Although salespeople can use their intelligence to collect customer information in various ways, in this process, salespeople can't do this work at will. Generally speaking, when collecting customer information, salespeople should pay attention to the following issues besides following relevant laws and regulations and social ethics:
Try not to disturb the normal work and life of customers.
Strive for accuracy and learn to distinguish false information.
Grasp the key points and eliminate irrelevant information.
Pay attention to efficiency, don't spend too much time in this area, so as not to miss the best sales opportunity.
Don't disclose important information of customers at will.
Using the customer funnel management model, sales staff can constantly tap customers, analyze customers, screen customers, and match the best resources of the enterprise to the customers who can bring the most profits to the enterprise. According to the customer funnel model, salespeople usually go through the following three stages to sort out customer information:
1. Target market.
According to the clear product positioning of the enterprise, determine which customers will have demand for the products of the enterprise; Then, according to the relevant customer information collected, analyze the customer's demand for enterprise products. Then, according to the above analysis results, customers are classified in an orderly manner.
At the end of this stage of work, under normal circumstances, those customers with large demand will be listed as important potential customers, and sales staff need to take these customers seriously.
2. Potential customers.
Potential customers are those who are interested in buying in the target market. Whether they are interested in buying your products depends on the cooperation of company advertising and market research. If we only rely on the personal efforts of sales staff, the overall work efficiency will be very low. Therefore, at this stage, the sales staff should not only carefully analyze their own customer-related information, but also make full use of the company's resources for analysis, and finally determine which customers have a strong purchase intention and which customers have no intention to buy your products or services at all. This will help salespeople to allocate time and energy reasonably in the next step.
3. Target customers.
Target customers are potential customers who have clear purchasing intention, purchasing ability and are sure to reach an order in a short time.
It is worth noting that at this time, when sorting out customer information, sales staff must know whether the other party has purchasing power, that is, whether the customer has the ability to buy the products or services you promote. Among them, there are three situations: first, there is a clear intention to buy, but it is temporarily impossible to buy; Second, there is a clear purchase intention, and the purchasing power is not strong; Third, there is a clear purchase intention and strong purchasing power. Obviously, customers who meet the third situation first need sales staff to spend more time and energy; For customers who belong to the first category, the salesperson can put it aside for the time being, but still need to keep in touch; Customers who belong to the second category should also keep in touch and actively strive for it. Every time a salesperson visits a dealer, the task includes five aspects:
1. Sell products. This is the main task of visiting customers.
2. Market maintenance. A market without maintenance is a flash in the pan. Sales staff should deal with the problems in market operation, solve the contradictions between customers, straighten out the relationship between channels and ensure the stability of the market.
3. Establish customer feelings. Salespeople should establish their own personal brand image in the hearts of customers. This will help you win the cooperation and support of customers for your work.
4. Information collection. Sales staff should keep abreast of the market situation and monitor the market dynamics.
5. Guide customers. There are two types of salespeople: one is to ask customers for orders, and the other is to give customers advice. The former type of salespeople will have a long way to get orders, while the latter type of salespeople will win the respect of customers.
In order to achieve these five tasks, sales staff should do the following work when visiting customers:
1) sales preparation
To prepare for failure is to prepare for failure. Before visiting customers, salespeople should lay a solid foundation for success.
1. master resource. Understand the company's sales policy, price policy and promotion policy. Especially when enterprises introduce new sales policies, price policies and promotion policies, they need to know the details of the new sales policies and promotion policies. What are the characteristics and selling points of the new products launched by the company? Without understanding the new sales policy, it is impossible to attract customers with the new policy; If you don't know new products, you can't sell them to customers.
2. Have a clear sales target and plan. Salespeople should strive to achieve their goals. The principle of sales is: make a sales plan and then sell according to the plan. Every time a salesperson visits a customer, he should know what his goal is. What can be done to achieve the goal? Customer visit objectives are divided into sales objectives and administrative objectives. Sales targets include asking old customers to increase the number or variety of orders; Recommend products that have not been operated in existing products to old customers; Introduce new products; Ask new customers to place orders, etc. Management objectives include collecting accounts, handling complaints, conveying policies and establishing customer conditions.
