If you converted 10% more of your leads to paying customers, what would that mean to you?
I posted on here a while ago looking for some SEO help and have since talked to several providers both locally and around the country. I made a few observations as a small business owner (your customer) and as a sales professional by trade, that I hope can help some of you. I have been in B2B sales for over 10 years and have owned a business for the last five.
Create a sales process. Everyone in here knows that it doesn't matter how much traffic comes to your page if you can't convert. This does not just apply to your clients. Your sales funnel needs to have a defined process for each stage. If you don't have a formal way of walking your prospects through a sales process, you will leave a lot of business on the table.
I hate to tell you but one call or meeting is not enough. If you sell anything that costs more than a few thousand dollars, people are going to need to walk through a sales process with you. It shows you are a pro and helps to fortify the relationship over time. The people who pitched me on the first call and had no clear direction other than "sign up and we'll do an evaluation" were done before they started.
Even though you are in digital marketing, you are in B2B sales once that phone gets picked up. It's time to act like it.
I know that I see a lot of people on this sub complaining about doing free evaluations. I hear ya. We do them every week for our prospects and we provide value, for free, that they can take elsewhere and do what they want with. I can tell you that our sales process is highly different than our competition because of the amount of value we provide. It creates goodwill, differentiates, and increases our closing rate dramatically.
Here is how a typical sales process looks for B2B services:
- Gain Access- Trying to get in the door. This can be through outreach, inbound, or referral. Of course, in your case, they came to your site and found you and clicked on one of your amazing CTA's. Seriously, though. SEO People. MAKE YOUR WEBSITE BETTER. Don't tell me you are going to do all of these things for us that you haven't done for your own company. I know "you are too busy serving so many amazing clients" but you will be able to hire three more people in a year if you make your site into the prototype that shows me you can do all the things you say you can do (and not keyword stuff the shit out of it).
- First Meeting- Set an agenda and control the meeting from the start. Format: share some challenges your clients normally face (try to put your prospect into your current customer's shoes), ask lots of questions (ID their challenges), tell stories of alignment (once again, let them visualize themselves working with you)- try to sell the next meeting where you can really sell your value. You don't need to close for your services here. Your close rate will be incredibly low if you are willing to stop at one call or meeting. IF IT IS A GOOD FIT, sell the next meeting. However, you should be trial closing starting here "if we are able to help you achieve the goals you just told me, when will you be ready to sign up for our services." "The next steps look like this>>> after that I am going to present you with a business case on why you should work with us. Are you the right person to sign the agreement? Who else should be involved in these conversations?" You want to know WHO, WHAT, and WHEN before moving forward. Who is involved, what will they be basing the decision on, and when will they sign up.
- Diagnosis or Analysis- This can be combined with the first meeting if time permits and there is obvious interest. The bigger the client, the more the need for this to be a separate meeting. This is where you want to ask the specific questions so you can build a business case. This is where you can really differentiate your service. You don't need to provide them with a roadmap on how to do everything themselves but you should be able to share what you are going to do and the impact that will have after this meeting is complete. This also allows you to schedule the next meeting to...
- Pitch/ Demo- Now you can show off the work you have done for other customers and talk about the impact your services will have on them growing their business. Create a formal way of doing this that is easy to replicate. I suggest sharing the challenges they told you they are trying to solve and ask if there is anything you are missing, then present your solution to the challenges. Make sure to do a "cooking demo". Don't show them a million things. Show them the three things that matter. Take the dish out of the oven, don't slice all of the ingredients in front of them.
- Closing- ask for the business. Do this throughout the process but mostly now. During the demo meeting. You should learn a lot about overcoming objections as this will be important at all stages but this is where you need to hold people accountable. You told me in the first meeting if we could do XYZ and ABC that you would gladly partner with us. Have we showed you that we can accomplish that? What else is there to consider? I would be happy to help talk through it with you.
- Implementation- People forget about how important client onboarding is. I chose a provider and we are considering backing out because their process has been so unprofessional to get started. It makes me wonder how organized their processes are for doing their work.
There is obviously a lot more to every piece of this but I think many of you could benefit from bolstering the sales process once you find a lead. Feel free to disagree or ask questions.
Thanks!
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from Search Engine Optimization: The Latest SEO News https://www.reddit.com/r/SEO/comments/aiqzre/seo_from_the_consumer_side_your_sales_process/>
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