We share the best 10 Tips to increase BD, Marketing, and Sales in face-to-face meetings or on your online website, Sales Funnel. This Proven Process will help You get the competitive advantage as You Skyrocket Your sales with these 10 Tips from the expert marketing team at content branding Solutions.  The proper process and coaching tips will help you close the deal and skyrocket sales.

You know you can knock it out of the ballpark with these ten effective, simple sales and marketing techniques, from listening to closing techniques pertinent to every thought leader and professional business developer to a salesperson.

Discover the confidence you need to grow your sales.  If you are a professional in any industry, you need to be aware that you are a salesperson.  Everyone is in sales, from accountants, architects, engineers, and contractors, and yes, that means you!  You and your team need to become professional salespeople to represent and showcase your expertise and thought leadership to become the go-to industry leaders.

1.  Balance are You Really Listening or Just Waiting to Talk?

Balance - Your Talk to Listen to Ratio in your sales funnel - if you are always talking and not listening, you may be missing out on relevant information.  Consequently, your failure to listen and hear what the other is saying is a bad habit you and your team must break in 2022. Instead, stop thinking about what you will say next and listen to the person talking to you to improve your listening ratio. You’ll be amazed at what you learn and how better the conversation flows.

Expert Tip: Less said, best said.  Often prospects sell themselves.

Tips for Listening Better:

• Practice
• Be open-minded
• Be attentive and relaxed
• Listen to the words and the sentence connotation
• Ask Questions
• Find Out What are their problems, goals, and needs are?
  • Focus on what they have done.
  • Focus on How did it get more sales in the past?
  • How did it get them more customers?
  • How did it make their business easier to run?
  • How did it, or could the marketing sales funnel get more efficient and effective?
  • How did it increase the value of the firm?
  • Ask leading questions to avoid the 10 Common Sales Mistakes.

Always Lead with 'Results and the Benefit' and Close with an 'Easy Next Step.'

Source:  (Osten, 2016)

2.  Pre-Qualify and Research Your Leads in Your Sales Funnel

Pre-Qualify - Research Your Leads - Biggest time waster is not pre-qualifying your leads with targeted Attraction Marketing, Copywriting, Content, Copy, and SEO.   Do you have a qualifying pre-road map?  A set of questions to ask prospects.  Make yourself a master list of the perfect client, qualities you're looking for, and who aligns with your company's mission, vision, and goals the best.

Don’t be afraid to say no to a prospect that isn’t the correct fit. Instead, try it some time, and let go of an opportunity that doesn’t fit your vision.  A freeing experience that opens you and your company up for positive flow.

3.  Integrity

Integrity - Never Lie to Prospects - Making up alternate facts is not the way to win over the business and create long-lasting relationships.  Honesty is everything.  Remember the golden rule “do unto others as they would do unto you.”  The best rule created!

4.  Honor

Honor - Never Over Promise - Under promise and overdeliver is a motto to live by; it creates a win-win for all involved.  Getting into situations that keep perpetuating underperformance will get you and your firm fired quickly.

5.  Truth

Expert Tip:  “Don’t be a ‘YES’ person!  What are the biggest sales mistake you can make?  It is not forgetting or skipping the step to pre-qualify potential clients.  Surprisingly it’s saying ‘YES,’ to ideas and actions that are not in the benefit of your client.”  - Cheri Lucking

Truth - Learn to Say No - Have you ever been in a client meeting when the client is trying to take you away from your mission, vision, or goals?

Recently we were in a situation where it made good sense to walk away from the business.  A prospect that didn’t line up with the type of client we wanted to work with; our vision, mission, goals, and process were not the same. In addition, the prospect was not respecting the expertise we were bringing to the project.

Magic will Happen if you Open the Door
for
New Business to Flow Through

You don’t need to compromise your values for the sake of money.  Feeling excited and happy to meet and work with your clients is a sign of a healthy you and business.  Just Say No!  It’s ok NOT to work with anybody who comes knocking on your door. Working together needs to be a two-way experience.  Life is a journey of positive and negative; choose positive whenever possible!

Expert Tip: Ditch negative, abusive clients to create a pleasant journey as a team.

6.  Sell the Value and Benefits

Value - Sell the Benefits, Not the Product or Services - When you sell the benefits of your product or service, the positive outcome, you are more likely to get the work.  Your prospects need to feel, by engaging with your product or services, that they will reap benefits far more significant than if they didn’t buy from you.

7.  Follow Up on Your Sales Funnel

Follow Up – Today, not “Mañana” - If you tend to procrastinate, make a New Year’s Resolution to get it done today!  It is a freeing experience.  It gets the project out the door and out of your mind so you can move on to the next order of business or pleasure.

Coaching and applying expert sales techniques, follow-up, and closing techniques, have led me to believe that short scripted one-sentence hooks can increase sales by 60% or more.

