Sales system overwhelm. It happens. Sales is a primary engine or system in your business. Like any engine or system, they need to be designed well, built well, maintained well… and upgraded well from time to time.
Once you have a selling system in place, you have several advantages:
- You can test out different markets and grow your business
- You can save yourself time by automating some of the processes
- You can look to see where you can cut costs
- You can see where you can increase Return on Investment i.e. get more bang for your buck, time and energy and more importantly, look to see where and how you can optimize your processes
Most people have no systems or an undefined system with little control or little in the way of measuring results and resources put in.
What is a simple way of creating a system like this? OR if you already have a system, how can you define it so that you can start controlling/optimizing it better?
1. Stop Sales System Overwhelm: Identify the stages that a typical client goes through
If you have had prospects turn into clients, write down the stages that they went through to become clients. If you are starting out fresh, try your best to imagine/guess what stages they would need to go through to become clients.
Examples of stages include the following
- No interest in purchase but curiosity is present about future possibilities
- Sufficiently informed about technical aspects of your product and service to consider buying
- Identified a problem that your service or product can solve
- Identified that the problem is worth at least spending an hour with you to see if you can help resolve
- Interest in buying but needs to know more about the product to help them make the choice: “Education Required” stage, etc.
2. Stop Sales System Overwhelm: Map out the possible routes that prospects can work their way through these stages to buy from you
You’ve mapped out the steps, but how do they come through the door?
For example: Curiosity -> Informed -> Identified problem -> problem is worth solving ->
sufficient demo of the product serving the solution -> Close -> Post Product Delivery Request of Referrals
3. Stop Sales System Overwhelm: Identify how you will quickly identify their stage
How will you know which stage your prospect is in? It’s important to get a sense of the symptoms people develop at each stage so you know how to help people quickly.
For example, they contact you and ask for an initial consultation or to find out about a product: you ask them how much they know about your product and they say “Nothing”. This is a symptom of the stage “Education required”
4. Stop Sales System Overwhelm: Indentify how they can move to the next stage
What will it take for the person to move to the next stage? The more you consider this, the easier it is to help.
For example, to move from curiosity to informed, the prospect watches 1 short video summary of your product and one quick demonstration
5. Stop Sales System Overwhelm: Optimize how fast people move from one stage to the next
Ask the question “How can we move prospects from one stage to the other faster?”
The last point #5 is where things start improving quickly. Most people don’t get to this point because they don’t have an identified system in place.
The above is a simplified approach. Each of you is going to have nuances and exceptions that require customization for your particular market, personality, and other factors.
However, the exercise in this article is for you to start thinking about sales processes so that you can experience the benefits of saving time, creating more free time for yourself.. while making more money with less stress.
If you’re ready to power up your sales system, contact me, or follow me on LinkedIn.
Since 1991, I’ve been reflecting on, designing, and implementing methodologies and systems for bringing a transcendent, creative and innovative approach to critical aspects of entrepreneurship.
