How we can take a book out of corporate marketing to improve marketing as a small agency and sole-proprietors:
After 5 years of marketing for companies, small businesses, individuals, and also my own company’s services, I realised sales is not a singular isolated activity that leads to a binary outcome - success or failure.
Sales is not a one-off effort - hit it or miss it
Sales is a literal endless journey of converting a potential customer into a paying and recurring customer. It requires corporate discipline and a systematic approach to get repeatable success.
In order to visualise this, sales funnel or sales stage model are used. This is especially useful in organisations where teams work on sales accounts jointly, which enables them to ensure that all potential customers are rightfully categorised, then adequately communicated to and not forgotten.
Create a standardised sales stage process
These stages are standardised according to the intended process in which a customer experiences your company. It acknowledges that not all customers will go through the stages sequentially, but will assume that they will progress linearly towards a defined objective.
The sales stages also highlight the importance of looking at potential customers at each stage as different from each other. Hence, they will require different impetus to take the next step towards a sale. In other words, in order to move clients from one stage to the other, you will need to understand what is holding them back and help them get over their hesitation.
This is FastTrack's sales stage process:
Here is an example of what my company FastTrackSG plans for its sales process:
There are 7 stages in total:
- People who don’t know us.
- People who know us by name/service
- People who minor opt-in - small commitment in time or dollars
- People who are going to meet up
- People who are going to make the purchase.
- People who are going to make the purchase
- People who have made subsequent purchases.
By using these stages, we’re able to classify all of our target, leads and accounts. It forces us to think of 7 unique messages to be communicated to these targets on a regular basis, develop a communication and marketing plan. They also help to identify activities that would raise conversions and areas where these efforts are lacking.
As a result, all of our marketing messages become more precise and efforts, more focused - on moving individuals forward in stages.
What to do and intended effects
| WHO | TO DO | INTENDED EFFECT |
| People who don’t know us but we know them | Make an introductory call
Facebook Advertisement SEO (Website) |
Improve Searchability & Shareability |
| People who know us by name/service | New Internal Programmes
Leadforms Social proofing Articles |
Increase attractiveness
Aptness Value & benefits |
| People who made a minor opt-in (small commitment in time or dollars) | Limited Offers
Consultation Workshops |
Create Urgency |
| People who are going to meet us | Social Proofing
Results sharing Adding us as partners |
Create commitment |
| People who are going to make the purchase | Paid Service
Value-added services |
Increase satisfaction |
| People who have made a purchase | Get referrals | Get recommendations |
| People who have made subsequent purchases | Create unpaid mutually benefiting content with them | Improve everyone’s businesses |
Final note:
It is a numbers game.
You need a volume of people that you can move stage by stage. Keep refining your efforts, review the process, innovating, and you will find success at every stage.