To take a simple example, imagine that you were running a hotel. In looking to make your hotel the best one on the market, you could go onto a site like orbitz or expedia, and look at the reviews of your competitors, the other established hotels in your area and price range. However, by focusing on the lowest reviews, you could find exactly what customers didn’t like about the hotel, and find ways for your product to pick up on opportunities that were missed by your competitors.

You can do this in any industry, and with any type of business. It’s just a matter of knowing where to look, and how to properly turn the negative feedback into useful and constructive advice.

Begin by knowing where to look, and what to look for. This depends primarily upon your industry. There are hundreds of industry-specific review websites and social networks out there, some of them better known than others. Twitter and Facebook are obviously great places to start, as are social media sites like Yelp, provided that they are relevant to your industry.

To find additional review sites, just browse through what people are linking to on Twitter and Facebook, or do a Google search for “your industry + reviews.” You’ll be surprised just how many sites there are out there.

Once you find negative feedback, you’ll need to incorporate what you’ve learned into your business. So if you see a lot of customers complaining about a business practice that is common in your industry (even if the complaints are specifically directed toward your company), then you know to change that practice. For instance, if you see a lot of complaints about online marketers sending out too many useless emails, you might want to take a step back and think about whether you’re personally guilty of that sin.

On the other side, if you see a lot of people complaining about something that doesn’t exist, then you may have found a niche for your business to profitably expand into.

At the end of the day, it’s always good to know what customers are saying about your business, and the other businesses in your industry. And considering that people are 10 times more likely to post a negative comment than a positive one, looking for negativity is a great way to start.

Happy marketing!

Sean

Sean McPheat

Marketing Consultant – Sales Expert - Motivational Speaker

Make or Break

Never forget that, more than any other type of sales, face to face selling is a make or break opportunity. People are busy, they have short attention spans, and typically they aren’t very interested in what you’re selling, at least initially. Which is all the more reason that it is absolutely essential to open strong and close quickly.

Capture Their Attention

Once you get the first few seconds of someone’s attention, you can easily build from there. But getting the first few seconds is the tough part – how do you get someone to take a break from their busy life and listen to what you have to say? By making a creating appeal to their emotions, or by offering them a deal! Even the busiest among us are always looking for a way to save a couple of quid, so give them a chance to do just that.

Create Urgency

Along with being make-or-break, face to face selling needs to move along quickly. As opposed to internet-based sales, where you bring in your customer slowly with free information before offering them an opportunity to buy, face-to-face sales need to close quickly.

If your customer walks away without making a purchase, you will likely never hear from them again. So build urgency in whatever manner you can. Stress that there is only a limited amount of your product left, or that the offer you’re giving them will not be good forever.

However, here you must be careful to steer away from hackneyed phrases like “limited time offer,” and “only available for a short time.” People are so accustomed to these phrases being thrown around that they won’t believe you even if you’re telling the truth, and you’ll damage your credibility by looking like a pushy, amateur, salesman.

In today’s age of faceless promotion and internet marketing, face-to-face sales are more effective than ever. However, the key to effective in-person selling is understanding that your customers are busy, making a powerful appeal, giving them an offer, creating urgency, and closing deal without coming off as pushy or annoying. Sounds like a tall order, but the only way to get better at it is by practising.

Happy marketing!

Sean

Sean McPheat

Marketing Consultant – Sales Expert - Motivational Speaker

They’ll take the shirt off your back if you’re not careful!

He wants to know about the price of your product.

Of course he does – and rightfully so! But here’s where most salesmen begin to falter. They’re uncomfortable talking about price because they aren’t sure how the customer will respond at this critical point in the sales process. What they don’t realize is that their level of confidence visibly drains, their body language completely changes, and their response to this question is more of a turnoff than a convincing close.

Why wouldn’t you be confident about the price of your product? You just spend a good 30-60 minutes telling your prospect about the pros, cons, and benefits of your services. Don’t you think it’s priced competitively?

Never be afraid to confidently answer questions about the price of your product, especially if you’re at the point in which the sale may close. Maintain eye contact with your prospect, use the same hand gestures you’ve used throughout the entire presentation, and make sure your body language and tone express how excited you are about the product and the way it is priced.

