Business Management - Marketing/Sales

There is an urban legend that a guy went to Nordstroms to return four tires. He railed about what a good customer he is to the store, how much he spends, and so on, loudly stating his case.

I am a GLEEK. And I will not apologize for it. I love that show. And last week, there was a scene that for the first time made me say, “Hey, there’s something I can use to blog about.”

The furniture store wasn’t about price. It was about relationships, expertise and trust. Michelle, the new Print Buyer, rapidly changed all of that. How could a company buy with one philosophy and sell with another? It wasn’t fair.

With unrestricted marketing warfare, marketing weapons can be used to overwhelm the consumer and control their purchasing power. Start with print—the faithful, heavy artillery of marketing. Next, add some stealth, such as emerging technologies—QR codes, SMS, and mobile sites—all linked to the Internet via personalized microsites

Most business people have at least 100 people they call their business associates, strategic partners, vendors and related support services providers that they know well. The “Strategy of 100” lets you start with people who do know you, trust you and will give you an audience.

Discounting isn’t always a bad strategy. Pricing to the realities of the marketplace should at least be considered. In the right situations, intelligent discounting can lead to better profits as well as revenue growth.

There is a good chance that we (the print community) have a lot to learn from each other. This was made particularly clear to me last week at GRAPH EXPO 2011 when Bill and I talked to a group of owners, executives and salespeople about how to motivate salespeople to embrace selling digital.

The subject was, “How to get your sales team to sell digital and VDP.” With the calm of a 50-year print veteran, the self-proclaimed “oldest man in the room” asked a seminar-stopping question: “Why is this so hard?”

No matter how many years pass and how many articles or blog posts we read and digest about the right and wrong ways to approach a prospect, the point about sending appropriate samples doesn’t quite sink in. If you’re contacting a new prospect, find out as much about this person’s company as you can before sending samples of work you’ve done for other customers.

Anyone involved in the sales and marketing of a company has heard about sales funnels and their importance. What may not be quite as familiar is AIDA. AIDA is a simple acronym that was devised a long time ago as a reminder of four stages of the sales process