Sales are the backbone of any company. Without sales, the company ceases to exist.
You can’t close the leads you’re given, you need to put that coffee down!
To increase sales, there are millions of ways to proceed.
It’s difficult to know where to start.
It requires focus and skills in different areas (marketing, prospection, cold-calling, emailing, copy-writing, design, negotiation, deal-making, business development…).
And you can’t be good at most of them.
To structure the discussion, you’ll find 10 ways that you can improve your sales performance:
- Increasing your amount of incoming prospects/leads
- Increase the rate of qualified leads
- Reduce your pipeline cycle time
- Increase your conversion rate
- Reducing the cost of acquisition
- Increase the average sale value
- Increase the sales from existing customers
- Increase the customer lifetime value
- Improve your product
And a bonus one:
- Increase your price
Increasing your amount of incoming prospects/leads
Sales obey the law of numbers. You can either increase your success rate or increase the number of incoming opportunities.
The latter one is scalable if you use the right marketing and prospection techniques. And will lead to sustainable growth.
Increase the rate of qualified leads
Knowing the ideal customer, and knowing whether that person is qualified will help you discard the wrong leads as early as possible. Draining months of energy for a wrong lead will make you miss other qualified opportunities.
Reduce your pipeline cycle time
Spotting early the prospects that will get you to lose your time will help you focus more on the prospects that are leading to a close.
It saves you time and reduces the average time a prospect stays in the pipe before it is won or lost.
Having a fast pipe means more cash at the end of the month.
Increase your conversion rate
Knowing how to select the right customer, and performing a good negotiation will help you achieve better conversion rates.
Reducing the cost of acquisition
If you spend more on marketing than you make per sale, your pipeline is doomed. Paying attention to the cost of acquisition will tell you how much it costs to acquire a new client (per website, phone calls, emailing, ads, etc.)
Increase the average sale value
To increase the average sale value, you need to sell more for the same contract. You can either sell options, additional services, up-sell by providing a better or an improved version of your product.
Increase the sales from existing customers
It is by far easier to convert existing customers rather than finding new ones. Having your customers satisfied will make them come back. And the cost of acquisition will be much lower.
Increase the customer lifetime value
Focusing on customers that purchase repeatedly will help you boost your sales without draining your resources.
Developing relationships is much more valuable in the long run than having one-off orders.
Improve your product
The product or service you’re selling is the single most important element of your sales. Without rock-solid confidence in your product, improvements in your sales performance will be vain.
Increase your price
It is by far the easiest. Not sure you’ll keep all your customers happy, but the benefit may outrun the drawback. It may be worth trying.
Taking action
Do you know how to calculate any of these indicators?
Do you know how to improve any of these indicators?
Do people around you know about these factors?
If you wish to know more about it, subscribe to the newsletter or leave a comment below. I’ll develop more on that topic.
