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As a small business owner, you know that boosting sales is vital for your success and growth. Whether your business is a brick and mortar store or an e-commerce venture, boosting sales takes effort and dedication.
According to the Small Business Administration, over 30 million small businesses account for 99% of American companies and 54% of all sales. Yet only about 45% to 51% of small businesses survive beyond the fifth year. Most failures are due to low sales and revenue. A small business can ensure survival and growth by taking the following steps in their sales processes.
Know Your Ideal Customer
How well do you know the people buying your products or services? It’s important to always keep your ideal customer in mind when it comes to what you sell and how you brand and pitch your products.
Back in 1990, Coors Brewing Company ventured into the bottled water market. The demand for clean bottled water was high, and Coors beer was popular. The company figured their Rocky Mountain Sparkling Water would ride on the brand’s popularity to realize incredible sales. Instead, the product was a flop.
Consumers were confused about whether the bottled water was alcoholic or nonalcoholic. There was also confusion about whether the water was for mixing with beer or hard liquor.
While big brands can weather the storm of not identifying their market, small businesses could collapse if they make a similar mistake. Business owners can polish up their customer targeting through negotiation skills training. To identify your ideal customer, you can:
- Research buying patterns of different demographics.
- Determine who benefits most from your products.
- Review your customer journey map.
- Collect customer feedback.
- Build buyer personas.
Disqualify Leads
Your business can’t serve everyone. Poor leads may only inflate your sales pipeline with dead-end prospects. At face value, it seems that creating more opportunities at the top of the funnel leads to more sales at the bottom. Yet this mindset can become a drain on your time and resources.
Chasing the wrong prospect leads to less focus on qualified leads. Every hour spent negotiating with a dead-end candidate is an hour you could have used to sell to a qualified lead. Dead-end prospects typically have the following characteristics:
- Unable to buy. No budget for your product.
- Not ready. The prospect doesn’t have a workflow that fits your product’s uses.
- Not now; we don’t know when. The prospect lacks a definite timeline for using your products.
- No authority. Your lead isn’t the decision-maker.
Aside from the loss of resources, negotiating with too many dead-end leads can demoralize your staff. Also, even if you succeed in selling to the wrong customer, you risk receiving poor customer reviews or fewer reviews, and losing future customers.
Hire a Salesforce
According to Fundera, small businesses with employees tend to fare better than non-employer businesses. If the employees consist of skilled salespeople, revenues grow even more.
Customer-centric companies aim to sell the best products to the right customers in the right way. Skillful sales staff can support product development, target the right customers, and build strategies that attract and retain paying customers.
Building and training a sales team that can perform to expectations is mission-critical to growing your revenues. To boost your sales, attract the right talent. Clarify why you’re hiring for that particular sales role. A wrong hire can be a costly mistake, so ensure that you determine your business needs by identifying areas that are ready for expansion.
Detail Your Sales Funnel
Your sales funnel should capture all steps someone takes to become a paying customer. By knowing each step of your sales journey, you can influence buyers to move from one level to the next.
Let’s say you’re running a brick and mortar shoe store. People at the top of your sales funnel are pedestrians admiring shoes at your window display. Some of the window shoppers walk into the store. That’s the next step of your funnel. A fraction of those who enter the store try on some shoes. A percentage of those try on shoes, select at least one pair, and walk to the check-out. After some inquiries and some negotiation, a few people complete the purchase and reach the bottom of the sales funnel.
Whether you’re running an online or offline business, understanding your funnel lets you plug holes where prospects drop out. With sales skills training, you can optimize your funnel to increase the number of leads who convert.
Overcome Common Objections
According to HubSpot, 36% of sales negotiators cite closing the deal as the most challenging part of the sales process. One key difficulty in closing lies in overcoming objections.
A “no” from a prospect essentially means the prospect doesn’t yet see sufficient value to buy. Often a “no” is not an outright rejection but an opportunity for the salesperson to negotiate and clarify misconceptions.
Understanding common objections in your business can lead to more prospects flowing to the bottom of the funnel. Some examples of common objections and possible ways to resolve them include:
- Price objections: Emphasize value, such as return on investment.
- Hesitation to commit: Offer low risk, money back, or no-contract terms.
- Buying from your competitors: Discover areas of unmet needs or outright dissatisfaction with your competitors to craft your unique selling proposition.
- Wanting different features: Customize your offers to meet tailor-made needs.
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This content is brought to you by Lily Joseland.
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