Increase in sales – Many companies and self-employed people are stuck and ask themselves “How do I increase my turnover?”. The answers to the question of more sales are in principle simple. There are only a few strategies for increasing sales. Only 3 to be exact. Read on and find out which ones.
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Increase sales with the golden 3 rules
Making more sales, increasing sales or increasing sales always works with the same 3 strategies – the golden 3. Increase sales by turning these three buttons of your sales strategy.
Revenue Increase Strategy #1: Generate more sales through more customers / New customer acquisition
This strategy for increasing sales is often the first to be pursued. The question: “How can you increase sales?” is usually quickly followed by the answer: “Make customer acquisition and win new customers!” This is true, although strategy 2 and 3 to increase sales are no less effective when it comes to increasing sales.
This first strategy for increasing sales is divided into two variants:
Variant A – Increase sales through more contacts and generate more leads, increased new customer acquisition
This variant to increase sales is about increasing the amount of potential new customers that is poured into the sales funnel at the top. True to the motto:
Contacts bring contracts!
The measures to increase sales in this way depend on how you acquire new customers and generate leads. If that works, you can increase your sales by simply doing more revenue-boosting measures… e.B. the following:
- make more acquisition calls
- do more advertising
- visit more events and trade fairs
- Distribute more posts on social media
- Generate more referral partners
- Engage more people on the street if that suits your business
… there are now a myriad of possibilities and ideas to generate contacts and thus boost sales.
However, it may also be necessary or useful to break new ground in the acquisition of new customers in order to achieve more sales. Often, companies traditionally always do the same thing to attract new customers, although this works worse and worse.
Times and conditions are changing. Due to the technological progress even rapidly. Get new ideas for increasing sales by fundamentally questioning the old methods of increasing sales.
Variant B – Additional sales through better conversion rate
The second variant for increasing sales does not strengthen the approach to new customers, but improves the completion rate in the context of new customer acquisition. You can increase sales by turning a higher percentage of contacts into customers.
Although some companies manage to generate many leads and new customer contacts, the result in terms of sales figures is still weak due to too low completion rates.
The only holes in the sales funnel should be up and down.
Analyze in detail BEFORE you implement sales-increasing measures
When I work as a management consultant in sales – in the B2B sector or in retail – and support companies in finding and implementing sales-increasing measures, I usually analyze together with the company where in the sales process and why they lose contact.
We record all contact key figures exactly and it becomes clear very quickly where the leak is in the sales funnel and how to plug it. These findings are then often translated into concrete measures to increase sales in sales training courses or a sales seminar for the sales organization. Identifying your sales teams strengths and weaknesses on an individual basis can also enable you to direct leads to the best salespeople using either manual lead distribution or a lead routing tool.
Revenue Increase Strategy #2: Generate more revenue per customer
The second basic strategy for increasing sales is: Sell more to existing customers. If there is too much focus on acquiring new customers, this strategy for increasing sales is often neglected, as I often notice as a management consultant and business coach.
Increasing sales with existing customers is much easier in terms of sales psychology than winning a new customer. In many cases, it means less effort (time and money) for you to sell more to an existing customer than to acquire a new customer.
Also for this strategy, there are again two basic variants for increasing sales as well as a lot of individual points on the subject of “Increase sales ideas”.
Increase in sales Measures: Variant – Additional sales with existing customers
Many sellers are satisfied with the fact that the customer says YES and buys something. In the joy of the conclusion, they often forget completely what the customer could still buy. “Additional sales / increased sales through cross-selling” is the motto.
But the increase in sales through additional sales often fails because there is nothing (anymore) that could be sold to the customer.
To drive revenue growth along the way, it’s important to have an offering portfolio that still offers something the customer could buy. When the main offer is over, a lot of potential for increasing sales is left behind.
Increase in sales Measures: Variant – Sell larger products / units / packages
The second way to increase sales with existing customers is to offer larger products, services or packages. Although this goes in the same direction as additional sales, something else is meant.
If a coach sells e.B. individual coaching by the hour, he has to sell many hours in order to achieve sufficiently high sales. Generating a lot of sales in this way is only possible if you address many more potential customers.
This, in turn, requires a lot of effort, especially time. But our coach doesn’t have that time because he has to coach for many hours. A cat biting its tail.
True to the motto:
Those who work too much do not have time to earn money.
The effort to sell a “small product” (such as .B a coaching lesson) is often as great as (sometimes even greater than) the effort to sell a large product (e.B. a package with 100 coaching hours for a company).
But this applies not only to service providers, but also to many other companies. For real estate developers, for example, it is largely the same effort to process a € 1 million project or a € 3 million. The profit, however, increases significantly.
If you already bake rolls, why not the same size?
Therefore, one of the most effective ideas for increasing sales is to make the products, product packages or service packages larger.
If, on the other hand, you want to increase sales and achieve more sales with small products, the question is in the foreground “How can I generate more sales more efficiently?” The way to increase sales can lead through standardization and automation.
Increase sales Strategy #3: Generate more sales through higher customer buying frequency
Last but not least, you can answer the question “How to increase sales?” by getting your customers to increase the frequency of purchases.
This type of increase in sales can be based on additional products (see also additional sales / cross-selling) or on motivating your customers to consume more of your products (go for a massage more often, eat more pasta, travel more often).
Increase in sales through customer loyalty
It may also be that your customers meet some of their needs with your competitors. In this case, real increase in sales is a matter of customer loyalty and loyalty.
Find out if this is the case and if so, think about
how you can get your customers to buy more from you. A good answer to this question can mean significant additional sales for your company.