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Business Growth 4
Finding
Business in Today’s Economy
By Paul R.
Lloyd
Here are 10
ideas that can help you fast track your way out of a tough economy.
1. Follow
successful companies.
Look for companies, industries or organizations that are thriving
because of the downturn and see how your products and services fit
in with their needs.
2. Adapt to
change. Adapt your product and service offerings to meet the needs of the
companies you have identified as thriving in the downturn.
3. Narrow
your niche. The
temptation during a downturn is to expand your niche in order to
increase your prospect base. You confuse the market when you do
this. By narrowing your niche, it makes it easier for the buyer to
identify how your products or services meet their needs.
4. Out
service the competition.
Customer service is a major contributor to growth. The upside of the
downturn is there are many excellent customer-friendly employees out
of work. Replace grumpy workers with customer-driven staff.
5.
Communicate faster/more often.
Increase your communications flow to customers and prospects using
“free” services like email blasts, blogs, twitter, Facebook and
LinkedIn.
6. Make it
easy to buy. Review your
policies and procedures to see if you can make changes so that it is
easier for customers and prospects to find you, learn about your
products and services, and make purchases.
7. Make
downtime sales time. Use
downtime to increase your visibility in trade organizations and the
business community by serving on boards or other voluntary
activities. This not only helps these organizations when their own
funding sources are low, but also helps you network with potential
customers.
8. Solve
customer problems. Focus
your efforts towards solving immediate problems that customers are
willing to pay for. Find out what the biggest problem your customers
are facing and then develop a solution to that problem. This could
move you from a product focus to a service focus, but that’s okay as
long as you are bringing in revenue in the downturn.
9. Don’t
give away your services.
The temptation in a down economy is to give away your services in
hopes of making a bigger sale later. An example is doing a free
consulting project to help the customer plan how to best use one
your products. Stay focused on delivering high value and service
along with a quality product. A little free consulting can go a long
way to seal a deal, but a customer looking to you to perform a major
consulting project for free is just using you. If the project has
high perceived value, the customer should pay for it. If it doesn’t,
the customer doesn’t need it. Often the problem in these situations
is the sales rep has failed to sell value and has instead focused on
price.
10. Adjust
price only according to marketplace realities.
If your costs have not gone down, then you can’t reduce your selling
price without reducing your profit margin. Hold the line on your
selling price by emphasizing value. Look to your supplier network
and your product design team to find ways to reduce costs so you can
pass these savings on to customers. If the customer needs to lower
the price, then the customer needs to make some sort of trade off so
you can stay profitable. For example, you may be able to offer a
lower price in exchange for a longer term contract or an exclusive
vendor arrangement.
Would you like
to discuss strategies for growing your business at no cost or
obligation? Join Paul Lloyd for a conversation at a coffee shop near
you.
Call 630-393-6516 or send an
email.
Zuk-Lloyd Associates, Inc. – Creative writing and art solutions.
We help
clients increase sales by turning ordinary business information into
extraordinary stories.
Contact:
Paul R. Lloyd
630-393-6516
info@zuklloyd.com
www.zuklloyd.com
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