"Nine Critical Steps to Sales Success"

Most organizations have separate marketing, sales and customer service departments, but to truly maximize a company's efforts these departments must be closely intertwined. Potentially, each group has a tremendous, long-lasting impact on prospects and customers. First impressions are powerful. To ensure that your business' impact and image remain positive, it's imperative that the marketing, sales and service departments function cooperatively. Essential to this undertaking is streamlined communications (internal and external) and a centralized pool of resources that customers can rely on. The good news is that user adoption of the Web and e-commerce is helping to accelerate the convergence of these functions.

Step #1 - Image Building

People often base their purchasing decisions on company image. Developing a good image is especially important when your product's benefits are intangible or difficult to measure. When customers don't have the expertise to critically analyze a variety of products and features to make an informed decision, the company with the best - or most well known - image usually wins. How can a company overcome this? It can be a huge challenge for smaller or emerging businesses or those trying to catch up with competitors.

The DemoRoom levels the playing field. Each product in The DemoRoom is presented along side others that are in the same classification; giving your product great "shelf space" and equal exposure to prospects who may not be aware of all their options. The best features of the product and company are highlighted, building credibility and confidence. Periodically, The DemoRoom features a product or manufacturer-increasing its exposure to high-quality, qualified buyers.

Step #2 - Creating the Message

Critical to sales success is creating the right messages. Marketing is faced with the challenge of aligning the company's needs and culture, attributes of the products and their position in the marketplace, and desires and demands of consumers; creating coherent and persuasive sales messages. Developing an effective marketing campaign is an art and consumer input is essential.

The DemoRoom provides valuable buyer insight. The DemoRoom continuously collects and organizes the interests and comments of prospective buyers for use by your marketing group. Insightful information will help your marketing managers create more compelling messages and effective marketing campaigns.

Step #3 - Generating Leads and Prospects

Lead generation is an ongoing and demanding process, typically accomplished through advertising, public relations, conventions, trade shows, and word-of- mouth. Filtering and qualifying leads can be an arduous task. Effectiveness is usually measured in dollars per inquiry, per demo, or per sale.

Step #4 - Qualifying

Identifying a prospect's needs early in the sales cycle is important to avoid wasting time - for both buyer and seller. Qualifying prospects also entails determining whether or not they have the authority and the budget to make a purchase. A prospect not qualified today may be in the future, which makes the process of identifying, tracking and moving prospects closer to a sale very critical.

The DemoRoom attracts qualified buyers. Visitors that come to The DemoRoom are pre-qualified buyers who are actively shopping. Market research indicates that the majority of these shoppers have credit cards and the authority to buy.

Step #5 - Making Presentations

The lead generator has delivered the prospect... now the salesperson takes over. Manufacturers have a lot at stake. They must strive to ensure that every buyer is satisfied with their products and that its full value is extracted. A challenge under these current conditions: 1) When an industry is fast moving; 2) When price points are well above the impulse purchase level; 3) When a purchase also requires a commitment of time, attention and energy; and 4) When a purchase of a "wrong" product can cause significant disruption for both buyer and seller. In other words, engaging buyers and aligning their needs with product capabilities is growing more complex. New products, along with new versions, upgrades, etc., are hitting the streets at alarming rates; adding to the confusion.

The DemoRoom helps buyers make informed purchasing decisions. The DemoRoom has been carefully designed to help customers make thoughtful, informed purchases, based on realistic expectations. A decision that leads to long-term satisfaction. The DemoRoom provides a flexible and captivating stage for your product presentation. Interested buyers view key features, operating requirements, and special effects that give the prospect the "look and feel" of the product. Depending upon the intricacies or the complexity of the product, a presentation could range from three or four Web pages to as much as 25 pages. On their own accord, shoppers receive the full sales presentation, including features/functions/benefits, system requirements, and manufacturer background.

Step #6 - Answering Objections

Handling objections professionally and pragmatically is critical in consultative selling. The savvy salesperson will actually surface objections and tackle them head on.

The DemoRoom enables buyers to address issues up front. An approach that is simple and effective: Boost the prospect's confidence level by providing factual information and thoughtful answers to questions. Like a capable salesperson, the purpose of The DemoRoom is to highlight a product's selling points and provide facts. On top of that, The DemoRoom effectively addresses objections by giving prospects the means to easily answer their own questions. In the end, this leads to an informed buying decision and higher user satisfaction.

Step #7 - Closing the Sale

The defining moment in the entire process. Also known as writing up the order, making a positive buying decision, plunkin' down the old credit card....

The DemoRoom makes buying easy. Just as a polished salesperson would, The DemoRoom dispenses information in small doses for two primary reasons. First, people can better assimilate information in small increments. Second, with The DemoRoom, there is always a soft trial close on the screen. The prospect is never more than two clicks away from the shopping cart. Once the decision to buy is made, the transaction is quick and easy.

Step #8 - Customer Service

Service is the key to customer loyalty. Every customer - satisfied or dissatisfied - directly influences an enormous pool of prospects. Remember, your customer service department can be your best source of sales.

Step #9 - Customer Relations/Resale

In many industries, profit structures depend on resale revenue. Upgrades, new versions or replacements, add-on modules and other "enhancements" have given manufacturers an opportunity to recoup initial development costs by selling high-margin products. The cost of obtaining a new customer - versus retaining one - is expensive and chews into profit margins. With this in mind, it's imperative that you stay in front of your customers through an effective means of communication.

The DemoRoom encourages follow-up sales activity. The DemoRoom strengthens customer loyalty and encourages follow-up sales in two ways: (1) customers who make well-informed buying decisions are more satisfied with the product; and (2) by leveraging The DemoRoom's customer communications vehicles, anyone who wants know what's new (i.e. products, events, news, etc.) from a particular manufacturer is personally notified through e-mail. While the intent is not to replace the manufacturer's communication activities, The DemoRoom's "point-of-view" appears unbiased. This approach augments and reinforces the manufacturer's efforts.

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