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B2B Sales Best Practices

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In our last post we examined a few B2B marketing best practices, basic strategies and activities that have earned a reputation for dependably producing successful outcomes; marketing strategies and activities augmented by AI-powered technology have proven to be especially effective. Marketing best practices are routinely followed by those who are considered leading marketers—a savvy and practical lot who avoid the miscalculations of strategies that are, unfortunately, associated with marketing laggards. Marketing leaders know that strategies and activities grounded in best practices are capable of not only producing your organization’s personal best year-end revenue and profit, but also generate business momentum that can propel you into a very happy 2026.

Now that we’ve taken a dive into marketing and learned what’s likely to inspire prospects to ask that you schedule a sales conversation, we can next examine what can be said to represent B2B sales best practices, in particular as they apply to Freelance professionals and small business owners. As always, the goal is to produce healthy revenue and profit results and avoid being seduced by strategies that make sense for, perhaps, an enterprise national or multinational corporation but are probably unattainable for smaller entities. In our continually evolving B2B marketplace, it’s necessary to recognize when to follow traditional B2B basic business practices and when (and which) of the dizzying array of new technologies are capable of facilitating your revenue and other business goals.

Navigating the complexity of B2B purchase decision-making 

B2B sales cycles are typically much longer than their B2C counterparts. The purchasing approval process often requires input from influential stakeholders and it is standard for multiple decision-makers to be involved. Complicated negotiations may be needed to reach agreement on pricing, payment terms and logistics before a sale can be approved. As a result, it is common to meet not just with the project team leader, but with a decision committee when you are invited into a sales conversation.

So—let’s figure out how to survive the lion’s den and earn a chance to rack up as much sales revenue as possible before the 2025 finish line. As usual, the best sales techniques follow a “work smart and keep it simple” philosophy. An effective sales process focuses on more than a financial transaction—the necessity of relationship building, the customer experience and also repeat business and referrals that grow the client list remind you that your sales strategies and skills are building blocks of long-term business growth and are integral to future-proofing your organization. The five steps detailed below are sure to help you improve your sales performance:

  1. Whenever possible, schedule face2face sales meetings to facilitate relationship building opportunities. Teleconferences are useful and very convenient but when possible, especially for the first meeting, find a time and place that will enable all participants to attend in person. Furthermore, it will also benefit you to schedule a face2face meeting at what you anticipate will be the meeting during which you expect to clinch the sale. Facilitating good communication and encouraging transparency and collaboration are easier to achieve in face2face interactions and make it easier to both encourage the sale and plant the seeds of a good client relationship.
  2. In-person meetings provide a forum for you and the decision team to get to get comfortable enough to share relevant information and build trust. The intimacy of in-person interactions are the fastest way to learn what really motivated the prospect’s team to seek out and evaluate your company’s solution. It’s much easier to bring this type of info to the surface when all players are in a room together. Face2face meetings encourage the development of communication and trust whose depth will surpass a merely transactional agenda. Like marketing leaders, sales leaders want to add to their roster clients who are willing to bring repeat business and make referrals to your company. BTW, you can also make referrals for your clients, an action that is certain to strengthen your business relationships.
  3. Sales meetings are typically the setting in which you receive previously undisclosed info that reveals why your prospect is willing to resolve a certain pain point by seeking a solution (that you hope to provide). The prospect’s team might divulge false starts, frustrations and failures that were the outcomes of other solutions. You can move the discovery forward by developing a list of open-ended questions that may encourage decision team members to talk, so that you can actively listen and take notes. Obtaining a clear understanding of client motives, goals, past experiences and concerns will allow you to personalize a solution that addresses what matters to the prospect.
  4. Prospective clients in most cases are concerned with maximizing value for the spend. Therefore, you are advised to focus on the dependable benefits of your solution’s outcomes and results, rather than reciting a list of features that are associated with the service or product.
  5. It is often said that half of life is about showing up; the other half is about the right kind of follow-up. If you’re waiting anxiously for an answer that concerns the proceedings of a recent sales conversation, by all means reach out and make contact. Your job is to add value to the communication and not bring pressure. Good meeting notes will help you to diplomatically present information that addresses client needs and priorities and moves the sale toward a successful conclusion. Maybe you can send a case study that was not previously discussed, or there is an add-on or upgrade that is not costly in terms of time and/or money for you to provide, but will bring value to the client and make your solution more attractive?

Sales skills are critical for B2B sector Freelancers and SMB owners. Those who sell are the revenue engine, making periodic professional sales skills training a must-do. If you’re the company’s one-person sales team, you’ll be much more successful when you sharpen your ability to persuasively and clearly articulate your product or service value proposition/unique sales proposition, refine your responses to prospect questions and objections so that you instill confidence—and close deals in a way that builds client relationships. Keep in mind that utilizing sales best practices tactics alone will not ensure success in the hypercompetitive B2B sector. Producing sales revenue and profit that achieves your targets will also require that you stay abreast of the evolving expectations of your clients and prospects and updated on industry developments and trends.

