April 24, 2024
5 Sales Tactics That Close More Deals
In today's marketplace, customers demand a higher level of personalization and service than ever before. This shift in expectations calls for a reevaluation of traditional sales funnels and channel processes.
According to McKinsey's report on Big Data, Analytics, and the Future of Marketing & Sales, personalizing the customer experience can yield five to eight times the ROI on marketing spend and boost sales by 10% or more.
This article presents five sales tactics aimed at boosting your channel sales performance.
- TWEAK PRESENTATIONS TO THE NEEDS OF YOUR CUSTOMERS
The most impactful word in sales and marketing is "YOU," referring to the customer. Prospects are interested in your offerings because they believe your product or service will help them achieve their goals more effectively. Therefore, your sales process should focus on addressing the specific needs of your customers.
Successful companies find ways to make their products customer-centric, even if those products are highly complex. Apple, for example, excels at this approach, as demonstrated by the screenshot below from their website:
“Anything you can do, you can do better” is a brilliant headline that is not about the iPad, but about the customer. The following page from Apple’s website is a page about iOS 10. Notice how many times the word “you, ” and its variations appear here, from the copy on the page to the picture of the iPad on the right.
This is how you want your sales presentations to look and feel, too. Your channel sales materials should be enabling your prospects and customers to envision how their users will benefit from your solutions and what they will get from using your products or services. A product pitch without full discovery on what makes your prospect tick keeps them up at night or delights them is a missed opportunity to deliver on their expectations.
Don’t forget this stat: 89% of business buyers agree they expect companies to understand their business needs and expectations.
2.PROVIDE TECHNICAL DEMONSTRATIONS
During the sales process, many sales teams often focus solely on highlighting the features of their products. While these features are important, prospects typically have no doubts about whether the software or hardware possesses these features as claimed. Instead, their concerns lie in the finer details such as ease of use, update frequency, and implementation costs. They want to understand the time and financial investment required for training, as well as the complexity of the learning curve. For this reason, it's crucial to supplement sales presentations with technical demonstrations.
A valuable sales asset is a video library demonstrating step-by-step how users can achieve various tasks using your products. This differs significantly from providing a static reference manual, which typically offers an A-Z guide about a product. A video library is usually organized to allow prospects to achieve specific tasks and locate particular content easily.
The key objective is to ensure the video library is user-friendly. Customers should be able to input a question or keyword, swiftly receive an answer, and easily implement the provided information, rather than just learning about the product's capabilities.
Apple's Genius Bar and its exceptional support are examples of why Apple customers exhibit strong brand loyalty. Consider offering free workshops, which essentially serve as technical demonstrations and training sessions. For instance, here is a schedule of Apple events in New York City:
3. HAVE DISCOVERY SESSIONS
A discovery session can be a really powerful sales tool because during your conversational Q&A session you can learn more about the needs and problems of a prospect and present your solution in a way that resonates.
Let’s use the example of a medical diagnosis. The process starts with diagnostics, during which a patient talks about his or her specific issues, concerns, goals and pain points. A doctor writes a prescription only after a diagnostic is complete. Every prescription is individually tailored to the patient.
Using discovery sessions in selling is a way for channel partners to replicate this highly-effective process. Learn more about your prospects individually, ask specific questions, present your solution in a way that is individually tailored, tied to their goals and your conversion rates will go up significantly.
4. TAILOR YOUR SALES MATERIALS BY INDUSTRY
Every industry has its own issues, pain points and language. One of the best things you can do to increase your sales conversions is to tailor your product messaging and services to specific industries.
Salesforce is a perfect example of a company that is doing this right. Here is one of the menus on the Salesforce website homepage:
You can see solutions separated by need, role, business type and industry. When you click on any of the industries, you see industry-specific language and descriptions tailored to that industry. Here’s how Salesforce talks to prospects from the manufacturing industry:
5. FOLLOW UP
If you are prospecting large clients or have a complex and expensive product, you most likely are accustomed to seeing a longer sales cycle. For a purchasing decision to occur, three things need to happen simultaneously:
1. A prospect and his/her team of stakeholders has a need or a want
2. A prospect has a reason to buy now
3. A prospect has sufficient funds
Think about anything you’ve bought in the past and you will realize that all three requirements were at play no matter what you were buying. You have no control over budgets or the business needs of your prospects. As a sales professional, you can only influence factor #2, giving your prospects and customers reasons to buy now.
One of your leads may have a need and reasons to buy but not have sufficient funds at the moment. Your best option a scenario like this is to have a strong follow-up process.
“80% of sales require at least five follow-ups.”
Make sure that you touch base regularly using all of the tools at your disposal- social, email, newsletters, invitations webinars and events, and share valuable marketing materials like case studies and success stories.
For more tips and expert advice on scaling your channel for success, click here to learn about our partner training and channel enablement services.
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About CGS CGS’s channel partner program is centered on five services:
We have the ability to drive revenue by identifying partners who align with each vendor’s core markets and solutions, establishing relevant training, accelerating sales ramp-up time with the right mix of sales aids and messaging, and providing ongoing first-, second- and third-level support based on vendor requirements. We have over 30 years of experience recruiting and supporting over 45,000 partners for IT vendors, including Red Hat, Citrix and IBM. For more details on our industry-recognized approach to channel enablement, contact us at [email protected] |
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