Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Is It Worth You Doing It?

Average ratio is 60 to 1 / calls to sales 1 of 10 cold calls leads to prospect appointment
1 of 6 appointments leads to sale


Most experts agree that it takes at least 5 ‘touches’ to finalize 80% of sales. The general statistics go something like this:
- 2% of sales are made on the 1st contact (touch). These are usually people who have already done their research and know exactly what they want;
- 3% of sales are made on the 2nd contact;
- 5% of sales are made on the 3rd contact;
- 10% of sales are made on the 4th contact;
- 80% of sales are made on the 5th contact.


The above are industry standards. So how can you get the odds more in your favor?


First off you need to be aggressive. That does not mean the traditional agressivenss associated with a telemarketer that brow beats you into submission or the classic “Used Car Salesman” idea. If you go in with a multiple touch, multichannel approach you will not cork someone off. How you construct your program will make all the difference on how fast your lead generation program will start producing.


Now while I use telemarketing as the main core of my programs. We also put in place SEO . direct mail, email blasts, social media marketing strategies, blogs, to name a few. In this way we can lower the odds of engagement. And getting a lead from ground zero to happy customer in the shortest amount of time possible, based on your sales cycle, of course.


Larson Notes & Satire: We need sales, we need them now! How many salespeople have hear that cry out of the mouth of their sales manager? What do you do? It’s like a street drag race. Your stopped at a stop sign. Engines poised and ready, the light turns green, you pop the clutch and go………. It can be done but like the drag race it takes a lot of energy to go from ZERO to 60 in 5 seconds.


“HeyLittle Cobra” by the Rip Cords:


Hey, Little Cobra, don't you know
you're gonna to shut 'em down


I took my Cobra down to the track,
hitched to the back of my Cadillac,


Everyone was there just a waiting for me
There were plenty of Stingrays and XKEs,


Spring little Cobra getting ready to strike
Spring Little Cobra with all your might
Spring little Cobra getting ready to strike
Spring Little Cobra with all your might


Hey, Little Cobra, don't you know
you are going to shut them down


When the flag went down, you could hear rubber burn,
The Stingray pulled me going into the turn


I hung a big shift, and I got into high,
When I when I flew by the Stingray, I waved bye bye.


Spring little Cobra getting ready to strike
Spring Little Cobra with all your might
Spring little Cobra getting ready to strike
Spring Little Cobra with all your might


Hey, Little Cobra, Don't you know
you are going to shut 'em down


Around the turn into the straight away
I was blowing off everything that got in my way,


Stingrays and Jags were so far behind
I took my Cobra out of gear and let it coast to the line.

Spring little Cobra getting ready to strike
Spring Little Cobra with all your might
Spring little Cobra getting ready to strike
Spring Little Cobra with all your might


Hey, Little Cobra, Don't you know
you are going to shut 'em down
Shut'em down, shut'em down, shut'em down...


Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3rd our Virtual Business Consulting Program


Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates


https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate


P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

It’s Really In The Outbound

How many emails, how many sales calls do I get by online web guys, SEO experts, get 2000 leads on line in a day people? Every week they hit me with their offers of more and more leads. It is wonderful to be loved. Now I admit my web site is nothing to write home about but it is getting the job done, people are finding it, reading it and some are reacting and even becoming clients. And as much as these wonderful people want to help they don’t seem to understand that in some categories with the help of landing pages I come up #1. Include that with my #1 status in a local search and well . . .


But hold on a second, let’s look at this a moment. Seems these we will make you #1 on Google guys are doing, can it be, OUTBOUND MARKETING. Oh MY Gosh, say it ain’t so! They are selling me “inbound marketing”, using “outbound marketing” techniques.


Don’t get me wrong here; I don’t want to be misunderstood. Having a marketing strategy of being found is good and being 1st on a Google search is a beautiful thing but it just does not create enough volume. We, you and I, need a certain number of leads which can then be converted into a certain number of sales to stay in business. Inbound leads only make up a small percentage of those needed prospects.


To get it done you need to implement two key elements, predictive prospecting and an outbound marketing plan.


