Sunday, July 6, 2014

5 Lead Generation Tips You Should Be Using

Lead generation is the process of raising buyer interest and gathering inquiries from prospective purchasers, often in the form of names and contact information. Lead generation is an important factor in all marketing campaigns.

These leads are then qualified for their ability and desire to purchase your products and services.
While generally the focus of B2B marketing organizations, lead generation also applies to B2C companies, especially where high price, high consideration products are involved.

57 percent of a typical purchase decision is made before a prospect ever talks to a supplier based on  a Corporate Executive Board study of over 1,400 B2B customers across industries. This is an aspect that you can't control but it leaves you 43 percent to work with.

For marketers, lead generation is a tradeoff between quality and quantity. Specifically without a sufficient number of leads, you can’t achieve your sales conversion goals.
By contrast, too many leads often translates to unqualified buyers who need lots of persuasion to convert or they’ll never buy.

(1)Today’s customers are social media and content marketing savvy. Whether they’re making a purchase for themselves or their business, they’ve at least started their research before they ever contact you. The more you know their behavior, the better off you'll be.

(2)Experiment with owned, earned and paid campaigns. Try something you’ve never tried before. Be willing to fail small and fast. Trial and error is big in sales and lead generation, you have to fall before you can climb.

(3)The most effective way for marketing to drive stellar leads for sales is to deliver the right content to the right prospect at the right time. Targeting the right audience. Mapping content to the buyer journey and then delivering it to the right prospects is the best way to drive effective sales-ready leads without wasting your sales’ teams time and you company’s money.

(4)Include a strong call to action. A strong COA is so vital. So much social media marketing and content marketing fails when the recipient of the message isn’t clear about what to do with it. Do you want a share? A site visit? Their contact information? A subscription to your page or channel? Spell it out clearly to them, lead them down the road you want to take them. You don't have to hide it!

(5)Ensure that the content is the right type of content for the community that it’s presented to and the right place in the customer journey. Be cognizant of the many steps in your customer’s journey. Make sure that awareness content is used in social channels. Consideration type content can be used for paid targeted audience buys. If the content is wrong, you either won't get the lead or it won't be the type of customer you need.

Thursday, June 12, 2014


Sales Training 101 – Why Consistency Matters to Sales Professionals

 

With the right sales training, sales professionals know it is important to take the time to make outbound selling calls and set up meetings with prospects and customers. So why is it so hard to set aside that time and get it done?

Often, as sales professionals we feel there is very little risk to putting it off. Or, maybe we’re too heavily focused on today’s problems to think about tomorrow’s problems—which could be bigger and worse if we don't look for more business today. Or, we might just have terrible time management skills and find it difficult to schedule ourselves, letting our time be dictated by how we react to daily events.

In addition, there are risks to lack of consistent effort. For one thing, we don't develop the level of skills required to get results, costing us business and allowing competitors to outsell us. Not a very impressive performance, our boss viewing it as average or below. Our sales training taught us better than this. If we're not working hard today to develop business for tomorrow, we could find ourselves in a difficult position in the future, either not meeting our sales goals, or not making enough income to survive.

Consistency pays off for several reasons. Practice makes us better. Experience makes us smarter. And with this, selling gets easier. Between our sales training and our experience, when we really need great selling skills to succeed, they are there.

 
Here are five tips to increase selling consistency:

·         Schedule time for specific selling activities, such as prospecting.

·         When you’re successful, don’t get complacent. Continue to spend time on the activities that brought you success.

·         Consistency is easier when you turn a sometime-behavior into a habit, so commit yourself to building one positive new habit over the next 30 days.

·         Spend fifteen minutes at the end of every day thinking about what you should do tomorrow—and start every day by consistently doing the top three selling activities on your to-do list.

·         Write down your goal. Read it every day. Know what it takes to achieve it. Do what it takes to achieve it relentlessly, every single day.

Good selling!

 

Thursday, March 20, 2014

Generating Sales Leads


How Can I Generate Sales Leads?

 
 
When it comes to generating sales leads, everyone has their own personal opinion of what works and what doesn't. One thing that can be said is the fact that lead generation is the lifeline of business development. Finding great leads is a path to more sales, revenue and profits. In Thought Transformation's sales training classes, we teach our clients in detail the 10 best ways to generate paid leads. In this article, we're going to explain how you can generate sales leads.
 
Direct Referrals
 
Everyone has an opinion about the best ways to generate paid leads. In my opinion, one of the best ways to generate paid leads is by direct referrals. Right? Customer referrals are a great way to generate sales leads. If your business is providing quality services, chances are that their business will recommend you if the situation arises. You do know that every customer and client matters, yes? Be sure your current clients have your business card and contact information. Don't forget, always provide quality services.
 
Co-Marketing
 
You are probably already marketing locally, nationally or online. As you may already know, marketing on multiple levels can get expensive. What about a vendor or association with a non-competitive business? You can help each other share ideas, promotions and links. They can promote your business while you promote theirs. If you work in separate sectors, you may even be able to generate leads with one another.
 
SEO Services
 
As the online world continues to grow, SEO services are becoming a great way to generate sales leads. Also known as search engine optimization, SEO can help you increase your online rankings and help grow traffic to your website. Some SEO companies are able to provide SEM and PPC services as well. All three methods are great ways to generate leads. Although search engine optimization takes time to develop, it will benefit your company in the long run.
 
