Posts Tagged ‘exceeding customer expectations’
It’s true that not everyone has been around “forever,” not even Google. In fact, it was only in 1998 that they were officially Incorporated.
Why do I mention that? Well, it has something to do with credibility of The Sales Corner.
Matt Geier was designing websites BEFORE Google was around. Matt designed his first website in 1995, and did about 10-15 of them that year using HTML 1.0. Later they evolved into better version of HTML and eventually started using CSS and other “code” to improve aesthetics, interoperability among browsers, and more!
When Google came out, some website owners became scared as to the unknown about “this new search engine” and others, like me, learned to thrive on that unknown with the promise of what was to come down the line. Those that didn’t understand how it worked, couldn’t utilize it and maximize their success as well, simply from lack of understanding and knowledge about it.
When Google first became “real” a lot of questions were asked about their search engine algorithms and how they looked at sites and more;
Nobody knew the secrets, and so you had website owners, and webmasters doing things like adding pop ups, or exchanging links, or sharing links on sites, and anything they could do to get Google algorithms to pick up on their sites with Google Robots and so forth. Some things people did know, came back to these types of tactics to get noticed. Unfortunately, hurting a lot of credibility from reputable sources in the process due to the “fast acting ways to get recognized” which were later recognized as ill-legitimate ways vs the good quality ways and over time Google adjusted this to some of the more current algorithms we see today.
Unfortunately, even today people try and fail to get the understanding of how Google searches work, and what they are really looking for in order to rank your page, or show you on a search.
We understand it; why? Because we’ve been “getting it” since day one finding out any information about how Google works! Searching and scouring the net; but did you know the best place is “from the source” Google, themselves? Yes, that’s right, you can follow them in all kinds of ways to understand what they tell you is the best way to get your website ranked, searched, and more!
Nowadays, Google has their hand in all kinds of things; and I want you to take advantage of Google’s great ability to show your website some really spectacular ranking results and traffic but in order to do that, here’s a list of things you’ll need to do every single day……..no, I’m not joking…. and If you cannot, then I simply suggest finding someone who can do this for you, because this is what it takes to generate results; Like The Sales Corner
1) Make sure you generate NEW content every single day, including Saturday’s and Sunday’s; This should be between 3-10 Articles or Blog posts a day that are original from each other. Each Article or Blog should be different in context or if the content is the same, change it so that the same content is read or appears different, and now it’s NEW or SIMILAR, but NOT THE SAME.
2) You need to advertise and market your content and drive it to the people, all of it, every day. The more your active with your site, the better results you’ll get from page ranking tools, and people like Google always looking for “active and popular” websites and blogs! The more people AND GOOGLE see your site active, the higher it will rank in popularity!
3) Don’t bother just exchanging links anymore, or even submitting to link exchanges! Get EXTERNAL LINKS in place! The problem with adding your link to a exchange, is well, you’re with about 1000 other links too; who knows if they are the same type of products or services. Instead; establish good relationships and get your link permanently placed on your partner’s pages, or customer’s websites. The reason you want permanent placement is to help with your “popularity” and the popular you are, the higher you’ll rank. This is only measured in part by how many external links you have; none-the-less, get some, it will help!
4) Stop making exact copies of your pages and putting them on different domain names. The only thing this is doing, is giving you three individual domains, with the same content on each one. That doesn’t provide any value. Google frowns immensely on this kind of behavior. Google algorithms look for “value add” and “unique” things that attract it’s attention. Having a site the same as the next, is like owning three cookie cutter houses in three different zip codes; You still have three houses, and the same amount of relatives at any given time in each one. Nothing new and valuable, just the same.
5) If you cannot do what needs to be done to manage and maintain your website presence, find someone, like The Sales Corner, who can help offset those tasks and become focused on generating results geared to help YOU directly! It’s imperative you take a focus on your business results and stop leaving sales and marketing driven items to your graphics designer, or sales to your engineering team! Work with people that give you the results you’re looking for; not the one’s they want to sell or offer in their proposal!
Good Luck
Matt G
The Sales Corner
For more information on the types of things The Sales Corner LLC can do for your business, website, or brick and mortar, you can can follow this link to our Free Membership Information page, or view our Digital Services and Products Store. If you’d like to become a member of The Sales Corner LLC to get more Free Sales and Marketing or Business help, you can fill out this form now. To go back and understand even more history, there’s a wonderful story about The Sales Corner LLC here that you can review.
Many years ago while participating in track and field my coaches typically spoke of cadence. In fact, many athletic events use cadence in their respective performance. Football players have a cadence before each play, dancers have a cadence in their performance and coincidentally those that sell require a cadence.
To perform at a higher level in selling products and services, one must have a certain cadence in delivery and building relationships with clients. Here are some of the things required to assist with your cadence:
- Confidence. Consumers invest in those they know and trust. However, they also invest in the conviction from the selling representative. Your cadence will be affected by the highs and lows of your confidence.