When you need to find who would buy from you. You can find names but who out of the 1000’s of names you can collect are real prospects? Here is my way of finding top prospects, the same way I do it for my clients. I ask them to tell me 2 different things. 1st who are their top 10 customers. 2nd what kind of work is most profitable for them to do. If you can tell me that I can compile a list of the best possible prospects that will fit your business. Once you have this list of golden leads you are already down the path of easier closes because you know this kind of prospect and you already know you can help them with what you are now doing. Be lazy my friend.


The 2nd part is you need to go out and get proactive about prospecting, which is why many companies call us. It can be telemarketing, cold calling, direct mail, email blasts, but it is about pushing, yes pushing yourself in front to the prospect to talk to them, let them know you exist to help them in your specialty. Do it right you will find this the fastest way to find selling opportunities. Unless you are lucky most people do things and buy from the same companies they have worked with before. As Muhammad Ali once said, “You Got To Beat The Champ”. To beat him you have to go after him, not just trade online punches.


A special mention here of Social Media needs to be made. Singularly it is an important channel for you to be working. If you are paying attention to your 3 F’s (friends, followers, fans) you can send out targeted messages and get instant feedback which you respond to. Remember Social Media Marketing is about being social and that means you need to be there to socialize and become a known factor in your area of expertise, the expert in your field. It your listening your 3F’s will tell you everything you need to know to sell them.


Larson Notes & Satire: Be lazy my friends. Outbound Marketing is becoming a lost art. Sales people and even marketing professionals want to take the easy road to lead gen and prospecting, but the easy road is not the lazy way to do it. I strongly urge you to be proactive with both your inbound and your outbound marketing / sales work. Get 1st page in Google, twitter your way to the top, find your Facebook fan feeding frenzy that is all fine and wonderful but take a hint if you want to be “found” you need to be seen and the best way that I know of is in outbound sales and marketing. Don’t wait from them. Even if your 1st page Google, if they don’t search they won’t find you.


Create a balanced sustainable attack for long term success. Together inbound/outbound marketing can deliver you the best and most leads possible. Be lazy, stay lazy my friends.


Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3rd our Virtual Business Consulting Program


Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates


https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate


P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

Monday, June 27, 2011

Steps To Better Leads

I don’t know too many companies that went out for business because they did not have enough sales. And in those sales there are 3 kinds all important but all different.

1) The One Time Sale.
2) The Repeat Customer
3) The New Customer


For today I will focus on finding the New Customer. In the process you will find The one time sale but isn’t what we want the new customer that becomes a repeat customer? Those are the bread and butter of a company. The ones you can “go to the bank” with.


It is an unfortunate fact that sales people now are under “quota” at an alarming rate. From what I’m hearing almost 50% of all sales people will be below expectations. In my humble opinion, as if anyone cares, this is due to first off the economy and second, fewer leads to sell to.


So what are the some solid steps you can be taking to rectify this problem?


1st Define your market. Sit down and identify your 5 most profitable accounts. Figure out what kind of companies they are. Find the largest grouping of those industries and picking the largest industry first, create your basic lead list.


2nd Decide in your own company what is the definition of a lead. Don’t get trapped into your definition being ONLY those with budget, authority, need, and a time frame, broaden your scope. As important as these are as a whole there are glaring areas where need (or any of these singularly) might trump the buying process.


3rd Agree on expectations. Sales and marketing need to agree on what is a qualified lead or not. Your salespeople should know the kind of lead they can work with and convert and then marketing needs to be able to get them that targeted prospect. Measuring results should help you to pin point what you need to be even more successful.


4th Reports and how often. What do you measure? Cost per lead, cost per opportunity, cost per sale? Having good controls is important but don’t make it stifling to the overall process.


5th Fewer but better = better. Time is money so when looking at your lead gen program providing your sales staff with fewer but a more qualified leads list is more cost effective for them and they should love you for it. If you only look at and demand numbers that is what you will get.


6th Long term leads. I don’t care what you sell; some companies that DO buy what you sell are not ready to buy for their reasons. Don’t ignore these people. If you have a list of 2500 prospects and out of those 50 become “quick” sales there might be another 50 long term sales. In working these people you can in essence double your sales 6 months to a year down the road.


7th Hit them with a multi channel attack. This one is my personal favorite. You got to hit them in all kinds of different ways at all kinds of different times because different people respond to different channels of communication. The so called trick is to know what media to use, when to use it and how often. As John Wannamaker once said "I know that half my advertising budget is working, I just don't know which half." You need to be where they are, not where you want to be. I suggest you use a series of multichannel touches over a period of time to educate, stimulate and give the buyer name recognition of your company.