  1. Instituting an efficient sales system is essential for B2B sector Freelancers and SMBs. A CRM (customer relationship management) system that helps you to monitor leads, sales offers being considered and prospective client interactions should be a part of your sales system. You should establish an inbound sales pipeline that helps you visualize your sales process and identify areas where you can improve. Refer to your marketing buyer persona and use that profile as a snapshot of the client(s) you’re selling to, so that you can tailor and personalize your sales process to fit their needs and expectations. 
  2. Freelance consultants and SMBs operating in the B2B sector must develop a sales strategy.  Your sales strategy will guide you to identify reasonable and attainable sales revenue goals and identify potentially useful sales distribution strategies. Might facilitating website online ordering of certain of your products or services be attractive to your clients and persuade them to do more business with you? Your sales strategy will also guide you to identify principle competitors and learn how to persuasively articulate your unique sales proposition.
  3. Make your sales pitch simple and easy for the client to envision how your solution can be incorporated into the workflow and operate in the real world. Provide information about how your solution can meet the prospect’s specific needs—that is, benefits and outcomes— rather than the ins and outs of service or product features.
  4. Recognize and introduce opportunities to up-sell to premium level service or cross-sell add-on services or accessories. If your service or product line does not currently feature options to “trade-up” or ‘add-on,” consider how you can include such options. For example, designing an “economy” level service may attract interested prospects who are on a budget but are motivated to become buyers. On the other hand, those who have more expansive needs and a budget to match may be ideal candidates for up-selling to premium service/product options, or add-ons.
  5. In 2025-2026, the payment options you offer to prospects can be presented as a competitive advantage. As fintech expands what’s possible, know that buyer expectations are shifting toward flexible, personalized payment terms. Furthermore, cybersecurity and other risk-mitigating considerations are at top of mind. Confirm that your current payment options meet buyer expectations of payment transaction security and give yourself another pathway to encouraging sales and developing good business relationships.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: © Rido/Dreamstime

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LeadGen and Customer Acquisition in 2025

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LocaliQ, a digital marketing platform that specializes in lead generation and multichannel marketing campaign management, and is a subsidiary of Gannett Publishing, surveyed more than 730 small business owners and marketers worldwide to get boots-on-the-ground perspectives on leadgen and customer acquisition marketing tactics SMB owners are using now and uncensored feedback on what’s producing the best results. The survey is a rich source of benchmarking and actionable insights that have the potential to inform your approach to leadgen and customer acquisition strategies and tactics this year.

In its first Small Business Marketing Trends Report, LocaliQ shares the results of a deep data dive that’s intended to help Freelance consultants and SMB owners successfully navigate the business landscape they can expect to encounter in 2025 by learning how their peers energize sales revenue by identifying leadgen tactics that promote customer acquisition.

The relevance of LocaliQ data is for many of you validated by the survey demographics—15% of respondents are soloprenuers; 31% have 2-10 full-time employees; 24% have a marketing budget that’s less than $500/ year (5% have no marketing budget); and 74% are based in Canada and the U.S. (all six inhabited continents plus New Zealand are represented). The survey was published in October 2024. How does the average Freelancer or SMB owner attract prospects?

Survey respondents do what you’d expect and it’s safe to assume that they use more than one leadgen tactic to implement their marketing /sales strategy. Social media marketing (free) is used by 52% of respondents; 47% of respondents use (paid) social media advertising; and 40% of respondents use search advertising, i.e., pay-per-click sponsored ads that appear in search engine inquiries. Other popular leadgen tactics are email marketing, used by 39% of respondents and content marketing, used by 33% of respondents. Online listings and directories (28%), display ads (24%) and traditional media (23%) are 20th century tactics and that gives them a similarity (IMHO); when combined, 75% of survey respondents use one or more of these older leadgen tactics.

As for the social media platforms used, it’s no surprise that Facebook dominates—76% of respondents use the platform for leadgen, promoting products and services and otherwise engaging with current customers and prospects. Instagram is used by 63% of survey respondents and LinkedIn, tailored as it is to B2B customers, is used by 43% of respondents. The data also showed that 29% of respondents use video marketing, a feature that is available on the above three platforms and also YouTube, which is used by 38% of respondents and recently rescued TikTok, which is used by 34% of respondents. Surprisingly X, a platform intended for Instant Messaging and other text communications, is used by 41% of respondents for social media marketing (X also hosts video sharing).

Now let’s talk turkey—when asked about their satisfaction (or disappointment) with the results of leadgen tactics, social media marketing and online listings/business directory users are satisfied with results—66% of social media marketing users and 61% of online listings/business directory users are pleased with their leadgen marketing results—still, each group also has a dissatisfaction rate of 15%. Furthermore, there is a rather large group of “neither satisfied nor dissatisfied” —meaning lukewarm?—users associated with those leadgen marketing tactics and 24% of online listing/ business directory users and 19% of social media marketing users joined the lukewarm group. Maybe it’s too difficult to measure leadgen results directly from social media marketing activity, whose conversation threads remain visible for years and likewise for presence on a business listing site or directory that a prospect might see many months after publication?

More clarity is derived from search advertising and it topped the list as the leadgen tactic most respondents are happy with, as evidenced by its 76% satisfaction rate (with 12% dissatisfied and 12% neither satisfied nor dissatisfied). A close second in popularity is video marketing, a leadgen tactic that has a growing user rate on every platform; in this survey, 74% of users are pleased with their video marketing outcomes and just 8% are unhappy (and 17% are neither satisfied nor dissatisfied). Short-form videos, like those on TikTok and Instagram Reels, continue to surge and 58% of respondents have either recently tried or would like to try the format.

Search advertising succeeds because it kicks in precisely when the purchasing motive is strongest and prospects are actively looking to buy a product or service that’s similar to yours. Readily available alternative options are waiting for them, as shown in search ads you’ve seen. Survey respondents also indicate satisfaction with results they’re finding with content marketing (75%) and advertising on social media platforms (73%).

