sales
282 posts
5 Steps To Making Things People Want
Here’s the subject line ‘just curious’ email I got the other day. Maybe you got one too? The marketing consultant had gone to the trouble to know my name, but that’s where the personalisation ended. “Hi Bernadette, By any chance, are you interested in solutions for getting sales appointments and lea
The Power Of What We Measure
It’s easier than ever before to create a set of metrics by which to monitor our progress and measure our success. Click-through rates, subscriber numbers, impressions and customer lifetime value are useful data points. What if we measured our success by the results we delivered for our customers? No
Why Did You Win?
Even when our innovation and marketing succeeds, we don’t always take the time to understand what’s working so that we can replicate it. We gratefully welcome and respond to prospective new customers every day, often without knowing how and why they showed up. Five questions to get you started 1. Ho
The Art Of Selling
Buying is defined as the acquisition of one thing in exchange for something else. Of course it goes beyond ownership or the trading of things. Buying is an exchange of trust and value—a belief in promises we expect will be kept. Selling is described as the transfer of goods or services in exchange f
The Value Of What We Don’t Know
Six years. That’s how long it took IKEA to research the South Korean culture before they were ready to open the first store there. Six years of understanding what they didn’t know about the story Korean customers lived and wanted to believe—so that they could tell a story that resonated. The goal wa
Motivating People To Buy
Imagine you have taken your children on a day trip to the seaside. It’s the perfect day, the sun is shining, the waves are lapping the shore and you’re having a day that you’ll never forget. There is a new gelato shop across the street selling home made ices at $5 a scoop. Clearly as…
Clever Marketing
Do you remember those TV ads that succeeded in interrupting or engaging us for sixty seconds? That’s what we used to call clever marketing. Today, clever marketing is no longer about creating the best advertising campaign, it’s about understanding your customer’s worldview and how they want to feel—
What’s Your Customer’s Narrative?
Why do thousands of people line up outside department stores waiting for the doors to open on Boxing Day? The stock is the same as it was two days before, after all— what’s changed is the story the buyer gets to tell himself. You are in the story selling business, as much as you are…
Wanted And Welcomed
We still have a landline phone at home to make it easy and more economical for elderly relatives overseas to get in touch. It rings at lunchtime and at around 6pm every day. We don’t pick up, because we know these particular calls are not ones we want or welcome. I often wonder what the…
The Relationship Between Curiosity And Business Growth
Whenever I visit the tiny local florist I am the only customer and the most bizarre thing happened when I stopped off there last Friday evening. The entire floor was filled with buckets and buckets of multi-coloured roses. It was so full there was barely room to navigate to the register to pay. I th
The Best Marketing In The World
It’s easy to know why the features you built into your products and services are important, but it takes a particular skill to understand and communicate why they should matter to people. The best marketing in the world doesn’t remind people how great the company is or how many features have been ad
Showing Up For Humans, Not Just For Google
I want to send some flowers to a friend a few suburbs away, of course I could deliver them myself, but there is something magical about the unexpected arrival of flowers that means I want to have them delivered. And so I turn to Google. After 20 minutes I find myself on page ten feeling…
Which Would You Choose?
If you could only pick only one of the following, which would you choose? 1. Would you like more people to know about you, your product or service? OR 2. Would you like your existing customers to be blown away by you, your product or service? Awareness doesn’t always scale. But creating difference f
Driving Sales, The Gates Effect And Flawed Marketing Vocabulary
Over the weekend a previously out of print business book, which was unknown to many and forgotten by most shot up the Amazon bestseller list. Why when we had previously ignored John Brooks’ Business Adventures were we suddenly snapping up enough copies to make it the #1 bestselling business book on
We Need To Stop Telling Customers What We Do
I’m driving along behind the white Ezy Tiles van, when we stop at a red light and I get close enough to read their sales pitch, which is an image and a single line. The picture is of three guys wearing dust masks that look like something you’d see in a documentary about chemical warfare.…
How To Sell A Guitar…..Or Anything
The number one reason a salesperson fails to close a sale is that she can’t effectively communicate the value of the product. Of course it makes sense that if you can’t help your customers to understand why they should care, then you’re not likely to be able to convince them to buy. The luthier take
Success Is How Your Customers Feel
You’ve just had a great launch. You made your monthly sales targets. Your stock sold out in one day. There are a hundred and one reasons to celebrate, and one thing to remember. Success is not just a data point that you hit on the sales chart, or a dollar figure that makes your accountant…
How Apple Succeeded, While Others Failed
When Apple designed their first store, they made sure that over half of it was dedicated to what they called, ‘solutions’. The store wasn’t stacked ceiling to floor with inventory, instead it was a wall-to-wall space of discovery. While most retailers were showing people what they had in stock, Appl
Closing The Sale
It was a mid-week afternoon and the jewellery store was empty. Three assistants, and one customer shopping for a ring. A selection of diamonds was presented. The assistant talked about size and shape, colour and clarity, and a twelve week wait when she couldn’t find a ring to fit. The customer made
Sales Is…..
sales noun 1. The exchange of a commodity for money; the action of selling something. 2. A quantity or amount sold. Actually sales is understanding how your customer wants to feel, not what she wants to buy and doing everything you can to get her there. Image by Ed Yourdon.
