Wednesday, June 13, 2007

Marketing Today - Helpful Hints for Understanding Your Future and Existing Clients

There exists several unspoken secrets in the marketing world that you should be aware of when contacting prospective or regular clients. Familiarizing yourself and your employees with these principles can build confidence and help you to remember the business world’s big picture.

When it comes to marketing your business, walk into any possible situation with the approach that clients do want and need your services. Believe in your products and services and promote what you are offering confidently. Don’t let negativity or a few bad experiences destroy your vision of success. There may be other companies out there that are providing some of the same work that you are involved in, but strive to be the best. Let your clients know this.

Regardless of what business you are in, know that your clients want to feel better. They want an eye cream that minimizes wrinkles, and that makes them feel better. They want industrial appliances in their business for efficiency, and also so that they can feel better about their workload and energy usage. They want their hard wood floors resurfaced, so that their natural quality is improved… and so that they can feel better about entertaining and enjoying their home. Establish “making clients feel better” as a part of your company’s philosophy.

Make it easy for potential clients to reach you. Today, searching for a massage therapist, accountant, or printing company most likely means using the Internet. Create a web site. Publish your contact information. Have a cell phone. Be available for customers. Post your hours of operation. Be present at your physical location if you operate out of one. If you are unable to be present, hire someone to answer inquiries so that clients have a response. If you operate solely on-line, have enough personnel to make communication possible.

Understand that because of our globalized economy, many of your customers have more to manage than they desire. Consider the emails, faxes, telephone calls, written correspondence, and personal and financial issues that most of us deal with on a given day. Remember this, and have patience when marketing your services. If you reach out to a first time or repeat client, and they fail to respond, give them some time. Then, try again.

Treat each prospective client as though they were your best client, yet have the mentality that you can’t make every deal. Likewise you can’t realistically make every single person happy. Though, having a warm, positive approach is likely to attract people regardless.

Be clear about what you are offering clients. This will save confusion and client relationships later. If your Japanese restaurant only serves sushi, make this unmistakable. The people that want to eat there will do so whole-heartedly and will continue. Those hoping for something else will know this in advance. They may choose to take their money some place else, but in the end, they won’t have had a bad experience because of a lack of communication. On the other hand, they may decide to try your cuisine any way, or make a referral to someone else.

Possible clients are not always experts in your field. They may know what their goals are, but you have the education and experience to make that happen for them. If your client has never been to cosmetology school, their telling you how to cut their hair could be disastrous. Let them paint picture of the desired outcome, but assure them you have skills to materialize their wishes. In any business, often times what customers request or how they do so is not always what they really want.

Your prospects might need time to consider the best decision for themselves and those involved. Allow them the space they require for further research or exploring other possibilities. In the end, if you truly believe in your services, your confidence will emanate and attract clients.

Whether you communicate over e-mail, via the telephone, or in person, your clients are human beings. Both on-line and written communication can be interpreted as ambiguous. Be aware of this.

Remember the golden rule. Evaluate your own preferences for being contacted. How do you appreciate being approached? In what manner do you wish to be responded to? Have you ever needed time to process a decision? What are your needs in the role of a consumer?

These principles may seem simple, but in our hurry to accomplish what we would like to, they can be easily dismissed. Recharge your marketing batteries with these key points and prepare yourself for success.
There exists several unspoken secrets in the marketing world that you should be aware of when contacting prospective or regular clients. Familiarizing yourself and your employees with these principles can build confidence and help you to remember the business world’s big picture.

When it comes to marketing your business, walk into any possible situation with the approach that clients do want and need your services. Believe in your products and services and promote what you are offering confidently. Don’t let negativity or a few bad experiences destroy your vision of success. There may be other companies out there that are providing some of the same work that you are involved in, but strive to be the best. Let your clients know this.

Regardless of what business you are in, know that your clients want to feel better. They want an eye cream that minimizes wrinkles, and that makes them feel better. They want industrial appliances in their business for efficiency, and also so that they can feel better about their workload and energy usage. They want their hard wood floors resurfaced, so that their natural quality is improved… and so that they can feel better about entertaining and enjoying their home. Establish “making clients feel better” as a part of your company’s philosophy.

Make it easy for potential clients to reach you. Today, searching for a massage therapist, accountant, or printing company most likely means using the Internet. Create a web site. Publish your contact information. Have a cell phone. Be available for customers. Post your hours of operation. Be present at your physical location if you operate out of one. If you are unable to be present, hire someone to answer inquiries so that clients have a response. If you operate solely on-line, have enough personnel to make communication possible.

Understand that because of our globalized economy, many of your customers have more to manage than they desire. Consider the emails, faxes, telephone calls, written correspondence, and personal and financial issues that most of us deal with on a given day. Remember this, and have patience when marketing your services. If you reach out to a first time or repeat client, and they fail to respond, give them some time. Then, try again.

Treat each prospective client as though they were your best client, yet have the mentality that you can’t make every deal. Likewise you can’t realistically make every single person happy. Though, having a warm, positive approach is likely to attract people regardless.

Be clear about what you are offering clients. This will save confusion and client relationships later. If your Japanese restaurant only serves sushi, make this unmistakable. The people that want to eat there will do so whole-heartedly and will continue. Those hoping for something else will know this in advance. They may choose to take their money some place else, but in the end, they won’t have had a bad experience because of a lack of communication. On the other hand, they may decide to try your cuisine any way, or make a referral to someone else.

Possible clients are not always experts in your field. They may know what their goals are, but you have the education and experience to make that happen for them. If your client has never been to cosmetology school, their telling you how to cut their hair could be disastrous. Let them paint picture of the desired outcome, but assure them you have skills to materialize their wishes. In any business, often times what customers request or how they do so is not always what they really want.