The best source of leadgen is (drum roll) customer referrals! Almost 65% of survey respondents reported that customer referrals are the best leadgen sources. The influence of customer referrals is greatest (75%) for SMBs that have 10 or fewer full-time employees and have less influence in larger organizations—just 46% of businesses with 50 or more employees report that customer referrals are the best source of new customer leads.

Major challenges anticipated in 2025

Freelance consultants and SMB owners know that in order to survive and thrive, a clear-eyed view of their economic landscape is necessary. Economic uncertainty, leadgen tactics that stimulate new customer acquisition and optimizing an (often modest) marketing budget are by necessity at top-of-mind. The ability to predict which marketing tactics can be relied on to produce the strongest return on investment is viewed as somewhat or very challenging for nearly half of survey respondents—44% are somewhat or very concerned about the capability of their chosen leadgen tactics to drive results. Adapting to new technology is a concern for 40% of respondents, who indicate they are somewhat or very concerned about keeping up. Furthermore, 45% of respondents are somewhat or very concerned about their leadgen tactics bringing in enough new customers and 48% are somewhat or very worried about economic conditions and uncertainty.

So, what are the recommendations for driving Freelancer and SMB success in 2025? There are no definitive answers and the suggestions offered below are not new and not rocket science. Your goal is to make money, but you could meet with headwinds for any number of reasons. Outcomes produced by your business strategies and tactics cannot be predicted but appropriate design, execution and performance monitoring on your part can be expected to yield at least modest success. Marketing and sales have a direct effect on customer acquisition and generating revenue, making these two closely related functions the money-making engine of a business venture and deserving of your intense focus. Just do it.

It’s helpful to monitor the performance metrics of marketing tactics and for that process, Google Analytics generates relevant and insightful data that enables you to evaluate your campaigns—at no charge. Sign up now! Along with leadgen/customer acquisition, make a point to promote customer referrals by asking your current customers if any of their colleagues or customers have the potential to become one of your customers. Also, create customer experience protocols that at every touchpoint anticipate and respond to customer needs end-to-end, from new or returning customer onboarding to after-sale training or other services. Finally, invite customer feedback by directly speaking with those who do business with you when possible. It’s good business to send out an email survey (maybe once a year), or chat with customers by way of social media; it’s important to learn what customers would like to see you do (or not do), so that you can optimize the experience of doing business with your company.

  • Be prepared to manage both the opportunities and challenges you encounter by being aware, being agile, being resourceful and being resilient.
  • Develop comprehensive marketing/sales strategies and implement with tactics you can expect to be effective. Regularly consult your website (and social media) performance metrics and make adjustments where necessary, to maximize performance.
  • Identify one or two local business associations and aim to attend one program per quarter as a way to obtain professional development and/or enhance your business acumen skills as you meet colleagues and engage in face2face networking that builds mutually beneficial relationships.
  • As soon as your budget allows hire an (outsourced) business accountant or bookkeeper to not only maintain the integrity and timeliness of your business financials and tax filings, but also to discuss and guide the potential business growth and expansion of your venture.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: © kali9/ iStock

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What Freelancers Should Prioritize to Prevail in 2025

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Taking on 2025

Well, here we are! The trap door opened, we all fell in and like it or not, 2025 has us in its grip. When the inevitable obstacles and setbacks disrupt the flow you planned for your business venture, will you be caught in a whirling vortex of problems—or might you somehow regroup and win a skirmish or two? Better still, will Fortune smile and hand you a big victory this year? More than likely, however, 2025 will be a test of strength and strategy that feels like you’re in a triathlon (swim, bike, run); cross-training, so to speak, will be the best preparation to get your entity in shape to compete and win.

Political instability, compromised national borders, cybersecurity breaches, a metastasizing housing crisis, unrelenting armed conflicts boiling on three continents and wildfires burning in rural and metro areas of the U.S. are just a partial list of adversities troubling the global economy and working against your attempts to make an acceptable profit. The need to develop resilience—the ability to adapt and prevail over unexpected, often destabilizing, occurrences—will be a priority for Freelancers and other small business owners in 2025 (and probably beyond).

More than just surviving, resilience means developing the capability to respond well to unexpected, difficult, events. Resilience gives you the courage to accept sudden, radical change and realize that if it happens, you must take charge and quickly assess the new business conditions to figure out your next move and design a well-executed pivot that aligns your business with the new normal.

As we move into 2025, it’s clear that Freelancers and SMBs must be ready to adapt to a rapidly evolving landscape. By behaving proactively and building up resilience as a defense against economic uncertainty, you can position your entity to not only survive, but thrive, in the coming year.

Master the challenges

How will you prepare for the trends, challenges and opportunities that Freelancers could encounter in 2025? Your must-do list is unlikely to hold any surprises but nevertheless, the evolving economic and political circumstances, global and national, are bound to bring about a shift in the relevance and interpretation of What Matters Now. At the beginning of the year, Freelancers and SMBs will be wise to adopt a big-picture view of their entity and focus on how to remain viable over the next 12 months.

  • Review the pricing structure of products and services
  • Update marketing strategies
  • Identify potential new or niche markets
  • Analyze the company’s financial condition
  • Nurture client relationships
  • Revitalize networking, with goals of developing new relationships and finding new clients

Enhance your brand and be visible

A trusted brand is a valuable resource during times of uncertainty. Clients and prospects gravitate to Freelancers who inspire trust, based on their reputation (brand) and online presence. Beyond showcasing a well-presented portfolio, Freelancers should actively engage on platforms like LinkedIn, as well as join or host webinars, get invited to podcasts, teach workshops or classes related to your core professional expertise at local colleges, business associations, libraries, or other credible venues. It is also recommended that you author informative blog posts, as a guest blogger or on your own site, and share relevant industry insights on social media. In other words, establishing yourself as a thought leader will increase visibility, enhance your brand and attract high-value clients. Showcasing your most desirable skills and competencies can help attract potential clients more effectively.

