Don’t become sales’ lone eagle
Sales is an art form. Not everyone can be good at it. But for some people, it comes naturally. Those are the eagles. They spot their prey on the ground, make a go for it, and more often than not come out victorious.
When someone tells them, “You should really try to incorporate marketing automation tools in your selling process.” They give that person the eagle eye stare and fly away. “I won’t let you cage me.” The eagle thinks to himself.
Eagles know that they need to hit targets to survive. As a matter of fact, they strive to exceed their goals. Oh, the glory when they catch a young bighorn sheep instead of a field mouse.
Well, you could be the eagle to reach legendary status by catching a bighorn sheep, or maybe even a pronghorn antelope. That is if you learn how to use marketing automation to your advantage.
Promise to keep an open mind while we explain how?
Closing deals over, and over, and over again
Don’t get it confused. Marketing automation isn’t a trick to cage you. It’s actually a tool that enhances your sales power. All your innate sales talent and tactics are still applicable.
But, if your favorite part of selling is to find leads by scorching the internet, going to trade shows, and exhausting your Rolodex than maybe marketing automation isn’t for you after all. If you live for making deals, however, you’re going to love this part. See, what marketing automation does is it attracts leads for you. Think about it: if you were given an infinite supply of leads and never would have to worry about that part again, how much time would you have left to close deals?
What you need to realize is that the customer that ends up talking to you doesn’t come to you in the way he did before. We live in the Information era now. Once, you used to be the first point of contact for a potential client. Now, you’re almost the last stop before a customer decides to make a purchase. Your position, from the client’s viewpoint, has shifted from the top to nearly the bottom of the funnel. In a way, that means, you’ve become even more critical to the sales process. When the client reaches out to you, they’re done with their research. They just want a human contact to give them the last nudge to buy. So, you’re really at the make it or break it point of the sales cycle. And that’s where analytics can help you.
Get to know potential clients better than ever before
How much research a potential client has done differs and is hard to distinguish when they call you out of the blue. But, with marketing analytics, you know exactly what a prospect has done on your website. It tells you if they read any articles and which ones and which pages they visited on your website. Did they go to the homepage only? Or did they also visit the services page, the pricing page, and the about page? You can use all of this information to figure out what you need to talk about with them. If you have no idea about your prospect’s behavior, you can’t meet him where he’s at in the funnel which will certainly cause you to lose rapport instantly.
Information about the prospect’s behavior also gives you a better insight into his wants and needs which helps you to target your sales better. You know, so you’ll sell them something that actually makes them happy.
By giving feedback to the marketing team on the leads they’ve sent to you, the marketing software can filter out similar people that turned out not to be great clients. This will mean that you eventually only have to spend time with perfect leads. Which will continuously increase your sales numbers, giving you the legendary status you’re dreaming of.
Who knows, you might even start to love the teamwork between you and the marketing team.
So, off you go into the big blue sky. Be free but let marketing automation carry you like the wind onto higher highs and glorious hunting stoops.