Sales are a huge factor in any successful business. Unfortunately, qualified leads and potential sales often fall through the cracks. While you may be an excellent salesperson, you may have an employee who is missing out on these potential sales – leaving money on the table.
Ten Sales that Commonly Fall Through the Cracks
You can have a great marketing plan in place along with a fantastic product – but if your sales team is not on the ball, you will be missing out on working with the perfect clients. Fortunately, you don’t need to lose these customers! Here are ten sales that you can capture:
1. Automated Follow up
Studies show that 44% of salespeople give up after only one follow-up, while 80% of sales require five follow-ups before they close. One of the quickest and easiest ways to follow-up with clients is to set up an automated system. In this way, your team can rapidly gain new customers they would have otherwise failed to close.
2. Picking up the phone
While automation is an excellent way to keep in touch with many potential clients, many sales require the personal touch. In fact, studies show that 80% of sales need five follow up phone calls after the meeting. Train your salespeople to talk to customers over the phone as well as by email – you’ll be glad you did!
3. Responding/following up using the customer’s preferred medium
There are so many ways to get in touch these days that follow up systems don’t have to be limited to email or phone calls. You now have text, chat methods, direct messaging on social media, or even a Snap through Snapchat. There are so many ways to get in touch that you may want the first response or follow up to use the same medium your potential customer used.
4. Responding immediately
Did you know that 35-50% of sales go to the vendor that responds first? That’s why it’s so important to have a system of immediate responses in place. Response times online (through email, social media, or live chat) should be just as fast as they would be when you pick up the phone. Studies show that, if you follow up with a web lead within five minutes, you’re nine times more likely to convert them.
5. Ask for referrals
Referrals are so important, and yet so many companies and salespeople fail to ask for them! Before the internet age, many companies depended solely upon referrals for their business – and numerous companies still do. This is because customers are four times more likely to buy from a company if a friend has referred them. So, be sure to set up an effective referral program and ask for those referrals!
6. Using social media to sell
Very few companies have nailed the use of social media to sell their products. Some are overwhelmed, wondering which medium is best on which to sell – Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, GooglePlus, LinkedIn, Snapchat, Tumblr, etc. Others have a presence on these media but haven’t nailed down making money off of this presence.
One of the best and simplest ways to take advantage of social media as a salesperson is to be available and rapid in your responses and to provide people using social an easy way to get onto your leads list or to buy your product. This may be done by updating your profile, offering direct links to “buy now” pages, or creating a loss leader like a free eBook and promoting that.
7. Providing an online store
79% of Americans shop online these days. That means they don’t want to research an item and then go to a store – they want to buy direct immediately. Providing your customers with a means to do just that will help you capture your ideal demographic.
8. Coordinating marketing and sales strategies
It is incredibly important for one hand to know what the other is doing when it comes to business. That means that marketing and sales need to be up-to-date on what each side of the coin is up to. If you have an incredible online presence, but your sales team has no idea how to even access the online accounts, very little follow up is going to happen, and leads will be lost. So, be sure to get your sales team in the room when the marketing people are talking – and vice versa.
9. Doing cold calls
In a recent survey, 78% of decision makers polled took an appointment or attended an event that came from an email or cold call. So, while cold calls may seem daunting – they still work.
10. Training your sales staff thoroughly on the product or service
It’s been found that 70% of purchasing decisions are made to solve a problem. Therefore, your sales team needs to know everything about your product so that they understand what problems it solves – and what it doesn’t. The image of a “used car salesman” type can dissuade potential customers from buying, so be sure your team understands your products/services and is honest about how they can help potential customers. A trustworthy and reliable sales team is an excellent way to get qualified referrals.
Is your business ready to amp up its sales strategy? Contact Business Success Consulting Group! We provide sales and marketing consulting for companies that are ready to grow.
References:
https://blog.hubspot.com/sales/sales-statistics#sm.000008337rfpyafbcu51j2x23u3o6
