By Fiona Humberstone, 27th Mar 2008
When do you start planning how you’re going to follow up on an exhibition? For many businesses it’s not till you have the shoebox of leads in front of you that you think “What on earth am I going to say to these people?”. However, I’m going to suggest that you actually start planning your follow ups BEFORE the exhibition.
At my Exhibitor Secrets workshop this morning we discussed the downsides of waiting till after the exhibition to write your email or sales letter. You become overwhelmed with the amount of work you have to do, you waste valuable time writing a letter you could have written before the event, instead of chasing hot leads! And you miss opportunities.
Make your life easier, and your marketing more effective by planning your follow ups at least two weeks before your exhibition. Try to think about:
How many leads do you expect to obtain? How much time do you need to block out to follow them up by telephone? Cancel all non-urgent meetings and block out that time so that you focus on maximising the potential from the leads you have.
How quickly can you get these leads onto your database? Do you need support to help you do that – is your time better spent on the phone or on data entry?
Is there an email that you can send out immediately or within a couple of days to touch base?
Will you send a follow up pack with a letter? Can you put in a timebound offer?
All of this can be done before the event. It sounds so obvious, and yet many of us wait until we have a pile of leads before tackling this.
Tagged as , direct, exhibitor, follow, letters, marketing, sales, secrets, up in Exhibitions
By Fiona Humberstone, 11th Feb 2008
Motivating statements are powerful phrases that you can use to encourage your customers or prospects forwards in your sales or order process. Using them in your email, telephone and face to face dialogues will dramatically increase your conversion ratio, as well as making the whole experience much more pleasant for the person you’re communicating with. Let me give you an example.
My Mac had a complete and utter breakdown a couple of weeks ago. Not just a slight hiccup, but a full-on nervous breakdown. I couldn’t use Microsoft office at all and after a whole wasted afternoon I was recommended to an IT support company who specialise in Macs. I was completely frazzled and more than a little bit stressed by this point and was delighted to speak to someone who I thought would be able to help me.
“So, Fiona, you’re having problems with your Mac are you?” (cue nervous laughter and a positive response). “Right then can you quit all applications”. And he continued to launch straight into his diagnosis. I’m pleased to say that after 24 hours of work, and more than a little bit of stress we eventually got the computer fixed. Now how much easier would the conversation have been if at the outset the conversation had run a little like this
“So, Fiona, you’re having problems with your Mac are you? Don’t worry, we deal with these sorts of problems all the time. We’ll start by running through some simple diagnostic tests which will help me identify where the problem lies, and then we can work on fixing it for you. I’m sure we’ll have you up and running again very quickly.” It doesn’t cost anything does it, but certainly makes a world of difference to the person on the other end of the phone.
What motivating statements could you use in your business?
Tagged as , motivating, sales, selling, statement in Uncategorized
