For every business, there is a sales cycle. It starts with identifying the target market, reaching out, bringing them in, and closing the deal. A good company takes it a few steps further by maintain the customer relationship—which leads to a much shorter resale cycle.
In a post on BusinessKnowHow.com, I read a pretty good breakdown of the
sales cycle, but I noticed that the last three steps could especially benefit from hearty injections of conference calling.
Step Six: Practice Great Follow-Up – It’s a good problem, but if you’ve got a popular product with many interested potential customers, it can be difficult to do individual follow-ups to close deals. A conference call allows you to “chat” with all of your potential customers at once and follow-up as frequently as you like, all while still retaining a personal touch.
Step Seven: Close the Sale – After following-up and asking for their business, you can increase your chances of a sale by giving the potential customer as much information as they want—without smothering them of course. Hosting regular web conferences give you an opportunity to unobtrusively reach out, and it allows the customers find out more about your products. In that web conference, you can show pictures, your brochure, demonstrations, and whatever else you think will get the customer on your side.
Step Eight: Make Additional Offers – Here’s where conferencing really shines. You have them as a customer, so now it’s time to get them to buy again. You’ve already established a relationship, so continuing communications is not only expected, it’s beneficial. Host regular customers-only conference calls to listen to their complaints and suggestions. Find out what their thinking, act on that information, and then ask for their business again.
