Fresh out of school most people aren’t interested in sales – moreover there aren’t any Bachelors or Master degrees in Sales.
Still many end up in sales during their career.
Only a few really have the title of ‘Salesman‘ or ‘Sales rep’, but job titles like:
- Business Development
- Account Manager
- Account Executive
- Sales Engineer
- Pre-Sales rep
- Pre-Sales Engineer
- Inside Sales
- Inside Sales Assistant
- Regional Sales Manager (without any staff)
- Office representation
- Sales Administrator
- Sales Coordinator
- Sales Associate
- Telemarketer
- Telesales
- Strategic Partnerships
- Evangelist
- Business Unit Manager
All have only one purpose which is to get more sales. They are all into sales.

Although the sales job of selling is most important in any business, people seem wanting to hide they are in sales. Hence all these fancy names in order to cover-up the real function of a person.
What is so less prestigious about being in sales ?
Is it the commission and the lesser fixed monthly wage ?
Selling isn’t evil – Selling is good (much better than greed)

Why did you end up in sales (any of the above job titles)?
- For the better pay / commission ?
- For the car ?
- For the fringe benefits ?
- For the travel ?
- For the dining and wining ?
- For there was no other opportunity ?

Money versus time, effort and creativity

According to the laws of thermodynamics no energy is wasted as one type of energy is converted into another one. The same effect is present in marketing: money versus effort and creativity.

In marketing you can spend a lot of money on a campaign with little effort and creativity
OR
You can invest time, creativity and effort for realizing a marketing campaign without spending much money.

In traditional marketing it was and is mainly the amount of money spend on a marketing campaign that influences the result.

In social marketing money is of lesser importance as mainly the effort and creativity count for getting more or better results.

The more money spent the less effort or creativity required.
The lesser money spent the more effort and creativity is required.

Yin Yang

Yang is fast, focused, hot, aggressive, hard and solid: money
A marketer can spend a lot of money fast on an aggressive marketing campaign, that will only last as long as the money lasts.

Yin is characterized as slow, passive, soft, yielding and diffuse: effort, time and creativity.
A marketer can invest a lot of time and creativity in a marketing campaign without getting any results fast. However the effect of the campaign will last long.

What is your style: spending money or investing time, effort and creativity ?

Content marketing hype and problems

Content marketing seems to be the next hype as the shift from outbound to inbound marketing is bound to happen soon although several problems will have to be faced.
As you will trade your content as currency for interest your content should attract the right people and make an impact on them before and during their buying cycle all without gating for content as this will scare off your possible customers.
You content should be valuable, entertaining as else people will zap away like they zap TV commercials.

The 10 Content marketing guidelines

Although content marketing is a bit like gambling as you don’t know upfront what will generate most interest and most leads, still there are guidelines in order not to fail:

1. Attention grabbing title
The title should grab the attention but it should tell what’s on the inside but not sell what’s on the inside.

2. Subtitle hook
The title is the bait whereas the subtitle is the hook for convincing to spend time on this content.

3. Content target
Managers want and need different content than CxO’s.
Managers want to know how, what and advantages.
The CEO, COO, CFO, CIO, CMO want to know about tangible and intangible benefits for the company.
Different requirements result in different content.

4. Convenience content
Your content should be easy to understand and digest as people don’t want to think or get the wrong impression and make the wrong conclusions.

5. Avoid sales pitch
Your content shouldn’t be a sales pitch for your products or services as that will not be appreciated as valuable content.
Still the content should sell your solutions in the end by convincing facts or deductions.

6. No industry or technical words or abbreviations
Avoid using specific vocabulary and words related to your industry as in other countries other words might be used or people are not aware of the signification.
In case industry or technical terms or vocabulary are used then they should be explained briefly as even the CEO should be able to understand without the knowledge of the technical terms.

Abbreviations are not done.

7. Take-aways to remember and re-use
Make sure you provide a few (one, two or three) take-aways to remember or re-use in order to give a benefit and satisfaction for the time invested.

8. Content curation
Avoid getting lured by the temping easiness of content curation as people want real fresh original valuable content

9. Grammar and spelling
At least use a spelling checker in order to remove the most fragrant grammar or spelling errors. If possible let a proofreader verify your content.

10. Have patience
Content marketing takes time compared to advertising or email marketing which produce almost immediate responses massively.

In any case don’t use Social Media Marketing Crapola.
Due to Content Marketing the job of the Marketing Manager has changed for good as he needs to organize or create remarkable content which also needs to be entertaining – The Marketer becomes an entertainer ! ?

When will you have a go at your Content Marketing ?

Email Marketing Data

Every day we get an email with the proposition to buy at bargain prices their Email & Direct marketing data as their division or the even company is closing down.
It seems the business of contact data is no longer profitable which might be due to the contact information available on the social website LinkedIn, Xing, Viadeo, Ecademy or in online data bases like Jigsaw, Spoke or Zoominfo.

