategies. think would be useful. Idenu Who your compettify someone to assist you in itors and customers getting this information into are. everyone’s hands. u Your customers’ businesses and market factors. u What and why your clients buy from you. Every day your employees are interacting with a range of community players. There are bound to be some influencers and prospects in the mix, and you will want them to be able to represent you well. Epilogue

You never know who your staff members may bump into out there in the world, and it could make a big difference to them and the company if they could speak knowledgeably about your business.

115 Keep Employees Engaged A great way to increase sales is to increase the level of excitement in and around your products and customers. You

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales will enjoy great results if you take time to keep employees in the loop about target markets, recent sales success, and key prospects. Consider these ideas for sharing information: u Sales presentations could be looped and played on a monitor in the break room. u Periodic briefings could be held during lunch (provided by you), including updates on customers and prospects. u Trade show displays should be set up in house so that employees can see how the sales team presents the organization. A lot of work goes into the development of proposals and sales presentations. Sharing elAssignment ements of them with your Put a small team toemployees will give you a biggether to plan an ger return on your investment in-house briefing for of time and energy. You might your staff. Once you get be surprised by how much ina format established it terest they show and ideas they should be easy to replimay come up with. cate without a great deal of work.

Epilogue Once employees see how and why the company’s services are being presented to prospects, they will have more clarity about what they do and the difference it makes.

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116 Develop Your Corporate Information Bite There are several ways that you can help your employees be more confident and positive in the representation of themselves and the organization. One of the best ways is to teach your organization’s information bite—a sound bite that briefly summarizes a company in laymen’s terms. Here’s a list of questions your information bite should answer: 1. Name of organization? 2. What does your organization do? 3. How many years in business? 4. How many employees? 5. What kind of products or services for sale? 6. Name of your organization’s unique niche? 7. Who are your customers? 8. What does customer service mean to you? 9. How does the organization currently Assignment support sales? Work through the exerOnce distilled, you cise here and create an should practice delivering information bite. Plan to your conversationally orishare this process with othented info bite in 45 seconds ers in the organization. or less.

Epilogue While attending a wedding next month, your lead developer may be seated next to one of your best prospects. Will he be prepared to share the company’s information bite?

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117 Suppliers Can Help You Sell Once you grasp the concept that business development is the active representation of your organization (not just sales pitches) you can get a lot of others in on act. Suppliers should be added to the list—after all, they do have a stake in your success. Businesspeople tend to think that their suppliers already know a lot about them, but most would be surprised by how little they can articulate to others about what you do. Even if they do have a pretty good understanding of your products or services they may not know what niches you have identified. If you want them to positively and actively represent you to the people Assignment they come in contact with, Review the list of everyyou have to ask them to. one who sells you materials They do have other things and supplies. Schedule apon their mind—such as pointments with them and their own business developdiscuss this concept. You ment activities. will both benefit from the Meet with suppliers dialogue. one on one and discuss how you can help each other be successful.

Epilogue Suppliers have a stake in your success. Let them help you tell your story. Maybe you can help tell theirs.

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118 Customers Can Help You Sell Customers can be a powerful part of the sales force, but many salespeople never fully activate this category. There are a variety of reasons, but mainly it is a lack of attention. Salespeople tend to work really hard to get a sale and then do a weak job of staying in touch with the customer during and after service delivery. They have moved on to the next big prospect. Plan to solicit customers for add-on and referral business. That means you will need to handle the relationship with a higher degree of attention, care, and proactive behavior. Knowing your customers well, and having an idea how they can help, will also help you to gain their support for the business development efforts. Key elements that will impact a customer’s willingness include: Assignment u His or her level of Write a project recap satisfaction with for your last three cool the products and projects. Summarize the sitservices you have uation each client was delivered. facing, what your product u What he or she was to accomplish, results to understands your date, and key items learned offerings. form the project. Include u The level of rapthese solution scenarios in port he or she has your ongoing marketing to with the employees existing customers. that were part of your service team.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Epilogue Customers can help you to develop more business, directly or through their stories.

119 The Community Can Help You Sell The community can be a powerful force for increasing sales. It’s big, it’s diverse, and it’s a product- and service-consuming machine. Making community its own category of influence is important because it allows you to call attention to all the people who do not already fit neatly into one of your other groups. Community captures people who are not currently your suppliers, employees, or customers. In fact, they haven’t even made it to your prospect list. Interacting with the community in a meaningful way can have tremendous impact on your sales. Granted, some of this depends on what you sell. If you sell specialized industriAssignment al products, your opportunity will not be as high as it would Develop a community if you sell karate lessons. interaction strategy for Help your company to your own territory. Considbe a good community citizen. er ways that you and your At the same time, be precompany can interact in a pared to inform people in the meaningful way. Actively community about your busicommunicate who you are. ness, and don’t be afraid to ask them for their help.

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Epilogue Many communities have a “we take care of our own” mentality. They can help a lot more when they really know you.

