Three Strategies to Accelerate Sales Growth

Three Strategies

to Accelerate Sales Growth

By Brad Harker, Author and Sales Growth Advisor

Selling has evolved drastically over the last few decades. Innovation has shifted both what we sell and how we sell it. With such a rapid pace of change, it can be easy to complicate your sales process in an effort to stay competitive. Sales revenue is the lifeblood of your business, and in the words of Heraclitus, “The only constant in life is change.” Given the fact that even the most finely tuned sales systems develop bottlenecks and inefficiencies, here are three strategies to accelerate sales growth and boost revenue in 2021: 1. Sell value over features.

“Nothing happens in business until something gets sold.” – Thomas Watson

Improving customer engagement might be the most effective way to boost sales growth. With so much noise vying for your customers’ attention, you need to be compelling! Let’s quickly recap two important rules of selling:

Rule #1: The product or service you offer isn’t as significant as the value it creates for your customer. Your customer doesn’t care who you are or what you offer unless and until they can clearly see the value it provides for them.

Rule #2: The value your product offers must be greater than the perceived cost. As value exceeds cost, urgency and demand increase as well.

Challenge: Does your current messaging strategy focus on product features or customer challenges? What is the value your solution creates for your customers? How does it solve their problems? Ask existing customers to share the value they have gained from your solution. Use this content to test new messaging strategies.

2. Be a guide, not a hero.

“Your customer should be the hero of the story, not your brand. This is the secret every phenomenally successful business understands.” – Donald Miller

A common reason marketing and sales strategies fall short is because they position the company or sales executive as the “hero” with a solution to save the customer. According to Donald Miller, author of Building a StoryBrand, your customer is the hero. You are the guide with a plan (your solution) to help the hero defeat the villain (pain). While this might seem like a subtle nuance, most companies inadvertently position themselves as the hero and fail to recognize the many ways their product-centric messaging stifles rapport, fails to connect, or even alienates the customer during the sales process. Consider the attributes of an effective guide. First, most guides are experts in their chosen fields. This expertise allows them to confidently lead, even in challenging circumstances. A guide has knowledge and situational awareness to modify the plan to fit any situation. Finally, a guide has empathy. He/she invests in the hero’s success, not their own. A guide adapts to the hero’s needs, customizing the plan (solution) to meet their specific needs. Challenge: Invite your team to read Building A StoryBrand by Donald Miller, or review your sales process and messaging in context of the “Hero’s Journey.” Evaluate your team members through the lens of an effective guide: product knowledge, empathy, adaptability, and leadership. 3. Refine the customer journey.

“If you can’t describe what you are doing as a process, you don’t know what you’re doing.” – Edwards Deming

An orchestra provides a suitable metaphor for an effective sales process. Every orchestra shares a few key elements: tuned instruments, trained musicians, music, and a conductor. With any part missing, chaos would certainly ensue. Yet, when each element is in place, the conductor tunes the orchestra to concert pitch and, without saying a word, launches the orchestra into action with incredible precision. With only a few simple gestures, the conductor moves the orchestra from piece to piece, adjusting the timing, volume, and intensity to deliver a musical masterpiece. An effective sales process is similar. Every sales process introduces a viable candidate through the stages of lead generation, sales development, sales, implementation, and customer success. In each stage, various messages, emails, tasks, statistics, and handoffs are choreographed to create a seamless customer journey. Like the orchestra, consistent structure can help you tune, accelerate, and scale your sales growth to generate powerful results. It is always interesting to watch sales processes evolve in the early phases of growth. Selling can be intense and unpredictable. It is this intensity and passion that makes it so rewarding to watch a fledgling sales process transform into an efficient and predictable engine of growth. Challenge: Is your sales process ready to scale? Take an inventory of your last ten transactions using the following six questions, giving yourself a score of 0-10 depending on how many sales met the criteria. Out of 10, how many sales/customers: 1. Came from a consistent lead source? Score ____/10 2. Followed a consistent sales process? Score ____/10 3. Closed without requiring product customization? Score ____/10 4. Were satisfied with the performance/stability of the product? Score ____/10 5. Purchased the solution for a similar need/pain? Score ____/10 6. Voluntarily evangelized or referred your company? Score ____/10

Total ____/60

Brad Harker is a published author, software executive, and sales growth advisor to companies in the mountain west. Brad has enjoyed an ambitious career spanning real estate development, corporate entrepreneurship, and more than a quarterbillion dollars in sales. Brad was born in Calgary, Canada, graduated from BYU, and has spent the last eleven years in St. George with his wife and four children. You can reach Brad via email: brad@bradharker.com