How many businesses have asked themselves, “How can we get more sales?” Sales keep your business running. It doesn’t matter how noble the cause, without profit from sales, a business won’t succeed. A business needs revenue, and revenue comes from paying customers. So what is the secret behind getting more paying customers? We’ll look at what exactly is involved, at every aspect of sales, to find the answer.
Sales are the actions your business takes to convert prospects into paying customers. It’s that conversion process that is essential to your business turning a profit. Your sales approach expands on your marketing, which seeks to understand the perspective of your prospective customers.
The information about who your customers are, what they want, and how to reach them is essential to sales, but it isn’t the sales process. In this moment, as in so many others, communication is critical. Your marketing process is about collecting information about customers. It works from the customer’s perspective, looking back at your business.
Sales, on the other hand, takes that information and translates it into what you should be doing for your customers to be buying. It isn’t just about getting your customers to know about you, who you are and why they should go with your company. It’s about getting them to make the purchase. It’s about getting them to that step from understanding who you are and how you align with their values to deciding to buy.
So how do you make them take that step? Similar to marketing, sales involves communicating with customers. Psychology is involved, with some understanding of how people make decisions, as well as concrete actions that deliver the results that your customers have asked for or will appreciate.
Communicate
Make your first impression count. Be clear about your message. You can use this opportunity to do some things, use a more casual or professional tone, give advice or ask your customer a question, present a moving image or make a joke. Whatever it is you decide to do, be clear and make sure you represent your company. Your communication at every level should stem from what your company represents and the kind of experience you advertise to your customers.
Give Your Customers a Chance to Say Yes
Sometimes the jump from being a prospect to buying your product is a big one. If you go straight from asking a customer whether they like your company to asking whether they’re ready to buy from you, the question could feel like a lot of pressure.
Instead, try asking them smaller questions without pushing them to buy from you right away. Start with smaller requests, then build on an easy yes so that the leap later isn’t so big. Ask questions here and there with yes being the implied answer. Letting your potential customers say yes also gets them into a small commitment, even if it’s just psychological.
Establish Yourself as an Authority
Establishing yourself as an authority is a part of marketing as well as sales but in different ways. From a marketing perspective, you might put together a book or establish a business blog to establish yourself as an authority. Being an authority from a sales perspective might look like helping a potential customer with questions and problems in real time. A travel agency, for example, might make a sale thanks to customer service representatives who can think outside of the box quickly, to help a client find the cheapest itinerary, or else who have suggestions for places to see that the client hadn’t known about.
Get Recommendations From Others
A recommendation will also work towards your appearance as an authority. Customers who know that other have used and recommend you will be more likely to trust you. Imagine having testimonies ready to offer a person considering purchasing from your company. You might tell your potential customer that you’re sure their going to enjoy your product and find it useful. However, being able to say that so-and-so already used your product, loved it, and has this to say, is much more convincing.
Give Something, Get Something
Often if you can give your customer something for free, it will establish a dynamic that encourages them to buy from you. Even though you don’t ask for anything in return, there’s a psychological urge often to give something back. You thus spark interest and establish a relationship by giving free things away.