120 100 Percent Participation in Intelligence-Gathering Knowing what’s going on in the communities you serve will help you sell more. And your goal should be 100-percent employee participation in this process. When everyone helps you will collect more and better intelligence, and employees will get more engaged in the company’s growth. Routine information-gathering should include items about all of your groups of influence, including: customers, prospects, suppliers, employees, and the community. Here’s a starting list of intelligence-gathering tips: u Ask staff to bring in clippings from newspapers and other pubs. u Expect all staff to enhance customer profiles if they learn new information. u Watch for personal information that may call for a card or gift to a key contact (promotions, births, anniversaries, and so forth). u If you are a one-person show consider using a clipping service to watch for key elements of importance.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Someone specific

should be assigned to each industry journal so he or she can do a quick look immediately upon its arrival. There are typically key sections where announcements and feature stories are located.

Assignment Create a place for people to share the information they bring in. High-tech or low-tech—either way. Just be sure to make it easy and interesting.

Epilogue The act of collecting and valuing information about your groups of influence will help create community among your employees.

121 An Attitude for Business Development Assignment Identify two employees and help them see how they can have a positive impact on business development by embodying these attitudes.

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Increasing sales will be easier when employees in your organization accept a broader view of business development. Part of accepting a broader view is understanding and adopting

Quick Ideas 120 to 122 productive attitudes. Productive attitudes for creating a highproducing business development culture include: u Business development is everyone’s business. u Helpfulness. u Sharing. u Abundance. u Involvement. u Collaboration.

Epilogue People might not change their mind about their view of selling, but they might make a new decision about what they are willing to do to contribute.

122 Skills for Business Development A business development culture requires skills in making and keeping a range of personal and professional connections alive. A skill is an ability to do something well and it is usually gained through training and experience. Pull back the curtain and let others see that the ones behind it (the sales team) are regular folk, just as they are. The primary difference is they’ve honed specific attitudes, skills, and knowledge. Skills necessary for sustaining a high-performing business development culture are: u Good verbal and written communication skills. u Information-gathering.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Informationu u u u

sharing. Networking. Problem-solving. Time management. Ability to see the big picture.

Assignment Model the necessary skills for total participation in business development. Involve your employees in information-gathering and information-sharing and you will win them over.

Epilogue Skills can be taught in many ways, including on-the-job training, simulation, practice, trial and error, and modeling.

123 Everyday Things That Impact Sales Employees who understand their personal impact on the business tend to stick around longer, provide higher levels of customer satisfaction, and collaborate more openly with other staffers. All of these things can help you increase sales. Recognize the everyday things people do that have impact and then share your insights with them. Here are a few examples to inspire your thinking: u I come to work on time so that I can keep projects on time.

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Quick Ideas 122 to 124 u I return phone calls

promptly so people have a positive impression of our organization. u I help make clients happy so they keep buying our products. u I answer customer questions to support the sales team. u I keep the plant running smoothly so we can deliver on time. Make sure employees have the tools they need to do their best work.

Assignment Consider three main jobs in the organization and make a list of three things that they do or should do that would have a positive impact on sales. Then discuss them with each. Consider starting with the receptionist, department heads, and the role with the highest concentration of staff. Then pick three more.

Epilogue As the business development “champion,” your main role should be to help others to do their best work.

124 How to Lose a Customer A great way to increase sales is to not lose the customers you already have. Take time to perform this creative exercise

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales and see what you learn that will help you keep customers. Here’s how it works: You get a small group of people together to brainstorm ideas. It won’t take long. Have fun with this. How to Lose a Customer: 1. Make a list of things you would do if you wanted to lose all your customers. 2. Don’t do them. If you want to string the exercise out a bit more you can do it in three steps. Have the group: 1. Make a list of things that a restaurant could do that would clearly make their restaurant the worst in town. 2. Make a list of small things you could do that would cause customers to question whether you were the best vendor Assignment for them. Work through this 3. Make a list of things exercise and make a you could do that great list of big and would make customsmall ways to run off ers quit doing business your customers. Then with you. don’t do them!

Epilogue Sometimes the best way to approach an important issue is from behind.

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125 Product Category Makeover Sales increases may be hard to come by for a mature business that already boasts a high percentage of the market share. Uncovering new ways to serve customers may be your best bet. Try this is creativity exercise to get your vision refocused. Get out the yellow page directory of your choice. Open the book at random and pick a heading. Write this heading down. Do it again to come up with a second random heading, and write it down as well. Examples include audio/visual, sales, rental, and service; as well as copiers and supplies. Now, for the fun part: brainstorm what a business might look like if it was a combination of both these random categories. Feel free to consider a combination of Web-based and land-based applications. Repeat this exercise until you get some momenAssignment tum going. It’s okay to be Do the creativity exersilly about it at first, but try cise described here. Have to become more serious fun and combine your disabout the possibilities of this coveries with the other ideas hybrid business idea. you have been considering. Now you are free to consider some possible category combinations for your own business. Keeping your business as the first listing, use the phone book to identify potential combinations.

Epilogue You may not need a complete makeover to achieve your sales goals, but a new view is bound to spark something good.

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126 Microwave Customers Microwave popcorn is a good model for increasing sales. All you need to do is zap it in the microwave and watch it cook to perfection. This perfection is possible because you have all of the essential ingredients in the bag. The short time between the craving and the eating is what makes it best of all. There are always cravings for new customers. People seem to be in a rush for them, too, so why can’t we have microwave customers? Maybe you can. Here’s the recipe: u Identify an adequate number of sales leads/prospects. (Start with the best kernels.) u Understand the sales cycle and keep the pipeline full. (Put just the right amount of popcorn in the bag.) u Know what product offers and calls to action will help you close deals. (Choose the best cooking oil and don’t forget to add the butter and the salt— it provides the spice.) Assignment u Perform your integrated sales and Make some microwave marketing activipopcorn. Watch it cook. Eat ties consistently success and be inspired. for best results. (Cook on high power.)