Social media platforms, most notably LinkedIn, which was designed for professional networking, is an excellent tool for staying in touch with past clients, posting articles you’ve written and connecting with others in your industry. Staying active on the right platforms can increase your visibility and encourage client acquisition.

 Optimize workflow by investing in AI-powered tools

As you grow your client list, you may at times find yourself juggling multiple projects. It’s the realization of your goal, but feeling overwhelmed and stressed can result. You can more efficiently manage your projects, instead of the projects managing you, by using one (or more) online productivity tools to streamline your workflow. From video communication platforms like Microsoft Teams and Goto Meeting to project management platforms like Asana and ClickUp, the right online tools will help to expedite your workflow. Incidentally, familiarizing yourself with one or more popular software tools can make you appear more competent, and therefore more marketable, to those clients who, all things being equal, prefer working with Freelancers who are familiar with their company’s preferred in-house workflow platforms.

Moreover, Artificial Intelligence is revolutionizing how Freelancers work in every industry—graphic designers can use AI to generate initial concepts for marketing materials they’ve been hired to create; copywriters can identify the most popular keywords to include. Marketers can discover copywriting ideas and conduct content analyses, accountants and bookkeepers can automate routine tasks and direct their focus to high-value work that clients appreciate, such as strategic financial decision-making. Staying updated on the latest AI advancements and incorporating them into your workflow will ensure that you deliver faster and smarter solutions for your clients. You will be wise to do some research and incorporate AI into your business.

Learn and grow by seeking client feedback

To achieve success, Freelance professionals must use all available opportunities to build a healthy client list; part of the process is to invite post-project follow-up, that is, client feedback. Understanding what is or isn’t working for clients helps you evaluate in real time your business processes and ensure that they reflect client preferences. Feedback can also lead you to make updates to your services and/or products, or introduce new features, add-ons, or upgrades that clients will value and buy. Demonstrating your attentiveness to feedback supports your goal of building a robust and loyal client base, which is another strategy that promotes stability during uncertain economic times—you’ll have a cushion. As you know, providing the best product or service and presenting a client experience that distinguishes your organization from competitors is a critical component of long-term success.

With your final project invoice, make it a practice to send a short survey and invite the client to share his/her thoughts about the experience of working with you. Some remarks may make you wince, but uncensored feedback is the best way to become aware of weaknesses and, on the bright side, discover opportunities for further growth. You could even discover a niche market, if several clients let you know that they’d appreciate it if you’d provide an additional product or service.

Finally, not only will post-project feedback help you learn a great deal very quickly, but it’s also a great way to show clients that their satisfaction matters. Routinely inviting client feedback can also enhance your brand and make you more marketable.

Routinely request referrals

Politely asking a satisfied customer to provide referrals of those who may be interested in your products and/or services is good business. Referrals can be requested in different forms, from asking a former client to write a reference letter for you to casually inquiring whether a client has any contacts who could use your services or products. However you pose the question, take care to use proper tact and time your request wisely. Additionally, be specific about what you’re asking for and include an opt-out to avoid any potential awkwardness.

If you don’t feel comfortable asking for a referral, asking for an online review can be a great alternative. Whether it’s posted on the profile page of a social media site like LinkedIn or appears on a business ranking site such as Yelp or Trip Advisor, reviews are just as important for Freelancer professionals as they are for SMB owners.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: © Ogden Pioneer Days Rodeo. Since its debut in 1934, the Pioneer Days Rodeo has ranked as one of the top five large outdoor rodeos on the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association circuit. Shown here is an image from July 2021.

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Use Customer Service to Grow Your Business

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The quality of customer service that your organization delivers reveals more than you may suspect about your organization— the quality of the products and services offered, your commitment to quality control, your respect for those who buy from you, your appreciation of the value of building and maintaining good customer relationships, your brand and your management skills.

Of the many tasks that a business owner must examine and address, few are more representative of your business acumen than customer service. You owe it to customers, prospective customers (you want to convert them, yes?) and yourself to analyze your company’s buyer’s journey and after- sale service and ensure that every customer touch point reflects your commitment to providing a solution to the needs of those who might become your customers and your goal to promote confidence and trust in your company.

Encourage customer feedback—-distribute a survey when you send an invoice, initiate conversations about what might make doing business with you even better. Read on and remind yourself of why customer service matters.

It’s good business

While there are many factors that contribute to the success or failure of a business, good customer service is always a positive. When customers are pleased to do business with your establishment, they’re likely to say good things about you, your team and your products or services. Remember to ask your happy customers to write online reviews, make referrals and also contribute testimonials or participate in a case study.

Prospects, too

The buyer’s journey requires the engagement of you or your team once prospects move from stage 1 Top of Funnel to stage 2 Middle of Funnel. As prospects become more serious about doing business, personal interaction begins. Prospects may want to have a 30 minute (free) consultation, or they may have a question or two. You and your team must respond to inquiries from prospective customers promptly, professionally and pleasantly.

Prospects who’ve maintained an interest in your product or service and entered stage 3 Bottom of Funnel are especially deserving of superior customer service. It can help you win the sale, or cause you to lose it, if you don’t perform to expectations. Converting someone from consideration to commitment is a careful balancing act that’s eased along with good customer service.