Feeling uncomfortable? Stand in front of your mirror in the morning and talk about your price point as if you are talking to a client. Repeat yourself several times until you are comfortable with this part of your presentation.

Remember this! Your confidence will give your prospect confidence!

Sean

Sales Expert - Marketing Consultant – Motivational Speaker

In my experience there are four main things you need to do when attempting to pursuade someone to make a purchase. These include:

• Being direct and to the point, immediately establishing your own credibility as a salesperson and someone your potential client should trust;
• The art of finding some sort of common ground between your business and the business of your prospect so that you can position yourself based on your similarities;
• The ability to show your prospect evidence that supports the fact that he wants or desires the product or services you are selling; and
• The ability to connect with your prospects on an emotional level.

Take any one of these skills and you’ll find your sales presentations begin to run smoother. Combine two, three, or all four and you’ll find your sales numbers increasing steadily.

Many of your prospects have already decided that they want to make a purchase. They’re just not sure what they’re going to buy or who from. It’s your job to pursuade them that they want what you have!

Sean

Sales Expert - Marketing Consultant – Motivational Speaker

1. What criteria do your customers use when determining whether or not they should make a purchase from you?
2. What makes a customer purchase your products more than once?
3. What makes a customer take his business away from you and go to another company?

These questions are similar to those we’ve asked before, but it’s important for you to understand the answers before you go out on your next sales call. You can guarantee that whatever criteria your prospect is applying to your meeting will apply across the board and you’re going to want to make sure the answers you give them to their questions (spoken or not) are better than the answers they get from your competition.

After your initial sale you’ll need to understand what is going to propmt your new client to continue purchasing from you. Pay special attention to his needs and desires in your initial meetings. You’re going to need this information in order to take a proactive approach in the future.

Remember, it’s easier to keep a current customer than to find a new one. The more willing you are to keep your customer happy the less likely it is you’ll end up losing him later on.

Sean

Sales Expert - Marketing Consultant – Motivational Speaker

There are four main characteristics that will help you to determine whether or not a customer is likely to remain loyal. When you review your current client list for upsells, or even your new prospect list, keep these factors in mind.

First, how satisfied has your client been with your product in the past? If he has a dislike he’s not likely to stay. Clients who merely like your product but don’t really care either way about the brand may or may not jump ship if they’re presented with a similiar product from another salesman. Someone who loves your brand is less likely to leave, even if offered a lower price.

Clients also make decisions based on what they percieve to be risks. Don’t expect to make a ton of sales if you’re offering a product or service that your clients fear may be a waste of money. You’ll need to not only sell the benefits of the product but find ways to show that those benefits far outweigh the risks.

Another important factor is the availability of substitutes. Let’s say, for example, you are selling widgets. Where do you think your customer will turn if three other companies are selling widgets and you are all pricing them differently? Probably to the cheapest competitor. That doesn’t mean you have to lowball your prices, but it does mean you have to offer incredible customer service and incentives to keep them around.

Lastly, a customer will remain loyal if he recognises that changing brands would be more costly than staying where he is. That does not mean you can kick back and relax. Most customers are willing to spend money moving to a new brand if they’re really upset with your customer service, accounting practices, or anything else that offends them.

Remember! Your customers won’t look around if you don’t give them a real reason to. Keep in touch, offer new products and services as they become available, and make sure they realize you care about their happiness. Make them feel special and they’ll remain customers for life!

Sean

Sales Expert - Marketing Consultant – Motivational Speaker

What type of customer are you trying to attract?

Anyone who will spend their money on your products and services, most likely. That’s a nice goal, but why don’t we narrow it down a little bit.

There are three types of customers that every organisation should aim to attract. They’re the ones you really need in order to ensure success. These include:

• Valuable current customers
• The customers of your competitors
• Valuable customers you have lost

Let’s clarify. There’s a huge difference between a current customer and a “valuable” current customer. A current customer with a really tiny account demanding a huge level of customer service may not be valuable; nor is the guy who forgets to pay his bill every month. These are the customers who actually cost you money to keep. What you really want to do is provide stellar customer service to the guys who pay their bills on time and don’t ask you to go above and beyond the scope of your contract (not too often, anyway). Keep your current customers happy and, later on, up-sell additional products and services.