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Epilogue Every time you see and smell popcorn, allow yourself to feel success. Your co-workers will wonder why you started eating popcorn for breakfast.

127 Target Market Overview Some people (mostly sales managers) think you have to work harder to make more sales. But that’s not usually the case. The “work smarter, not harder” method also has greater appeal. In order to work smarter, every salesperson should have his or her own Target Market Overview (TMO). The TMO will provide the background needed to plan effective daily activities. Your TMO should briefly address the following subjects: u Product/Service Proposition: Summary of product/service proposition, including how they support customer needs. u Market Definition: Geographic territory, number of leads available in your desired categories, relevant details about demographics, and psychographics of the area. u Competition: Recognize direct and indirect competition. u Strategy: General approach you will use to interact in your market.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Strategic Goals: Four to five. u Centers of Influence: What organizations or

categories of organizations can act as centers of influence for your type of product (referrals, gatekeepers)? u Strategic Activities: Eight to 10 implementation activities you will perform in order to Assignment execute the strategy and strategic goals. Draft a Target Maru Territory or Busiket Overview for your ness Expansion primary territory. Perform Plans: Note any some basic research if plans. needed. Try the public library if you need help.

Epilogue If you don’t know enough about your market to write a Target Market Overview, then you aren’t likely to achieve your goals.

128 Plan Ahead to Keep Them Talking Gathering great information from your prospect about his or her situation is one of the best things you can do to improve closing rates. I call information-gathering “discovery,” because it is always an adventure. Approach your discovery sessions with an open mind and enjoy the process.

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Quick Ideas 127 to 128 Here are some tips for having a good discovery session with your prospect: u Good discovery takes time. Ask for the amount of time you need. u Clarify the purpose of the meeting. Tell the prospect you’re not planning to present, but to learn about his or her situation. u Prepare a solid list of questions. He or she will be impressed with your organization. u Avoid slipping into product presentation mode. Presentation needs its own meeting. u Demonstrate the importance of what you learned. Include a brief situation analysis in your proposal or presentation. Link what you learned in discovery to recommendations. If you must combine discovery and presentation sessions into one Assignment single meeting, make a Commit to improving clear transition. You might your discovery process. say, “Thanks for sharing Practice techniques on peothis information about ple from your network that your (specific needs). Is could ultimately become inthere anything I haven’t fluencers for you as well. asked you about that you wish to tell me before we move on to talk about solutions?”

Epilogue It’s amazing how much more interesting people think you are when they do most of the talking.

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129 5 Levels of Deep Discovery should have purpose and depth. Let’s look at depth. A concept known as The Five Whys originated in the quality movement some time in the 1990s. I adaptAssignment ed the principle for use in teaching people about deTry using the concept of veloping discovery questions The Five Whys with your in sales situations and spouse or a teenager to get dubbed the concept the a better understanding of his Five Levels of Deep. or her situation. By digging A series of five why in to the Five Levels of questions will get you deep Deep you are sure to get the enough to understand allevel of understanding you most any key piece of need. information. Here’s an example of how The Five Whys could work for a Realtor. (Note: Questions are oversimplified to make a point.) 1. Q. What can I do for you, Mr. and Mrs. Prospect? A. We want to buy a house. 2. Q. Why would you like to buy a home? A. Because we don’t have one. 3. Q. Why don’t you have a home? A. We sold ours. 4. Q. What was your reason for selling? A. It was too small. 5. Q. Why was it too small? A. We are having a child.

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Epilogue Learning to use effective questioning techniques in a noninterrogative, conversational way will make you a better person all around. Good questioning skills will help you empathize, sympathize, and strategize.

130 Study Solutions to Your Customer’s Problems Do you want to be the go-to guy in your niche? Do you want to increase the odds of being asked to the table? Then study the primary problems, challenges, and opportunities that are facing your categories of customers and prospects. Start with the issues closely related to the solutions you provide, of course, but be willing to go deeper. Think about the Five Levels of Deep discussed in the previous idea. Sample Scenario: Salesperson works for a Web and graphic design studio. Potential Niche: Working with brick-and-mortar retailers who want to expand by opening or improving an online store. Special Study Topics: u Why are retailers expanding online? u Major examples of success running both types of stores. u Major differences in retailing online and offline. u Required staffing for an online business.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales In this example, you can easily see why they would benefit from carving out a niche. Realistically, it’s going to be difficult for a salesperson to do an adequate study of customer problems and opportunities if they don’t serve some type of niche with their solutions.

Assignment Choose one or two topics to study and gain tremendous insights.

Epilogue It pays to become a niche player. You will get an exponential return on your commitment to understanding customer problems and opportunities.

131 Build Memorable Sales Presentations Years ago, I was asked by the president of the local Ad Club to speak with members about making presentations. I was honored to be asked, but I told him no. I was certain that his group knew much more than I did about making presentations. They were, after all, an association of advertising professionals. After further discussion, I did agree to speak with the group on the topic of discovery. Specifically, how they could design dramatically better presentations, with meaningful content, by gathering better information from and about their audience? Here are some tips for memorable presentations: u The presentation should be the main reason for the meeting.

