Why Your Business Must Have a Sales Department Mindset

Now of course I understand you can’t hire a sales department overnight, or ever if you don’t want to but this article will take you through why (even if it’s just you behind that screen) you need to start prioritising a sales department strategy and mindset for your business.

Applying the fundamentals of a high performing sales department to your online ventures will see your sales activities and profits soar if done right.

Every business needs a sales and marketing strategy, and as a former sales manager I have transferred my years of skills learnt from my corporate career into supporting freedom focused entrepreneurs in the online space.

So, let’s explore how you keep up with companies with a sales force when it is just you….
How you can ensure your potential customers get taken through a solid sales process, from finding your company’s product to closing the deal whilst ensuring the best customer service…

What Even is a Sales Department Mindset You May Be Wondering?

LEAD GENERATION – Firstly, your lead generation processes must be consistent and mapped out.

If you have no leads then it will be hard to offer your services and products, so a good place to start is thinking about where you will find your leads and then what you will do with them once they have been made aware or expressed interest in your offer.

Winging a few initial leads and posting and praying on social media is NOT a sales or lead generation strategy.  (Download my guide to attracting the ideal clients)

I spoke about the importance of tracking and I personally recommend using a tool such as Asana to devise a workflow that keeps your sales strategy organised.

RELATIONSHIPS – Another easy way anyone can manage their interactions with potential customers (and a tip I used in my corporate sales conversations), is to note details about the person you are speaking to in a document you can update as and when you apply your retouch strategy.

For example, if you create a Google document and note the interactions you have during your sales calls or enquiries, you are far more likely to remember details and build deeper relationships with a potential client or customer than you would if you had no idea about them every time you made repeat contact (or relied on memory alone).

Relationships are everything, so instead of focusing on the sale, focus on building a relationship with your potential clients and customers.

ACCOUNTABILITY – Another factor as to why sales departments are successful is they work on accountability and consequences.

For example, the people who exceed at selling get recognition and possibly even incentives, those that don’t get the same results are encouraged and supported so they can do better as they develop their skills.

If you can emulate this in your own key sales generating actions you will become better at selling, for example if you are a reward based personality type you might want to acknowledge a sale with a small gift or treat, reinforcing the motivation to keep making sales in your business.

Being solely responsible for the sales of your business can be a scary thought. Finding the accountability to continue in your sales operations is vital, even when it gets tough (and it will at times).

RESILIENCE – Building a sustainable business depends on your sales and by emulating how a sales department operates you are preparing yourself for resilience. Resilience is key right now as many businesses plateau.

Tweaking content, copy and offers in the hope of avoiding key sales activities, then feeling deflated when sales are not coming in is normal if you don’t get into the right mindset.

Maybe you had some success in sales and yet recently conversion has slowed down.

Interestingly, it’s not all your fault!

Here’s why; selling online has changed, and the strategies and tactics that once worked so well, are becoming increasingly harder, more expensive and less effective.

The reason for this, the crazy online business bubble we are in is still relatively ‘new’ in the world of sales and marketing.

10 years ago, even 5 years ago most of what we are utilising now didn’t even exist.

You can read more about this here.

Building a resilient business that is safeguarding against predicted recession boils down to creating a resilient and consistent sales strategy and process in line with your individual business objectives. With or without a sales department, the fundamentals are still the same.

Putting your best sales representative head on and acknowledging that a great performing sales department puts one key factor ahead of sales statistics and that is the ability to build relationships with your potential, ideal customer.

Selling well also requires a solid product or service that you absolutely believe will serve your target market.

The great news is, with tools like social media allowing you to reach more and more people, sales staff are not a compulsory factor in your sales success, you alone steering your business with a sales department mentality will be enough to excel as a solopreneur.

Every day you must prioritise sales or generating the right kind of leads that will convert.

Now of course people are not numbers, and this is why honouring that serving is what you do as an integral business and getting paid to serve brings about the right attitude and energy in sales turnover.

Hopefully, from reading this article, your sales department mentality with help you as the business owner see that by focusing on customer contact and building those relationships leads to creating a long term network and brand association.

This in turn will allow sales to continue over a long period of time, despite what the economy is doing.

The effects of a recession can be devastating, because just like customers, the business owner like yourself is a human being with life and business pressures, so my role as a sales coach prepares you for an unshakeable resilience even when sales dip or you plateau.

CUSTOMER RETENTION Another factor to consider that many entrepreneurs miss is customer retention, you ideally aim to see people going from potential customer to repeat customer.

Without the right retouch strategy and systems in place you create a sales method where you are constantly reinventing what you think are enticing offers and products and they flop, by having a great customer service journey in place, even post sale, you highlight your quality and care over that of your competitors.

Mindset and accountability to keep going with your sales strategy is paramount to ensure you stay consistent and don’t give up, particularly during a launch. Having a fellow business owner that also needs to focus on their sales success is a great idea, you can hold each other accountable and even set targets and friendly competition to stay motivated.

If you are a solopreneur and really do need to focus on long term resilience at a time when people are more cautious online with their money, and the market is becoming oversaturated and in turn people are harder to impress, investing in sales training or outsourcing sales activities may be a smart move.

No sales equals no business.

Stay ahead as an entrepreneur despite not having a whole sales team behind you by applying a sales department mindset.

Jade x

P.S. There’s load of FREE training and resources over on my Sales Swag page in case you’ve missed it!

All stock photography used in this post, is courtesy of UKBlackTech.