How to develop customers

Author: Shi Guangqi

The front-line sales in the market is the hardest position in the enterprise. Now most of the time, sales staff are busy every day developing new customers, maintaining old customers, and visiting customers. If you work in the market, not only will you often be ignored and rejected after a month, but you may also be unable to complete the task, resulting in physical and mental exhaustion. Therefore, many people are unwilling to do marketing and sales work, or have incorrect attitudes. As a result, companies are now suffering from the lack of excellent sales personnel. Sales personnel also complain that they work very hard but earn very little. In fact, the front line of the market is not a hell on earth as many people say. On the contrary, this is the Whampoa Military Academy for senior corporate managers. Many senior managers and even business owners of well-known companies are from the front line of the market sales staff.

Marketing is a practice. Although it contains scientific factors, it is not a theoretical science. Therefore, marketing must be learned in practice. It is not possible to do marketing work well without a college or graduate degree. Classes for marketing majors are in the market, not in schools or offices. Only by slowly accumulating experience in the market and finding a sense of the market can we move to higher positions and operate the market purely by relying on the theories learned in school. Successful The odds are almost zero. The author has always believed that if you want to have excellent abilities, serve as a senior manager of a company or do something big in the workplace, you must first go through the baptism and training of this market. Even if you don't have this opportunity, you should create this opportunity. I often suggest that some senior corporate managers and even bosses who have no actual market experience go to the grassroots market to learn and find the real market feeling. This kind of work experience is really rare and necessary. But unfortunately, many marketing and sales personnel have stayed in this position and stage, and their income and abilities have not improved significantly. More often than not, they give up halfway after encountering setbacks. This is a pity. The main reason for failure and giving up is lack of determination and endurance, and failure to see the value and bright prospects of this job. In addition, as a salesperson, you should have certain sales skills and basic qualities. So what kind of qualities should an excellent salesperson have? The author believes that there are the following 5 points:

1. Persistence: 99℃+1℃ is boiling water, but many people often fail and give up when they work hard to 80%, 90% or even 99%. In fact, We are only one step away from success. Now it’s time to see who can persevere to the end and who is more persistent. When you are about to give up, think about it: others are about to give up at this time, but if you persist a little longer, you will surpass others and achieve success. This kind of thinking has led to countless world champions in the sports world, and the same is true in the field of marketing and sales. Persistence is one of the first qualities that a good salesperson should possess.

2. Confidence: Confidence is something that everyone has, and it is also what everyone is most likely to lose. Confidence is even more important for a salesperson who is walking on the front line of a difficult and dangerous market. If you don’t have confidence in yourself or the products you sell, can you expect your customers to trust you and your products? When you want to convince a customer, you must first convince yourself, otherwise the result will only be failure.

3. Enthusiasm: If a salesperson does not have enthusiasm for his work, it is basically certain that the result will end in failure. Because market development is not only a matter of rational persuasion, but also requires a kind of contagion. Excellent salespeople will infect their customers with their high emotions, which is very helpful in closing deals. On the contrary, if you have no enthusiasm for work, just treat the job as a chore, have a straight face or look tired, these negative emotions will also be transmitted to customers.

4. Keen sense of smell: When communicating with customers, only judging based on the customer's superficial reaction often has a very low accuracy rate, and the possibility of success is naturally low. It is necessary to hear what the customer is saying and discover the real intentions and thoughts behind the customer's appearance. This is often the key to success. This requires developing the ability to discern details and think backwards.

5. Continuous learning: Today’s society is no longer an era in which you can make money by exerting physical strength alone. Some sales staff believe that improving performance requires relying on two legs. In fact, the result of this idea is as follows Salespeople can only rely on their legs to earn the modest hard-earned money, and it is difficult to get promotion opportunities in their positions. An excellent salesperson should continue to learn. In addition to learning industry-related knowledge, he must also absorb comprehensive new knowledge and new information to keep pace with the times. In fact, many times the key to the success of a business is not only hard work and professional knowledge, but sometimes comprehensive knowledge helps you a lot.

If you have these qualities or are working towards the standards mentioned above, and are determined to make a difference in this position, please refer to the following 10 tips. These ways of thinking and skills can help salespeople improve their sales.