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Quick Ideas 130 to 132 u Make sure prospects

u

u u u

Assignment see themselves in this presentation. InGive the presentation clude references to the attention it deserves by their mission, vision, building the framework in and values; business advance. Add specific progoals; and success posal elements as they benchmarks for cusbecome known. Your industomer, operational, try will dictate the technology financial, and innoexpectations. vative excellence. Always make a business case for your solution. Demonstrate the return on their investment. Keep it as short as possible, but meaty, too. The proposal is included in presentation, but it is not the entire presentation. Add quotes and examples that prove you do your homework. Epilogue

Memorable presentations prove that you understand your prospect and you can help make them look this good, too!

132 Daily Nourishment Essentials Nothing looks as good as a new day! And every day we need our nourishment.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales The best nourishment for a salesperson (and for most professionals) is meaningful work. By definition, nourishment is a valuable substance that one requires to live and grow, or remain fit and healthy—something that provides a stimulating and healthy emotional or intellectual environment. Here’s a short list of ideas to increase the nutrition found in your daily work: u Start your day with inspirational reading or listening. Every day! u Express thankfulness for your unique gifts and talents and put them to good use this day. u Don’t plan activities you dread doing. If you hate them, you’re probably not doing them well anyway. Find another way to deal with them. u Sort your day by the people you are going to help. u Know how the day’s activities are linked to your personal and Assignment business goals. Find a way to quit u Learn something doing one of the things new every day. Find that make your days someone with hard to look forward to. whom to share it. Keep doing this until you u Be an inspiration to get rid of all the junk. others. You’ll feel it, too!

Epilogue If we’re lucky, we’ll get lots more chances at having a good day. Practice makes perfect. Live well!

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133 Stay in Front of Your Clients Every Week People lose accounts all the time because they are not paying attention to their customers. When you’re not around for a while, believe it or not, your customers might forget some of the reasons why they chose your solution in the first place. Think about it this way: Your customer is someone else’s prospect now. Remember the full-court press you made when they were your prospect? That memory should be all you need to snap you back to reality. Brainstorm meaningful ways to stay in touch. Here are some idea-starters: u E-mail a “thought of the week.” (Brand it for your business, and prepare them a quarter in advance.) u Deliver on your product and serAssignment vice promises (your primary touch point Work with a group of if you have an onemployees from other degoing relationship). partments to brainstorm practical ways to stay in u Send brief recaps front of your client every or cool resources week. or information from professional workshops and seminars you attend (industry-specific and general business).

Epilogue If you are managing your accounts well, all customers will be prospects.

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134 Invest in Yourself There are a lot of things that impact your sales. But the one element that has the biggest impact of all is YOU! How you care for yourself will influence everything else in your world. The fact is that many salespeople occasionally struggle financially. Take heart; you will come through this rough patch. You will get better at making sales and therefore increase your income or perhaps make a new career decision. Either way, you will want to learn how to invest in you. Here are some tips for investing your time, talent, and treasure in you: u Look your best. Hit the sales, shop secondhand, and get someone who cares about you to help you shop. u Keep your mind sharp. Read lots of books and journals. u Volunteer for something that inspires you. u Dump activities from your schedAssignment ule that don’t bring Take time to consider you closer to a goal where you may be falling of personal best. short regarding your investu Barter. It’s a ment in you. Make progress good way to trade in one category this week. goods or services with others.

Epilogue Investing in yourself is a proposition with lasting impact.

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135 Become an Expert (It’s Easier Than You Think) Professionals are expected to bring knowledge to their jobs every day. That’s why they’re hired by employers and customers. Those who effectively combine industry expertise, sales skills, and meaningful products take home the biggest prizes. You can increase your sales and your overall value to your employer, customers, and peers by becoming a recognized expert on your topic of choice. Here’s how it’s done: u Topic Selection: Choose a topic of interest to you and your professional community. A narrow topic is good for focus, but don’t go obscure. u Research: Dig into history, founders of the industry, who’s making news on the subject, and leading authorities. u Study: Study the subject as if it was the cure for cancer. (Maybe that is your topic.) u Writing: Keep a journal of all resources, insights, observations, and questions, and then turn them into useful tools. u Publishing: Make arAssignment ticles, surveys, and Pick a topic to bereports on the subject available to your emcome an expert on. ployees, professional Write down reasons for associations, and the choosing this topic. media. Highlight your relevant skills, knowledge, and u Speaking: Present on experience. the topic whenever you can.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Fellowship: Interact with others who have a deep

interest. Share resources openly. Build your specialized knowledge into your approach on the job. You will have much fun.

Epilogue Expertise is a journey not a destination.

136 Keep Your Promises Understand that every time you assure somebody that something will be done, you are giving a promise. The quickest way to lose business is fail to keep a promise. And one of the best things you can do to increase sales is keep your promises. Here’s how: u Make it a habit to fully understand and articulate all factors affecting a desired outcome. u Make sure your entire work team understands the promises explicit in your relationships with customers. u Don’t over-promise. This usually happens when people are trying to make up for some other shortcoming or disappointment. That’s Assignment what people mean when they say that Think back to the last “things are going time you remember breakdownhill fast.” ing a promise. How did that make you feel? I thought so.

