I need some quick sales. Any ideas?

Dear Aunty B,

For some reason things fell off a cliff for us in February this year.

I can blame the economy and one of our suppliers who decided to become our competitor (thanks very much), but I am really blaming myself for not acting faster.

I am 27 and have been in business for three years, so looking back I suppose I didn’t have the experience to see it coming and respond in time. I have had to let some people go, restructured and focused the business, but now we need to get stuck into it, so I wondered if you had any great tips for as quickly as possible to fill my sales pipeline? I am in retail and don’t have a lot of money.

Philip W,
Yas

Dear Philip,

Here is a prediction Philip. In 10 years time you are going to be a top entrepreneur because you learn from your mistakes, take responsibility and are resilient enough to make the hard decisions to keep going.

And of course you don’t have a lot of money. Who does?! Your quickest avenue to more sales is through internet marketing. Find out where your potential audience congregates online. Make sure they are an audience who will pay and not just browse. Put together a great offer with extra value (don’t discount.) And then do some banner advertising and social media around that offer. Make sure you can deal with the leads and inquiries when they come in so you don’t waste the opportunity.

Look at what has worked for you or your competitors in the past. How can you improve/adjust that? Look through past clients. Contact them with a special campaign. Make a list of competitors to your customers. What trial deal can you offer them? Can you make contact with relevant communities and market through those? And of course you have developed a comprehensive email database and can send them a compelling offer.

So make a plan, activate the troops and set up the war room. I mean that. Declare it sales war fortnight and give a bottle of something to the person with the fattest pipeline and then another something to the person whose pipeline yields the most during that fortnight. Set up a whiteboard and make everyone join in. Make it fun and really competitive!

Be smart,
Your Aunty B

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