They remember

The customer may forget what they bought and when they bought it, but memories of the interactions between you, or your staff, and the customer will have a long life. It is therefore in your interest to take all possible steps to leave customers and also prospective customers, with pleasant memories of your establishment. I’m sorry to say that memories of poor customer service have the longest life. Many marketing experts estimate that 12 positive experiences are necessary to make up for just one unsatisfactory customer service experience.

They matter

Providing good customer service is the ultimate demonstration of courtesy and respect. Part of the value that you deliver to customers (and prospects) is communicating that you value their business and their interest in doing business with you, even if you ultimately cannot fulfill their need at this time. Treat customers and prospects well and you’ll leave them with a good feeling. They will trust you and will be more likely to refer you to others who may become your customers.

They return

Depending on which study you believe, and what industry you’re in, acquiring a new customer is anywhere from five to 25 times more expensive than retaining an existing one. Research done by Frederick Reichheld of Bain and Company in Boston, MA concluded that increasing customer retention rates by 5% increases profits by 25% to 95%.

Good customer service is an important ingredient of your customer development strategy. It encourages good customer relationships, good online reviews, good word of mouth, repeat business and referrals. In other words, good customer service is worth money. I believe making money is why you went into business?

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: © Nick Briggs, Carnival Film & Television Ltd. Members of the Downton Abbey household staff

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Do It Better: Perfecting the Customer Experience

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In today’s competitive business world to delight your customers, rather than simply satisfying them, is critical to the success of your venture. Customer delight is the new standard. To delight your customers means exceeding their expectations and creating a highly positive and memorable experience with your product or brand. Delight calls upon your entire team , customer-facing and back office, to smoothly collaborate to deliver timely, efficient and pleasant service to customers by focusing on their needs, challenges, questions and preferences.

Satisfied customers are good for your company, but delighted customers help you much more. Customers who carry the memory of their delightful experiences with your organization are more likely to become loyal customers and brand advocates who enthusiastically make referrals, give testimonials and reward your company with glowing online reviews. They become extensions of your marketing department.

When you accomplish this, you’ll build a strong relationship with your customers that makes them want to remain loyal brand advocates and promoters. Read on to better understand how your organization can achieve this level of service.

  1. Personalize every customer experience—Start at the top by addressing all customers and prospects by name in each marketing email. Furthermore, the product or service that you promote in those emails should be something that the recipients might possibly use. Obtain this information by resarching your customers. As always, knowing the customer is key.
  2. Quick response and follow-up—A critical aspect of solving problems for customers is responding to them ASAP — meaning, a big component of customer delight is the ability to be available and responsive whenever your customers reach out. Whether the issue is big or small, show your customers that you’re always prioritizing them by responding quickly.
  3. Resolve customer problems fast—The first and most important thing your organization needs to do is solve whatever problems your current and prospective customers are experiencing. Offering your customers a solution to a challenge they’re facing, or a way to achieve the goal they’re working towards, is what motivated them to do business with you — so don’t disappoint them. Offer your customers solutions that align with their individual wishes, needs, and preferences. The same goes for prospects and potential customers. Even though they aren’t paying customers just (yet), potential customers require you to solve their problems as well. not only should you solve customers’ problems in the short term, but you should think ahead for their future needs, too. Going beyond the immediate solution to provide information and ways to help your customers manage their challenges — and teach them to do so on their own, if and when possible — is how you can solve for the future, too.
  4. Help customers have the best experience possible—Make sure you understand why people are buying your product or service to determine how to help them succeed. When you truly understand what it is people need from a product or service like yours, you’ll be able to target those pain points and solve for them to exceed customer expectations. It can also be on a smaller scale, like the way you train your new employees to handle customer questions. Additionally, help customers succeed by providing them with the right educational resources so they know how to reach out to your service and support teams, get the help they want and need, or find answers to questions on their own.
  5. Listen to customer feedback—It doesn’t feel good to hear feedback that’s critical of your company, but if you’re serious about delivering the best possible customer service, you must face the unvarnished truth about how your product or service meets expectations, or doesn’t. You must learn what disappoints. Then you can fix it. Then you become more aware, smarter, faster and more successful. Your customers will tell you, one way or another. Listen to honest feedback, take chronic complainers ith a grain of salt.
  6. Loyal customers receive preferential treatment and perks —Loyal customers are the bedrock of your business and it would be inconsiderate and unwise to take them for granted. Keep their business by giving them VIP treatment and communicating to them that you understand and appreciate their business and also them, as individuals. Offer them perks such as discounts, service upgrades, speedy delivery, invitations to special in-store events and other benefits as appropriate. A strong customer loyalty program will make your customers feel appreciated while securing their future business. Did I mention that your loyal customers also make referrals?
  7. Surprise, delight and please —Enable your company to stand out from competitors, then you need to make a lasting impression on your customers. While your primary goal is to solve the customer’s problem, you can create a memorable experience by giving customers more than they ever anticipated. Customers expect to see their needs fulfilled, but are truly delighted when your team goes above and beyond in the customer experience.
  8. Easy to find company contact info—It’s so annoying to have to hunt down a company’s contact information. Customers should be able to get in contact with you easily. Even more importantly, they should have several avenues for reaching you, such as email address, telephone number and social media sites.
  9. Be enthusiastic—In every interaction with current and prospective customers, be sure that you (and your employees or anyone who represents you) displays a positive and welcoming demeanor that complements your brand. Always provide a real, warm, welcoming, helpful and personalized interaction that respects your customer’s time and leaves them happy, satisfied —and with a better understanding of the value of your product or service.
  10. Build a community—Humans are social beings and we enjoy the feeling of belonging to a community or group. Your community might be used as a resource for sharing useful information or act as a medium for users to submit customer reviews. No matter what your community’s function is, creating a space where customers can interact with one another and you and/or your employees adds value to the customer experience that your company provides and continue to delight these people.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

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10 Tips to Create Repeat Business

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A well-known study conducted by Frederick Reichheld of Bain & Company in 2010 confirmed what has been well-known anecdotally by business owners and leaders for decades—that it costs (at least) 5 times more to bring in a new customer than it does to keep the customer you already have. Decreasing churn, that is, the phenomenon of one-off customers who are never seen again, is not the way to build a sustainably profitable venture. You don’t want to run a business that behaves like a revolving door.

