Have you ever really wondered how sales have evolved over the years?
If you are an entrepreneur or a seller, it’s time to understand what direction the business world has taken. If you don’t welcome the Digital Transformation you risk stalling your company. And, as you know, the prerogative of every business is growth.
If your business doesn’t grow it can only take another direction: blockage, decline, even bankruptcy.
Do I seem too exaggerated to you?
Unfortunately they are not. If your business doesn’t evolve at the pace changes are happening today, it won’t get off the ground. And do you know what this entails? It means that it will always be subject to the transformations of the competition.
Your business cannot depend on others, you have to take matters into your own hands.
Are you wondering how to do it?
Stop convincing yourself of these things:
- My sector is different
- Web marketing is not for me
- It doesn’t work for me anyway
Do you know what these are? They’re just excuses not to get involved.
In 2011, Gartner made a bold statement: “By 2020, customer-business relationships will be managed 85% without human interactions.”
We are in 2020 and if you look around you can notice that consumers are increasingly comfortable with the world of automation, automatic responders, chatbots.
And now I ask you, do you really believe that it doesn’t involve you too
ability to adapt to change?
If you still have doubts, now let’s see together how sales have evolved and how to adapt to this modern process.
How sales have evolved with technology
Sales are essential for grow your business. This applies both to still inexperienced sellers and to those already experienced.
New technologies have brought notable changes especially in recent years. Therefore it is necessary for you to know how sales have evolved to become a successful salesman Today.
If you perfect your sales process and embrace the changes happening in the world and in the market, you will lead your company to growth.
Let’s see immediately what has changed and what you need to know to intercept your customers and to increase sales.
1. Buyers do more research
Take into consideration who you are dealing with consumers
already on average or a lot informed. Today, in fact, users are used to doing a lot of research on the Internet. They search for information on products and services, compare brands and companies, they already know a lot about you and your competitors.
So, if you want to be contacted by your potential customers you have to be found online.
As?
By ensuring that your website is among the top search engine positions, Google in particular. Planning some marketing strategies for the positioning your brand on social platforms. In short, you have to exploit all the channels available to you so as not to be pushed to the edge of the market.
And if you think that you don’t need all this, well, you’re wrong.
You’re wrong because your competitors are already moving and you risk getting carried away. Instead, if they haven’t acted yet it’s a good motivation to do something different that makes you differentiate yourself from others.
Doing business also means tfind a way to emerge and stand out to be noticed by users. Plus, once you get them to your site, you need to make sure they find the information they need.
Consumers, today more than ever, know what they want and you must be ready to provide the right information and where they can find it.
2. Selling means finding solutions
Selling isn’t just the exchange of money for a product or service. Selling means offering the consumer the solution to his problem or fulfilling his wish.
It is the preconceived notions about selling that give it a negative meaning. To counteract this perception something must change.
The consumer, with his investment, wants obtain a change that will make his life condition betternot just a good or service.
And that’s exactly what you need to give him. You need to focus on the problems or desires of your potential customers and understand how to solve or satisfy them. Let them taste the result they will achieve and then make sure they actually achieve it.
3. Construction of specific targets
Thanks to tracking systems on your website or social media, you can build lists of interested potential customers. If users have voluntarily left their contact information with you, for example by filling out a form on your site, you can contact them again.
You can use a strategy with them communication via email sending ad hoc messages. You can make additional offers on the product they had shown interest in.
Or, if they have been on a specific page of your site or e-commerce, but have not concluded the sale, you can make some retargeting campaigns. That is, advertising campaigns that sponsor that product or service.
To make me understand better: you know when you go to a website and then find an advertisement everywhere online for exactly what you saw? Here, it means that you have been tracked and that you are seeing those ads precisely because of the interest shown.
With these methods you will waste less time chasing users who have never been interested in your offers. But you will be directed directly to those potentially interested and therefore means having the possibility to shorten the sales process.
4. The rise of content marketing
Today’s consumers, who search online, want to find information useful to their needs. If you develop a Content Marketing strategy and produce quality content, provide value to your potential customers.
Are you wondering why you should do this?
Because consumers want to consult useful content and find the information they need. If they find high-value content on your site they will have an easier purchasing process and will not go looking elsewhere.
So, the more high-value content you provide, the more trustworthy your company will appear and the better your chances of making the sale.
With Content Marketing you have to position your brand, Make yourself known to customers, give the information that he needs and, only maliciously, close the sale.
In fact, a user who has just arrived on your site will need to know more about you; while a consumer who already knows you is more ready to purchase and will need other practical information.
5. Customization of offers
You have to abandon mass selling. What does it mean? That in today’s interconnected world users seek relationship buildingso don’t treat them as a generalized group.
The more you can do establish a direct dialogue with your potential customerthe more your chances of closing your sales increase.
You can do this through emails, but even more so on social media. In fact, social platforms are the most suitable channels for building an “equal” dialogue with your potential customers.
One of the key words in our era is: customization. People want the ability to choose the products or services that best suit their needs.
They also want to have a direct connection in case they need assistance. You must have solutions optimized for mobile devices so that the customer can easily contact you wherever they are.
The more you know how to stay close to your customers, the more they will tend to rely on you.
Conclusion
Selling is not an insurmountable challenge, but you need to know how sales have evolved to understand the phases of the purchasing process of the consumer.
If you know what path your customer is taking and what they need, you will know where to find them and what to offer them.
I don’t deny that there will be difficult moments, that you will have to accept defeats and that not everything will immediately go as you imagine. Every transformation process brings with it slowdowns and the need to adopt new procedures.
Selling is a challenge for all entrepreneurs and sellers but you will know how to deal with it if you stay updated and follow my advice.