Free search Internet data bases

It is not just that abundant information is available for those who have an account, but you can easily search for free on these data bases using Google or Bing.

In many cases you can just search on the company which will return names of people working in this company. Once you get names of possible contact persons in a company, you can search for the email address of this person by searching on his name and the website (‘company.com’) without the ‘www’.
If not successful then it is most cases not difficult to build the email address as you can find the email address pattern by searching on the website (‘company.com’) without ‘www’.
Some companies use a different domain name for their email which is easily checked on their website as they all provide a generic contact or a press responsible in the press releases or an investor relations.

Mass mailings & B2B

Additionally in B2B mass mailings are no longer effective as people do expect personalized and relevant messages that relate to their current problems and issues.
That can only be achieved by having insight in their needs or demands, which is revealed when they visit your website by the search terms used and the pages people from the company have visited. Using such knowledge you can re-target these visiting companies with an appropriate and timely message, having a high likelihood of generating interest or responses.
As Email & Direct marketing lists can only provide static information and not the required dynamic information about when and what people and companies want and search for this is again a major drawback.

The business of email marketing data bases has certainly come under threat by all the available Internet data.

Do you still use Email & Direct marketing lists ?

Competition

Selling isn’t evil when the customer requires or wants a solution or needs a satisfaction. Selling to fulfill a need or a demand is more like a competition to win the customer over your competitors by removing the objections or showing the benefits.

Evil

Selling something that the customer really doesn’t need might be evil.
This type of selling is quite an art or a skill. It requires to be gifted as only a few people can do this. You really have to cheat and lie in the face of the customer.

Dumb

Selling the wrong solution to a customer when he has a need, demand or wants to be satisfied is dumb. It is a one time gain for a series of lost opportunities as this customer probably never will come back.

Marketing

Creating a demand that didn’t exist before with a customer isn’t sales but marketing. As a salesman trying to generate a need or a demand is a too long haul.

Courageous

Not selling to a customer when he demands a product that doesn’t solve his problems or isn’t fitting in his environment, is courageous. As this will require to convince the customer the solution is not the right one for him. This could upset the probable customer. Moreover you probably have to indicate where he can find the appropriate solution for him, thus sending a customer to a competitor.

Clever

Up-selling and cross-selling are the cleverest sales actions a salesman can achieve as the customer will buy more than he intended to buy.

Selling isn’t evil in most cases. Selling is good as it solves a problem or an issue for the customer. Selling starts with the customer.

Are you evil in sales ?

Even the best and distinguished companies forget about SEO as they keep the default settings of their CMS (Content Management System) in place. In this case Joomla!.

Joomla! – dynamische Portal-Engine und Content-Management-System.
Joomla! – the dynamic portal engine and content management system
In both cases is not about their business but about Joomla!.

Even if the company domain shows up in the search engine result pages, it is likely very few people will click on the link. Only those who know the company will.

It is clear no-one in these two example companies ever searched for the company website on a search engine.
Or is Joomla! so complex nobody knows internally how to change these default texts ?

The English example is one out of 3.8mio if you search on Google for “Joomla! – the dynamic portal engine and content management system”
The German is one out of 9.8mio
Why do all these companies have a presence on the Internet ?

Wondering if this is any good for Joomla ! As it gives the impression Joomla is difficult to handle CMS.

MySpace

First all companies flocked into MySpace and then it died for various reasons. Probably advertising, spam and Facebook.

Facebook

Facebook started out for a limited target group, soon expanding to a massive population. As such marketing guru’s advised that all companies should have a page on Facebook as it was the (next) place to be and to get leads.

Twitter

Then Twitter shot from the nerd underground to fame after Oprah presented Tweeting on her show. So marketing guru’s hurried to praise the commercial impact of Twitter which made CEO’s or CTO’s to put messages on Twitter. Additionally customer service was almost handled through Twitter and using Twitter for customer feedback was considered as normal.

Google+

While Twitter is being overwhelmed by automatic posts and spam bots, and the user interface or certain features of Facebook are getting cumbersome or confusing, Google has started out with Google +. Although it was by invitation only, Google+ had a considerable level of sign-ups over a a few weeks: 20 million in 21 days.

After only 21 days there were already consultants portraying themselves as Google+ specialists although business profiles (company pages) are not available yet.

Although the first uptake was impressive,it remains yet to be seen if the growth trend will continue as Google+ is still a small player in the social media and the forerunner Google Buzz failed.

Business and social media

Should companies all aim for getting a company page on Google + (once it will be allowed) or have we learned from the past ?

All the time and money by companies spend on MySpace (and consultants) has more or less evaporated, indicating investing in social media website might not be a good investment having a risky Return On Investment. This impacts businesses having put their hopes on social media marketing for lead generation.

After having invested time and money in MySpace, Facebook, Twitter and probably some other social websites that have disappeared now, will you aim for having a business profile page on Google+ ?
Or don’t you see any advantage anymore as you have seen it all before ?

