By Craig Klein, CEO of SalesNexus
The old Golden Rule says, “Do unto others as you would want to have done unto you.” It sounds generous and fair. However, in today’s sales environment, it is simply not enough. Instead, you will get much farther if you follow the advice of Dr. Tony Alessandra, behavioral psychologist. He has coined the “Platinum Rule” that says, “Do unto others as they would want to have done unto them.”
That sounds good, too. You may be asking how in the world you can know what your sales leads want from you. Often they resist even talking to a salesperson. How in the world can you get them to tell you what they want to have done to them that will help them learn about your product or service?
Dig Deep Inside Your Market
The best way to read the minds of your sales leads and think like they do is to use the data in your Customer Relationship Manager (CRM). If your CRM is married directly to your email marketing, it makes the process much easier. The goal is to see through your customer痴 eyes to understand exactly what appeals to them. Your CRM can be a virtual gold mine for such insight.
Who are your best clients? What do they want?
When you know the answers to these two questions, you can carefully tailor your sales process to meet their needs. Imagine if you could crawl inside the minds of some of your best customers to know their pain and struggle. If you clearly understood those aspects of their life, you can create an appeal that really makes a connection to them.
You also want to know how they want to receive your message. That is the secret to finding sales leads that are hungry for your product or service. Start by measuring a few of the action steps taken in your buyer’s process of interacting with your company. Reveal the ratios of different activities such as incoming calls, referrals, web leads, and trade shows compared to the number of closed sales. We recently created an eBook called, “Manage a Sales Process of Actions that Lead to Sales Growth ” to take an in-depth look at what should be measured.
With time, you can add new defined steps such as what big things you are doing such as proposals, presentations, appointments, responding to RFPs and other things. The process is unfolding every day and you benefit by carefully considering each step that the buyer typically goes through to determine the best return on your investment (ROI) of time, money and effort. Your current customers will tell you through their actions how they want to receive your message.
Make it Easy and Painless to Work with You
The last thing your sales leads want to experience is more pain and struggle. Yet many companies do not use information about their current customers to determine ways to deepen the customer relationship. A web based CRM with integrated email marketing can give you access into the minds of the customer. If you don稚 know these answers, you may end up selling to the wrong market or to one that may be a good market, but not the one most hungry for what you offer.
Recently, we developed a Sales Growth eBook series that simplifies a process for using cutting edge lead generation methods that are customer centric and quite effective. We hope you will benefit from learning these methods.
Access all the ebooks free here – http://www.salesnexus.com/sales-growth-webinar-series
So, by identifying your customers’ common “pains” and offering them solutions, they will look forward to your emails and calls. Building a sales process that gives each customer solutions that are particularly appealing to them isn’t hard. You know your products, services and customers like no one else. All that’s required is mapping out a process to organize how you share what’s already in your head!
Craig is the founder of SalesNexus.com, a leading provider of CRM, Email Marketing and Lead Generation solutions to business 2 business sales teams.