3. Master professional marketing skills. Master sales skills and carry out sales work in a professional way.
4. Clean up your personal image. Salespeople should show their brand image and corporate image to customers through a good personal image.
5. Bring all necessary sales tools. There is a saying in the business circles of Taiwan Province Province that "sales tools are like the sword of a knight". Salespeople should bring all materials that can promote sales.
The survey shows that when salespeople visit customers, using sales tools can reduce the labor cost by 50%, improve the success rate 10% and improve the sales quality 100%! Sales tools include product manuals and corporate promotional materials; Business card; Calculator; Notebooks and pens; Price list; Publicity materials; Sample; About newspaper clippings; Purchase order; Wet wipes and so on.
2) Action reflection
Sales staff should reflect on the last visit to customers, review, find shortcomings, and improve in time. Salespeople can be divided into two types: those who do and those who don't; Serious and not serious; Summarize or not summarize the work after completion; Improved and not improved; As a result of progress and non-progress, the former class succeeded and the latter class failed.
1. Whether the superior instructions are executed as required. The responsibility of the salesperson is to carry out-carry out the instructions of the leader. Salespeople should review themselves before each visit to customers. Did they fully carry out the instructions of the leader when they visited the customer last time? What aspects have not been implemented? How to implement it today?
2. Has the unfinished task been tracked?
3. Whether the customer's promise is fulfilled. A common mistake made by some salespeople is "making promises without keeping them". Zhu said: "Words are not credible." . Salespeople must "be careful about promises and do more implementation".
4. Work plan and arrangement for the next few days. Today's customer visit is the continuation of yesterday's customer visit and the starting point of tomorrow's customer visit. Sales staff should do a good job in route planning, arrange work in a unified way, make rational use of time and improve the efficiency of visiting.
3) Compare customer prices
The experience of China enterprises' market operation shows that market disorder begins with price disorder, which will inevitably lead to market disorder, so the core of market management is to manage prices. In order to manage the price, the salesperson must first understand the dealer's implementation of the enterprise price policy. Sales staff should know the following aspects:
1. Comparison of sales prices of different customers. Compare the prices of several customers in the local market horizontally and see the actual prices of different customers. Or compare the company's price policy to see if the dealer ships at the company's price.
2. Price comparison of the same customer in different periods. Compare the price of the same customer vertically to understand the price changes.
3. Comparison of purchase price and retail price. Because the price policy of enterprises is not uniform, the purchase price of many dealers is different, and the sales staff depends on the purchase price and retail price of dealers.
4. Understand the price of competing products. If the price of competing products changes, it should be fed back to the company.
4) Understand customer inventory
Knowing the customer's inventory is the basic responsibility of the salesperson.
1. Proportion of inventory products to sales. Know your inventory products and sales? What is the proportion of inventory products to sales? To find the problem. The proportion of inventory products to sales is too low, which may be out of stock or out of stock; If the proportion is too large, it shows that the products tend to be overstocked, and the sales staff should brainstorm with the customers to help them digest the inventory. 2. The proportion of self-owned products in inventory products. Look at the proportion of our products in customers' inventory. Occupy the dealer's warehouse and funds is the iron law of sales.
3. Which products have fast turnover and which ones have slow turnover? Due to the different market conditions in different places, the sales volume of the company's varieties in different places will also be different. Knowing which varieties sell fast and which ones sell slowly in the customer office can guide customers to do a good job in sales.
4. There is no obvious change in inventory quantity and variety. Understand what changes customers have made to the inventory quantity and variety of our products in recent days, and grasp the sales trends.
5) Understand the sales situation of customers.
On the basis of understanding the customer's sales and inventory, the salesperson introduces the product and sales intention to the customer, such as the company's new promotion plan, answers the customer's questions, and suggests the customer to order according to the safety inventory.
6) Check the customer's account.
Salespeople should not only increase sales, but also increase the gold content of sales. Reducing the risk of payment for goods is an important method to improve the gold content.
1. Check the actual quantity, collateral and quantity of the customer's store against the customer's store quota.
2. Confirm in writing that the customer has paid the unpaid amount, advance payment and accounts receivable.
3. Clean up the problems left over from history in time and sort out the creditor's rights and debts.
4. Regularly check with customers * * *, and take stock immediately when the price is reduced.
Check the after-sales service and promotion policies.