- Presentation Flow. Presentation is where it all begins. Know what you want to say, how you are going to say and but most of all listening is more important then speaking.
- Preparation. One cannot have cadence if there is a lack of preparation. Understand how your services can assist the buyer. Look at issues from the perspective of the buyer; think output. What can you deliver that can aid the client?
- Presence. When you look good, you feel good. Sellers need to dress the part. Invest in good clothes, and groom well. Be noticeable when you walk into a room.
- Poise. Buyers implicitly affect tempo with questions and concerns. Remain neutral during volatile periods with proper research and preparation. The better you plan the less likely impact to your poise.
- Equality. When you formulate equality with the buyer there is better conversation. Your interaction should be a meeting of peers, anything less is a vendor.
- Labor Intensity. Relationship building is must easier, and you have more swagger when you meet only with decision makers. Gatekeepers waste time and affect your confidence. Meet and greet only those that understand your value.
The concept of cadence is formulated from continuous learning and practice. Athletes and dancers practice daily to broaden their strengths. They understand the value of self-mastery, learning all they can to heighten their performance. Take the first step and before you know it you will be swaying with the music.
2010. Drew J. Stevens PhD. All rights reserved.
Drew J. Stevens Ph.D. (Dr. Drew) is the author of Split Second Selling and the soon to be released Ultimate Business Bible and six other business books on sales, customer loyalty, self mastery and business development solutions. Drew helps organizations to dramatically accelerate revenue and outstrip the competition. He conducts over 40 international keynotes, seminars and workshops per year. Dr. Drew is the founder of the Sales Leadership Certificate one of only 14 programs in the United States offering an accredited degree in the profession of selling and has a top ranked podcast called Sales Acceleration. To discover how Dr. Drew can assist your organization visit his marketing and sales website or call 877-391-6821.
During my workshops I frequently speak of the need for selling professionals to be prepared for every selling situation. With the lack of selling methodology and training amongst 92% of the selling population there are a number of gaffs during the sales day.
After a relaxing Independence Day weekend, I returned to several emails. One of the most striking included the following, “I realize that your company may be too big to have a need for our training materials, but I liked what I saw on your webpage and I thought it might be worth having a conversation.”
While I honor the selling representative for having the gumption to connect, their lack of knowledge for my firm is alarming. Worse yet, there exists the typical bromide of “what you can do for me approach”. Selling professionals must refrain from selling products and begin to realize the need to invest in and develop relationships. Consumers buy from those they know and trust and this begins with intellectual dialogue based on objectives and values.
If there is a desire to invest in a relationship then:
- Conduct fundamental research on the company and establish need.
- Get introduced to the economic buyer through a third party.
- If a cold call is required, ensure the focus is on objectives and measurements of success.
- Conduct research on the true economic buyer, blind messages to gatekeepers will only get lost.
- Stop thinking of input; consider how your product or service will benefit the customer. Think of external value end the selfishness and focus on the prospective client.
Before you pick up the phone or key a letter:
- Know the customer.
- Know the industry.
- Know the competition.
- Know your value.
- Know your differentiation.
- Know your value proposition.
- Know your output.
- Know your decision maker.
- Know your time frame.
Customers are too busy and not inclined to have their time wasted on the folly of sales commission. The only methods of competitively selling today include differentiation, value and output. Anything less is simply a waste of the selling professionals time. How much do you know?
© 2010. Drew Stevens PhD. All rights reserved.
Drew Stevens is one of the world’s leading authorities on Sales Marketing & Business Development Solutions . Drew is the author of the successful sales process book Split Second Selling. He is also the creator of the Sales Leadership Certificate one of only 14 programs in the United States offering an accredited degree in the profession of selling and has a top ranked podcast called Sales Acceleration. To discover how Dr. Drew can assist your organization visit his marketing and sales website.
In recent weeks in working with a number of clients, there is a tendency to see similar issues between them. Much of what I experience concerns the sales force. The larger issue is that many organizations do not invest in their sales teams. Ironic since the notion of every business is to retain and acquire clients.
To assist organizations to operate more efficiently here are a few thoughts to remember:
Selling professionals are in the marketing business. Spend one to two hours per day creating information that increases marketing. Use resources stemming from IMC to assist you and the organization to attract consumers. Creating an array of activity lessens labor and helps to increase brand.
Use testimonials to build brand. Ensure that your customers and alliances can reiterate your value proposition and articulate it to others. Consumers that trust you and enjoy your value will be tickled to inform others.
Maintain customer contact. Those that invest in customer relationships are always top of mind. Consumers not only conduct business with whom they trust- but also remember!
Sellers and their business are dependent on customers. Ensure that all calls are returned timely. I use a 90 minute rule! If not return all calls and emails by day’s end. Additionally, any and all staff should be well versed in customer service culture.
