Recently I responded to a request to help small businesses that were feeling despondent because of falling sales and general feelings of frustration with marketing a small business in difficult, trading times. I too experience these feelings, they come up for me when business is slow, and I follow my own advice which centers around the philosophy that:
“A clear vision, backed by a marketing plan, gives a tremendous feeling of confidence and personal power.”
In a series of Keep Calm & Keep Marketing posts to help improve feelings of confidence and personal power; part 1 will focus on 5 tips to improve Sales:
Develop 30-day sales goals each month
Break down how many sales you need each month to meet your revenue targets. Determine exactly how many meetings, calls, emails and blog posts you need to have, make, send or write to generate your target sales.
Make the first task of every day, activities to create sales
Focus each day, first thing in the morning, on actions that are “selling” or will definitely lead to sales. Do this offline and don’t go online* (*read getting distracted) until complete. You should be doing at least 60 minutes of sales cultivation activities per day.
Ask existing customer for referrals
Ask for referrals, they can always say no – but be honest – you need the work or you need to sell!
Prepare for “ Sales Objections”
Write down all the “sales objections” you get from potential customers and then script positive responses – so you are prepared for them when they are spoken. It will be the difference between passive and active selling that will get better results.
Mine that dormant pot of gold!
Follow-up on old sales leads – get out every old business card, brochure or any other sales lead that you may have and start calling these contacts. Take out any old enquiries that had not been converted into orders and follow up on every single one of them.
Let me know if find you find these tips helpful? Please leave a comment below:
About the Author: Teresa Bassham of Zenworkz Authentic Marketing inspires small businesses to develop and use an empowering Marketing and Communications Plan for Business Profitability … see my full services at www.zenworkz.com
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