I
am having difficulty finding sales people
or even real clients. My small business
was growing for the first year from
contacts I had but now I can’t seem to
find new ones. I have been going at least
twice a week to networking meetings.
Everyone tells me that is the best way to
meet clients but it’s not working for me.
This
is a very common problem and fortunately
easy to solve. Your exact solution can’t
be discovered in a brief letter that
doesn’t give any details of your business.
It is possible to state a few general
truths, however, that will put you on the
right track.
In recent years it has
become a common practice for small
business owners to become members of
several networking groups. It has been my
experience that very few people are made
better by their attendance. First,
networking is an art that needs to be
practiced and studied. You may have heard
this truth that is often quoted. “ It’s
not what you know, or even who you know,
but who knows you.” I have seen many
potential entrepreneurs lose valuable
sales time becoming expensive secretaries.
Some have extensive data collection
systems that require care and maintenance
to collect names of people who don’t
really even talk to them and are certainly
not qualified prospects. Networking is an
important and valuable skill, and there
are many good groups to join, but
calculate your income per hour for the
time you spend and reduce or expand
accordingly. Simply meeting people will
actually work against you if your
presentation isn’t good.
In your particular case, since I will
assume that you don’t have a great deal of
money to hire sales people, you have four
good possibilities.
1) Hire a sales
person on straight commission but good
ones are hard to find.
2)Hire a sales
agent, although this can also be pricey.
3)Share a sales person with a firm that
sells complimentary products
4)Hire a
sales rep or sales manager with strong
experience and capabilities for only one
day per week. You get the best at a good
price. As they bring income you can expand
the time or have them hire and train their
replacements as your personal staff.
Doctor Profit provides all these
services and I apologize if it seems
“salesy” to say that. We do appreciate the
business, but I am mentioning it here only
to say that we actually work these
programs regularly and each one can be
tremendously effective but it is important
to choose the one that is appropriate to
your needs and environment.
We
have been manufacturing a software product
for more than two years and sales are
growing. We are establishing sales in our
target market and are profitable but it’s
growing slower than planned. Our largest
customer wants us to private label the
product for them under their brand name.
This would give us a good regular income
now, but, is this a good idea ?
Although
this is a very complex and difficult
question, it is common enough that
We have plenty of case histories and
evidence to understand how this is likely
to play out. There are too many specifics
we don’t know about your situation but
this is critical. Would you be offering
any kind of exclusivity and have you
protected yourself by ensuring that they
cannot in the future switch brands or
manufacture their own version, once they
have sufficient market share ? It is also
important to understand whether this major
client was 20% or 80% of your sales.
Remember that this profit will be gone and
private labeling will probably not have
such high margins. You also need to
consider whether this major client has
enough influence to be an important
reference for your brand. If they are very
influential, you may lose a lot when you
lose your brand name sales to them.
We obviously can’t give a yes or no answer
without knowing these facts but you can
think them through.
Consider whether it
will be the right decision in five years.
You have launched successfully and
established a quality brand so effectively
that a large player admits that you’re the
best. You don’t want to lose years of
growing profit for a short term gain that
you’re going to get anyway.
Where do
you want to be in five years ? Maybe they
can get you there faster and with more
security than you could ever do on your
own. Many entrepreneurs would assess this
as an important lifestyle decision, more
than a financial one.
Read the case
histories of similar companies in fields
similar to yours. Of course, it is always
wise to seek the counsel of
successful leaders who have been through
this process before, such as Doctor
Profit, or the many other excellent
consultants who guide people through these
waters.
