Small Business Sales Tips - Part One

The Achilles heel of most small business owners is sales, especially cold calling. I hear this time and time again. So I've asked my friend and colleague, Gene D'Agostino, a sales trainer to share his lifelong knowledge of sales with me here. I can personally attest to his expertise as I was one of his students.

The dreaded sales call - Part One

Ask anyone if they like making sales calls & my guess is 99% of non sales professionals say they'd rather swallow daggers than pick up the phone to make a sales call - especially make a cold call. But yet, so much can be accomplished by simply picking up the phone. When you consider the cost of marketing, you have to admit that making a phone call is awfully affordable. So why don't more small business owners do it? Why do so many put it off for so long?

Well, what I discovered for myself was that I had the absolute wrong mindset. You simply MUST believe that you are selling something valuable & when done right, has a better ROI than most other marketing techniques.

I'm covering 5 of the Top Ten Most Common Mistakes that people make when making sales calls. Stay tuned for the second half in my next blog post.

Mistake #1 - They TALK instead of LISTEN
Too many salespeople monopolize the time they have in front of a prospect by talking too much. The 80/20 Rule of Marketing applies to Sales too. Salespeople should talk just 20% of the time, while allowing their prospects to talk 80% of the time.

Mistake #2 - They PRESUME instead of ASKING QUESTIONS
Salespeople tend to think they have all the answers. Learn to ask questions early on so that you fully understand their problem. Then offer the right solution to them that fits. Imagine you are a doctor writing a prescription. You would listen to your patient before writing a prescription to fix their ills. Same here.

Mistake #3 - They answer UNASKED QUESTIONS
For example, your prospect says "Your price is high," but that is not a question. Before you start talking about value or quality - or worse - lower your price get to heart of the issue.

Mistake #4 - They fail to get the prospect to reveal their BUDGET UPFRONT
Before you get so tied up in investing time (both yours as well as your prospects) you MUST get to the tough question "is your prospect ready, willing & able to financially commit to solving their problem." If yes, you're ready to begin the discussion in earnest, if not, then you're setting yourself up for the age-old standard reply "I'll think about it" which can drag on for a very long time.

Mistake #5 - They make TOO MANY follow up calls
Stop wasting time chasing a dead sale. If the prospect hasn't returned your calls or emails just leave it & move on. Remember that you will never close 100% of your prospects - often for reasons that are beyond your control. Put your energies towards qualified prospects only.

Remember, that marketing TODAY keeps you in business for TOMORROW. Contact us today to ask about My Affordable Marketing Plan TM - Small Business Marketing. Revolutionized.

©2015 Affordable Marketing Solutions LLC. All Rights Reserved.

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The ever-important timing consideration of small business marketing

Marketers should take a cue from stand-up comedians - Timing is everything!

The other day I spoke with a small business owner to review his marketing campaign that fell flat. He & his partners wanted to know what could be done to improve their efforts in the future. As we're reviewing the piece on the phone I asked "when did this launch?" I found out they emailed school superintendents the first week of school. Ah ha!

They had the target correct, the offer was pretty good, but boy was their timing off. So let's talk about the relationship between timing and marketing success.

Keep reading & you too will see why it matters very much WHEN you market - even if it's to the right audience.

Most marketing campaigns begin by applying the standard formula for success:

60% audience; 30% offer; 10% design

So where does the timing factor fall? I say it's a portion of the 60% because if your audience doesn't get your offer when they're ready to purchase then it's a wasted effort, no matter how good the offer is.

1. Industry Timing - My client's case in point is a perfect example of this. Decision makers at schools are otherwise distracted during the first few weeks of a new school year, so it is not the best time to get their attention. Similarly, consumers won't be installing pools in February, so you must know the best time to get the attention of the target decision makers. If you're marketing to a new industry segment, educate yourself by doing your homework so that you don't waste efforts.

2. Channel Timing - Brand Mechanics recently published a detailed analysis of the 10 best times of day/week for social media marketing. Some of their findings are common sense, others were a bit of a surprise to me. For example, as I wrote in the email chapter of my book, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays are typically the best days to email B2B, while Thursdays and Fridays are best for B2C. But, I hadn't known that the highest percentage of Facebook shares happen beginning Friday evening and all day Saturday. And, Bitly says that most B2B links are clicked weekdays in the 11AM hour.

3. Time of Day - Yes, this matters too. Salespeople know that you don't call prospects first thing in the morning, but did you know that a blogs best times and highest read rates are early morning? For emails too timing is important. The best open rates for B2B are between 11AM-2PM during peak days.

4. Lifecycle Timing - Also called "triggers" there are certain events that would naturally trigger purchases. These include buying a new home or having a baby. Getting to these folks at the time they need your products & services is crucial to your success. Selling furniture? Purchase new homeowner lists in your target zip codes. Selling diapers? Advertise on the new mommy blogs, or partner with a local hospital. Consider Facebook's advertiser tool called "real time" marketing. One of their best case studies comes from a wedding photography studio. The studio tested putting an ad on a user's page as soon as they changed their status to "engaged." The company claims that with just a few hundred dollars' investment, they've made many thousands of dollars by getting to newly engaged folks before their competitors could.

5. Event Timing - If you're having a seminar, workshop, or special event consider 6 weeks' notice, with email follow-ups at two week intervals as the date gets closer. The day before you should plan on sending a final reminder too. I recently received an email inviting me to a seminar the very next day. Not good timing & I wonder how many folks showed up.

6. Two-Step Follow-Ups - One shot marketing almost never works, so how do you plan your follow up touches to maximize response rates? Consider that each channel is handled differently, so follow these industry guidelines for the two most common prospecting channels:
• Direct Mail - follow up with a phone call within two weeks
• Direct Mail - follow up with a second mailing within four weeks
• Email - follow up with a phone call within three business days
• Email - follow up with a second email within two weeks

7. Holiday Timing - It seems that retailers are always one season ahead & while consumer may not respond right away, it makes their to-do list & acts as a reminder. There will always be those that are on top of gift/card giving, but consider those last-minute shoppers that you can appeal to as well. And, remember there are many holidays that marketing can play upon if it makes sense for your business. For example, Arbor Day for a landscaping firm or tax deadline dates for financial professionals.

A few final words on timing:

-Before planning a big event Google the date to be sure it doesn't conflict with something else in your area, especially if the same audience would be interested in both.
-When doing your marketing planning for the following year, get out a calendar & plan for each one not just by launch date, but also by adding follow up efforts so you can better plan for budgeting & project management.

Marketing TODAY keeps you in business for TOMORROW.


Copyright 2015 Affordable Marketing Solutions LLC

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