The Center for Sales Strategy Blog

Another new year is quickly approaching and 2014 will be here before you know it. Each new year produces a multitude of predictions around what trends to be aware of in the next year. This is not that blog – instead of giving you a list of potential trends to be on the look out for, here are three big trends that started already and will continue to stick around in 2014.  

1. Online Video will continue to grow

According to Adapt.tv’s report Q4 2013 State of Video Industry, 86% of brands plan to increase their budgets by an average of 65%, while 91% of agencies plan to increase their online video budgets by an average of 28% in 2014. These are big jumps and while some of the increases will be incremental a good portion of the dollars will come at the expense of traditional media.  

Spending time with fewer, more highly-qualified prospects is generally a good strategy. Better prospects who meet your Ideal Customer Profile deserve more time, energy, and creativity in your approach because they have such strong potential. In fact, you probably already know the monetary value of such a high-quality appointment with the near-perfect prospect.

Peter Drucker says "Concentration is the secret to all economic success," and concentrating your appointment-setting activities on ideal prospects always pays off. If you make 40 new business approaches a week, you will accomplish more by communicating five times with eight strong prospects than one time with 40 prospects. Studies show prospects don't even begin to notice you until you make five approaches and many appointments are set after seven touches. Most salespeople give up way before that.

Quantity or Quality?

But sometimes we see salespeople using the quality paradigm as an excuse to make fewer new business calls. New business activity should not diminish because you are calling on fewer prospects. In fact, it may actually increase compared to the scorched earth approach of just smiling and dialing. Under this approach your work is directed toward your best prospects and the work is more likely to secure an appointment.  

Seven years ago my wife and I were blessed with our second child, who came by helicopter from a war-torn Lebanon. Because of the craziness surrounding her arrival, we spent several years weaving our way through the bureaucracy of her citizenship. In 2011 at the age of five, she finally received it two days before Thanksgiving; in a cheerful twist she played a pilgrim in her school’s play that very same day.  

Game On

So – after that 5 year haul toward citizenship, you can imagine our surprise when the US government denied her passport application! We were more than shocked.  We were panicked because the family trip to Canada that we had already planned and paid for was quickly approaching. With no time to waste, we rapidly tried many different ways to fix this problem, and every time we hit a roadblock. Needless to say, we could not accept “no” for an answer, and my wife was fired up to make this happen. Thankfully, she was persistent, polite, and strong… and had a strong sense of purpose. She never gave up.

Recently while attending a meeting with a prospect and explaining the 7-Step Lead Generation process to them, and how they start to generate leads with inbound marketing, they made the comment that “inbound marketing is like understanding rocket science.” This comment stuck with me and made it more evident than ever that to some, inbound marketing is not as easy to grasp as some experts make it appear.

Why is Inbound Marketing Difficult to Some?
If you understand Search Engine Optimization (SEO), social media, email marketing, and website design and have a great team of writers on staff, and have someone that can dedicate 10 hours a week or more to publishing blog posts and creating landing pages for your premium content, it’s not really that challenging.  

What? You don’t have those skill sets within your company or the resources to dedicate to inbound marketing?  It’s okay… for those companies that don’t have this expertise but are still interested in generating leads through inbound marketing there are plenty of ways to make the process easier and doable even for the smallest of companies.

How to Make Inbound Marketing Effortless
Well, you can’t really make it effortless but you can do a few things to help supplement the resources you have available. Here are 3 steps to make inbound marketing easier: 

In Memory of Melissa Kelly – My First Sales Manager

I dedicate this blog in memory of my first sales manager, Melissa Kelly, who taught me so much. She lost a hard fought battle to breast cancer last year at the age of 53, but she NEVER lost a sale.

Here’s one of the main reasons why: In every stage of the sales process she used a very simple phrase, “If I (fill in the blank)?, Will You (fill in the blank)?" 

She made sure that every step she took when working with a client was a collaborative effort. Therefore, she always knew she was on the right path towards her next desired outcome in the sales process. Some examples:

Getting the Appointment

Melissa: “If I am able to share some capabilities I have to help you drive more sales from your website, will you allow me to spend an hour with you to really uncover your marketing challenges so I can determine what solutions might work best?

“Every artist was first an amateur” …Ralph Waldo Emerson. This quote perfectly describes how anyone achieves greatness in sales—or in life. You can't be a great artist, unless you have artistic talent. But we all start as amateurs, even in areas where we have natural ability. We need to develop our talents so that they become strengths.

To become an extraordinary leader, you must appreciate the importance of natural talent and also the power of developing that talent. I have seen managers who have little regard for the importance of sales talent. They tend to think they can hire anyone and just show them what to do and if that person works hard, they will be successful. That's not true.  Not if you are trying to shoot for excellence. It works to some degree, if you are shooting for average or slightly above average. Conversely, you can't hire great talent and then do nothing to develop them and expect greatness.  Again, you will likely get average.

Anyone paying attention to the news these days can find both encouraging and discouraging signs all around us.  The same is true in business. I see this in the conversations I have with sales managers about how to drive performance in their sales departments.

Most of us can think of a few great customer experiences we’ve had… and maybe a few bad ones that range from totally frustrating to completely hilarious. But for a minute, don’t think of customer satisfaction from the customer’s point of view; think of it from the seller’s perspective.

Are you satisfied with your customers?

Do you invest way too much time for the ultimate revenue that account will generate?  

When you pick up the phone to call them or get in your car to head to that appointment with them... are you stressed, or excited?

Following is a letter of thanks that makes me feel good just reading it!

Thank you for trusting in me, and thank you for allowing me to get to know you and help you grow your business the past few years. I truly appreciate the opportunity to work with you; it’s obvious that your team feels the same way. You’re a great leader and while I know our partnership has played a part in your company’s growth, it’s because of your vision, your dedication and your ability to motivate and inspire your people that your company is thriving. 

While the competition in your industry has been fierce, you’ve succeeded in creating a culture that attracts high performing employees, one that promises to promote and support the continued growth of each individual person. Your turnover is remarkably low, and you’ve experienced record sales over the past two years. Those achievements were not reached by accident! I value your business and I value the friendship we’ve forged over the years. It’s because of circumstances like this, and people like you that I forget I’m “doing my job.” Working with you has never felt like a “job.” It’s a partnership that continues to motivate and inspire me. It’s why I get excited to get up each morning, and for that I’m truly grateful! Thank you!

As we approach Thanksgiving, it’s natural for us to reflect on what we’re thankful for. 

If you’re in the position of needing to attract new and better prospects to your business, then I want to let you in on a little secret. While you may have your sales team busy cold calling or your marketing team putting together outbound marketing initiatives – both which can be extremely useful and effective when done correctly– there is still a world of B2B decision makers that are not hearing, seeing, or noticing your message. 

So, where are they? They’re in the same place you are right this very second. They’re online… searching for information, seeking solutions to their problems, and researching options for their business. The question then is, are they finding you when they search online? Or are they finding your competitor? Does your company website have valuable content that represents your areas of expertise while delivering a thought-provoking and resource-rich experience? Or is it just an online brochure of the services you offer? 

While original, keyword-rich, and relevant content written for your best prospects is what every B2B company needs in order to compete in the online world of search and social media, it’s not always easy to come up with that all-important content on a regular basis. So, here is list of 8.5 content creation ideas that you can start working on today: