Want to know how to sell more?
When it comes to how to sell more, why not make it easy on yourself?
That's what top sales professionals do.
How do they do it?
Well they do 2 things.
First, they go after what we (in the trade) call “low hanging fruit.” In other words they do the simplest and easiest work first. They do the work that will yield them the most return, the fastest.
In sales, it means this…
- They go after the products and services that are easier to sell.
- They seek out the easiest clients to sell to.
Second, they pick their horses.
Stay with me, as all will become clear…
Story time
In 2002, when my IT company was about 5 years old, we niched our offering down and were just starting to sell a new service, called penetration testing.
You can lower those eyebrows now – it's nothing sexual – just purely a technical term in information security! 😉
I'd been championing this as I knew instinctively that it was the way to go. To begin with, we went to market by targeting our existing client base. We then adopted a more scattergun approach. We did a lot of evangelising and educating. And, whilst it was great fun, few sales resulted and much time was wasted.
So, with the devil riding our back in terms of cash-flow, we had to find a way to sell more – FASTER.
What did we do?
Well, we changed our approach and went after the low hanging fruit.
As penetration testing was a fairly new service to the market, few clients were ready to buy. However, there were a small minority – the early adopters – who were, and they'd pay handsomely for it. We looked at their traits, considered why they needed to buy the service, what would be the consequences of not buying it and looked at what our competitors were offering. We then worked on creating a strategy, which resulted in a new ideal target profile and communication plan.
Things became much easier after that. Although our market was tiny, it was easy to target. With a clear message, and a good service at the back-end I have to tell you we mopped up.
Now it would have been easy to stop there but we didn't.
We went after our competitors with a vengeance. We targeted who they'd educated on the value of the service and then made them a more competitive offer.
As I said, we'd studied our competition to find their weaknesses and while many of our prospects were loyal to their suppliers, if we found a way to get in front of them, it was only a matter of time before they converted. As soon as we got our foot in the door, we'd bring up a number of things that we knew were important to their business and that our competitors couldn't do.
I'd also follow up by saying, “Don't ask your suppliers (our competitors) if they can do this, because they'll tell you they can. Instead have them show you whether they can do it or not.”
I got the sale 9 times out of 10 because I concentrated on the few things that we could do that our competitors couldn't. Of course there were other things that they could do that we couldn't, but I chose to focus on our strengths, not our weaknesses.
Pick your horse
So, whether you find it admirable to really work a sale, and take someone from not wanting your offering to eventually making them a client is up to you. Personally I find it nonsensical and a waste of time!
The story I've just shared with you forced me to focus only on those who were ready to buy. I then focused my strategy on how to convert them to be my client.
Think about it.
How many times have you heard the saying, “You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink?” How often have you been frustrated because your sales efforts have not resulted in a sale? How often have you gone after the wrong clients? Why carry on doing this? I say…
[box]“Find a thirsty horse; lead it to water; watch it drink.” – Jane Frankland TWEET THIS[/box]
How easy is it to talk to ‘easy' clients – those who get what you're selling – those who are ready to buy? How easy is it to send information to qualified leads? How easy is it wait for the next call or email or social interaction?
It's easy, right?
These are just some of the things that I teach my students in The DailyWins, a tiered program that's focused on getting you more clients. If you're interested, just sign up here and I'll let you know when the next program starts.
Now I want to hear from you!
When it comes to how to sell more, have you ever gone after the most obvious opportunities because they're readily achievable and don't require a lot of effort? Tell me whether you found it resulted in more sales or not. Leave your story in the box below.
With love and gratitude – as always,
