How To Convert More Leads Into Sales?

There is a process of Sales - A scientific process - called as SPANCO.
(i) Suspects
(ii) Prospects
(iii) Approach
(iv) Negotiations
(v) Closing
(vi) Order
We have to find Prospects among suspects. Bringing in Prospects and approaching them is what is called as lead generation. When we approach for the first time, normally we will know whether the clients are interested and willing to buy. But normally after the first meetings, hardly any follow up is done. It is estimated that it is here that many of the leads are lost and fail to convert into sales. Hardly, 2-5 % of the sales that are closed happen because of the first meeting. As no follow up is done, the client also forgets about you.

If you are eager to convert more leads into sales, FOLLOWING UP is the most important factor. If some client asks for some time, you need to call them at that time so that he is reminded about you and your product. When follow ups are done, the client also knows that you are serious. It does help when you are in a market where buying is on recurring basis. Every day, Every month, Every Quarter OR Every Year. If you are in touch with the prospect round the year, a time may come when there are some problems with the existing suppliers or they need to develop some other products, etc. They will be ready for giving business to you.

There are also Negotiations happening, once the client decides to buy from you. You should be clear about your costings so that you are not at a Disadvantage. You should know your limit so that the moment something comes below your level, you quit. You can still be in touch with the client, though. After all, you know he requires things that you have.

Look For The Big Fish

Haven't you heard about the Pareto Principle? It is one of the greatest principles to have come. What it says, if understood, can make you stand in good stead. Read carefully. The Pareto Principle says that 80 % of the results are due to 20 % of efforts and vice versa. While the percentage may vary a little, but it is true in every field that the biggest amount of results come due to least amount of effort. This Pareto Principle can apply to many different things. Like, 80 % of profit is due to 20 % of profit. Ratio might be 70-30 %, but this is true. The Pareto principle looks at the impact rather than the overall thing. If you are working for anything, you might just put all of your efforts on the 20 % efforts, which will bring in the maximum 75-80 % results. This is the Big fish and it will come with least efforts. But for this effort too, you have to work hard. 

Though I do not remember the exact example of things, but the story goes like this. There was one CFO in Cognizant. He was too young. But when he came, he did not focus much on the work. But he made different fish bone diagrams. The average delivery time of a project used to be more than 150 days. Just by making these fish bone diagrams, he was able to identify the bottlenecks and in a short time, made the average delivery time of a project to 34 days. Now, imagine that at a scale at which Cognizant is working, what must be the savings. This 1 % manpower or effort has been able to impact in such a way that the whole business cycle changed. 

The fish bone diagram is nothing but a loose structure where a horizontal line is drawn and other slanting lines are made. The horizontal line is the problem that we are looking at. The slanting lines are the components of the problem. Here all the reasons, all the parameters affecting the problems are identified. And at the end of it, reasons are identified. Action plan is made and by executing the actions, solutions are found. When you work with different reasons, we have to first find the big fish - the big reason by which we can achieve the best result. Because may be less efforts will be required there. 

You Cannot Be Everything To Everyone

When we think of probabilities, they are big. Even playing the what if... is great. When we think about the product that we are dealing / making, we think about wow! The market is so big. We think, wow, we can supply to them. Low cost, no problem. Then we look at the high margin product and think. Wow, this is good. It is very difficult to be high margin and low margin at a time. Both things have different mindset. For marketing, we have to look at HUL. It is a school where marketing is taught. They can do this. They have Wheel as well as they have Rin / Surf Excel. They have Lifebuoy as well as they have Dove, the extreme end of high margin. 

HUL has a clear strategy. They don't sell this high margin and low margin product together. These brands are managed separately. The people (except for the senior management) behind the brands are different. They don't advertise the Dove and Lifebuoy at a time. They do it separately. HUL has the wherewithal to do this. Not SMEs. They do not have enough manpower. And mindset is the most important thing. If they get into the mindset of costing less, then it will be really difficult to come out of it. 

We need to identify a section in the market whom we can serve. Once this section has been identified, then you can tailor offering accordingly. If you identify a volume based part, then you should be very low cost. In fact, so low cost that competitors will hardly come near you. Once the zone is identified, you can target them. Like whether your target is school going children, college going children, young woman, married woman, middle aged people, old people, etc. Once this is identified, then it becomes easier. If you make everything for everyone, then your resources will have to be divided. This increases the resources that can be put to work and hence, the cost increases in near term. Of course, if you consider this as cost. Actually it is an investment. Isn't it ?

Spoon Feeding OR Teaching?

I had once heard a story / joke of a race where three little children were participating. One was American, Other was Japanese while the third was an Indian. The children were very small, may be about year and a half or so. There mothers were besides them. The three children had to complete the race one by one. It was a small distance. First the American child went. Midway it fell. American mother asserted, 'Get up and go' and the child got up and walked and completed the race. Then it was Japanese mother's turn. The Japanese child too stumbled midway. The Japanese mother ran to the other end and called her child 'Come on, Baby'. Seeing the mother, the child went up to her and completed the race. Then it was the third child's turn. The third child started and fell midway. It began crying. Immediately, the Indian mother came, picked up the child and ran with it to complete the race. 

