How to Improve Sales and Finish the Year Strong
You’re heading into the home stretch of your sales year as you begin Q4. What can you do to get some quick sales now? Here are a few sales strategies to help you finish the year strong and meet your sales goals.
How to improve sales
Sell differently to speed up the sales process
Face-to-face sales calls take time. Instead of scheduling in-person meetings, why not schedule sales calls by phone to at least start building your sales foundation? Yes, you will find it harder to sell over the phone because you can’t see your prospects and they can’t see you. But what you’re looking for is speed. You have a greater chance of speaking with someone on the telephone than scheduling an in-person appointment with a busy prospect.
Consider a telephone sales call just like you would a face-to-face call. Plan how you will open the call, the questions you will ask, and how you will guide your prospect through the points you want to make or get the information that you need to sell.
Also be sure your presentation is interactive and can be viewed on your prospect's computer. To reduce the probability of the prospect checking email instead of listening to you, intersperse the presentation with questions that are displayed on their computer screen so that the prospect has to pay attention to you.
Use your existing accounts to sell faster
What takes time in selling? First, it’s finding new prospects who need and want what you have to sell. Next, it's taking the time for prospects to trust you enough so that they will buy from you instead of staying with their current supplier or buying from a competitor.
Existing customers, on the other hand, already know and trust you, and are more open to listening to your pitch and buying from you. So why not call all your existing customers now to see what else you can be selling them? Most salespeople forget that current customers buy other products, too.
Your existing customers are your best prospects for when you need to quickly put more sales on the books. A good salesperson always finds out what products customers may be buying from other sources to see if they can supply them with the same product, an alternative, or an improvement.
Lost customers can be new customers again
Yes, it does happen. You lose business. And hopefully it happens through no fault of your own. Even if it was your fault, times do change and people learn from their mistakes. Consider talking with your former customer about buying again if the following conditions have occurred:
First, you should have apologized if you caused the problem that resulted in the lost business. If you were responsible, you should have tried to make amends and can’t be seriously reconsidered unless you had apologized for what you did. Assuming you did apologize, you can then describe what you will do to ensure the situation doesn’t occur again.
Second, enough time must have passed in order for you to be considered again. How much time is enough time? I estimate it has to be at least one year. Consider the time it would have taken for a contract, if there was one, to have been completed with a new supplier. Then try to find out if things are working out between the supplier and your former customer. Your position to earn back the business will be stronger if the new supplier isn’t working out.
Third, you must be able to demonstrate what has changed so the situation that caused you to lose the business is no longer a possibility. Has a process changed? Are you now able to identify problems before they cause unfortunate results? Make your former customer aware that things are now different and he or she can be comfortable buying from you again.
You may have heard this quote, “The best time to plant a tree is 25 years ago. The next best time is now.” The year is quickly passing and you must act now to get the sales results you want at the year's end.