1. Know yourself and the enemy, and you will never be defeated in a hundred battles

Be fully prepared before visiting the customer, which mainly includes understanding all the information of the other party as detailed as possible, and then carefully analyzing, summarizing and refining what you want to express. , questions that the other party may ask and how to answer them, etc. Also consider what will happen if the person in charge of the other party is not available? What should I do if a phone call or fax goes to voicemail? What should I do if the other party prevaricates or refuses? The more fully you consider possible situations, the better you can take the initiative in communication. The probability of success is therefore increased.

2. If you want to take something, give it first

Laozi said in the Tao Te Ching: "The more you give to others, the more you have; the more you give to others." Focusing on making money from customers, the result is that the more anxious you are, the less money you can make. In fact, you should not rush to sell to customers. At this time, you should change your thinking and start from the perspective of helping customers solve their problems. The results will be very different. Before visiting the customer, research the customer's information first to find out what the customer's problems are and what they want. Or if you want to solve a problem, you can also listen carefully during communication to find out what the customer is concerned about, care about and troubled by, and try to solve the problem for them as much as possible. For example, you can provide the customer with some information and suggestions that they care about. It is not necessary and impossible to solve all their problems, but as long as you can help a little, or even just be a sincere listener, you will have more or less created value for the customer, and the customer will Your favorability will also increase accordingly, and it will be much easier to discuss your business.

3. Take the circuitous path as the straight path and move forward in a curve

German strategist General von Klauwitz said: "Often the most circuitous and tortuous path is the shortcut to achieve the goal." The same is true for marketing. The most direct method is often the stupidest and least effective. The success rate of direct customer promotion is very low. If you make a few more detours, the chance of success will be significantly improved. For example, when communicating with customers, don’t rush to say what you want to say, because what the customer wants to hear and what you want to say will never be the same. Similarly, it is the wisest way to make customers interested at this time. You can talk about some topics that customers are interested in or topics that are related to the business and can bring benefits to customers, and then lead the topic to yours after the unfamiliarity is eliminated. Purpose, and appropriate questions will also stimulate the customer's interest, and at the same time, you can learn more customer information. Some key large customers need to strategically move forward in a roundabout way. You may not even talk about your business in the first few contacts. Just to connect with them and solve their problems as best as possible. We humans have a unique characteristic: when a stranger comes into contact with another person for profit purposes, the other person will instinctively reject it. If this person does not have a personal purpose to interact with him or even help the other person, then The other party will be happy to accept it. When you become friends, it is much easier to discuss business, and the other party will even help you as much as you would a friend.

4. Quality first, quantity second

One of the most critical elements in sales skills is quantity. Success is a probability. The greater the quantity, the greater the probability of success. of improvement. There is a saying in the market: "Sales is always a numbers game." This sentence is true, but you can also add this sentence: "The pursuit of quality will make this game more exciting." When conducting business, we should expand quantity while improving quality as much as possible, and control quality. The quality here includes more valuable customers, attention and negotiation skills, etc. Because purely seeking quantity is likely to consume a lot of energy on low-quality customers who are difficult to generate benefits, the 80/20 law also applies here. Only by continuously improving quantity while ensuring quality is the foundation for improving performance.

5. Don’t despise everyone related to the business

We usually ignore some people who seem to be non-customers, and sometimes these people are likely to be big customers or people who influence purchasing decisions. .

For example, a couple came to a car sales company to buy a car. The man who mainly communicated with the salesperson was the man, but the salesperson keenly discovered that the purchasing decision-making power was in the hands of the woman who came. The female salesperson came over to chat with the lady. It turned out that the lady's husband was about to go abroad for two years to work. For the convenience and safety of his wife's commuting, he planned to buy a car for his wife, but the lady had many concerns and doubts, so, The salesperson focused on the woman, allayed her concerns and provided some suggestions, and the deal was successfully concluded. In this case, the man is the buyer, and the woman is the purchasing decision-maker and user. If you take it at face value and focus on this man, you are likely to lose the deal. Don’t underestimate everyone who is related to the transaction, or even seemingly unrelated people, and be good at accurately discovering who is the buyer, who is the purchase influencer, and who is the user.

