A Novice’s Guide to Marketing & Sales

By John E. Hudson

Marketing has long been a fancy of mine. The reason I find marketing so interesting is that it deals with the way people develop and react to different concepts. It also provides insight into the process a particular individual uses to develop the rationale for the decision they just reached. The key to a good market program is to focus on, and exploit this human trait. Creating a plan to suggest consumer acceptance before the targeted prospect develops the sense of need is a great skill.

While this may sound like a subliminal message, it really isn’t. Today’s technical name is pro-active marketing. You can really call it what you want. The bottom line is to create a market need using your strengths in order to capture a position of leadership. After you have done it, you tell the world about it and they stand in line to give you money.

Sounds great doesn’t it? You know the market really needs what you have to offer. Are you ready to start tomorrow? Why not?

These are the key attitudes necessary to create an aggressive marketing campaign that will increase your sales volume and profit dollars. A common mistake of business is the belief that price management allows you to maintain a level of business that is necessary for long term success. To develop long term business success you must provide value to a select group of individuals who truly believe you are the only source for what they seek.

There are several items critical to the development of a successful, aggressive marketing plan: Market Leadership, Risk Management and Selling Tactics. Without these essential skills it is difficult to control the business environment because you don’t have a complete picture of how outside influences affect the market.

Market Leadership: If you are not willing to define the industry accepted criteria for a specific product or service offering, your competition will. The prospect will always have an opinion of what they want to buy and how much they are willing to pay. They will also have an opinion on the perceived value of your goods and services to their business or to them personally.

Selling Message #1, Perception. Create an industry need only you can fulfill!

To lead the market it is necessary to teach it about the benefits of purchasing goods and services from you. The consumers are influenced by what they read, see and hear. Rarely do you find an independent thinker. People want things that make them successful. So, your objective is well defined. Create a message that is believable and is verifiable by references in the market segment.

Risk Management: Aggressive campaigns must be measurable. The primary goal is to take control of the market. Other elements that must be influence dare, the content of services offered, the proper price structure, and the acceptable standards for conducting business. These are the goals. To be successful you must have criteria for measuring your success at reaching these goals. Risk management consists of many elements. Each of these issues deals specifically with the elements that affect your potential for success. Also, each has an associated out-of-pocket expense. This makes it mandatory to manage the effectiveness of the program.

Selling Message #2, Value. By tailoring our products to the requirements of their market, we have helped our customers succeed.

I believe the two most critical issues in a pro-active marketing campaign are the “time line for success,” and the “barriers to entry.” Many business planners deal with these issues separately. In my opinion, it is mandatory that these two issues be dealt with as a set. This is especially true in a small business that has limited resources in time and money.

The “time line for success” provides a schedule of events that must occur during the campaign. You manage the campaign with a series of milestones. Each milestone has a set of goals associated with it. The milestones will change with each new campaign. As you approach the milestones at the end of the schedule, you should have specific goals for capture rate and customer acceptance.

If you are meeting your goals on the time line you set, you are on the road to success. As soon as you sense that you are having trouble meeting the goals, reevaluate both the goals and the timing for success. You may find that the market is not what you expected, or your goals are too ambitious. Apply the rule of “time versus money.” Will the project create the income I want in a time frame that is acceptable to me and by business? If the answer is no, or maybe, you should consider abandoning the project. If you do closeout the project, you need to know why it did not succeed. Some parts were successful, some were not. It is equally important to know why elements of any project succeed or fail.

Selling Message #3, Need. The market needs your services because you told them they did!

Entry barriers have a major effect on the time line. The level of market awareness by the consumer, as well as the number and quality of your perceived competitors, can severely impact the timing required to succeed. In either case these are two items that you must understand and factor into your campaign before you commit to spend your business development dollars.

Other issues affecting your decision to enter are; market segment knowledge, your time commitments to other projects, personal and business resources, and the cost of technology to serve the market. The bottom line in risk management should not be viewed as a negative. It is good business to know your strengths and limitations. This kind of knowledge allows you to optimize your personal and business resources. Any time you decide to take an aggressive position you should be well prepared to win.

Selling Tactics: Creating an aggressive marketing plan without an aggressive selling plan is like practicing all your life to hit a home run and then never getting up to bat. If your intent is to attack the market you need to:

  1. Develop the language of the industry
  2. Solve the problem
  3. Manage the selling cycle
  4. Steam roll the competition

These four items are dealt with in sets. Language development and solving problems go hand-in hand. In order to successfully sell in a market segment you must develop their vocabulary and understand how and when to apply it. We have all seen it É someone tries to sell us something and they have no concept of how it’s used, or why we would use it. If that applies to us, why wouldn’t it apply to our prospect? To make the sale, allow the prospect to be the hero. We win because we allowed them to provide solutions to the individuals they are responsible to.

Selling Message #4, Ask for the Order. At some point in the selling cycle you must stop selling and ask for a commitment from the buyer.

Managing the selling cycle and steam rolling the competition are keys to sales success. The only way to steam roll the competition is understand and manage the selling cycle. This means that you, or a sales manager, must take an active roll in preparing the sales staff to be well trained in creating the approach to closing the sale.

The requirements for closing a sale are part of the risk management portion of a marketing plan. To complete a sale for anything certain needs have to be met. The other portion of the sales cycle is managing the flow of the sale. By managing the flow it makes it difficult for competition to invade the prospect.

Selling Message #5, Winning. To win both the seller and the buyer must believe that their objectives are being met.

Remember, the company that defines the buyers needs, presents products to fill those needs, and controls the selling cycle will always win in the long run.

Conclusion

Some industry critics believe that aggressively attacking a specific business segment is risky and leaves a bad image if it is done improperly. To some degree they are correct. The business that is not prepared to actively solve the buyer’s needs will fail and negatively influence the prospect on the value of goods offered to them by another company. The message is be prepared to win. Fill the needs of the prospect at the point of sale.

John Hudson is a Product Director for Comverse Technology, Inc.

[From Connection Magazine, January 1994]

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