Effective Use of Conversation in CRM
Salespeople are working harder than ever to make sales for the company. They are in a constant fury trying to get one customer after another to buy their product or service without really taking time to understand the client's situation and needs. This situation has risen because executives and investors expect accelerated sales and higher profit margins. The goal of these companies is to sell at a higher price, but the goal of all customers is to buy the bare minimum of what they need at the lowest price they can find. This dichotomy creates a situation where something has to give.
To combat this compromising situation, many companies have employed a variety of internal projects. Some of these projects include; developing ROI tools, developing campaigns to increase demand, developing branding and marketing strategies, creating sales- coaching models, and modifying CRM systems to improve reporting and prediction procedures.
Most of these companies, unfortunately, fail to correctly manage these projects and coordinate them. This failure brings some less-than-desirable consequences. Consequently, they revert to hiring even more salespeople to meet growth objectives. This puts even more burden on the sales force to manage the customer relationship. These tactics, as well as centralizing and reducing marketing resources, result in an unintended creation of sales models which are too labor intensive and difficult to really measure.
You may find your company in a similar situation and struggle trying to get out of the downward spiral. Making a significant change requires a shift in strategies. You must first understand that the value of your product or service is communicated to your clients through multiple small interactions over time. These interactions take place in the conversations that individuals from your company (salespeople, managers, customer service representatives, etc.) have with your customers. Thus, a good sale is actually a synthesis of multiple discrete conversations based on the common goal of solving your customer's problem.
Often the biggest problem a company has in closing sales is to manage the difficult task of organizing and managing the many small distinct conversations into a single communications strategy. To begin really addressing your clients' situations and needs and closing sales, consider the following questions:
- Who is affected by the problem they face?
- What role does your company hold in assisting your clients solve their problem?
- When will the problem be addressed, and where is the client currently in their decision making process.
- Where will the client get the means to pay for solving the problem, and what other resources or services are they considering rather than from you?
- Why does the problem need to be addressed now, and how does it relate to your clients' other problems?
- How can the customer solve their problem in their unique circumstances?
It is important as well to remember that you may have solutions that can solve multiple problems your clients may be facing. Therefore, these questions need to be answered for every possible problem.
Effective conversations need to be dynamic and correlative between both parties. Trust is also extremely important to exist between each person involved. To foster an effective conversation, the salesperson needs to present information that is relevant to the unique circumstances of the client. The information needs to be in context to the specific roles and responsibilities of the person with whom the conversation is taking place. Also, the information needs to be timely, meaning it comes at an opportune time in their problem-solving process so the client is able to address the problem you can help solve.
Understand that the biggest factor in whether or not you make sales is the conversation that exists between your company and your clients. Loyal customer relationships are developed over time, through a series of discrete conversations between your company and the valued customer. An effective CRM program relies on using gathered information about each customer to be able to address their own personal needs and problems. With this information, your conversations will be relevant, in context, and timely to your customer.
Shawn Hart is an internet marketing professional for LeadMaster.com. For more information about effective CRM strategies and customer communications, visit www.LeadMaster.com.
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