It’s The Recession

Everybody is cutting back on costs – including what they spend with you. Most of your customers’ businesses are down, so they need less from you. And of course some of them are gone forever! Here’s how to offset the impact of a dismal economy.

Change the focus of sales efforts – When your customers buy they are completing a multi-step process that begins with considering a goal and ends with placing an order. During boom times sales efforts tend to focus on the final steps in the customer’s process – the order. Salespeople urge the customer to place the order sooner rather than later. They are careful to capture the order accurately, and to negotiate advantageous, but mutually beneficial terms. These are all good things to do, but during lean times the focus of sales needs to move to a much earlier point in the process. Focus the conversation with customers less on the end of the process (when to order, what to pay, delivery details) and more on the early stages of the process. Talk to your customers about what they want to achieve, the full range of obstacles to their goals, their total costs of achieving their goals. By doing that you will have the opportunity to showcase every feature and benefit that might push the decision in your favor. That strategy also wins you a promotion from “vendor” to “trusted advisor.” When you earn the customer’s confidence early in the purchase decision process, by the time the process nears its conclusion it’s too late for your competitors to gain traction.

Get new customers – If nothing changes except that your current customers order, on average, 20% less, the math is pretty simple for predicting what kind of year you are going to have. And let’s not forget your competitors. They are staring at the same bleak prospects, and are starting to eye some of your customers. It is time to step up prospecting. Your older salespeople may remember how to prospect, but your younger ones may never have sold during a recession.  To jumpstart prospecting:

1. Capture the best practices of your successful prospectors. Transfer those best practices through training.
2. Identify the best sources for referrals.
3. Fine tune compensation and other rewards to focus on new business.
4. Make sure leads passed to salespeople are not squandered. Create accountability for what happens to those assets.

Let us help - With these and other strategies Fido Communications helps companies improve sales productivity. Contact us to arrange for a “no obligation” meeting. It won’t cost you anything more than a modest amount of your time and attention, we guarantee it will be interesting, and it may be the most important thing you do during the recession.

Call 914 962 0786 and ask for Dan Luckett or Michael Glyn. Or email :DL@fidocommunications.com

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