Your prospects might need time to consider the best decision for themselves and those involved. Allow them the space they require for further research or exploring other possibilities. In the end, if you truly believe in your services, your confidence will emanate and attract clients.

Whether you communicate over e-mail, via the telephone, or in person, your clients are human beings. Both on-line and written communication can be interpreted as ambiguous. Be aware of this.

Remember the golden rule. Evaluate your own preferences for being contacted. How do you appreciate being approached? In what manner do you wish to be responded to? Have you ever needed time to process a decision? What are your needs in the role of a consumer?

These principles may seem simple, but in our hurry to accomplish what we would like to, they can be easily dismissed. Recharge your marketing batteries with these key points and prepare yourself for success.

Is Your Sales Team Paralysed By the Fear of Failure?

Selling for a living can be living under a constant push for figures. If you are struggling as a team to hit your sales target you are under a huge amount of pressure to hit it…. or else, if you just about hit target you’re under pressure to improve and if you smash your target? You can guarantee it will be put up for the next month.

As sales managers we can fall into the bad habit of ‘passing down’ to our sales teams the pressure we are put under by our company. Is that an effective way of motivating our team and building a culture of success? Absolutely not! It is the worse thing we can do as a manager, in fact the more pressure we put our teams under, the more we increase the probability of missing our sales target by a long way. Why is that?

It sabotages your chances of success because you introduce the fear of failure into your sales person’s success ratio. It is that fear of failure which prevents sales people, teams and Companies hitting target week in week out. Does a fear of failure really affect your sales people so badly? Try this out, lay a length of 100x50mm timber on the floor and ask for volunteers to walk across it. Every one will be happy to do that with hardly any one loosing their balance. If you then raised that timber 50m into the air and asked for volunteers to walk across it with out any safety nets, how many would volunteer? None!

Although physically nothing has changed it is just walking across a piece of wood, the fear of falling makes it a completely different activity, in fact the greater your fear of falling is, the worse your performance will be.

This works just the same with our sales people, we could think that the more pressure we put them under to perform, the more seriously they will take it, the more effort they will put in and the better chance we have of getting good results from them but it very rarely works because of that fear of failure. On the other hand it is amazing what results can be achieved if you take the pressure off them.

I managed a team of sales people for a large telecommunication Company whose sales were achieved from door to door selling. This was a very tuff selling environment and we were under relentless pressure to perform. This meant every so often one of my sales people would suffer a crisis of confidence and go into a sales slump, the harder they tried to sell the more stress and anxiety they felt.

I used a very simple method to turn them round and get them earning money again. I would sit them down and tell them that I would sell the deals they needed for that day and the next day if I needed to, they did not need to sell at all, and in fact I did not want them to sell!

I just wanted them to go out and enjoy them selves for the day and get their confidence back, I wanted them to find nice people who they could have a laugh with, practice some small talk on, and share a joke and most of all have fun. They would go out with no pressure on them at all and guess what? They would have one of their best selling days for weeks because, just like walking on the piece of wood on the ground, there was no fear of failure.

As managers we need to find as many ways as possible to reduce that fear of failure for our sales people at the same time as initiating a thorough and comprehensive examination of the complete sales process.
Selling for a living can be living under a constant push for figures. If you are struggling as a team to hit your sales target you are under a huge amount of pressure to hit it…. or else, if you just about hit target you’re under pressure to improve and if you smash your target? You can guarantee it will be put up for the next month.

As sales managers we can fall into the bad habit of ‘passing down’ to our sales teams the pressure we are put under by our company. Is that an effective way of motivating our team and building a culture of success? Absolutely not! It is the worse thing we can do as a manager, in fact the more pressure we put our teams under, the more we increase the probability of missing our sales target by a long way. Why is that?

It sabotages your chances of success because you introduce the fear of failure into your sales person’s success ratio. It is that fear of failure which prevents sales people, teams and Companies hitting target week in week out. Does a fear of failure really affect your sales people so badly? Try this out, lay a length of 100x50mm timber on the floor and ask for volunteers to walk across it. Every one will be happy to do that with hardly any one loosing their balance. If you then raised that timber 50m into the air and asked for volunteers to walk across it with out any safety nets, how many would volunteer? None!

Although physically nothing has changed it is just walking across a piece of wood, the fear of falling makes it a completely different activity, in fact the greater your fear of falling is, the worse your performance will be.

This works just the same with our sales people, we could think that the more pressure we put them under to perform, the more seriously they will take it, the more effort they will put in and the better chance we have of getting good results from them but it very rarely works because of that fear of failure. On the other hand it is amazing what results can be achieved if you take the pressure off them.

I managed a team of sales people for a large telecommunication Company whose sales were achieved from door to door selling. This was a very tuff selling environment and we were under relentless pressure to perform. This meant every so often one of my sales people would suffer a crisis of confidence and go into a sales slump, the harder they tried to sell the more stress and anxiety they felt.

I used a very simple method to turn them round and get them earning money again. I would sit them down and tell them that I would sell the deals they needed for that day and the next day if I needed to, they did not need to sell at all, and in fact I did not want them to sell!

I just wanted them to go out and enjoy them selves for the day and get their confidence back, I wanted them to find nice people who they could have a laugh with, practice some small talk on, and share a joke and most of all have fun. They would go out with no pressure on them at all and guess what? They would have one of their best selling days for weeks because, just like walking on the piece of wood on the ground, there was no fear of failure.

As managers we need to find as many ways as possible to reduce that fear of failure for our sales people at the same time as initiating a thorough and comprehensive examination of the complete sales process.