Bears: less leads

Whenever the stock market goes down during a few consecutive days then less people request a 30-day free trial. This effect lags a few days behind as if people need to process the impact of a down market.
At the same time less trials will convert into subscriptions as the managers seem in a not spending mode. As our service is lead generation might be exactly the wrong reaction as companies will need all the possible leads they can get during a depressed period.

Bulls: drive leads

As soon as the Bulls rule again, delayed by a week we will see an renewed interest in requesting a free trial and more leads convert into paying customers.
When the future is bright, people and managers seem wanting to spend money in order to ride on the boosting economy.

No rationale

If people or manager would be rational thinkers, then they would invest in a lead generation service when the economy is slowing down as they will struggle for revenue, whereas when the economy is flourishing then there should be abundant leads available. However in reality the contrary happens.

The stock market is ahead (leads) of our lead generation.

Do you see a similar effect of the stock market on your lead generation ?

In sales, persuasion comes second after listening to your probable customer.
There are many means, ways and approaches to persuasion but there are three common mistakes:

The Hard Sell

A direct and forceful sales pitch by applying psychological pressure for a quick purchase decision no longer work in B2B. Persuasion by fear, vanity or greed won’t work or speed up the sales process in B2B.
Instead use a subtle or casual sales message (soft sell) that is supported by facts or references relating to the issue, problem, situation of the prospect.

The Yes-But Sell

Persuasion and “Yes … But” don’t go together as it negates everything the potential customer has said before. You not only destroy what your prospect has said or stated previously but you destroy all of your persuasion as you wipe out the statement of the prospect.
Instead try not to react directly upon the statement, but ask open ended questions about the statement indicating you might be able to help

The Sprint Sell

In B2B selling is not sprint a relatively slow sales process with many people involved. Trying to speed up and reach the close to fast will probably put you out of the game.
Take your time as in B2B people need to discuss and meet before the purchase decision. Move on to the next lead and come back when the prospect is ready for the next step.

The Waterfall Sell

Often salespeople think they have to talk and communicate ever more messages to the lead or customer. The meeting or call becomes an endless stream of words and sentences of the salesman.
Talking too much is one of the worst selling methods as the customer isn’t able to process all the information and he will miss most of it, retaining only a few that might not be the most important. Moreover all the talking just seems a reason to hide facts or not being prepared for the case of this prospect.
Don’t speak, please stop explaining and I don’t need your reasons. Just try to listen as when they speak they feel important and you will learn more than they had the intention to reveal.

Questioning Social Media Marketing for small businesses

All marketing guru’s will tell businesses to use Social Media Marketing for driving leads and customer to their website/shop or engage potential customers.

However in case of a small business the use of Social Media for marketing purposes is less evident as for midsized and larger companies as:
- Their target market is localized geographically – no global or continent wide
- Their messages won’t be headline news
- Their frequency of posting messages will be rather low

Chances are small that small businesses will get followers – if any followers – on social media.

Social media presence

On the other hand these small businesses should have Social Media presence for:
- SEO reasons – it will help search findability and SERP
- Presence: an occasional message from a customer
Not having presence on Social Media is a fail as every message missed to get posted is a lost free opportunity to expose the company brand.

Social Media Marketing: investment of time and money

Small businesses should have social media presence, but should limit the amount of money and time spend on it. As all the social media services are free (except MySpace), getting an account or setting up a page (Facebook) is already a major step in the right direction. Additionally these accounts and pages should be referenced on the company website.

Starting a blog becomes quickly a burden as it requires posting on a regular basis (at least once a week) consuming time and effort. Thus a blog becomes an investment in time and requires creativity.

Also when having Social Media presence make sure you verify and question each content you publish as certain content could be interpreted differently. E.g. your expensive employee event pictures might give the wrong impression with customers.

The ROI of social Media Marketing is questionable and difficult (if not impossible) to measure.

Free marketing

Not participating in social media is turning down free marketing:
- Your messages brings exposure
- Every time someone tries to reach out to you on social media platforms
- Increase of findability in searches as social media shows up high in search

Social Media content ?

What to post on Social Media easily without spending much time or money:
- Your new products
- Your promotions
- Your season discounts or special deals
- The press releases of the products you represent
- The links to articles related to your industry
- The link to analyst industry reports – even if it is only an introduction/teaser to the report
- Your new content: every piece of new content should get linked in a message on Social Media
- Youtube, Vimeo or Dailymotion video – creating a video can be on the cheap

Just don’t put anyone (interns, junior staffers)  in charge of the Social Media is it exposes the company with a wider reach than any of your previous marketing.

Hope for traffic, engagement and forwarding: exposure

Just hope for people:
- Visiting your website thanks to social media
- Engaging into a conversation
- Forwarding your messages
For exposure on the Internet to the world

Not having Social Media presence will lead to missing opportunities.
Thus in the long run those small companies without Social Media presence will fall behind for various reasons.

Is your company present on Social Media ?