Learn how to increase your sales from an experienced business coach.
“The only essential thing is growth. Everything else we associate with startups follows from growth.” -Gabriel Weinberg (Bestselling author of Traction: A Startup Guide to Getting Customers)
Business Coach Shares Marshall Marination Moment: How Do I Do Sales?
I remember when I first joined the team, I was highly checklist-driven and wanted to work on building out the sales systems for the various companies I was working with. The pitfall was that I was not yet an expert in sales. In fact, I had no idea the right or wrong way to do sales. I found it very difficult to systemize something that I knew nothing about. So for all of the business owners who may be right where I used to be and who need some supporting resources on how to do sales, this is a high-level view of the sales process that we cover in-depth in our online trainings (because you can write an entire series of books on effective sales).
Again, this is NOT an all-encompassing training on sales, but only a high-level view. I highly recommend that you visit www.Thrive15.com/5StepsToSales for training on closing more deals.
As an added bonus, we have a training on how to get past the gatekeeper at www.Thrive15.com/HowToGetPastTheGateKeeper
We also have a training on how to set an appointment at www.Thrive15.com/HowToSetAnAppointment
Business Coach Teaches The 7 Ninja Moves to Building an Effective Sales System Now
Unless you were drunk or lying when you took the Sales System Analysis, you are probably slightly overwhelmed or at least dissatisfied with your overall score. Don’t stress out about this, as it’s very hard to fix a problem that you did not even know existed. However, now that you do know of your company’s weaknesses, you must go through the painstaking process of actually fixing these problems or “opportunities for growth,” as the optimist would put it. DON’T FREAK OUT. We’ll get it done together.
The starting point where we need to focus is on converting ideal and likely buyers who are prospects into actual paying customers and closed deals. Here is the super plan to get this done. You must draw out your current sales system process and workflow on a white board. You might be asking, “Why the heck do I need to buy a white board? Can’t I just use an APP on my phone?” The answer is NO. This system must be SUPER VISUAL. Make each part of your sales system into a square that connects to another square moving from left to right. Chinese Thrivers, calm down about the left to right thing. I don’t speak Mandarin yet, but if you keep building those man-made islands, maybe we’ll all eventually be speaking Mandarin.
To download an example of what an effective sales workflow looks like, visit: www.Thrive15.com/sales-how-to-create-a-linear-sales-workflow-process
Create an area on the whiteboard to track each part (square) of your sales workflow process. The goal here is to figure out where in the sales workflow process your potential deals are blowing up. Here are some business coach questions you must ask yourself. Are they blowing up when you first speak to the ideal and likely buyer? Are they blowing up when those buyers come for their appointment? Are they blowing up when you go for the close? Where are your potential deals blowing up?
Business Coach Ample Example:
Just this year I worked with a business in the fitness space who had a huge amount of website traffic. In fact, this owner had almost 15 inbound leads flooding into his e-mail inbox each week and approximately 20 inbound sales calls from ideal and likely buyers who were trying to schedule their first consultation and their free 2-week trial period.
After we created the detailed workflow chart for his business, it was quickly discovered that he was having no problem generating leads. He also was having no problem converting leads once they came out for their free 2-week trial. Looking at the workflow sales process on the board, it became clear that we had a people problem and not a system problem. We discovered that the team member who was supposed to be answering all inbound calls and responding to all inquiries within 12 hours had actually put his phone on silent permanently and had set up some ridiculous automated call routing system. This person was only responding to inbound leads via e-mail.
Once we fired this slug and replaced him with a hungry lady who really valued the job, our sales numbers grew exponentially. The company went from having three conversions per week to having nearly 11 per week. The profound levels of “jackassery” (my word, but feel free to use it) that were impacting our sales system would have never been discovered if we had not looked at the system from a very linear and non-emotional perspective. Take it from a business coach, focus on each area of your sales process system one at a time. Don’t attempt to fix the entire system in one night. Just look for the biggest limiting factor then fix it, dealing with the factors one at a time.