Call Me today to See How I Can Help You at 303-362-0498 or Email me: at cheri@contentbrandingsolutions.com

8.  Occam’s Razor

Occam’s razor, also spelled Ockham’s razor, also called the law of economy or law of parsimony, the principle stated by the Scholastic philosopher William of Ockham (1285–1347/49) (Duignan, 2018)

"When you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is, the better."

Or as coined in the 1960s by Skunk Works engineer Kelly Johnson

"Keep it Simple, Stupid," (KISS).

Occam’s Razor - Utilize the KISS Principal - overcomplicating any process is unnecessary.  The problem-solving principle is that the simplest solution tends to be the right one.  It’s that simple!

9.  Respect Your Potential clients In the Sales Funnel

The inbound attraction sales approach changes how you relate to prospects and close your deals and contracts.  Through expertise and thought leadership, respect, and providing value and benefits to your qualified candidates lies at the heart of excellent attraction marketing.

Respect – Your Clients.  Many professionals refer to their clients as idiots, “They don’t understand the process, etc.”  Remember that your clients are experts in their field.  As an expert in your field, you need to educate them by sharing your expertise and never talk badly about them behind their back to anyone.

Respect - Do Not Blast Emails - Don’t burn out your email list by over-sending emails to your list.  Your messages will end up in the junk folder and trash bin. Instead, respect your email list; it is your gold.  Use sparingly and on purpose sharing useful information.  Don’t always be selling your product or service. Instead, give them something of benefit, compliment on their accomplishments, and it will return in kind.

Respect - Stop! Think!
Stop sending LinkedIn Navigator Automated Messages to Peoples in Trays! 

They will just block you...

10.  Convert and Close the Deal

When it comes to closing a lucrative deal and getting that significant contract, it all depends on how you ask and when you stop talking. Unfortunately, we’ve been in presentations where the presenter asks for the order, then proceeds to talk themselves out of the contract by steering the prospect onto another topic. Instead, ask for the order, let the prospect talk next, and don’t interrupt.  Here are four effective closing techniques to try today.

“Learn when to stop talking. Then, once you have presented your close, Stop Talking!”  – Cheri Lucking.

• How to Convert with Emails - Write Short Emails to Engage - Data suggests emails shorter in length have above a 50% response rate. Keeping your emails between 50 and 125 words will help avoid the clickthrough.  Keep emails positive, short, snappy, and worthy of the receiver’s time and energy.  Try it and enjoy the results.

In a face-to-face meeting, always utilize effective closing techniques.  Before you close, cover the basics from the pain points to the solution, the promise, to the value.

Ask questions before the close to fan the flames of your prospect's need to succeed using your product or service. Then, listen, recognize, and respond to the prospect's objections before committing to the contract.

The Simple Art of the Deal is to Always ask for the Order:

• The Assumptive Close: “Did this presentation meet your expectations?” After sharing content, “Does this sound like something valuable to your company? Are we in agreement to work together?"
• The Takeaway Close if you can’t agree on the price: Reduce scope, try taking away a feature or service in exchange for a lower price.  Taking items away often makes the client nervous and curious about the impact of losing that feature on the overall project.

The Confident expert close:

“Are you ready to get started?

Let's Open the Door to Opportunity Together”

Contact us today!  What are you waiting for?

With three decades as an expert and Multimedia Marketing Executive in B2B and B2C in radio, TV, and media marketing, I see these common sales mistakes recurring.  Coaching sales:

From architects to contractors, professionals in the A&E industry are the least trained sales and marketing people we have come across. As a result, they have difficulty believing that their services are a product that needs delivery and practical closing skills.

“Let us write, edit and illustrate for you.  Then coach your team to knock it out of the ballpark.  After all, it’s our passion.”

Coaching is an essential improvement for many professionals that pays for itself.  We train you to anticipate your client’s concerns, learn the answers to their objections and fears, and help lead them to the close.

Drop me a line for your Thought Leadership Coaching and Training

Phone: 303-362-0498
or
Email me: cheri@contentbrandingsolutions.com

We are Content Marketing Strategists specializing in branding, digital marketing, thought leadership, and custom website design with SEO, editing, and graphics services to jump-start your business's brand voice, visual identity, and equity assets.  Branding with an Edge

Content Branding Solutions Brand Imagineering
Will help You
Envision Your Goals, Your Brand Voice, and your Visual Identity
to
Create Equity in a Competitive Market.

Copywriting demand is at an all-time high. As a result, marketers actively search for professionals who know their market and want to partner with them.

Want to know more about Cheri Lucking?  Our Company Specialty Niche is Small to Mid-size Enterprise Business - B2B and B2C SEO Copywriting. 

References for 10 Common Sales Mistakes in Your Sales Funnel

Duignan, B. (2018, December 19). Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved from Encyclopedia Britannica: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Occams-razor

Osten, C. (2016, October 05). Are You Really Listening, or Just Waiting to Talk? Retrieved from Psychology Today: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-right-balance/201610/are-you-really-listening-or-just-waiting-talk