Centering your sales process around the needs of your customers
It isn’t always the sales process that’s the issue, rather the sales team isn’t actioning the type of activities that result in winning business
A CRM allows you to drill down into the activities your sales team undertake to produce the best sales results and make insightful customer-centric decisions
Reduce administrative tasks
It’s hard for salespeople to be effective in front of customers if they don’t have the time to get in front of customers
Automate data entry with free webform lead capture and track all your touch-points with an effective CRM
New leads flow through to the sales pipeline with an activity assigned to the salesperson. Freeing up your team to spend more time negotiating and closing deals
By highlighting key contacts within each business sales reps follow up the actual decision-maker in the business saving time and resources. Social media links enable a quick background check prior to engaging with the client
Activity notes ensure communication is relevent to the phase they occupy in the sales process and can be viewed by the wider team if required
Know your customers
The more you know about your customers, the more effective your sales efforts will be
- WHO they are
- WHAT they buy
- WHY they buy it
You can learn a great deal from your customers by talking to them so make sure you set up repeating activities such as meetings, catchups, and phone calls
When selling to other businesses know who’s responsible for the purchasing decision and who has influence over it. Keep enriching contact information with birthday reminders, likes/dislikes, etc, and track your conversations with each person within the company.
Regularly review customer purchasing behaviour by connecting Xero to reveal by product code their month to date, year to date sales in order to flag any issues or opportunities for further business
Customer dashboards provide management a clear picture of who their most valuable customers are and what activities are planned to keep their business
Timely follow up
Making contact with your new lead is only the first step of the sales process with numerous follow-up activities needed in order to win their business
If the lead asks for a follow up simply schedule an activity in your CRM along with notes to support the next interaction on their preferred date
A timely follow-up is encouraged within a clear sales process with phase lengths that suit the customer buying journey and encourage velocity. Color-coded reminders then prompt the sales team to act quickly to drive the sale opportunity forward
Setting activity-based KPI’s will motivate salespeople to perform the right types of activities at the right time for the right customers
Ask for a referral
91% of customers say they’d give referrals. Only 11% of salespeople ask for referrals
If you’re making this mistake, you are wasting precious opportunities. All you have to do is ask! What’s the worst that can happen? Don’t beat around the bush and “suggest” referrals and instead ask for them directly.
Now start tracking the source of your new leads to ensure you’re investing money and staff resources in the right places in order to improve your sales process.
Monitor performance
Put your CRM software to use. Using a CRM, you can create reports to analyse the performance of your sales team such as lead response time, activities, deals closed, and much more.
You may find certain reps are facing obstacles at specific stages of the sales process. If this is the case, be sure to offer them additional resources and support, and allow them to shadow and learn from high-performing sales reps.
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