Your repeat customers are loyal to your brand because they have had good experiences with you. Due to this, repeat customers are highly likely to promote your brand through word of mouth or social media and on review sites such as Yelp and Trip Advisor. In other words, your repeat customers pay you with referrals and testimonials that bring more new customers to your door. It doesn’t get better than that!

As you build your business and go about refining and strengthening your brand, you should strive to cultivate a community that believes in your brand, that is loyal and is invested in seeing you succeed. One of the best ways to ensure customer loyalty is to make your customers feel that they’re a part of something rewarding when they engage and do business with your brand. Below are a few low-cost, no-cost actions you can take to promote customer loyalty, which usually translate into customer retention, I.e. repeat business and referrals, too.

Surprise and delight

Pleasant surprises are always a good thing during the course of a customer relationship. Introducing a nice surprise, typically in the form of an unexpected little perk for the customer and in particular at the beginning of the interaction, is a great strategy to differentiate yourself from competitors. It’s good business to show customers and serious prospects that you’re a cut above.

Customer experience, customer service

According to a 2018 survey of US consumers released by the multinational professional services company Price Waterhouse Coopers (PwC), which happens to be the second-largest professional services firm in the world, consumers rank price and quality at top-of-mind when buying decisions are made. But when they think about interacting with companies they buy from, 73% of survey respondents reported that positive experiences influence their purchasing decisions and 65% feel that a positive buying experience is more influential than great advertising.

You basically have only one chance to get your customer experience and service right. 32% of customers surveyed reported that they’d stop doing business with a brand they loved after even
one bad experience.

Make an effort to structure the experience your business provides to reflect what matters most to the customers. When customers feel appreciated the company benefits, primarily from customer retention and referrals. 86% of survey respondents indicated that they’re willing to pay more for a good end-to-end customer experience and 80% say their reason for switching to another company was poor customer service.

Email marketing, social media, blog, newsletter

Update your customers by way of your website and social media accounts about what’s new—-special offers, new products or services or special pricing and be certain to include those who have not purchased in a while. If you publish a newsletter and/ or blog, include your product and service special offers, special pricing or new product or service announcement. Get your community excited about what’s happening and they may share the good news with those who could become your future customers and loyal fans.

Retain on your mailing list all customers with whom you’ve worked over the past five years, including those who’ve been inactive, and also retain on your mailing list prospects who have had some level of engagement with your organization. Always position yourself to win over a prospect or win back an inactive customer. Until someone clicks the opt-out button, continue to send marketing emails, your newsletter and/or your blog. You never know when lightening will strike.

Payment made easy

Make paying for your products and services easy. By adding digital payment options such as Square, Paypal, Bill.com, or Stripe and facilitating direct deposit payments to your bank or debit card and/or accepting online check payments, you’ll encourage customers to do business with you more often because you’ll make paying invoices a convenient process. Easy payment is an element of a pleasant customer experience.

Website and social media

Merely having an “online presence” is no longer enough. The internet is over-saturated and short attention spans are the norm. To maintain the appeal of your social media accounts and website, make your content—text, audio and video–relevant and timely. Constantly confirm that your posts and images resonate. Update regularly with fresh images, blog posts and and other text, audio and/or video.

Thank you card

The survey revealed that human interaction matters now—and 82% of U.S.
consumers want more of it in the future. With that in mind, a small personal gesture, such as sending a thank you card (or note) to a new customer, or one who has spent a certain threshold amount is a powerful statement. Your card or note can create or enhance the feeling of community and build loyalty for your brand.

Special occasions

The PwC survey found that when customers feel appreciated, they are more likely to recommend or endorse a brand on social media or review sites, subscribe to a brand’s newsletter, sign up for special promotions and make repeat purchases. Sending cards to mark occasions such as customer birthdays, if that is appropriate for your industry, or holiday cards in December is a predictable but usually much-appreciated way to communicate to customers your thoughtfulness.

Showcase testimonials

If visitors to your website and social media accounts see your customers and colleagues singing your praises, in text, audio, or video, then chances are they’ll be more likely to take a chance and buy from you themselves. User-generated content in the form of reviews is a powerful way to win customer loyalty. Case studies in text or video format, are also quite compelling since the story of how you and your team assess and resolve a problem is told.

After sale service

After-sales service often amounts to listening to customer feedback and being available to answer questions or give encouragement. After-sales service can make the difference between a happy customer who loves doing business with your organization, or one who is underwhelmed or even frustrated. A follow-up call to a customer, especially a new customer, will 1). Show your empathy—you care about the customer’s pain point or goal; and 2). Ensure that the customer is achieving objectives. If the solution isn’t working as expected, you can quickly diagnose the glitch and fix it. If a training will help, deliver it, on the spot or by appointment. You want to create a cadre of satisfied customers who will become your loyal cheerleaders.

