By Caroline Petersen, Founder and Creative Director of Gallery Design Studio
Sales is about personality and building trust, and a good salesperson knows the industry they are working in like the back of their hand, which is why helping your sales team learn your industry and what you offer with a visual guide is one of the best investments you can make.
With SaaS technology becoming more popular by the day, finding new leads has become easier, but how do you build a relationship over email or the phone? If a fellow entrepreneur is willing to give you the time of day, then you know she/he is interested in what you offer and have to make it worth it by getting to your point.
Make sure your sales team knows what to say by creating a visual toolkit so they understand why you are pitching this particular person your business. While it does not have to include everything, it can be done in several ways including:
- Bolding important numbers that show adding your company to their payroll will immediately benefit who your sales team is contacting
- A word cloud they can email showing how many others in the potential clients industry are taking advantage of what you offer
- Arrows showing how businesses saved money or increased profits using your services
- Block quotes of clients who have used your services that can be read easily over the phone
Using methods such as these will help them remember the information your sales representative needs to know. Why? Because over half of the people in this world are visual learners and need to see information to fully absorb it. In fact, using visuals in any handbook has helped employees do their jobs because they actually look at what you want them to know.
Many companies are also using similar methods for their sales teams with videos. And why not? Just think of the movies you have watched. Why do you think it has been easier to remember what a great effect looked like, or why a pivotal scene is stuck in your head, and not what a potential client you spoke to said? Because the movie was done in a way that was compelling enough for you to clearly remember what occurred. Businesses can do this too by creating video graphics of facts, numbers, or other pertinent information that helps employees remembers them because they were presented in the same “movie magic” way.
While SaaS is great at generating the leads you need, it does not tell you who the person you are calling is. What are their hobbies? Which sports teams does she/he watch? What music do they listen to? And let’s face it, if they are as busy as you are, your goal is to find this out later as you develop the relationship, which makes the information you put in front of your sales team all the more important.
Do not get me wrong, SaaS technology has tons of advantages but you have to use it right. If you get 100 contacts a day, chances are you will only hear back from 10 of them, which means you probably need two of them to sign a contract to make your sales representative time worth it. But if your team is looking for information to keep those 10 companies enticed, you have a problem.
Putting visual facts in front of your sales team will allow them to respond immediately and consistently which, by the way, has proven tosave companies money.
So if your sales team is slowing down, or you think they can do better, give them the visuals they need to succeed.
Caroline Petersen, Founder and Creative Director, Gallery Design Studio, https://www.gallerydesignstudio.com, caroline@gallerydesignstudio.com
