Thursday, 17 January 2013

SALES STRATEGIES FOR 2013


There is a huge number of things that your 2013 sales strategy could and should contain. A good sales strategy and plan should target and address all the minute challenges and opportunities your business is facing. It should be focused on unique business distinctions; however…there are three things that should be top of your list to complete your 2013 sales strategy: i) A Learning Plan, ii) Content Marketing and iii) Social Selling.

A Learning Plan – despite not taking everything in whilst at school, I have always been a big fan of learning and problem solving, I see something that interests me, and I want to learn more. This year I am committing to a learning plan; I have a list of things that I want to learn to help increase my sales.

We’re wired to learn; we can’t help but learn, but we can choose what we learn and depending on what you choose it can make a huge difference to your sales. The companies that have been benefiting for the past few years from; social media, content marketing, blogging, etc. are in most case's learners; they build a learning plan into their sales strategy. Recognize the development of a trend or a gap in your knowledge and commit to increasing your knowledge in that space.

If your 2013 sales strategy lacks a learning plan, you will find yourself behind the curve. Find a specific topic or topics you and your organization want to become the expert in during 2013.

Content Marketing – every sales and marketing organization's 2013 strategy needs to contain a content driven lead generation campaign. It must have a way to attract clients with detailed content.

Content Marketing is used by the foremost sales people who have the greatest command of information and insight. Long before social media, content marketing, or the Internet, the most successful sales people carried the best and most compelling insights and information. Content marketing is perfectly built to propel those with insight and knowledge. If your sales organization isn’t very good but has more relevant insight and information, there is no better way to differentiate your organization than Content Marketing.

Social Selling – Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google Plus are changing the selling game; it has created a new approach for sales people to connect and sell to customers and clients. Social Media has given sales people the insight and connectivity to their target market in ways they couldn’t do in times gone by. Ignoring Social Selling and not proactively integrating it into your sales strategy via training and tools is failing your sales organization.

If your 2013 plan doesn’t have these three things, then it could cost you not only in 2013 but also in future years.

Written by Liam Oakes

Liam is the Candidate Manager at Aaron Wallis and has been with the company for 2 years after having a career with the RAF; Liam has helped hundreds of Sales Professionals secure a new Sales role and ensures that Aaron Wallis runs smoothly.




LinkedIn - http://www.linkedin.com/pub/liam-oakes/4b/536/403

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