The Pedestal Group

Putting our clients where they belong

Long or Short Sales Cycle Makes a Difference

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The length of your sales cycle has a lot to do with your marketing. A good marketer always has an eye to how to manage the workload when the marketing efforts pay off and it is a rare situation to have things pay off in a nice, orderly fashion. Generally everything comes in at once. So understanding if you will have several large deals a year vs. a bunch of small ones means understanding how long a sales cycle you run.

Obviously most business owners can describe their sales cycle – it is a measure they pay attention to on a regular basis. But how should that influence your marketing? In a short sales cycle, you can get a lot of quick hits. A person makes a decision right away and there are no barriers or issues to hold them back. That means your marketing needs to be targeted, to the point, and SHORT. Don’t bog me down in a bunch of details if I need to make a quick decision. Let me ask for more info if I need it (or find it on your website). Make the reasons to decide yes compelling – use testimonials, case studies, or examples of your work to show me how this will be a benefit. Don’t expect me to fill in the blanks myself – I didn’t care until you said something so I’m not going to spend time on it. Make it as easy as possible.

But if your sales cycle is long, then there are lots of opportunities for me to change my mind, look at other people, or generally stretch it out even more. In these cases, it is critical to identify key points in the process and sell to those. Prospecting? Sell to getting an appointment to discuss your products – not the final sale. If you are constantly pushing to get to the final sale, you may lose the person in the process. Instead, set up a series of smaller wins so that the end result is more assured. Reviewing previous sales, if you have the data check and see what buying percentage there is as each prospect got through those milestones. If 80% of prospects buy once they get through the on-site demo, then sell to that demo and get more people through that process. If only 20% of people buy after the demo, then you know you need to retool your demo, change the mechanism or interview existing customers to see why that was valuable to them so you know where in the process to put it.

In a long sales cycle, messages need to be more informative and detail-driven. Rarely is a product or service with a long sales cycle considered by itself – it is generally being reviewed next to its competitors. With that in mind, the easier it is for the client to get information about the product or service the more likely they will favor it. If I am heading a purchasing committee to obtain a service and one company gives me all the information while the other makes me ask, I will naturally feel company A is more open, honest and willing to share information. I will see them as strong communicators and be more inclined to give them the business.

The sales cycle dictates a lot about the marketing message including content, intent and type of information. But no matter what, your goal is always to make it easy for the client to decide to go with YOU. So be sure your messages, marketing materials and website always make it EASY.

Established or Create The Need

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This is part four in our series on how to start thinking about marketing.  To see our previous articles, check out: Product or Service Strong Company Brand Strong Personal Brand When anyone is trying to sell something, the buyer has to recognize a reason to pay for it.  We refer to those reasons as needs.  For some businesses, the need is always there – it is an established need.  For others, they have to create the need to get the buyer to purchase.  Each should be approached differently. For example, I have a friend who is a seamstress. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t have a couple items of clothing in a pile waiting to be repaired, hemmed or generally sewn in some way.  That need is established.  So her marketing needs to be focused on getting the person to act on that need.  That […] Continue reading

Strong Personal Brands

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This is the third installment in our continuing series on how I get started with a client. These questions help clients understand where they should target their marketing efforts.

The next area of focus is strong personal brand. There are some products that sell themselves. For the rest of us, we have to sell our products and services. When people buy, they buy us first, and then what we are selling. With that in mind, your prospect needs to consider you an expert in your field – someone who knows what they are talking about and can be trusted to produce. But you can’t be in every right place at every right time, right?

For some people, there is the added challenge of working for a large company with many people who do what you do. Insurance reps, realtors, financial service providers, etc. are often working the same area as their coworkers. So now, you have to work within your company brand and convince someone that you are the best choice at your firm without putting down anyone else at your firm. That is a pretty tall order!

The best way to manage both of these issues is to have a strong personal brand. If people can find you quickly, easily and in a way that shows you are an expert, you don’t have to sell as hard. The person can accept you as that expert.

So how do you get recognized as an expert? First, you have to know where your customers are looking. If they look on the web, you need to be sure your online presence reflects your expert status. LinkedIn is the first place to start as you get the opportunity to use your profile to explain how you got where you are. Nothing says “expert” like relevant experience!

In addition to LinkedIn, clients should be able to find you easily. Complete profiles and establish your online reputation so that you control it (See Own the Information About You for more information).

If your clients aren’t on line, think about where they will see your information and REMEMBER it. An ad in the local paper won’t work if people don’t read it and remember it when they need you. Sometimes you have to offer to speak, provide content or do something else to be seen as an expert in your field.

Building your personal brand is an important part of how to make sure people come to YOU when they need your help instead of you having to always find them. Our next installment will be about an Established Need vs. a Time-Based Need.