There’s a brutal, short-sighted cycle running through the manufacturing sector. A hire-fire culture that’s become almost standard practice.
A new sales hire comes in, eager and often experienced, and is told, sometimes without even a proper conversation:
“Go out. Knock on doors. Bring in new business… Or else.”
No strategy. No support. No tools.
Just pressure.
So how’s that Neanderthal approach working out for you?
Right. Thought so.
You’ve paid a recruiter a hefty fee. You’ve spent hours interviewing. You’ve forked out for a new laptop, a car, the salary, the pension, the insurance, a sign-on fee, the NI. And now, six months later, you’re cutting them loose. AGAIN!!.
What went wrong?
It’s easy to blame the hire.
But let’s be honest, most of the time, the failure isn’t theirs.
It’s yours…. No seriously it is!
You hired someone and left them to it, convinced they’d storm into new accounts just by picking up the phone, knocking on a door or waving that magic sales wand they must have somewhere.
And you believed, deep down, that your product would carry itself because it’s the best, it’s legendary, everyone used to love it when you were out on the road.
How terribly old fashioned 🥱
You may have even sent them on a sales training course.
Honestly?…. That kind of thinking belongs in the 1980s.
The world has changed. The buying journey has changed.
These days, most companies are locked down tighter than a cleanroom. There’s no receptionist to talk past. No buyer just waiting for a cold call*.
*seriously, even today there are many bosses with the ignorant belief that door knocking is still acceptable and welcomed, and buyers sit looking at the phone hoping your salespeople will call.
Sales teams need new tools
So if your sales team can’t simply knock on doors, how do they get in?
It’s a different time now, things have changed and they need new tools. In the past the sales team were first in, but now it’s marketing that open those doors for your sales team.
Creating the interest and desire in your product or service comes ahead of your sales team. Once you achieve this, the selling gets easy.
Without it, you’re just throwing another name onto the same old hire-fire roundabout.
Wake up!
Wake up to the way the b2b sales world is, stop fighting and blaming your sales team and get behind them instead.
For every new hire make sure you factor in the money and resource to support them with marketing, to drive the right people to them.
I’m not talking about business cards, flyers, an exhibition once in a while… There are far more productive ways to help them with that.
Oh no, I just mentioned the word “exhibition’…. Now don’t get me started on that one 😡! It’s the ultimate cop out for bosses. Pay for an annual exhibition and you have a clean conscience that you’ve helped your sales team. Right?
WRONG!
So at this point I hear many bosses quietly and shamefully asking what on earth they need to do if an exhibition and some flyers isn’t enough?
I will get you started with some tools that work in the real world, we use them with our clients every day (don’t be afraid to pick up the phone to ask for further clarification).
Tried and trusted tools:
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Develop and push a clear, confident value proposition that explains why you exist and what makes you different.
If you don't know what I mean then get in touch, as it's easier to explain that way, and it's really important you get this bit right. - Ensure you have a great looking, well-optimised website that captures and converts traffic. Even today, bosses still don’t seem to get the value of a decent website. But without it, you may as well give up as it's where 90% of potential new customers go, before speaking to you or to your sales team.
- Regular, well-targeted LinkedIn and email campaigns will warm up leads. This is a perfect way in B2B to raise brand recognition and desirability of your product or service. It’s one of the best ways to support your sales team, but do remember to give it time and do be consistent, it’s not a quick win.
- Sector-specific sales decks and PDF guides that open doors.
- Proper case studies, written, visual or video, that prove you deliver.
- Google Ads or LinkedIn Ads that generate inbound enquiries.
- An SEO plan that brings in relevant organic traffic.
- Follow-up campaigns to nurture prospects not yet ready to buy
Where do I start?
That’s quite a long list, and you can see now why many bosses don’t have the time, preferring to go back to the old fashioned methods of managing their sales teams.
It’s the easy way out.
For those open to some change though, and the prospect of generating higher revenue by changing their current methods, the above is the perfect way to start.
If you don’t have the time to do it, call in an industrial marketing team like ours.
If you can create interest before your sales team makes contact, then two-thirds of the sale is already done. Your salesperson becomes a guide, not a door-knocker, and guess what… They start to make those sales and move your company forwards.
