Not Making Enough
Sales? – “Sales is the New Marketing”
Your sales are
down and leads are rare. The phone’s not ringing. Let’s blame marketing!
If you join
this band wagon to rationalize your poor sales results, you need to
step up and take responsibility for your own fate. It’s amazing how often
sales teams play the victim here. They blame the marketing department, team
or an individual, for their lack of sales.
Often, in a
typical, let’s say “traditional” organization, there is disconnection
between marketing and the sales organization. There is a lack of
communication, team work and common goals. Sad but true.
Often, the
larger the company, the less marketing serves the individual sales
professional. In corporations, it seems the norm for marketing is to
concentrate on selling “the brand” and not products and services. Corporate
marketing sells ‘the logo’ to trigger trust and positive emotions when
people see it. Not all, but most, traditional marketing leans on
advertising which fails to work directly for you in attracting new prospects
and leads.
In small to
medium-sized companies, there is usually a very small marketing team or a
single very, over-worked marketeer. Worst, as a business owner or
independent professional, you don’t have a budget and you do everything!
Again, marketing is absent or not good enough to generate enough new
opportunities.
The most
important and singular point I’m making is that you must recognize and deal
with “what is,” to improve your situation.
Recently, I
turned 40 years old. A friend said to me, “Don’t worry, 40 is the new 30.”
If you want to improve your sales and your profit, guess what? “Sales is
the new Marketing!”
Understand YOU
are your own marketing department. Accept it and take action.
Just like the
decline (if not extinction) of personal assistants, sales administrative
assistants and secretaries to support sales teams or individuals, there is
less marketing support too. You type your own sales letters and other
correspondence and keep your own schedule.
Today, you need
to work on your own public awareness, lead generation and sales support
materials and communications. With tighter budgets, less staff and more
responsibility, it’s up to you, as an individual.
Any way you
look at it, as a sales professional you must take charge. Sales superstars
and expert managers know this. They devise a strategy and implement their
own marketing systems, in addition to the brand-like corporate, marketing
efforts. Marketing is continual communication to influence someone to take
an action. Marketing departments do it through various means and on a mass
scale, via print and media advertising and public relations. Single sales
people can market effectively through personal contact and working in the
field. You can source new deals and increase lead generation within your
existing sales process without as much pain or work as you think.
If you don’t
accept that you have to take action yourself and keep looking outside for
leads and prospects, you’re going to continue to fail to reach your sales
objectives. The good news is that the technology and tools available today
are powerful, affordable and effective for solving this challenge.
Keep an eye out
for future Customer Catcher series of articles, where I’ll give you
strategies, tips and tricks for creating a profitable, Personal Marketing
program to drive your sales skyward. You’ll get the sales you want and
become your own marketing machine with bigger, better and more immediate
results.
Until then,
think about evolving into your latest role because…
Sales is the
new Marketing.
Got a problem stopping you or a question about increasing your sales &
profits? Ask The Customer Catcher™, at
www.AskMartinWales.com.
Plus, get FREE expert advice at
www.CustomerCatcherTips.com.
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