6. Become an expert in the products you sell

We all easily accept the advice of experts in a certain field, and it is easier to believe what experts say. Therefore, being an expert on the products you sell is very helpful to promote your business. Especially the more you sell products with asymmetric information, the greater the role of the expert image. But when selling products that we are all familiar with and understand, the role of experts is relatively small. Much smaller, such as food, clothing, etc. And if it is a product that is unfamiliar or highly specialized, that is, a product with asymmetric information, such as medicines, high-tech instruments, etc., becoming an expert consultant can be very helpful in promoting sales. Even if the salesperson of general merchandise knows everything about the products he sells, it will increase the trust of customers. On the contrary, if you don't even understand your products, how can customers buy with confidence.

7. Handle the relationship between value and price skillfully

Sales staff often face bargaining from customers. Bargaining is normal, but the attitude of dealing with it determines the initiative. In whose hands and the outcome of the transaction. Usually, in order to close a deal, the salesperson continues to meet the customer's bargaining requirements until it drops to the bottom line that he can bear. Even if you reach the bottom line, you may not necessarily be able to conclude a deal, because when you lower the price and compromise, it is also shaking the customer's confidence in your product. The more you lower the price, the less confident the customer will be, and the sense of value of your product in their heart will also continue to increase. As the sense of value decreases, the price they are willing to pay will also continue to decrease.

The correct approach is to try not to lower the price, but to add value to the product, so that customers feel that paying the money to buy your product is a good value for money, such as emphasizing the advantages of the product and what it can do for customers. The benefits brought by the product, some other goods or value-added services, etc. can be given as a bonus, so as to ensure the value of the goods without losing profits. However, for products with obvious room for price reduction, customers will be unwilling to accept any price concessions. At this time, the price can be slightly lowered to allow customers to gain psychological balance. However, the price reduction should make customers feel that it takes a lot of effort, and the price reduction should be very small, because the characteristic of human nature is that the less easily obtained things are, the more precious they are, and they will cherish them after they are obtained, and vice versa.

8. Pay attention to the people around the decision-maker

Although some people close to the decision-maker, such as assistants and secretaries, do not have decision-making power, they have strong decision-making influence and even business The key to success or failure is determined by these people. These people are the close confidants of the decision-maker. The decision-maker will refer to the opinions of these people and offend, despise or ignore these people because they feel that they have already established a connection with the decision-maker. The result may be It is these people who are the main reason your business fails.

9. Dedicated maintenance and communication

During holidays or major events, sales staff will send some invitations or greeting emails to customers. Because there are many customers, in order to save money Most of the time, mass emails are sent, but the effect of such emails is very poor, because mainstream mailboxes will treat most mass emails as spam and discard them. The use of mass mailing without distinguishing individual factors such as age, gender, identity, etc. also shows insufficient attention to customers.

The same goes for sending short messages to customers during festivals. Most of them are to find a blessing text message and send it to all customers in bulk. Customers will know it well when they receive such a text message, so they will naturally not pay attention to it. Nowadays, many new mobile phones also have a firewall function for group text messages, which automatically treats group text messages as spam and rejects them. The correct approach is to "tailor-tailor" emails or text messages for different customers. Not only this is necessary if they are relatively unfamiliar customers or customers who are contacted for the first time, but setting an attractive theme is also very effective.

These practices may seem like they take a little more time, but they can bring unexpected gains.

10. The best way to visit customers

"Mobai" is very popular now. It is generally believed that people are afraid of meeting and trees are afraid of peeling off their skin. Meeting in person has a higher success rate than making a phone call. High, but the actual situation is that it is difficult to find the person in charge of the other party when visiting strangers. After a day, I am exhausted, and I can only visit an average of 3-5 customers (the number varies depending on the industry), and the success rate is still lower than that of telephone visits. . Telephone visits can make at least 50 calls a day, and the method is flexible, making it easier to find the person in charge. The frustration when a cold call fails is much higher than when a phone call fails, because the costs and psychological states of the two are different. When a visit from a stranger fails, your morale and self-confidence will be seriously affected. Therefore, you should first establish contact with the other party through phone calls, emails, etc., and at least find out whether the other party has needs, who is in charge, etc. before visiting at home. More appropriate.

There is a saying in the marketing industry: "If you love someone, let him do sales, because this place is full of wealth and dreams; if you hate someone, let him do sales, because it is full of hardships and hardships." I hope Friends who are currently in sales or aspiring to do so will be able to have dreams and gain wealth more easily in the market after reading this article.

(Author: Shi Guangqi)