Many small businesses spend so much time and effort focusing on the front end of the marketing funnel that they neglect one of the most important components of the marketing process. What happens to a lead once they express interest in your business? For most small businesses, one of the most costly aspects of the marketing equation is how your staff handle the leads that come to you – whether by phone, email, fax, or in person. You’re investing a lot in generating leads, and every lead counts! That’s why training all your staff on how to properly answer the phone, respond to a customer request, and handle leads is so critical. – Tiffany Monhollon
Sales people are not the devil. Sales is not a four-letter word.
Sales are what keeps your business or organization alive. Tiffany was exactly right, but did you notice how she didn’t use the word sales even one time…
Really, it is OK. If it makes you feel better, you can call it conversion, engagement, lead handling, customer service, account management, or any of the other dozens of made up titles for sales. I don’t care as long as you realize that it is a critical part of the process. So many Internet marketers forget that sales people are a good thing!
Nobody is any company, any where, at any time, has ever made any money, until someone sold something.
I call this process Social Media Sales. It is the process converting leads generated through social media and internet marketing into actual revenue dollars for your organization. It usually goes something like this:
- Develop the personal relationship
- Identify customer needs
- Qualify customer for budget and resources
- Assist in the decision making process
- Present custom solutions not offered on the Internet
- Assist in the delivery of the product or service
- Resolve issues or concerns throughout the entire process
- Ask for referrals and testimonials
As you can see there are a lot of things that the marketing and website team are typically not equipped to deal with. A trained staff of professional salespeople can help you take the prospects from click to close, and increase your online conversions dramatically.
A lot of people are having a hard time defining a Return On Investment for internet marketing and social media, and it’s because they have left out the sales department. If your activities all eventually lead to dollars sold, then a return is right in the bottom line. Did you sell more than you spent?