April 5, 2007
Too Much Time Selling and Not Enough Marketing?
I know the subject line probably looks like an odd question. I mean, how is it possible to do TOO much selling? Isn’t selling a good thing?
Actually, it depends.
To understand what I mean it’s important to understand the definitions of each, sales and marketing. Sales is the one-on-one meetings you have with a client trying to get them to pull out their checkbook. Marketing is the process you go through to put yourself in selling situations.
Now, when I pose the question of doing too much selling and not enough marketing, it’s because a lot of the selling business owners do is explaining their services, educating customers on the services they provide, and why they’re the best choice of all the available options. Basically, instead of actually getting them to sign on the dotted line, they’re doing WAY too much sifting and sorting. In fact, a lot of this ‘selling’ consists of repetitive tasks that could easily be automated or systematized.
If this is the case, it means you need to reconstruct your marketing to do a lot of this pre-sales work for your. Your marketing should be telling customers about your business, the processes you use, the ways they can expect to receive service, why you’re the best choice, and ultimately resolve any concerns they might have that stand between you and their checkbook.
At the end of the day, if your marketing process is designed properly you should be in selling situations with only those prospects that meet the following criteria:
- Pre-interested in what you’re selling
- Pre-motivated to buy what you’re selling
- Pre-qualified to buy what you’re selling
- Pre-disposed to give you money
So, if you’re spending more time than you should with prospects that don’t meet these criteria, take a look at your marketing to see what things need to be added to the mix.
Do this and I promise you’ll find yourself with a whole lot more time to work on building the kind of business your after instead of having to constantly sell your services.
Filed under Lawn Care Marketing by Chestin