Understand the services provided by the general distributor for the second batch of merchants and retailers. Does the customer provide services to the customer according to the service policy and system of the enterprise? The promotion policies of the second batch of manufacturers and retailers should be implemented through dealers, and the sales staff should know the implementation of the promotion policies by dealers and whether there are problems such as misappropriation of promotional items.
7) Collect market information
1. Know about potential customers. The customer team of the enterprise is constantly adjusting, and the sales staff should know the information of potential customers in the local market. When the enterprise adjusts its customers, there are spare customer resources to use.
2. By visiting customers and other media, investigate and understand the channels, prices, products, advertising promotion methods and market share of competitors.
3. Understand and implement banner advertisements, POPs, etc. And organize on-site promotion.
4. Investigate the credit status of customers and its changes.
8) Customer communication
Frequent communication with customers can bring us closer to customers. Sales practice shows that no matter how big the problem is, it can be solved satisfactorily through good communication. Many contradictions between enterprises and customers are caused by poor communication.
Introduction of enterprise information. Let customers know about the company's situation and recent trends, and describe the company's development prospects to customers, which will help build customer confidence. Dealers choose products according to the three principles of "good products, good enterprises and good people in enterprises". Let customers know about the enterprise dynamics, which can not only let customers discover new opportunities, but also establish a corporate image in their hearts.
2. Introduce sales information. Introduce our company's successful experience in some regional markets to customers, and introduce some sales experience and promotion methods to customers.
3. Competitive product information. Introduce competitors' products, prices, channels, promotions, personnel changes and other information to customers, and then work with customers to find ways to deal with competing products.
9) Customer guidance
When visiting customers, salespeople help customers find problems and propose solutions, which is a win-win way. In enterprise training, a sales manager of an enterprise does not sit in the customer's office and chat with the customer every time he visits the customer, but goes to the customer's storefront and warehouse, goes to the market, goes to the wholesaler and retail terminal, talks with the people below the dealer, and then returns to the dealer's office to find a way to solve the problem and expand sales. The experience of excellent salespeople is that it is better to treat customers to a hundred meals than to do something practical for them.
1. Training When I was training in a company in Sichuan, one of the company's salespeople had a high performance. One of his successful experiences is that every time he visits the dealer, he spends an hour or two training the salesman of the dealer. He has 8 years of sales experience and loves learning. He talked about the practical methods of running the market and doing sales, and soon won the favor of customers. Every time he visits a dealer, he is addressed as a "teacher" from the boss to the salesman. When customers respect you as a teacher, won't they strongly promote your products?
2. consultative selling. Give more advice to customers and find ways to become an indispensable arm in their business.
3. service. Salespeople should be the solvers of customer problems. Customers can find salespeople when they encounter problems, and salespeople can help customers solve problems, which will win the respect of customers.
4. Handle customer complaints. Correctly handling customer complaints is the basic skill of salespeople. Correctly handling customer complaints = improving customer satisfaction = improving the enthusiasm of customers to promote products = rich profits.
X) Administrative work
After visiting customers, sales staff should also do the following work:
1. Fill in the sales report and access the customer record card.
2. Implement the commitment to customers.
3. Evaluate sales performance. Through the comparative analysis of the visiting objectives and the actual results, the purpose is to let the sales staff focus on the sales results and remind themselves to think more about the improvement methods and implement these steps in the next visit.
(1) Did you reach your visit goal? If not, review and analyze the reasons?
(2) What are your strengths? What needs to be improved? Write it down.
Only by knowing the specific situation of customer sales can we find problems, give guidance and do a good job in sales.
1. What are the main products sold by the company? What are the percentage of profitable products and unsalable products in the total sales of customers? How much can competitive products be sold? The purpose is to know which varieties of our products and competing products sell well and which are not.
2. Whether it is possible to monopolize the counters, and whether the samples are set up, eye-catching and replaced as required.
3. Is the company logo and advertising materials complete and the environment clean and refreshing?
4. Is the shopping guide service standard?
—— Quoted from the Marketing Encyclopedia of Yanbian People's Publishing House.