The 8 Key Steps the Best Sales Processes Cover

Though every business is different, their sales processes all seem to gravitate to one specific progression. I think of it as a continuum that starts with a sales development process and ends with revenue generation. And it’s true for new business acquisition as well as expansion of existing business. The typical sales process in the simplest terms goes something like this:

1. 做目标受众research.
2. 提高意识并产生潜在客户。
3. 进行联系，安排会议和/或进行演讲。
4. 提交建议并赢得业务。
5. Repeat.

But in most cases, that's not enough. There should be more to a sales process. Most successful ones are carried out with two underlying goals in mind — establishing credibility and building trust.

一旦覆盖了这两个基础，就会产生收入。尽管这些目标为有效的销售流程提供了骨干，但还有一些其他相互关联和支持的组件需要工作以查看可靠的结果。他们来了。

举例来说，我们将遵循教育课程和调度软件公司的代表的销售过程。bob电竞官方下载bob全站app

1.资格

这是对定性，定量，人口和心理研究进行分析以深入了解前景行为和购买模式的阶段。

除其他地方available resourceslikeemail scheduling tools- 帮助产生合格的潜在客户，大大减少呼叫，并大大缩短销售周期。

假设我们的教育课程和调度软件公司经营一个受欢迎的博客。bob电竞官方下载bob全站app它发布了一篇有关使用云存储以获取学生信息的优点的文章。本文包含链接到内容报价的行动呼吁 - 有关大学如何使用技术来适应传统学年的中断的网络研讨会。

A high-level administrator from a community college in Northern California reads the article, clicks on the call to action, and provides their contact information in exchange for access to the webinar.

Our rep takes that information and sets up a discovery call with this administrator. On the call, the rep asks relevant, thoughtful questions to get valuable insight into whether this prospect is a good fit in terms of the school's size, problems, budget, and other key traits.

假设我们的销售人员提出了所有正确的问题，并得到他们需要的答案。现在，潜在客户是合格的领导者，他们可以在销售过程中继续前进。

2. Preparation

这个销售过程阶段涵盖了各种不同的销售技能，例如满足准备，引起兴趣，预期和克服异议，表现，咨询，受众参与技术，闭幕手势，后续行动等等。

而且准备不仅是一次性的事情，而且正在进行中。其他一些制备组件涵盖了您的潜在客户面临的竞争格局和挑战，证实您的产品和服务将应对这些挑战，并以具有成本效益的基于需求的方式进行，并确定可量化的价值。

If you can't do all of these things, you're not truly prepared.

In our example, our salesperson would take the time to understand the challenges a school of that size faces, the budget it might have allocated for scheduling software, how it compares to other community colleges in Northern California in terms of enrollment and endowment, and several other factors that would provide context for the school's unique challenges.

That way, our salesperson can best establish how their product can fit its needs and help them overcome the overarching issues and concerns it faces.

3. Approach

在进近阶段，您将应用您在前一步中收集的知识开始建立更实质性的互动。在领先优势之后，您是您首次联系的地方。通过电话，通过视频聊天或其他一些特别直接的媒介，可以通过电话进行这种情况。

In this stage, you leverage your company-specific insight and general sales acumen to intrigue your prospect — you create enough actionable curiosity to warrant a more thorough presentation. There are multiple methods you can use in this stage. Three of the most prominent are the premium approach, the question approach, and the product approach.

Premium Approach

With the premium approach, you offer a prospect some sort of promotional item or gift. That could be anything from a gift card to something specific to your company or industry. In our educational curriculum and software example, our rep might offer the prospect a year's subscription to a prestigious, expensive academic journal.

Question Approach

The question approach involves less schmoozing and more critical thinking. It's where you ask a question — or series of questions — that gets your prospect to critically evaluate their current pain points.

In our example, our rep might try to ask questions about specific professors' experiences with or complaints about the college's current scheduling process, hoping that the prospect will see cracks in its current situation from a perspective they hadn't considered.

产品方法

最后,产品的方法是提供prospect a sample or free trial of your product or service to give them a picture of what the product looks like. Considering the scale and nature of the product in our example, our rep might not be able to pull this one off. Instead, they would give the prospect that kind of preview in the next stage — presentation.

4.演示

Assuming you’ve done all your homework in the first two stages of the process, you may be fortunate enough tobook a meeting. The stage following the meeting and/or presentation will be determined by how well you have nailed down the prior two steps and how well you perform your demo — and yes, it is a performance.

So you better know what you’re talking about and rehearse it to the point that you could do it in your sleep while still seeming "spontaneous." It’s an art form. It’s also an important part of building credibility and establishing trust.

In our example, the rep had better know the ins and outs of the college's student body, the total number of faculty, the specific courses it's known for, the size of the campus itself, the number of classrooms, and any other information or factors that could possibly be affected or improved by leveraging the rep's software.

5. Realization

Once you’ve made it past the first three stages successfully, you might have earned the opportunity to present a proposal. This is where your agreed-upon client needs-based analysis and quantified value benefits need to be clearly laid out and justified. If they aren't, don’t even bother submitting a proposal.

我们的代表将需要从演示阶段获取所有信息，并能够应用它。他们将不得不明确地证明该软件将为大学所做的事情 - 在合法的数字中支持。bob电竞官方下载

If the software's ability to streamline scheduling would make the college more efficient, they would have to show exactly what that means in quantifiable terms.

6. Perform-ication

好的，所以我做了一个以保持“ -ation”主题。确实，这个销售过程阶段是关于义务的。如果您很幸运能够获得业务 - 通常可以归结为时机和运气，那么您有义务确保您将交付您的建议以及客户同意的内容。

在这里，出色的服务和性能的责任部分从代表转变为产品本身。在我们的示例中，学校更好地看到了结果。由于使用软件，调度过程必须变得更加容易。bob电竞官方下载否则，代表的全部努力将只是一些数字蛇油螺距。

7.沟通

An integral part of the process is keeping both internal and external contacts involved and in the loop. Use your CRM system — that’s what it’s for. But above all, make sure you keep the client updated and do it regularly. If you did well, tell them. If you encountered an issue, tell them about it and explain how it was corrected. They’ll respect you in both instances.

8. Continuation

This is an often-overlooked and underutilized stage of the process — despite containing hidden revenue-generating opportunities. How do I know? Because I’ve seen it happen ... and not happen. By neglecting to reinforce value, organizations miss opportunities to justify the client's decision, often making them lose out on referrals and upsell business.

Now, there's no guarantee your sales process will be totally in keeping with the steps listed above. Yours could differ based on factors like sales style, training, and experience. Still, the sequence detailed in this article can serve as an effective reference point for virtually any company looking to put an effective sales process together.

编者注：该帖子最初发表在May 2015and has been updated for comprehensiveness.