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Quick Ideas 135 to 137 u Be organized so that your good intentions don’t

slip through the cracks.

Epilogue

People don’t recommend people who don’t keep their promises.

137 Use the Buddy System Everyone has a bad day now and then, and sometimes we even string a few of them together to create a bad week. But don’t let yourself stay there. A sales professional often has a unique role in keeping everyone else upbeat and resourceful. Allowing yourself to stay down is a good way to lose momentum in your sales effort. Use the buddy system to get over disappointments and put yourself back on track. Everyone needs someone to talk to about problems. For professional considerations, choose a discussion buddy who can relate to your role and reAssignment sponsibilities. Agree with each other in advance to Consider joining or startlimit whining and gossip ing a mastermind group of and focus on productive your own. Depending on solutions. your market position you Mastermind groups might want to consider joinare springing up all over the ing a group from out of town.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales place. They’re groups of like-minded individuals, often selfemployed types with their eyes set on personal and professional success. They meet regularly to encourage and support one another. It is a great arrangement.

Epilogue We were put on this earth to share each other’s burdens. It’s a blessing to do so.

138 Go on Retreat Whether you are in sales for a big corporation, running your own deal, or somewhere in between, you need time to think. You need to take time to think, plan, rest, create, contemplate, and brainstorm. It’s hard to concentrate on your bigger ideals when you’re surrounded by the daily details of phones, e-mail, customers, co-workers, and kids. This “busy-ness” can keep you from giving your true vision a voice. The answer is to take yourself on strategic retreat. Alone, by yourself, because it’s your own ideas you’re looking for! The planning of your future deserves special consideration. Here are some key elements of a private strategic retreat: · u One to two days is good. An overnight stay lends perspective. u A quiet and inspiring place to work (think suite, cabin, beach house, friend’s empty house). u Lots of flip-chart paper, markers, and tape. u Good food.

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Quick Ideas 137 to 139 u No interruptions.

Let people know you’ll be unavailable. Put phones and e-mail on hold. u A plan for success. Go with the a rough plan of attack so you can take along any resources you think you might need.

Assignment Schedule your own retreat in the next 30 days. Start a folder to capture planning, organizing, and discussion topics. If you find it difficult to get organized, ask someone to help you plan.

Epilogue

There is a peace that comes from knowing you have carved out a vision for your future.

139 When You Feel the Pull It is said that nothing can remain the same—and why would you want it to? Sales and business professionals prove this every day as they seek new opportunities to do their best work and follow the money. Challenge yourself to be the best you, even if it means a move. Signs that it might be time for a change include: u Your sales are off and you don’t really give a hoot. u You have more enthusiasm for your volunteer work than your paying job.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u You’re in a bad

mood a lot during Assignment working hours. Pull out your resume or u You feel as if the bio and review past to work you perform present. Think about what is only using a you’d like to add before small portion of you’re done on this earth. your capabilities. u You worked really hard to capture a certain market and now you find that you don’t enjoy working in the category. Engagement Strategies: u Take on a volunteer responsibility that stretches you. u Start blogging and test interest in your favorite topics. u Start writing articles and look for publishing outlets. The Internet is full of options. u Write that book you’ve been dreaming about. If you write one page per day, you can have a complete book in less than a year.

Epilogue It’s not over till you say it’s over. Dream big!

140 Changing Places When a self-employed business professional moves into a new market there are many challenges beyond the typical

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Quick Ideas 139 to 140 moving hassles. If you Assignment make your living insales, you’re probably going to Organize a binder to need to get on a fast track capture key information to capture new customers. about your new community. Some tips for preparKeep it simple by adding a ing to make sales in your set of 1–26 tabs. You can new place: maintain a handwritten table of contents as you add imu Buy a street guide. portant lists, documents, and u Make a list of comarticles. This will become panies and causes your market overview. you have enjoyed working with in the past, and check for local offices. u Be genuinely excited about this opportunity for a do-over. People will appreciate your enthusiasm. u Use this opportunity to close in on a niche that is more exciting u Send e-mails to your contact list and tell them about your new adventure. Ask them for suggestions regarding your new city, and ask who they know in the area that you should connect with. u Visit the library. Look at some back issues of business journals and other publications and decide which to subscribe to. u Visit local chapters of professional and business associations that will help you acclimate to your new city.

Epilogue New place. New ideas. New excitement!

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141 Reality Check 101: Income Sales professionals are often lulled into projects with the promise of big bucks, but many deals simply don’t perform. Here are some reality checks to help evaluate deals. We’ll start with income, because if there’s not enough money in the deal, you won’t find financial success no matter how hard you work. Reality Check 101: Is There Enough Money in the Deal? u Are you earning enough to thrive on? (That’s thrive on, not just live on.) u Based on a typical deal, is there enough time to make as many sales as you would need to for a decent living? Are you sure? u Is your income per sale commensurate with the level of effort required to close and collect on the sale (out-ofpocket expenses, Assignment average number of Do the reality check and contacts to close, see what you discover. If level of expertise)? there is enough money in the u Do you believe it is deal, that’s great. Then work possible to improve through the next few pages your sales situation where you can continue evalenough to get your uating your deal. income where it needs to be?

