I’ve had countless conversations with many of the largest companies in the world and there are three things I’ve observed that lead to ROI and revenue growth.
If any of these three things are missing or off balance – it will show up in revenue and ROI.
Here they are:
- Marketing to drive leads
- Sales enablement to support sales
- Training to improve competence and close %
Being anemic with any one of these three things will result in reduced revenue.
First, you need a marketing machine that helps drive leads to sales. That’s a given. Whether that’s from advertising that targets the audience and goes to a landing page or webinar or straight one to one direct response – this needs to be a well-oiled machine.
Next, the leads go to sales and sales frequently follows up 3 times on average. 3 TIMES!! It takes 18 plus to close a deal which means all that money, time, and resources spent trying to get a lead in the first place is wasted most of the time in sales.
Why?
Call reluctance, sales process, and systems and lack of assets to stay the course and nurture the sales process.
What’s needed here is a well thought out sales process and content to support the sales team in a linear fashion. In other words, once they get a lead, you need assets that follow the buyer journey from start to finish and that helps support sales to sell and close each cycle. This alone will improve the close percent.
Lastly is training. If you give 10 people LEGO instructions to build a car and the blocks to do it, 10 out of 10 will build identical cars. On the other hand, if you drop bricks in front of 10 people and say “build a car” – you’ll get 10 different cars.
Sales training in most companies is either weak or non-existent.
The sales process needs to be mapped, the ideal sales model needs to codified in video format step by step so it can be easily digested and watched over and over (read: repetition equals success). This can be deployed via an LMS (Learning Management System) to ensure reps get through it. Then, drills need to be made to say “this happens, what do you do?” etc. to ensure they are ready, competent and they have absorbed the material. That’s how you create a consistent, repeatable model and avoid the typical peaks and valley.
Great selling is a sport about consistency.
These three things will drive an ROI on any spend which will push revenue growth and morale.
But I’ve seen many companies like some or all of these and scratch their heads wondering why they have issues with sales or why it isn’t where they want it to be.
It’s a commitment to have all three of these things and one that has a cost but there’s also a cost of not having them.
Richter is obsessively focused on helping companies solve the sales journey ensuring that all three of these areas are operational.
If you’d like to have a Zoom call to discuss these further, here’s my calendar: https://calendly.com/robertcornish
— Robert
Also – if we’re not connected on LinkedIn, lets connect
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About Robert Cornish: Robert Cornish founded Richter in early 2008 to build an agency focused on communication strategies that support sales growth for business to business technology-related companies. Bootstrapped with zero capital in the middle of the financial meltdown, Richter went on to make the Inc 5000 list comprised of the fastest-growing companies in America five times. Richter made the Silicon Valley Fast 50 four times and the Entrepreneur360 award two times. Robert has been featured in Bloomberg Businessweek, Selling Power Magazine, Inc Magazine and IDEA magazine. He's been a guest speaker for ACG Los Angeles, IASA Summit, West Point and been interviewed for 33Voices, EnTRUEpreneurship Podcast and IDEA Magazine by Northwood University. In 2012 Wiley & Sons published his book, What Works, about the lessons he's learned while growing his agency from start-up navigating his way to a multi-million dollar agency. Robert currently owns four companies.
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