As customer acquisition costs keep rising, savvy SaaS providers are focusing on retention to reduce their churn rates. An initial SaaS purchase is just the beginning of your relationship with a new customer. You must keep earning their loyalty to ensure high renewal rates and avoid financial and reputational damage.
Everyone loves a good story – from fables and folktales to case studies and compelling copy in marketing campaigns. A well-crafted story clearly illustrates how your solution adds value to an organization, and elicits a positive emotional response from the reader.
Your prospect has already visited your website, perused your online content and seen a demonstration of your product or service. What do you do next to convert an active inquiry into a sale? Prospects must understand the short and long term financial benefits of your solution if they are to make a positive purchase decision. This can be a challenge, as many focus on direct acquisition costs and compare them to the cost of what they’re already doing. Such analyses can be short-sighted and inaccurate because they omit the incremental value delivered by a new solution.
If you’re trying to find new opportunities in a market, it doesn't necessarily mean you have to expand your product line. First, expand your perspective. Why do I say this? To paraphrase Harvard marketing professor Theodore Levitt, people don’t want to buy a quarter-inch drill bit. They want a quarter-inch hole. In other words, look at the market from the perspective of the problem that you solve.
How frequently do you use the term “ROI” in front of customers and potential buyers? I frequently hear sales and marketing professionals talk about “ROI” inaccurately. In a casual conversation, people might still give you the benefit of the doubt and have faith that you know your stuff. However, if you’re making a formal presentation or having a serious conversation with a prospect who’s well versed in financial terminology, any misuse of the term could obviously leave a disastrous impression about you and your company.
One of the greatest advantages in selling is the ability to understand how CFOs (a typical approver) think. That’s particularly true if you’re selling a technology solution. Why? Tech sales generally represent large investments, and the job of any CFO is to make sure that any major expenditure will yield measurable results and a good ROI. As the steward of money within the company, CFOs wants to make smart investments. Your job as a seller is to provide proof of value. Although you might be extremely personable, likeable, and engaging, it’s important to realize that the typical personality of CFOs is not built to make decisions based on whether or not they like you.
In today’s economy, having a compelling business value proposition and being able to deliver against that promise is not a "nice to have," it’s the price of admission. Companies today constantly vie for business decision makers’ attention and the opportunity to sell their product or solution.
Every sales rep dreads hearing prospect objections. From “Your price is too high,” to “Call me again in three months when I get my budget back,” it can sometimes seem like all prospects want to do is find reasons not to buy from you. This is a frustrating situation for reps, especially when they feel, as the best do, that their product or solution could actually help the prospect and improve his or her business. So what’s the disconnect? If your offering can actually make life easier for this prospect, why is she spending so much time finding reasons to reject it?
How well can you describe your offering's value to different market segments? This is critical to any successful business strategy. Unfortunately, many B2B sales and marketing professionals communicate value in broad, generic terms, or fail to customize their language to appeal to different market segments.
In most competitive endeavors, fundamentals are what we must first learn and master in order to perform well. They provide us with confidence in setting basic direction and a stable foundation when the going gets rough. In marketing, sound fundamentals help set strategic direction, guide tactical plans and provide benchmarks for determining execution and performance.
