Being a born salesperson is something special! It’s a personality type and a skill that’s very hard to learn. Nevertheless, even without being a born salesperson, we can put a strategy in place to help us maximize our sales potential. Whilst we would all love for the phone to ring off the hook with incoming orders, that’s not how reality works and (most of us) have to work hard to secure an ongoing and increasing stream of sales. So how can we increase our chances? Put your eye on the goal!

1.           Analyze your sales data

Sounds boring, but it really helps to identify where previous sales revenue comes from. Existing or new customers? What industries? What motivates them to buy from you? What do they use your product/service for? Where are they located? How do they know about you?

There’s plenty more if you start looking for it. Once you identify what makes your customers tick, you can really cater to their needs and improve on lessons learned.

2.           Check out the market and your competitors

Your competitors want a piece of the pie, too. So have a look at who they are, what they do, how you are different and learn from any good or bad moves they have made. How is the market performing at the moment? Are there any new opportunities or threats out there?

Once you understand how they operate and what’s impacting the market, you can adjust your sales strategy to be a step ahead.

3.           Set an objective

After looking at your customers, the market and your competitors it’s time to start planning your sales future.

Setting an objective gives you a clear vision of where you want to go. Make it measurable. Give it a date. Make it realistic. Make it smart: i.e. Increase widget sales in ABC region by 5% by 31. December 2016.

Having a clear objective in mind will help you measure success as you go along and get you focused on what’s important. Plus it’s very rewarding when you reach or exceed it!

4.           Look your best

Have a critical look at your marketing collateral. Is everything up to date? Everyone using the latest version? Is it clear, concise and appealing to your target market? Is it better than what the competition has? Especially have a look at your proposal documents. Your next customer makes a buying decision whilst looking at them, so you want to make sure they are written in an easy to understand language, looking good and free from any typos or formatting mishaps.

5.           Collect clicks

Is your website up to date, compatible for mobile and tablet users? Easy to navigate? Engaging, informational and generating leads? Are your social media efforts working? Your digital representation is now more important than ever, so a regular review and update will go a long way.

6.           Track and Adjust

Tracking your progress as you go is an important aspect of staying on target. Confirm at regular intervals (at least once a month) that you are headed in the right direction to achieving your objective by the due date. If something doesn’t work, adjust it here and now to make sure you get there in the end.

7.           Makes sense but…

it’s just too hard and I’d rather focus on selling than spending time on strategic stuff. No worries, that’s understandable. Spending a bit of time on planning, however, will go a long way later down the track. There’s nothing wrong with getting some advice or outsourcing some aspects of running your business, though.