“Business is like a war in one respect. If its grand strategy is correct, any number of tactical errors can be made and yet the enterprise proves successful.” Robert E. Wood – Executive and Brigadier General.
Every business requires a strategy in all domains. Be it technology, marketing, sales, HR, et cetera. A strategy is typically formed keeping the outcome in mind. You develop a strategy ‘X’. to execute ‘N’ methods in order to achieve an outcome ‘Y’. It is very difficult for teams to function and for processes to be streamlined without a proper strategy in place.
According to the sales management Association, 75% of companies repeat their sales strategy while 54% of companies implement new sales strategies. As sales are the revenue generators of the company, sales strategy is equally important like other significant factors.
Follow these steps to build a killer sales strategy
A well-crafted sales strategy is always good and result-driven. It is prepared by keeping a few factors in mind. Those are:
- Have a clear vision
- The right approach to your target customers
- Grab the attention of your target audience
- Avoid Longer conversation
- Focus on the follow-ups
Have a clear vision
This first and important step of crafting a sales strategy is having a clear vision; in other words, having a roadmap. Each and every journey has a certain destination. Likewise, if you are running a business and you are unaware of your goals, then you can’t craft an efficient sales strategy.
Having a roadmap will provide you with a clear picture of your short term and long term goals. Your roadmap should contain the timeline where you want to see your business and the target market.
Once you have a roadmap, you will be able to craft a sales strategy and find probable ways to reach there. Also, you will be able to track yourself whether you can reach or not. If not, you can find the issues and work on them.
The right approach to your target customer
Once you have the roadmap and target customers, outreach them authentically. Most of the organization adopt LinkedIn channel outreach where no email id is required and LinkedIn also provides potential leads.
The more potential way to outreach good leads is to join the group in LinkedIn and approach them personally. You should personalize the message while outreaching them.
Apart from LinkedIn, another potential way to outreach them is email. Make sure the subject line of your email is catchy and informative. The body of the email should be short and sweet but detailed information should be there. Generating lead is also an integral part of the sales strategy.
Grab the attention of your target audience
The third important thing about the sales strategy is to captivate your customers. Customers are always busy with different activities, you need to make sure that you are remembered by them. As per Jennifer Willey, the sales expert, there are five points you need to keep in mind to be remembered by your customers. Those are:
- Your Confidence
- Genuine connection with your customers
- Transparency in you (clarity on what you want from them)
- Command of your data and your unique selling points
- The way you close the deal
Also, building rapport is another potential way to grab your customers’ attention.
Apart from this, researching your customers’ accounts will help you a lot. Before contacting your lead, find out what is the common interesting topic between you. Discussing that will engage your customer and they will remember you. “In the meantime, consider using effective tools such as UCaaS platforms to make customer communication more engaging and productive.”
Avoid longer conversation
Avoiding longer conversations with a new lead is an important point in the sales strategy. According to Jennifer Willey, if you are taking longer than 30 minutes, then you have not done any research on that lead.
In the sales strategy, every team should have an individual target. Each sales rep should allot a certain time frame for each lead. This type of micro calculation helps to achieve a daily target. If you don’t have a daily target, then you will tend to talk longer (to convince) with a lead even though you don’t get a positive response. You should move to the next lead when you don’t get a node towards conversion.
Focus on the follow-ups
Proper follow up is the key to a successful sale. Hence follow up is also one more important factor in a sales strategy. Most of the quality sales are closed after two or three follow-ups. When you are dealing with a lead, you should make him/her clear about the next step where you can utilize the next step as follow up. Setting up your follow up with a lead should be genuine, it should not be pushy.
When a lead is agreed for the next step, your follow up call should be well crafted or your follow up email should be well-drafted.
Types of sales strategies
Every organization categorizes its strategies for different purposes. The different strategies for the different lead like fresh leads, existing customers, the referral program, the up-gradation of the subscriptions, etc.
Basically, there are two major types of strategies every organization adopts.
- Strategy for new leads
- Strategy for the existing customers
Sales strategy for the new leads is very important as this brings new sales. Develop a separate pitch and train a dedicated team for these leads.
Segregate the team for both the strategies. For the existing customers, develop the pitch for the retention.
Significance of a sales strategy
Most of the organization do a common mistake that is leaving a small room for developing the sales strategy. They allocate a certain budget and time for the marketing strategy, product development, etc. but give less emphasis to sales strategy. This is a major factor most of the startups fail in the long run.
For the longevity of the company, revenue generation is required and in order to generate revenue, multiple sales strategies are required.
For an organization, the sales strategy is more important than the marketing strategy. Marketing strategy increases visibility whereas the sales strategy concentrates on making the sales. The sales strategy is directly involved in generating revenue.
Conclusion
When the sales strategy is not in place, it is required to change even in the middle of the month. However, you need to wait at least three to four months after implementing the sales strategy to see the result whether it is working or not.
The sales strategy works well when your sales pitch or sales email is well crafted. Again there should be different pitches or emails for the different types of leads. For all the business, sales strategy is most important and its micro calculation is also equally important.