I don’t know why you wouldn’t want to go after the customers of your competitors. After all, your products and services are better than theirs. RIGHT? If the answer to that question was no, you’d better take a close look at your marketing plan.

Finally, any customer you lost (for any reason) should be saught after (unless, of course, they fall into the category of a customer not worth retaining – in which case you shoudl let them go). Otherwise, remarket your products and services. Perhaps they’re not happy with their new provider and were too embarassed to come back to you. Maybe they realized later that they weren’t getting the same level of service or the same value for their money. It’s up to you to find out.

Make sure you include an evaluation of your customer base the next time your review your current sales process. There may be gaps in the market you haven’t considered and they may mean the difference between failure and success!

Sean

Sales Expert - Marketing Consultant – Motivational Speaker

Pricing, positioning and distribution are areas where the small retailer find it hard to compete with the big boys but one area where they really do have an advantage, if they do it right that is, are the levels of customer service that they provide to their prospects and clients.

Enter any medium to large sized retailer today and you are often faced with two approaches. You are either pounced upon by a sales assistant as soon as you come through the door or on the other extreme you get totally ignored.

But for the small retailer, this is an area where they can really make a difference to build up a loyal client base who are treated as individuals as opposed to a number.

Here are 5 top tips to turn your retail store into one that really appreciates its customers:

1.     The Customer Experience

Have you clearly articulated to your staff what you are trying to achieve in terms of customer experience? What do you want the experience to include? Friendly? Informative? Helpful? What do you want your browsers and customers to go away from your store saying about you?

2.     Add-Ons

I don’t advocate hard selling but on 80% of the occasions that someone purchases something in your store there is also an opportunity for them to purchase a complementary product too. Items like glue, thread and string can be combined with almost anything can add 5-10% onto the total purchase price without you looking like you are ramming it down their throat.

3.     Can I Help You?

Never ask this question because we all know that the person will come back with “I’m just looking”. Instead, ask “Is there anything I can help you to look for?” By asking this they cannot come back with the just looking excuse!

4.     Did You Find Everything You Were Looking For?

Here’s another golden nugget – when your customers are paying for their items ask “Did you find everything that you were looking for today?” Sometimes, this acts as a memory jogger for other items and sometimes the customer simply could not find what they needed but did not ask. Expect to have a 5-10% increase in your sales by using this approach.

5.     Make It Easy For Your Customers

When all is said and done your customers want an easy life! They want to browse your store, finding things easily with helpful staff. This is an experience that you can create with no excuses. Become well known for your excellent levels of customer service and friendliness and news will soon travel fast.

Sean

Marketing Consultant

Now in this store there are 6 floors and you have to go up to the very top floor and work your way down! There’s no cheating!

Floor 6 only goes down to floor 5, floor 5 only goes down to floor 4 etc - That includes the escalator, stairs and lift!

It was driving me nuts!

We found what we wanted on Floor 5 and had to walk around each floor to get to the exit to the next floor down! Plus my little daughter had one on her with the terrible two’s So I just wanted to get out of therE…….quick!

We were in the lift and everyone was commenting on how unfriendly the store layout was and that “I’m not coming here again in a hurry”

This got me thinking about their sales process and why they would want to force you to take a certain course of action. Now I’m all for this type of approach because it maximizes your revenues but it has got to be consumer friendly at the same time.

Their thinking is that by walking through every department, that you will buy more product simply by exposing you to more sales opportunities.

This may or may not be true. But whilst you may increase the average unit of sale, you will decrease the frequency of purchase by not visiting the store as often.

Coventry’s IKEA is not a place I would visit often because the buying process is “so painful”. I can’t simply go in, get what I want and get the heck out of there. Instead I am forced to join my “fellow herd” in following the EXIT signs for 20 minutes to get out of there!

Remember the ways to build a business?

Higher prices, get them to purchase more product, get them to purchase more frequently.

By using this approach IKEA are hoping for you to purchase more product but it will be at the expense of more frequently purchased products – or so 80% of the people (20) in my lift were confessing to anyhow.

Think through your sales process and adjust it accordingly. I sure do hope that Coventry’s IKEA changes it’s sales process because by the looks of it (Saturday afternoon and it was not busy) they may need all of the help they can get.

Happy Selling!

Sean