Salespeople - how are drumming up biz?
Discussion
How are those of you working as sales execs/account managers etc finding life at the moment, and what are you finding is working well for brand new business?
My pipeline is a little concerning 12 months into the future so wondered what you’re all finding works well these days, anywhere between hammering the phone to more modern ways of doing things? General discussion really.
B2B primarily
My pipeline is a little concerning 12 months into the future so wondered what you’re all finding works well these days, anywhere between hammering the phone to more modern ways of doing things? General discussion really.
B2B primarily
mikef said:
As a thought - how about stopping bugging people about sh!t that they don’t want to hear about (or they would go look for it) and maybe find a line of work that you can actually be proud of?
Wow, that was harsh 
and rather presumptive.Admittedly I didn’t go into any detail, but we don’t manufacture and supply any old superfluous crap.... it’s highly likely you have products in your house or at work that have components I or my company have supplied, likewise in most other countries.... things that range from entertaining you to saving lives.... so I am in fact quite proud to be involved in that to some degree.
Nor am I bugging purchasing people for things they don’t want to hear about. Engineers tend to be the beginning of my relationship.
My question was more general, and probably more along the lines of how does one carry on making progress in “slower” times. That was all. I know there’s a lot of experience on PH.
fat80b said:
It's hard. I'm in product, not sales, but I spend a lot of time on lead generation and qualification as we are building a new business.
Most of the Sales folk do this through local industry events and via LinkedIn. We also spend dollars on google adwords which yields a fair number of leads for the sales team to bug.
For lead gen in product, you need to find a method of generating leads that are vaguely qualified in order to feed the sales team. For us (also B2B), it is a combination of partnerships, webinars, and content (e.g. blogs, articles (LI and industry things) as well as having a clear message that drives people to you).
If you get the direct sales piece and the lead gen piece working, you should be able to measure the various activities and their cost / success rate. We have a pretty reliable model so if we know that if the pipeline is falling in 3 months, we can up the ad spend / marketing effort before it becomes a problem.
Thanks for that Most of the Sales folk do this through local industry events and via LinkedIn. We also spend dollars on google adwords which yields a fair number of leads for the sales team to bug.
For lead gen in product, you need to find a method of generating leads that are vaguely qualified in order to feed the sales team. For us (also B2B), it is a combination of partnerships, webinars, and content (e.g. blogs, articles (LI and industry things) as well as having a clear message that drives people to you).
If you get the direct sales piece and the lead gen piece working, you should be able to measure the various activities and their cost / success rate. We have a pretty reliable model so if we know that if the pipeline is falling in 3 months, we can up the ad spend / marketing effort before it becomes a problem.
As a company we have I have to say been pretty “old fashioned” for the last few decades but there’s a lot of emphasis and investment recently in expanding the “online presence” - as above, general “content” in the usual areas.
I’m just finding it hard in general to gain any traction anywhere recently, even the dignity of a response sometimes from even existing and good customers
Hoofy said:
I continue to witness people who sold well sell well (IYSWIM!). Whether it's in an economic boom, a global pandemic or a global economic crash. Primarily they develop relationships and when the time is right, the customer buys. No slimey hard sell.
Agreed - and certainly no slimey hard sell from me, in fact the complete opposite (3 year cycle sometimes, but mostly 1-2 years.)Perhaps I need to just get out there and busier.
What I have noticed though is a massive increase in being ignored!!! Mainly since
Covid. Everything requires multiple chases, or is just blanked. These are people who “should” be talking to us.
Louis Balfour said:
Krhuangbin said:
How are those of you working as sales execs/account managers etc finding life at the moment, and what are you finding is working well for brand new business?
My pipeline is a little concerning 12 months into the future so wondered what you’re all finding works well these days, anywhere between hammering the phone to more modern ways of doing things? General discussion really.
B2B primarily
What exactly do you sell?My pipeline is a little concerning 12 months into the future so wondered what you’re all finding works well these days, anywhere between hammering the phone to more modern ways of doing things? General discussion really.
B2B primarily
But I manage the entire process from design to shipping, with the teams/tools at my disposal.
Nothing inherently disadvantageous in the model in 2023, it’s more me I think and need to change tack! Hence the question
Edited by Krhuangbin on Wednesday 22 March 20:50
mikef said:
I’ll leave the cast of Glengarry Glen Ross to it
Do you have a car Mike?Do you realise the bulbs come from a specialist bulb manufacturer, and the leather comes from a leather manufacturer, and the tyres chosen come from a tyre manufacturer, and the windows come from a glass manufacturer? Or a few thereof?
How do you reckon they all become known to the engineering group at the car maker, and then into mass production?
Edited by Krhuangbin on Wednesday 22 March 21:36
StevieBee said:
Sheepshanks said:
Krhuangbin said he's sellling "a particular (and quite niche) type of electronic component"
This may be of usehttps://youtu.be/m3doQn83mD8?t=133
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