Are you client-dependent?
Is 50%+ of your freelance business, startup, or growing brand supported financially by a single client? If you answered yes, you are client-dependent. You are operating more as an independent contractor than a business owner. Diversification of your client base is vital to the health of your business. But, it can be tough to find the motivation to build new client relationships. Especially if your primary client has a consistent need for your services, pays well and on time. But at some point, that relationship will be ended by you, your client, or mutual agreement. It is inevitable. The great news is that you can proactively safeguard your business for that eventuality, grow and end up in an even better position. 1. Consistently network. 2. Scale your #sales & #businesdevelopment efforts 3. Consistently nurture large potential clients. Winning these clients is a marathon effort, not a sprint. 4. Utilize account-based marketing to increase conversions. 5. Manage all your sales & business development activity in a #crm. Any business should have a diversified client base to pick up the slack when any single client quits paying or when your engagement with them has run its course. Would you agree?
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Your perception is not always reality. Especially when it comes to your prospects and what it takes to nurture them into happy brand champions. Hubspot’s blog post “60 Key Sales Statistics That’ll Help You Sell Smarter in 2021” by Aja Frost is a must-read for any entrepreneur or sales & marketing team looking to up their conversion rates. Were you aware: It takes an average of 18 calls to connect with a buyer. 50% of your prospects are not a good fit for what you sell. 9 out of 10 companies use two or more lead enrichment tools to learn more about prospects. Email is nearly 40X more effective than either Facebook or Twitter at new customer acquisition. 80% of sales require 5 follow-up calls, whereas 44% of salespeople give up after one follow-up call. Half of revenue is influenced by social selling in 14 common industries, including computer software, healthcare, and marketing, and advertising. If you want to create a stellar sales experience according to buyers: Listen to their needs. Don’t be pushy. Proactively provide value by sharing relevant information. Respond promptly. #salesbestpractices #socialselling #emailmarketing #sales During the COVID-19 lockdown, I chatted with the CEO of a professional services firm.
He had been networking heavily on #Linkedin to generate business virtually. And he was having a lot of success connecting with people who could use his services. But he had a problem keeping track of them. He felt he had missed out on excellent business opportunities. I asked him how he was keeping track of his sales discussions and following up. He said he checked his Linkedin threads or #Google Meets conversation notes. He also relied on his memory. "Wow, you need a CRM system to manage your entire sales process," I told. He agreed and opted for my #business development consultation and services. I helped him pick the right CRM for his business. Now, he can follow up on his leads. The time spent on operational workflows across his business has been reduced. By centralizing all #sales & #marketing activities into a CRM system, he can now see where all his leads are in the #buyers journey. By the end of 2020, his company revenue had increased by 40%. I am so happy to help elevate his business to the next level. Many business owners don't know where their leads are, or how to engage them. Are you in this category? Let me paint a picture for you. Imagine a time when you got severely hurt. Or felt sick. The pain was tolerable at first. You were able to carry on for a few days. But then it became unbearable. You began to realize the pain would not go away on its own. So, you went to the doctor. You limped into her office, hopeful that she could finally determine what was wrong and make your pain go away. After waiting a bit, the doctor is finally ready to see you. She takes a quick look at your chart. Maybe you had X-rays taken, and she glances at those. After about 5 minutes, she says she recommends surgery and for you to report to the front desk to book a slot with her admin. The door closes behind her. How do you feel? I know how I felt because the patient in this story was me. I promptly walked out and found a different doctor. Experiences like these have illuminated my responsibility of asking questions as a #businessdevelopment consultant. Too often, when #businessdevelopment or #sales teams engage a lead, they eagerly launch into a “pitch.” They “prescribe” their capabilities, services, and demo SaaS platforms without taking the time to ask, “What hurts?” When you seek to prescribe before thoroughly diagnosing, it leads to lost opportunities. Would you agree? I read a #Linkedin post this past weekend that said cold calling is dead. The writer said it is expensive. And a waste of time. I agree. It can be. That is, if you do not put forth the effort to do it right. My most extraordinary #businessdevelopment successes resulted from thousands of hours spent cold calling. And these successes were not with small companies. They are some of the largest brands in the world. 57% of C-level buyers prefer that salespeople call them. (According to a comprehensive Rain Group study as cited by Michele McGovern in her Resource Selling article) Before making a single dial, be confident that the solutions you offer will benefit the companies you want to help. Do homework on each industry, company, and individual stakeholders you intend to contact. Remember: Rejection is not personal. But a natural path to victory. Learn to embrace voicemail as a means to build a relationship, not an obstacle. If you do, you will build great business relationships, add value, provide solutions to real problems and achieve remarkable outcomes. Cold calling is a vital component of any successful business development #salesstrategy. In my experience, it pays off handsomely if you commit to doing it right. #businessdevelopment #sales #hunter #coldcalling #salesstrategy Are you struggling to qualify the best leads for your business during all those back to back Zoom conversations?
