Time to launch your own stimulus package

Few of us will be saved by an industry bailout - that is reserved for bankers and motor companies.  Furthermore, quantitative easing is not going to help you meet your numbers and the economic stimulus package is not going to be enough to restore vitality to your sales.  

The reality is that Barack Obama, Gordon Brown or Angela Merkel have got too much on their minds to be concerned about your business, or mine.  So if you want to get sales revenues back on track then you are just going to have to launch your very own stimulus package.    A sales stimulus package that is.

As we see it that should have at least 4 components:

1.        Activity stimulus:  ramp up your levels of sales activity and keep them up, that means more sales calls, more emails, more meetings, etc.  As your competitors take their foot of the pedal you can cover new ground, make new contacts and woe new customers.

2.        Innovation stimulus: Never has the appetite for change being so great, with companies having a blank check as regarding reinventing themselves, their products and their processes.  In particular that means finding leaner and more flexible ways of delivering new and existing benefits to the customer.

3.        Value stimulus:  With so much talk of deflation and price cutting, a focus on how your solutions create value for the customer’s business is key.  If you are using long lists of features, or benefits to sell then now is the time to stop.  Focus instead on quantifying the impact your solutions have on the key metrics and variables that relate to the performance of your customers’s business.  Stimulate the buyer by explaining to prospects, using real customers as examples, how your solutions have cut costs, increased sales and impacted on other important business metrics.  Then explore new ways to add value to all your existing customers, ways to exceed their expectations and to transform your company from a supplier to a strategic partner in respect of their businesses success.

4.        Buyer stimulus:  As buyers stall buying decisions and delay key projects until a time of lower risk and uncertainty, what can you do to stimulate action?    In another article we have listed 8 ways in which sellers can reflect the changed priorities of buyers, including flexible pricing, agile implementation, point solutions, etc.  Success requires that sellers are in synch with the changed business requirements of their customers and prospects.  The appetite for large scale IT projects with long term paybacks has, without question, diminished, however that does but those who can help buyers do more for less, cut costs and respond to uncertainty can and will close business.