Lead Generation Training
 
Thought Transformation has been providing lead generation training for a decade now. In total, Thought Transformation has 20+ sales training courses in all. Be sure to visit our main website and discover all the sales training courses we offer. We're located in Atlanta and service surrounding areas. For complete details, call Linda at (770) 846-3510 or visit Thought Transformation.

Wednesday, March 5, 2014

One Big Reason Why Salespeople Fail to Get Meetings with Prospects


Here's the scenario. Bob is calling prospects to get a first meeting. He says, "Hi Prospect. This is Bob, and I would like to come meet with you to learn more about your company and see if our product is a good fit.”
What do you think of that message? Is it strong enough, powerful enough, compelling enough to get a meeting?
I say no. Prospects do not meet with salespeople to engage in vague discovery conversations. Prospects will meet you if they have a problem and they think you can solve it.
Think about what you are saying when you are prospecting, and ask three questions:
  • Is your message specific?
  • Does it clearly communicate the problem you can solve and the benefits to the prospect?
  • Is your message compelling?

Clients will accept meetings from sales professionals when they understand how you can help and they know it is in their best interest to meet with you. If you want better results, it's worth spending 10 minutes to look at your message and find a way to improve it.

Why People Fail To Get Meetings With Prospects

 
The FUD Approach
Fear. Uncertainty. Doubt. Believe it or not, this is what you want a buyer to feel, because if they feel these emotions after hearing your selling message, they are willing to meet with you.
Fear is a sense of impending and immediate danger. It is the strongest of the 3 emotions, and created when buyers recognize they are at risk. Buyers who feel fear are willing to change to eliminate danger.
Uncertainty is caused by worries about possible negative consequences in the future. When buyers feel uncertainty, they want to resolve it because no one likes to worry. Often, that prompts them to meet with the salesperson that offers a solution to eliminate concerns.
Like uncertainty, doubt is also created by worries about a negative future. Doubt is a nagging feeling that causes buyers to worry that a situation will turn out badly.
Fear. Uncertainty. Doubt. To eliminate these emotions, buyers make purchases. How can you strengthen your selling message—or create a completely new one using FUD?
Thought Transformation provides sales training courses in Atlanta and surrounding areas. Be sure to visit our website or call (770) 846-3510 to learn more about our sales training program.

Thursday, February 27, 2014

The Many Benefits of Sales Training

SALES TRAINING BENEFITS

Do you wonder how sales training can be beneficial? Although this may be more of a common sense question, many people don't realize the importance of our sales training courses. To anyone that suffers from ineffective sales approaches, ask yourself this question. "What would it mean to your company to make more sales?" Imagine having the knowledge to lead a company or affiliate in sales! Thought Transportation gives you the power to make sale after sale.

LEARNING FROM SALES PROFESSIONALS

At Thought Transportation, you're going to learn from sales training professionals with years of sales experience. Thought Transportation has provided sales training programs for a decade. Our sales training experts have sales experience that dates a decade plus. You're going to learn the same sales techniques that made us successful! Each sales training class is specifically designed to strengthen your strengths and focus on your weakest skills in sales.
 
Thought Transformation President, Linda Bishop, has two decades of sales experience. Linda is a pronounced sales training expert that mastered the Atlanta market. Linda is invited by nationally recognized companies to speak and offer sales training seminars. She specifically designed their sales training courses and our sales training program. To be the best, you have to learn from the best. This is the quality of sales training that you'll receive with Thought Transformation.

SALES TRAINING THAT LAST FOR YEARS TO COME

The great thing about the knowledge you receive in our sales training course is the fact that our training doesn't limit you at all. Our sales training classes were developed using the latest sales technology, skills and resources. The sales techniques that we're going to teach you will be used for many more decades to come. Thought Transformation's sales training program is powerful, educational and the only one of its kind. It doesn't matter what you're are selling, we're going to teach you how to sell it and how to sell it fast.
 
Since there's so many levels of sales and hundreds of elements that can affect a sale, we had to prepare for this in our sales training. When we created our sales training course, we developed it to be bulletproof. As sales technology advances, we make sure that we include it in our program. You're guaranteed to get the latest and most modern sales training courses available at Thought Transportation.

COVERS EVERY ASPECTS OF SALES 


Our sales training program is a decade in the making and is updated continuously to ensure you that you get the latest sales training services. In total, Thought Transformation has 20+ sales training courses in total. We cover all aspects of sales, from list generation to closing sales and everything in between. It doesn't matter if your new to sales or you're a sale veteran, our sales training classes will teach you cutting-edge sales techniques that are extremely effective.
 
At Thought Transformation, you have the option to choose the sales training courses that you want to take. You can take all our sales classes or only the sales programs that you need. We provide sales training courses in Atlanta and surrounding areas. If you live in this area, we'll even come to company address and provide your sales training! This is a great way to make sure your whole team is there to properly be trained. We have interactive sales training courses that will keep your staff interested, informed and learning.
 
If you have any questions, concerns or you want to schedule an appointment, please call (770) 846-3510 or visit our website at Thought Transformation.