Online #videoconferencing discussions can be incredibly distracting. And it is easy to forget your original #salesgoals for those meetings. Make it your goal to get these 4 questions answered in an initial conversation with a lead. If you do, you will quickly know whether a lead is a fit for your #business. And, if your product and service solutions are the ideal answer to solving their problem. Executive Summary It all started one evening over a few beers at a local pub. After a group run, some Cincinnati runners who had become enthusiastic serial marathoners decided it was high time the Queen City had its own showcase marathon venue. This original group trained together–meeting for training runs out of Bob Roncker’s Running Spot. We often talked about marathons we had run (the good, the bad and the ugly), and which marathon we were training for next. It dawned on us that night that there was an incredible opportunity for us to create Cincinnati’s first premier marathon. Collaborating with fellow runners and Bob Coughlin, Taylored Feats stepped up to the task of creating a successful Cincinnati marathon legacy from scratch: The Flying Pig Marathon. Challenges It's one thing to put together a local road race. It's quite another endeavor to create a destination marathon that has the alluring elements necessary to attract thousands of runners year after year. It requires the passion, dedication, and the hard work of many people. Taylored Feats realized we needed to identify the crucial elements inherent in other legacy marathons that contributed to their long-standing success and widespread appeal. We needed this information to ensure Cincinnati’s first major marathon would not be a one-shot deal. Getting all those elements right for a first-time marathon was a significant challenge given the massive 26.2 mile undertaking of creating a marathon road race. However, Taylored Feats, Bob Coughlin, and a small, dedicated group of Cincinnati visionaries were more than up to the task. How Taylored Feats Helped
Results
The inaugural Flying Pig Marathon went on to become the third largest first-time marathon in the United States. In 2020, Runners World continues to rate The Flying Pig Marathon as one of the top U.S. road races every runner should run. Executive Summary A strategic brand and package design agency with a rich legacy of creating and transforming brands was at a crossroads. Recent agency investments into growing new business had stalled and they knew they needed to make a change. Although they had an incredible reputation, did great work and had a coveted agency of record retainer relationship with one of the largest advertisers in the world, they were dissatisfied with the lack of results they were receiving from an outsourced agency new business and lead generation firm. The outsource company submitted monthly reports documenting activity on all the phone outreach they were conducting but did not secure one new account for the agency within 12 months. Frustrated, but motivated to grow and generate new revenue, the agency turned to Taylored Feats to activate a new strategy. Challenges Since the new business outsourcing company controlled an internal database of lead contacts, the brand agency did not own the data associated with the leads who had been contacted on their behalf. They also had no internal centralized sales CRM system for storing, contacting, nurturing, documenting and managing all new business activity. The agency enjoyed regular referrals from current and past clients but had no focused, proactive or structured new business plan to help them achieve their revenue goals. New business activity was stop and start at best since it was left to account executives whose primary charge was to service and support billable clients. Securing new business was considered vital to the agency’s financial & creative wellbeing. However, since internal staff time spent on new business was often not billable activity, any focused effort towards driving new business frequently happened only when the agency lost an account or when business was slow. How Taylored Feats Helped
Results
One of the over 2,000 plus contacts nurtured by Taylored Feats over a multi-year engagement included key brand decision makers at the world’s largest retailer. The agency had no established contacts or track record with this corporate giant. However, like many Fortune 500 companies, this retail behemoth had multiple categories where the agency’s brand & packaging expertise could provide significant value leading to a long-term partnership. Over a nine-month period, Taylored Feats built awareness and established trust & credibility with corporate decision makers overseeing the #1 retailer’s expansive private label brand. Taylored Feats single-handedly presented the agency’s unique capabilities remotely, circumventing the disruption and significant cost of flying the agency team to the retailer’s headquarters for a non-billable presentation. As a result, Taylored Feats was successful in securing the agency as a finalist in an RFP for the complete brand re-design of the retailer’s largest private label product line in the health and wellness category. Working as the lead contact for the agency in communications with the retailer’s global procurement department, Taylored Feats worked shoulder to shoulder with cross functional agency teams throughout the entire RFP process which stretched over 4 months. In the end, this collaborative team effort not only resulted in the agency & Taylored Feats winning the six-figure brand re-design contract (encompassing over 270 SKUs), but also in securing agency of record status and a long-term partnership with the world’s largest retailer. Executive Summary A prominent regional media buying & creative agency was looking for new ways to make in-roads with major national brands on both the East & West coast markets of the U.S. They were known as one of the top agencies in their region but lacked substantial awareness with top brands nationally. Their mission was to position themselves as offering the same first-class quality & service as Madison Avenue but at a midwestern value. Challenges The full-time internal sales team was tasked with generating a quota of 6-10 agency presentations monthly in order to achieve the agency’s desired annual revenue targets. Each salesperson had to make 250-350 sales outreaches per month in order for the agency to generate the desired number of agency presentations. The pressure to meet quota was substantial as it is with any sales team. So, to optimize their chances of success, most of the internal team focused on regional opportunities where the agency had substantial brand recognition and therefore, a much greater chance of closing a new sales contract. The agency very much desired to elevate its brand on a national level but was not in a position to hire another full-time salesperson. How Taylored Feats Helped Given a proven track record of securing new business with national brands across a variety of sectors, Taylored Feats was brought on-board for 10-15 hours per week to work shoulder to shoulder with the agency’s full-time sales team. Taylored Feats was given a defined territory of prominent national brands on both the east and west coast. This assigned territory of national global players had previously been worked by the internal team with no success. The prospect target list represented 180-210 brand decision makers (Chief Marketing Officers, Brand Managers, Product Managers & Category Leads) who had not been contacted by the agency sales staff for at least two years.
Results
Working 10-15 hours per week, Taylored Feats opened doors and nurtured relationships with top national brands across the U.S. including Del Monte, Carlson Travel, Monsanto, and Barnes & Noble. Within the first 5 month we established credibility & trust with the new marketing leadership at one of the top Belgian Chocolatiers in the world. This directly resulted in the agency being invited as an RFP finalist to compete with two other New York ad agencies for a coveted 7-figure media buying & creative agency of record contract with the global CPG chocolate brand. We continued to work with the internal sales team throughout the RFP process to ultimately win the account. This win was successfully merchandized by the agency to help open doors with other national brands. |
AuthorStephanie Taylor helps organizations grow by providing fractional strategic sales, marketing & business development consultation coupled with highly effective roll-up-your-sleeves execution. Archives
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