Developing a sales strategy is key to better leads. Is there a best way to do it?
There’s more than one way to skin a cat. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. These are clichés you’ve heard before, but can they apply to creating a sales strategy plan, creating sales leads, creating a sales pipeline and going to market? I think so.
You would only put some of your money into one investment, would you? Let’s hope not. So why wouldn’t you diversify your customer success and marketing as well as marketing and selling efforts? Here’s why you should.
Developing a sales strategy: Make Your Efforts Diverse
Everything about sales encourages a team sales approach that allows you to minimize risk, satisfy different ways your buyers want to communicate, give you the ability to measure which efforts work — and which don’t — and cast your net wider.
Marketing and customers, branding and sales and each sales strategy is unique to each company. So, a go to market launch plan that increases company sales for one company may be a dismal failure for another. The key is diversifying your efforts and measuring your success from each category. A few marketing and sales categories that may form the right mix for companies are inbound, focused outreach, and partnerships.
Inside Sales Strategy Works in Two Directions
Two types of inside sales best practices are inbound inquiries and focused outreach.
Inbound Inquiries – What could be more significant than qualified inbound inquiries? In the world of sales marketing inside sales lead generation and appointment setting, there is probably very little. But as you are building a marketing plan and awareness, the key questions to ask and to test are:
- Do these inbound inquiries fit your ideal customer profile and represent your ideal customer?
- Will they eventually buy from you?
- Will they refer you to your ideal customer?
- How strongly are they filing your pipeline of sales?
Testing and monitoring over time will give you your answer.
Focused Outreach – What could be a more challenging initiative than focused outreach? Probably very little. But the essential remaining questions are:
- What if your buyers expect you to reach out to them?
- What if you want to connect with your ideal customer in a personalized, highly focused manner when they have not connected with you?
- What if your buyers are looking for a human connection with you before or after they buy from you?
- What if potential buyers require a response from your company?
- What if you need more than your inbound activity or other efforts to meet your goals?
Should you wait? Probably not. Should you be proactive? Most definitely.
Your Experience Will Be Unique
Build your sales team or hire an outsourced sales team! Their sales marketing inside sales lead generation and appointment setting activities, can exceed or exceeds expectations based on your company goals, buyers’ preferences, and current appointment setting lead-generation results. What personal selling marketing strategy is producing the best sales results for your company?