Do the math

While at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland, the Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto (1848-1923) in 1896 demonstrated that on average, a business will derive 80% of its revenue from 20% of its customers. Further research has demonstrated that the likelihood of selling to an existing customer is 60% – 70% and repeat customers will on average spend 31% more than your new customers. Just a 5% increase your company’s customer retention rate will reward you with a 25% increase in profits. Are you convinced yet?

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: © WalterFilm. Marilyn Monroe in a publicity photo for How to Marry a Millionaire (1953, 20th Century Fox Studios)

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Client Testimonials: Cheerleaders for Your Business

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As you ambitiously devise and implement leadgen campaigns and branding strategies designed to keep your sales pipeline filled with prospects that you hope to convert into a few sales, it is easy to lose sight of a basic fact of marketing—your clients are the best promotional resource you’ll ever have. Satisfied clients can become your cheerleading squad and they have more credibility with prospects than any marketing tactic you could ever devise.

Today, there is so much sensory overload noise in the marketplace that Freelancers and other business owners are often best served by peer-2-peer testimonials to persuade prospects that doing business with your company is a safe bet. Unless you can afford to buy an ad during the Super Bowl, nothing has more credibility than from the trenches client testimonials, referrals, or case studies.

So how can you recruit a client to publicly recommend your products or services without seeming to overstep a boundary? Basically, you ask the right clients, you make it easy to say yes, you make the ask at the right time and you make sure that the end result makes the client and his/her organization look good.

Ask the right client

Obviously, your first job is to know which of your clients would make a good recruit for a testimonial ask. Recall clients with whom you worked over the past 2-3 years and for whom you’ve done an exceptional job in terms of beginning to end customer experience, delivering the solution and meeting, if not exceeding, all expectations. Most of all, the client has to recognize and value what you did on his/her behalf. In other words, ask clients who have plenty of good things to say about your company and the work you do or the products you sell.

Timing

Timing takes more than one form. One factor is, how far into the past can you reach to make an ask? Will it be awkward to ask a client with whom you worked, say, four years ago? The answer, I think, is that it depends. If you maintain contact with past clients, e.g., sending December holiday cards and perhaps also sending announcements about your appearances on webinars or podcasts, it will be easier to reach out and ask for a testimonial.

Another timing issue is to avoid the client’s busy season, or the end of the fiscal year, when the client may have deadlines to meet. To the best of your ability, avoid making the ask when your client faces time-sensitive, pressing work responsibilities.

The ask

The window between your last interaction with the client and when you plan to ask for a testimonial will impact your choice of communication. If it seems right to approach a client soon after the work is completed or the product purchased, including your testimonial ask in a post-sale client satisfaction survey will be perceived as a natural progression. Email the survey and encourage your client to share feelings about working with your organization, the products that were purchased, or the services provided.

Invite the client to provide more specific, detailed comments in the Testimonial Template that you embed in the survey. Note that comments may appear on your company website and social media sites.

To approach a client with whom you worked a year or more ago, it may be more appropriate to first call and discuss the testimonial ask and then follow-up with an email to confirm, with your Testimonial Template attached.

If your client prefers to make a video testimonial and you have the skills to record and edit the video, which should probably be no longer than 6-8 minutes, arrange to meet for the shoot. Alternatively, you might set up a videoconference call and record an interview with the client as s/he discusses the positive experience and great results obtained from working with you. Audio-only testimonials can also be recorded and they are likewise compelling. When using the audio or video options, send the Testimonial Template a week in advance and send it again 48 hours ahead of the recording session.

Questions and quotes

Help clients to endorse your products and services by including a few open-ended questions in your Testimonial Template to get the ball rolling. Devise simple, direct questions that put the client in story-telling mode and will yield good quotes.

Ask the client to briefly detail the goal that had to be achieved or problem solved and why there was a need for the products or services that were purchased. Also ask the client to divulge if s/he previously used another company to obtain similar products or services and to provide insight into what motivated him/her to explore your company. Remember to ask the client to share reasons why your organization was chosen and not another. Finally, urge the client to discuss the experience of working with your organization, with an emphasis on expectations and benefits derived.

Client benefit

Your testimonial will be posted on your company website and on one or more social media channels—-remember to link the text, audio, or video back to your client’s website. Let the client know that you’ve provided these valuable back links by sending links to all platforms on which the testimonial appears. Informing clients whom you approach for a testimonial that you’ll provide this sort of publicity may yield a “yes” for your ask and put your venture on the road to obtaining the best endorsements available.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: Cheerleaders in 1920s America

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Support Customers After the Sale

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Now that you’ve signed the contract and brought a new customer to your business, you may feel a mixture of pride and relief. You’re thrilled that your marketing tactics and sales talking points were persuasive. The customer is in-house and you’re ready to exhale.

But not yet. In fact, the real work is just beginning. Whether you’ve sold a product or a service, the smooth execution of project work or the product performance and ease of use are only part of the story. To declare a sustainable victory, you must ensure that the customer is pleased with the decision to do business with your organization. You and your team must enable the feel-good with a series of actions collectively known as after sales service.

The customer experience operates on several levels, including what is traditionally called customer service. In our increasingly competitive business environment, business owners and leaders are now motivated to also manage what happens after the sale because it has impact. The facet of customer service known as after-sales service is the follow-up support that customers receive after they’ve bought your product or contracted to receive your services.