There are teaching methods. Sometimes, we get too emotional. There are two things, spoon feeding and teaching how to eat. I hate the first thing - Spoon feeding. Spoon feeding is there where someone is dependent on you. It will not eat nor will learn to eat. It is a different matter, too young child or too old people or patients, have their own problems. I would love to spoon feed them. But, for others they know that they can eat themselves. But they are not willing to do that. They are more than happy that they are spoon-fed and they do not have any inclination to learn how to eat. Giving alms to beggar, I consider, is one such thing. Personally, I hate giving alms to beggars. But sometimes, I find myself helpless seeing the person in front. 

I would rather help them get employment or do something fruitful. Something, with which they can actually earn money and learn to eat themselves. This aspect is very important as the other person's dependability on others comes to an end. Even if I am not there tomorrow, others should be capable of eating by themselves. 

Remember - Healthy Body & Healthy Mind

At young age, we can work for any number of hours. We have the passion, we have the energy and we can run after work. But after a certain age, our body starts to give up. You feel like there is tiredness even if you don't do any physical activity. This will happen if you don't take care of your body. Remember that even though you love your passion much, you can take care of it only if you remain healthy. For remaining healthy, you need to take care of yourself. 

If your heart says, to take a break - take it. Believe me, you will feel fresh. Go for a walk or jog in the morning. Do some brisk exercises, even if they are for a couple of minutes. The briskness in the exercises bring in an rush of blood and you will feel energetic for the whole day.  You will feel better. Do deep breathing. Calm your mind. Meditate. Hear soothing music like old songs or ocean sounds or some mantras. Remember Prof. ViruS from '3 idiots'. Also remember his 7 minute powersnap. Yes, it helps in regaining the energy. 

Healthy body will help in keeping healthy mind and vice versa. Good food will help you in keeping healthy mind. For health of your mind, you can also try solving some sudoku's. It will stimulate your mind and it is like an exercise for the mind. Like our body needs exercise to remain in shape, so our mind too needs that. For a change, surprise your mind. If you are going by x route, take a Y route to your destination. If you are wearing watch on left hand, you can wear it on right hand for a change. This will help your mind to be ready for surprises. 

You can also take a walk to the top of the hill or go and visit the temple on the top of hill. Tell your mind that you need to visit that temple on some particular day, so you will do it once in a week at least. Play some sport - there are many of them. If you are alone, then you can play squash. You will need a small Table Tennis bat and ball and your home becomes the squash place. You will be surprised at the effect. If you get a partner, play badminton or cricket or football. It will take a lot of stress out of you and make you cheerful.

  

Adaptability To Market

Personal life and Professional life are similar in a way. Most of the fundamentals that apply to a professional life, a business are more or less applicable to the personal life too. One such trait is that of adaptability. When we join any industry to start working, there is a different environment from what we faced during our school and college. Even when we join some college from a school there is cultural change. What will make you stand in good stead is your adaptability to these situations. If you are adaptability is good, you will make the minor or major adjustments that you need to make to counter the present situation. When we go from college to work and from one company to other company or altogether another industry, it will be your adaptability which will decide whether or not you are accepted by the new opportunity. 

There are cases where people cannot adjust to the new company culture and leave the job sooner than expected. A similar trait is very important factor when you think of your business. Not long ago, there was a huge business of Greeting Cards. People used to buy greeting for any birthday, anniversary or other situations. Slowly, internet came, email came and all that stopped. There was a time when businesses couriered Greeting cards to customers. But a recent meeting with a courier person reveals another story. He says that courier business was booming at one time. Of course, it is booming today also. But the situations are different. Previously, the major chunk was the greeting cards and the cheques that company used to send. But due to the whatsapp and internet, this greeting cards have disappeared. And in this times when banks are aggressive with the online banking platform, many companies have stopped giving cheque payments. Instead of couriering the cheque, the money is transferred through the bank by NEFT or RTGS. Still the courier companies adapted beautifully to the E-commerce model. Due to the e-commerce, many things are couriered and this is where the business is booming for the couriers. 

Then the internet cafes which mushroomed in the last decade are disappearing now, because people have got 3G and 4G internet. The Jio from reliance has provided a deciding jolt to the internet cafes. They have lost most of their customer base. People have got the internet in hand then why would they go to the Cafe. Just a few days ago, SC gave a directive that there should be no Alcohol sale within 500 meters of Highway. Where will all this businesses go? This is the point where adaptability comes into picture. You must be ready with a backup plan. 

Hire The Best

Men make or break a team. Most of the founders of SME businesses should focus on this. There are some founders, who will make it a point to meet every new selection however big the team is. It is to ascertain the quality of men that are employed in the organization. Founders have a vision, a passion about their company and they want to share it with their employees. Nothing will beat a passionate employee. Shivaji was able to build the empire from scratch and it was not just on the basis of paid soldiers. The soldiers were willing to do anything for their King and this is the best that can happen. If we could share our vision with the employees and they become a part of it, then the team that comes up is the best.

There are often considerations of remunerations that come up before making a decision and it is often preferred to get a cheaper employee. It is often considered that money saved is money earned. While this is true, you must not underestimate the long term picture and the value that the employee will bring in the long term. Often the long term value that the right candidate can bring in is great and it will beat the cheaper option 'hands down'. The employee cost has to be considered as an investment rather than expense. 

Better employees bring in better systems, better work culture and this helps in the growing of the company. Ford said, 'Honesty does not come cheap' and it is true. How can you expect honesty from a hungry person? If the employees are satisfied they will take care of your company like their own. I have seen some employees, who cannot hear another word about their company. You can also look for good placement agencies who have a big database of employees. Instead of looking at the cost to be given to agencies, you should look at the value they offer.