Eschew the folly of trends. Refrain from the bromide trends of “casual day”. Always be prepared to visit a customer. Buy good clothes and resources (i.e. Wallet, brief case and yes a pen) to emulate the part. Have good vocabulary and become well versed to speak with economic buyers.
©2010. Drew Stevens Ph.D All Rights Reserved.
Drew Stevens is one of the world’s leading authorities on Sales Marketing & Business Development Solutions . Drew is the author of the successful sales process book Split Second Selling. He is also the creator of the Sales Leadership Certificate one of only 14 programs in the United States offering an accredited degree in the profession of selling and has a top ranked podcast called Sales Acceleration. To discover how Dr. Drew can assist your organization visit his marketing and sales website.
The odds of your business surviving five years are 50-50 according to David Birch, former head of a research firm specializing in studying small business data. (Isen 2007) There are many reasons why a business will fail. Much research is available to denote which factors are the most important, however, it appears that most business fail because they lack focus on the organization’s most vital asset – customers.
Solo practitioners begin a business for two reasons; money and passion. Business professionals desire to take their passion and make money from it, and there is little harm in this. There is no better way to enjoy your time on earth than to do the thing that you enjoy.
However, with passion there is a need for focus. Presently with the cacophony of noise due to the Internet and social media resources, consumers are overwhelmed with messages. Consumers today require differentiation to denote whom to shop and whom to avoid. Unfortunately the Internet’s ubiquity hinders variety so that only option remaining the builds brand and business success is customer service.
Customer service is simply the organizational culture and processes that entrepreneurs create to ensure allure. Consumer decisions are driven by emotion. Service must be enculturated into the organizations so all staff become dependent on the client. This is an important construct; there is little difference from one retailer to the next or one restaurant to the next with one exception- customer service. When treated correctly, customers inform others of their experience helping to manifest the organizations brand and announce it to others. No marketing tactic in the IMC process is as cost effective as a word of mouth.
When customers believe and trust their vendor they tell others helping to create brand differentiation. Exemplars include Apple whose retail outlets are the busiest of any mall and Zappos.com whose unblemished customer service helps helped to brand to proliferate.
If there is little belief in customer service think again. According to both Dun and Bradstreet and the Small Business Administration, businesses with fewer than 20 employees have only a 37% chance of surviving four years. Customer service can provide the life raft of success if used correctly. In reviewing the success statistics, would you rather be a follower or a leader?
©2010. Drew Stevens PhD. All Rights Reserved.
Drew Stevens is one of the world’s leading authorities on business development and sales. Drew is the author of the successful sales process book Split Second Selling. He is also the creator of the Sales Leadership Certificate one of only 14 programs in the United States offering an accredited degree in the profession of selling and has a top ranked podcast called Sales Fitness. To discover how Dr. Drew can assist your organization to increase their business development skills visit him at www.stevensconsultinggroup.com
Sales proposals are part of business. Buyers want to know what they can expect before they turn over their hard earned profits for your goods or services. Websites abound with free templates to how to write a killer sales proposal. Yet, to be the Red jacket, to stand out from all those other sales people suggests you may need to change the game plan if you truly wish to increase sales.
Outside of formal RFP’s required by many government or related agencies, most businesses use the word proposal. This word comes from the word propose which has Latin roots and means “to place forth.” Your goal is to place forth to your potential customer (a.k.a. prospect) what you will deliver.
Credit: Integratedinfo.co.in
If proposal means to place forth, then exactly what you are placing forth? In simple terms, you are placing forth a statement of work or SOW. So what would happen if you began to replace this phrase statement of work with proposal? Would you think differently about your relationship with the prospective customer? Sales Training Coaching Tip: Change your words, improve your results.
Any gray suit can write a proposal, but those (Red jackets) who understand the nuances of words and how those words affect people (think emotional intelligence and neuro-linguistic programming) can bring additional value to the relationship via a statement of work.
The problem with proposals are they are just that – proposing. Your potential customer does not see you any differently than anyone else who has submitted a similar document. Also why would you waste your time unless you knew, barring some unforeseen obstacle such as a change in management, you were going to earn the sale? I learned very early on that I could be in the proposal writing business or in the business of earning sales. For me in my executive consulting and coaching practice, practicality told to me choose the later because proposals in and by themselves are lost leaders.
Today, I do not, repeat do not, submit any proposals. Those are for the gray suits who are like sharks fighting after bits of decaying fish. What I have learned to do is to personally deliver statements of work that solidify the relationship and succinctly spell out how I envision the engagement to be conducted. My time is valuable and hence I am very selective in who I work with.
You can continue to deliver sales proposals after proposals or truly learn how to separate yourself from all those other sales people. The choice is yours.
Know – Choose – Create Tomorrow’s Solutions Today