8th Create offers based off of what you already know on needs and benefits. Remember people but for their reasons not yours. Go back and look over your offers. You needs might want to include the fear or pain of not buying or using your service.


9th Set up a realistic action plan with deadlines. Make people accountable for actions and when those actions need to be completed. If there is no end date there is no compelling reason to do the action by the time it needs to be done except for a person’s own reasons. If everyone on the team know where they fit in and how they will be held accountable you start to from a cohesive unit and plan of attract


Larson Notes & Satire: So you take a company like mine. This is what we do for companies. Some like to dump the whole thing in our laps, most like to do some and have us to a piece, either way to do it right we need to be a key player on their team. The more we are integrated into their action plan the more impute we can give them. As most of you know our main focus is on the telemarketing aspects with some entries into social media marketing and direct mail. We don’t have it all down right and after 36 years of sales, marketing and advertising we still don’t have it perfected but if there is any one key to the door of perpetual prospects and customer sales or all kinds it is found in one work, persistence.


Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3rd our Virtual Business Consulting Program


Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates


https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate


P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

Friday, June 17, 2011

Getting More Out Of Your Leads

If you want to get more value in the leads you collect, you need to be consistent. Day in and day out you need to keep in close effective content. You need to speak to the ones you need to talk to when and how they want to be talked at.

Be relative, action oriented to get to where you and your potential customer need to be. If you have their best interests at heart you are doing them a service. You become a trusted advisor. Earn and keep that trust.


Larson Notes & Satire: Now I have my way of working, and it works pretty darn good for me. After all I have been in business for over 36 years, so I must be doing something right. For me the key is pack in the leads and find people I want to work with. Now I think I am a pretty likable guy and I want to work with (almost) everyone. The other key is consistency. Do what you say and say what you do. I get my leads just like I get leads for my customers, so I figure if I can find and sell them, well I should be able to find and sell for them. Does that make any sense?



Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3rd our Virtual Business Consulting Program


Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates


https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate


P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

ROI in Social? Just Show Me The Money!

They pour in, more and more each day. Marketers that want to or are using Social Media Marketing. They hear about it. They think that this is the ticket to help their sluggish sales. (The Larson Lead Generation Team could set them straight on getting more sales but they aren’t asking good old Uncle Howie) So guess again. A large percentage of professional marketers, 58% find that not being able to get a handle on the metrics of Social Media as a major problem. Is it? Most (75%) don’t even try. And if they can’t measure it they seem to not be able to understand it.

For those few that do, the key metrics was listing to the Social buzz (61%), Branding (61%) Customer feedback (53%). SEO (52%), Lead generation (51%), and product or event generation (50%).


As for what is most important to these same marketers?
26% LinkedIn
20% Twitter
20% Facebook
14% Community
13% Blogging*

*Larson voted blogging


Just remember these are B2B marketers not B2C so LinkedIn is going to be more important.


Larson Notes & Satire: As for ROI off of Social Media? There is only one yes one figure that makes any real difference SALES!


Better ROI off of Social Media? We here at Larson's are going to be making special landing pages for each of the Big 4 sites we work. Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and MerchantCircle to track the hits coming into our web site. Is this perfect? No. But it might give us a better handle on where our hits are coming from. If you have a better idea I would love to hear about it. Last week our unique hits took a 33% spike in activity. I am thinking this is off of Twitter but I cannot be sure.


At the same time we got 1 new account. Now that is what I really like to track, sales!


Remember our 3 new programs for 2011
1st is our Virtual Sales Manager Program.
2nd our Sales Function Outsourcing Program
3rd our Virtual Business Consulting Program


Howard Larson
Larson & Associates
Target Marketing & Telesales Professionals for new account acquisition
Making good businesses great and great businesses even better
847-991-0488
howard@larsonassociates.ws
http://www.larsonassociates.ws/
http://larsonassociates.blogspot.com/
http://www.facebook.com/LarsonAndAssociatesFans
http://member.merchantcircle.com/larsonassociates


https://twitter.com/LarsonAssociate


P.S. We make telesales for small business affordable by offering programs down to only 15 hours a week. Maybe you could add telesales into your marketing mix call today and find out.