Epilogue It’s really not so bad having all your eggs in one basket, as long as you have enough eggs for breakfast.

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142 Reality Check 102: Target Market Salespeople often feel that if they work harder, they can overcome the problems with their deal, with their employer. It stems from too much positive thinking and visualization. It’s not always about your personal performance. Sometimes you need a better deal to increase sales. Identifying an adequate target market for Assignment your product is critical. A target market is a group of Do the reality check and customers of a certain see what you see. If there type considered likely to is an adequate target marbuy a particular product. ket for your products and Sometimes the probyou feel confident that you lem is that the identified can identify them, that’s target market is too big and great. If you haven’t done unmanageable or too small the Assignment for Idea 141, to sustain you. A poorly dego back a chapter and do it fined target market is one now. of the biggest factors in failed sales campaigns. Reality Check 102: Is There a Large Enough Target Market to Sustain You? u Have you clarified your target market? Can you give brief description? u Have you identified the specific leads in your target market? How many total leads can you list? How sortable are they by geography, or other factors?

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Have you refined your target by sub groups to be

most approachable? This is niche-building. u Have you gathered the contact information you need on these targets/leads to commence with your strategic approach? Consider this distinction. A lead is a name on a target list. A lead becomes a prospect once there is some interaction and interest on both sides.

Epilogue It’s okay to have all your eggs in one basket as long as you have enough chickens to feed the family.

143 Reality Check 103: Approach When sales are not what they need to be, it pays to look at the numbers and where your program may be losing steam. (Check out the last few pages for more info on sales income and target markets.) Reality Check 103: Are You Converting Enough Leads Into Paying Customers? u Are you turning enough leads from your target market lists into qualified prospects? How many qualified prospects have you done proposals for, presented to, or had in your store? u How many qualified prospects have you closed (number of sales made lately, number of sales made total)?

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Quick Ideas 142 to 144 u What percentage of the leads you are personally

interacting with are qualified prospects truly interested in your solutions? How many this month? How many this year? u How do you raise Assignment awareness of your Do the reality check. products with your These answers combined target markets? Do with those from the two preyou maintain a vious ideas should help you marketing outevaluate your deal. reach? (This is not sales.) u Have you taken what you’ve learned from your sales activities and revised your targeting and marketing efforts?

Epilogue It doesn’t matter how many eggs you have or what baskets you put them in if your guests want sausage and pancakes instead.

144 We Manage What We Measure Business runs fast. We can’t give every detail our full attention in the moment so we develop methods of tracking and reporting, then details can be reviewed later and managed accordingly. We, in turn, focus our management efforts on the

175

151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales elements of our business that we measure. We manage what we measure! Are you measuring the elements that are most important to your sales efforts? Are you managing the elements that are most important to your sales efforts?

Assignment Evaluate the measuring and reporting elements in your selling situation. Determine if they are useful measures for managing sales results. If you work in a sales department where extensive reporting is required (and ineffective), show this book to your sales manager and work together to develop a more productive approach.

Epilogue We manage what we measure, so measure what you believe is worthy of management.

145 Leading and Lagging Indicators A professional salesperson will always prefer leading anything over lagging everything. In this case, we’re talking about indicators, those little stats that tell us how we’re doing. There’s nothing wrong with lagging indicators, but by definition they

176

Quick Ideas 144 to 145 are history. Leading indicaAssignment tors, on the other hand, give information we can use to Identify three leading alter plans and devise new indicators that will help you strategies while there is determine if you’re getting still time to make a differthe right mix of activity to ence. Let me give you a few keep your sales on track. examples. Consider what approach you Lagging indicators will take when leading indiare important, but historical cators show weak activity. documentation, from a previous period of activity, can illustrate a great deal. These are documents such as: u Profit and loss statements. u New customer reports. u Lost customer reports. u Sales compared to the same period last year. Leading indicators can be culled from the marketing and sales activities that are known to have a demonstrated effect on helping you make sales. Leading indicators are: u Unique daily visitors to the Website. u The number of prospects who have asked for a proposal or price quote this week. u The number of Website visitors who have downloaded your special report of the month today. u The number of daily store visitors. u The number of leads who returned the five-question survey you sent out.

Epilogue If you’re going to be busy, be busy about the things that can truly make a difference.

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146 Measure What Matters to Customers Many elements influence our relationship with customers. We must do more than deliver our products to ensure continued business, new projects, and those coveted referrals. Their perception of the value we provide is likely the most significant of them all. We must learn to measure what matters to customers. Measuring what matters to customers assumes two things: That we: 1. Know what they value. 2. Have a way of benchmarking their satisfaction and progress. Knowing what matters to customers will come partially from your targeting strategy. The more niche-oriented you are, the more similar customer expectations will be. Individual details should be available from the selling process. Benchmarking progress and satisfaction can be trickier, but, if you know what they want to achieve and how your product or service is going to help, you will be able to create some type of process for gathering updates and reporting them in your customer report. Progress reporting is your opportunity Assignment to remind them what you have delivered in the period Develop a method for and to subtly promote some reporting to customers. Freof your other services. quency can coincide with Planning to measure invoicing or deliveries. Add progress and report to cusmarketing elements by ustomers will make you beting informative placeholders ter from the beginning. If for your add-on services. you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.

