It’s not widely known, but for companies to achieve significant, predictable, and sustainable sales growth, they need a system. A smooth selling system. Selling is a science that must be artfully executed. This system is not complicated, but like any other science, there are certain principles that must be followed to see consistent results.
Companies that can implement this smooth selling system, learning from the proven results of others, will find they have a competitive advantage.
The benefits of adopting a smooth selling system include:
- A shorter sales cycle. There is an old adage in sales that time kills deals. Smooth selling helps you close more deals by shortening the buying process.
- Higher leads-to-sales conversion rates. Small increases in conversion rates can have a huge impact on gross revenue.
- Larger transaction sizes. A smooth selling approach helps the sales team focus not just on the number of deals but also the size of the deal. Increasing that transaction size can greatly increase revenue growth, with the same amount of effort.
- Higher gross profit margins. Smooth selling shows how you don’t have to discount to get new business or enter a new market. This system helps you minimize the need for discounting, thus raising your profit margin.
- Longer sales employee retention rates. Most companies have a hard time attracting and retaining key sales talent. Top sales performers like to play on a winning team – one that has its act together where everyone knows the goals, measurements, and processes to follow.
- More cost-effective lead generation. With a proven process, generated leads don’t fall through the cracks, wasting valuable opportunities. Your organization will gather and nurture leads efficiently.
- Better marketing ROI. By eliminating sales waste, you’ll see an increased return on investment from your marketing efforts.
- Less business owner and sales leader stress. Overall, smooth selling reduces stress on business leaders. When the owners have a sales team they can count on, they can focus their attention on other important areas of the business. There will be fewer surprises and more consistent, sustainable growth.
Sounds good, right? Well, here’s what you need to know to get these benefits for your organization.
The Four Steps Needed for a Smooth Selling System
The Smooth Selling System that I teach in my STAR Guide workshops below, has four steps.
- The first step in sales planning is to stop and assess or audit your current sales process. Meaning, how well does your organization do with the following critical areas of sales operations: strategy, methodology, performance metrics, and organization? Do you have a documented process? Have you identified the most profitable target customer? How do you handle forecasting? Who has access to sales and prospect data? Have you evaluated the skills sets of your sales people? How do you set sales quotes and compensation plans? How is your sales organization structured?
Taking a deep dive into auditing your sales organizations’ strategy, processes and people is illuminating to analyze the gap between how your sales organization operates now and where it needs to be for more sustainable growth.
- The second step in sales planning is to design YOUR sales process. While the system steps are the same for all, how they get implemented is unique to your organization. After auditing your current state and analyzing the gaps, you may find that you need to design a new sales engagement model, or reengineer some of your sales processes, or work on strengthening your unique value proposition and sales messaging. This is where you chart the course forward.
- This is my favorite part in the process because this is where you take action to set yourself up for success. You may adopt a new customer relationship management (CRM) software to track sales activity and results. You may reorganize your sales team moving some people to inside sales to better take advantage of their unique skill sets. Or you may roll out a new sales compensation plan that better reflects the behaviors you want to reward and attracts better talent.
At this stage it’s all about investing the time and resources to focus on talent acquisition, on-boarding, training, sales processes, implementing sales support systems, and identifying the key metrics that matter to your organization’s goals.
- Ready, set, sail. The final step in the process focuses on properly managing the sales plan. The goal is to ensure that the sales plan is executed as effectively as possible and that the sales team adopts the newly defined sales processes, performance metrics, and reporting requirements.
That’s it. While it’s not complicated, it does take some time and commitment but success is totally obtainable. This process is proven. I have helped 63 companies in the past 31 years create 21 – 142% sales growth in the very first year.
But, how do you start?
To help business owners start and gain more control of their sales growth, I created the Star Guide Program for Smooth Selling Forever.
This accelerated, 10-week program gives you and your organization the processes, techniques and tools to get more control over your time, opportunities, and sales revenue for more predictable and sustainable sales growth.
There are two versions of this program, one for small and mid-size business owners that launches in April. You can get more information and register here. The second version is for trusted advisors, coaches, and consultants, since this program is also extremely effective where the owner is the main sales generator. Check back for more details and future workshops here.
If you have any questions on how a smooth selling system could benefit your organization or about the Star Guide Program, please give me a call at 630.649.4943.