Without a shadow of a doubt, sales is one of my favourite areas of business to work on, and specifically within the Sales System, the actual Sales Funnel. This starts with mapping out the extended sales funnel breaking each macro area down to its micro steps. It’s only when this is completed, the team see how much actual effort, time and resources goes into getting the customer over the line… the sale.
I’ve mentioned in previous videos, that the cost of sales can be phenomenal for a business, and a lot more than what people give it credit for. In fact the worst performing sales process I’ve worked on showed that 95% of the work carried out didn’t lead to a sale and of that 5% that did, only 3% were valuable sales with valuable clients. This usually isn’t a pretty conversation with teams. However, this fills me with hope as we can make substantial improvements in a relatively short space of time..
There are some key points of note, commons patterns I see no matter where I work, whether here or abroad, that I would like you to consider
- The more effective you make your sales funnel the less reliant you are on generating new leads (and the cost associated with that)
- A strong inquiry process is absolutely crucial in creating an effective sales funnel, and all going well, valuable customers
- Having a good understanding of what a good client looks like, adds great value throughout funnel
- Avoid wasting time on generating leads, meetings / proposal generation and lost revenue from doing business with clients that don’t add value to your business
- Understanding mechanisms of how you can add value to your prospects before you get the sale.. This builds great trust!
- Feedback at all stages will continually improve your efficacy again reducing wasted effort at all stages
Building a strong sales funnel is an iterative process, commit to continually improving it as if you are not improving you are going backwards