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Epilogue Sometimes you just need to remind them how good you are.

147 Measure What Matters in Your Business Sales cannot be the only department in the orAssignment ganization focused on the Do some research on job of attracting and retainThe Balanced Scorecard ing customers. Their must and talk with your leadership be a cohesive effort on the team about getting the orgapart of the entire organizanization more in alignment tion. Establishing a balfor success. anced and strategic way of planning for, measuring, and rewarding progress will help achieve organizational success— especially increased sales! Kaplan and Norton’s The Balanced Scorecard describes how to integrate strategy and performance from several different perspectives: u Financial. To succeed financially, what is required by your stockholders? u Customer. To achieve your vision, what does this mean you must do to satisfy the needs of your customers? u Operational. To satisfy your customers and shareholders, at what business processes must you excel?

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Innovation. To achieve your vision, how will you

sustain your ability to change and improve? Robert Kaplan and David Norton published The Balanced Scorecard in 1996 and The Strategy Focused Organization in 2000.

Epilogue Be a champion for excellence. It looks good on you.

148 Say Thank You—Often None of us gets through this life without a lot of help from other people. Heck, I don’t think I get through many days without help from other people. The point is that you need to say thanks to people every day—lots of them. And you need to find some creative ways to say it. Consider these: u Handwritten cards are still a favorite and, with fewer people doing it, they stand out that much more. u E-mail messages work, but consider adding some spice to your notes by using one of the stationery features or something else colorful (maybe a cartoon or joke of the week). u An offer of tickets to attend a meeting of some sort to hear a speaker or panel. u Special handwritten or other non-personalized communication.

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Quick Ideas 147 to 149 Tips for Staying on Track With Thank-You Notes: u Keep your stock of thanking supplies just as you do essentials such as copy paper. u When you schedule appointments make it a habit to note a reminder to send a thanks. u Keep a list of reasons to say “thanks for…” (trusting me with your business, the opportunity to talk about your business today, the opportunity to proAssignment vide you with a Identify two unique solution to your ways that you can thank _____, the gift of people that will keep you your time today, nicely in their minds and being a good hearts. Be original. friend).

Epilogue Sincere one-on-one contact is still the best way to let people know you appreciate them.

149 Live Thankfully Be thankful for your: u Struggles, for they make you better. u Customers, for they help you pay the bills. u Boss, for she keeps you humble.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Family, for they bring

Assignment perspective. u Co-workers, for they Take time each day bring levity. to give thanks for the small and big things that You can’t know what will brought you joy. happen tomorrow or tonight, and you can’t change the past. A spirit of thankfulness will help to keep you living in the present. Epilogue Life is never ordinary.

150 A View of Abundance Choose to view the world with an abundance mentality and scarcity must find a new home. For those with an abundant view, there seems to be a plentiful supply of everything. No worries about competition—just being their best and helping customers make their most informed decisions.There’s time to help co-workers and professional peers without concern for getting their share of leads or commissions. If a market is shifting and market potential is eroding, abundance thinkers uncover a new niche; they don’t sit around and whine about the good old days. All of the resources in your life can be viewed on a continuum of abundance. Believe in scarcity or believe in abundance—it’s your choice.

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Assignment Consider the areas of your life where you are not living in the spirit of abundance. Explore the basis for your feeling of scarcity and then do something bold to change your view.

As a salesperson you have unique ways to share your view of abundance. Share information freely and more will come to you. Your understanding will be multiplied. Paul Zane Pilzer is a well-known economist and author with a unique view on the impact of abundance versus scarcity thinking. Read one of his books.

Epilogue Live abundantly and it will be returned to you exponentially.

151 Celebrate and Reward Success Celebrate success—yours as well as those around you. Here are some tips: u Whenever possible, celebrate with an outing. The experience is sure to compound the excitement of the achievement and you also get the new opportunities for interaction. Nothing celebrates a consistent increase in unique visitors to the Website the way a trip to the go-cart track does, for example.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales u Celebrate the small things (proposals). They

add up to big things (sales). Bring in some shots of orange juice and coffee for the morning after a late-night push. If you really owe them, add fruit and donut-hole poppers. u When a co-worker or professional peer makes a big sale, reward him or her with personal recognition. How about a handmade poster to hang on his or her office door or cubicle? u Help foster an environment of Assignment reward and celebration in your Identify two or three workplace and benchmarks for celebration. home. It should Plan ahead for what you will become a natural do when you achieve them. occurrence. Make Remember to reward peoa habit of checkple for the efforts, not just ing in on Mondays results. to see what might be up for celebration this week. The anticipation has a value of its own. Also, keep a stock of congratulations cards on hand. u Celebrate Fridays with a juggling lesson from your co-worker.

Epilogue Life is short. Celebrate the small stuff.

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The Business Development Continuum Awareness Building Potential Elements in the Marketing Mix

Advertising

185

Website Field Sales and Distribution Pricing Strategies Speaking and Publishing Trade Shows Event Marketing Blogging Cause Marketing

Indirect Proactive Discovery Quoting Presenting Marketing Prospecting

Client/Account Management Agreement Testimonials Referrals

Appendix

Public Relations

Formal Sales Process

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Index A add-on projects, 97 sales, 20 advertising, 33 affiliate programs, 121 approach, sales, 175 assisted living, 139

B background information, 74 baseline factors, 23 become an expert, 164 big business, 112 red truck, 83 tickets, 106 BizStats.com, 78 blogging, 126 book sales, 127 brand, 17, 30 loyalty, 48 strategy, 30

budget category, 71 buffet restaurant, 137 business development, 13, 24, 139, 149 development continuum, 14-18, 32 goals, 23 initiatives, 34 buying pattern, 27

C cancer research, 89 cause marketing, 48 celebrity endorsement, 104 centers of influence, 156 charity cause, 25 cheap advertising, 88 children’s hospitals, 89 Children’s Miracle Network, 123 chocolate, 109 coffee shops, 114 cold calling, 44

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales collaborative workplace, 61 collateral materials, 26 common ground, finding, 59 communication, 72 community, 31, 146 calendars, 37 events, 57 initiatives, 38 competition, 155 consultants, 110 contact information, 68 contracting, 19 convenience stores, 102 conversion, 119 corporate information bite, 142 support, 123 coupons, 29 Cracker Jack moment, 45 cross-promotions, 41, 87 customer account management, 15, 19 demographics, 41 loyalty programs, 27 profiles, 27 referrals, 51 relationship management, 66 satisfaction benchmarks, 73

D deadlines, 37 decision-making process, 78 detailed proposals, 26

development time line, 64 direct mail, 47 sales, 14, 43 discovery, 18

E earned media, 35-36 El Paso Bar-B-Que, 125 Empire Glass, 125 engagement strategies, 170 Ethos, 49 event marketing, 52 promoters, 122 existing clients, 57

F financial landscape, 78 Five Levels of Deep, 158 formal sales phase, 18

G gift responsibly, 109 goal-oriented sales, 90 grassroots campaign, 121

H Harley Davidson, 133 home builders, 111

188

Index Home Depot, 134 housing programs, 89 humane societies, 89

lose a customer, 150 loss leader, 103

M

I ideal prospect, 58 income streams, 120 independent consultants, 108 industry insights, 74 infomercials, 107 information overload, 93 innovation, 62 intelligence gathering, 146 inventory, 24 invoicing, 98

J

March of Dimes, 123 market definition, 155 position, 71 media outlets, 131 Memorial Day, 87 merchandise, 101 microwave customers, 155 moment of agreement, 19 momentum, 83 markers, 64 Mother’s Day, 90

N

Jaycees, 50

no-sale, 101 not-for-profits, 122

K key audiences, 26 Kiwanis, 50

O one-to-one marketing, 46 outside interests, 80

L lagging indicators, 177 leading indicators, 177 leveraged interaction, 25, 87 lifetime value, 21 Lions, 50 Local Trade Zone, 45

P payroll, 79 point-of-sale technology, 27 PR campaign, 34 practice-development, 109

189

151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales premature pricing questions, 96 pricing strategy, 40 primary revenue streams, 23 product category makeover, 152 service proposition, 155 professional service firms, 47 project add-ons, 97 promo trips, 132 promotional budgets, 33 strategies, 29, 40 public announcement, 33 relations, 34 free publicity, 88

R

presentations, 161 process, 60 territory, 45 Scrip Bank, 128 short-term goals, 80 staff orientation, 140 staffing gaps, 78 strategic acount profile, 66 activities, 156 approach, 25, 56 goals, 156

T target market, 154, 172 territory management, 44 three-phased process, 15 time management, 150 trade shows, 42 transaction map, 13

rapport-building stage, 81 real estate agents, 137 referrals, 85 regulations, 85 retail art galleries, 124 retention, customer, 23 retirement communities, 130 Rotary Club, 50

U

S

W

sales objectives, 55

Web-based business, 116 windshield, 124

United Way, 123 unlimited funds, 17 upgrade or die, 116

190

About the Author For more than 25 years Linda worked in the field of sales, serving in a variety of selling situations. Her sales roles have included yellow page advertising, clerking at a local clock shop, and account management with a national information services company. Early on she realized her distinct preference for businessto-business selling; the nagging restlessness prevailed when she jumped the corporate ship in favor of the entrepreneurial experience. For 10 years Linda served as president and lead performance consultant with Performance Development Company (PDC), a business consulting and training firm she founded in 1990. Years of selling, consulting, and participating actively in the business community have enabled Linda to develop a thoughtful perspective on how things really get done in the daytoday business world. She believes many factors impact an organization’s ability to thrive and develop new business. Her mantra is: Everyone within a system has a distinct impact on organizational success. So thoroughly convinced, in 2000 Linda co-authored a book with her business partner Kris Butler titled Business Development Is Everyone’s Business. Since writing Business Development Is Everyone’s Business, most of her work has involved developing integrated marketing and communications plans for a wide range of corporate and not-for-profit clients.

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151 Quick Ideas to Increase Sales Her heart for community has led to major collaboration on community causes including the Indianapolis Air Show and Riley Hospital for Children. Working as an independent consultant gives Linda the opportunity to be selective and to choose clients and projects that are a good match for her skills, knowledge, and enthusiasm for business improvement. Linda resides in Tucson, Arizona, with her husband, Jim, her grandmother, and her hound dog, Emma.

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