By Elaine Ball
Sales follow-up, your friend or foe?
With the dawn of Intergeo here and the hustle & bustle of the exhibitors getting ready for another year of excitement, a more serious note is on the horizon for the dozens of geoinformation companies wishing to entice new customers to grow their sales.
“Sales follow-up”
Turning warm leads into sales
Sales follow-up is a very important one for the companies wishing to build their brand awareness and grow their sales. An important topic indeed and unfortunately, one that gets ignored very often after the excitement of Intergeo has died down.
Its true…. your sales people will fall into the trap of being overwhelmed and dare I say it…. lazy!
So, make ‘Follow-up’ into a competition and lets grow those sales.
Here is something to consider;
- Give your team different coloured enquiry forms in order to know who has done what.
- You want to measure on quality of leads over quantity, so have 1 pile for hot leads, 1 for medium and 1 for general
- At the start of any exhibition, ask your people what reward they would like to receive if they gain the most sales? What motivates them … it can even be the thrill of the competition (with their colleagues).
- At the end of Intergeo, pull your team together and write on a flip chart in the corresponding coloured pens HOT, MEDIUM & GENERAL
- The winner is the one with the most HOT leads
- Now… don’t stop there. Its all about nurturing the leads. Exhibitions are not a one off sales trip. Set your goals to check every 3 months. Have a chart held in the office, showing leads that have been converted. You could set a time goal so everyone has to work that little bit harder.
- Reward accordingly. Make it fun!
The point of this short sharp blog on ‘follow-up’ is to get you thinking about the expense you have invested at such a highly prestigious show. Don’t waste all that great effort your team has worked so hard on. Remember, the leads generated at the exhibition are ‘warm leads’ because the people came to you.
So don’t waste all that hard work. Make ‘follow-up’ part of your sales cycle and measure the results.
Challenge your sales team with sales follow-up