Business owners and leaders typically focus attention on filling the sales pipeline and strive to convert prospects into customers. That approach makes lots of sense, but it is to your advantage to devote a portion of your resources to what happens after the ink dries and payment is received. After-sales service is an important aspect of your customer retention strategy. It is a principal factor in cultivating repeat business, generating positive word-of-mouth that leads to referrals and enhancing the company brand.

Abandon customers once you have their money and it’s highly likely that they won’t return. It’s well-known that dissatisfied customers are bad for future sales, to say nothing of your brand’s reputation. But happy customers are your friends, the most valuable asset in your sales funnel.

The after-sales service your company provides might include advice on how to properly use the product or suggestions on how to get started with implementing the service. After-sales service often amounts to listening to customer feedback and being available to answer questions or give encouragement. In short, it’s a check-in to find out if the customer is satisfied with the purchase and helping to correct any glitches. After-sales service can make the difference between a happy customer who loves doing business with your organization, or one who is underwhelmed or even frustrated.

Customers who appreciate the way you and your team treat them are more likely to share their positive experience with your company and refer you to friends and associates. A 2016 survey conducted by The New York Times revealed that 65% of new business leads come from referrals. A 2011 study of 10,000 customers of a German bank found that customers who were referred to the bank by someone they know had a 16% higher lifetime revenue value than those who were not referred.

So how can you and your team build a winning after-sale service experience for your customers?Depending on your business, you can start the good vibes by sending business-appropriate thank you notes (paper or electronic) to express how much you appreciate that the customer chose to work with your organization.

Create a responsive new customer onboarding system, in which you welcome the customer, as discussed above, confirm customer priorities or must-haves, and also verify time table deadlines (if applicable) and project milestones. Do whatever is possible to make working with your organization easy. Encourage client feedback and listen to identify the onboarding experiences and information that your customers value. Standardize the process and use it consistently to set the stage for a positive working relationship.

Whether or not you send a note, your customer may be very happy to receive a follow-up call or email to get feedback on how, or if, the product or service is delivering and if expectations are being met. When performing project work, communicating progress, with a quick email or phone call on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, demonstrates your professionalism and commitment to excellence.

If the experience is a little bumpy, be ready to make suggestions, offer coaching or training, or even make an exchange. What surfaces in these conversations can be used to evaluate and, if necessary, to build or tweak more responsive after-sale service protocols.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: In Barcelona, Spain a flamenco instructor coaches students

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Meeting New Clients When They’re Virtual

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As we journey through the COVID business landscape, B2B product and service providers have mostly found that the process of selling to their current clients has successfully been transferred to virtual methods, that is, videoconferencing and the telephone. But the biggest shortcoming of virtual communication is revealed when the goal is to meet and cultivate new clients.

As business (and education, government, fitness, worship, et al.) has transitioned to remote functioning one glaring truth has emerged— it’s much easier to shift existing relationships into virtual mode than it is to create new relationships, business or personal, by way of Zoom. That’s especially true in B2B sales. While many Freelancers and other business owners and leaders have directed resources toward strengthening existing client relationships, facilitating new client acquisition has folks wringing their hands.

It’s been conclusively demonstrated that it costs at least five times more time and money to acquire a new client than it costs to maintain a current client, but it remains a fact that every business must put into motion a client acquisition strategy. New clients represent the potential for future growth and they are an essential component of a healthy business ecosystem.

The problem is, relationships are more easily created during face2face interactions and we’re just not able to meet people anymore! The lockdown has either closed or severely restricted nearly all public gathering spaces. Video and voice calls keep us connected, albeit at a distance, but those relationships are in many cases already established.

So our question of the day is—-how can a business effectively grow its client list when access to new prospects is unexpectedly limited? Let’s consider some alternatives to the once customary networking formulas.

Low hanging fruit and a system reboot

Mine your client data, knowledge and relationships to discover how you might persuade those with whom you’ve been doing business to do more business. Find the low hanging fruit on a tree familiar to you. In some instances, it may be necessary to reboot certain relationships if clients were forced to cease or curtail operations due to the shutdown and its aftershocks.

Create reasons to contact clients whose organizations were adversely but not fatally impacted, perhaps by emailing COVID business resource information as a conversation starter. While trading emails or calls, you’ll be able to inquire about the location of where business is now conducted—in the office or from home.

Ask those clients how they’re responding to the COVID environment and listen carefully for a way, however small, you can help get his/her company up and rolling again. You may rewarded with a handful of billable hours as conditions improve. This strategy is working for me, BTW.

Conversely, some businesses are experiencing growth during the pandemic and you should make it a point to identify those organizations and include those for whom your products or services can be a fit in your marketing efforts. Maybe you can get a referral from a friend, family member, or client?

Encourage referrals

Referrals confer to you the golden status of being considered a known and trusted quantity. Other than a Super Bowl ad, there is no better endorsement for your business than a referral. People who read reviews of books, movies, restaurants, or hotels are in reality searching for a business whose customers give it good referrals.

Create the conditions for good word-of-mouth about your service by excelling at superior customer service at every client touch point. Present a 360 degree pleasant and efficient experience from the intuitive navigation of your website, the relevance of your content marketing posts, to your follow-up and willingness to go the extra mile to provide the necessary solution, to your project proposals and invoicing.

Give your clients lots of good things to say about doing business with your organization. Ask them to spread the word. On client invoices, offer a 15% or so discount on their next invoice if a referral is made and a sale results.

Case studies and testimonials showcase how clients feel about your finest work. They are a form of referrals and business owners and leaders are advised to include such valuable endorsements on the company website and on social media platforms.

Get found with Inbound Marketing

Revisit your understanding of the ideal clients for your company’s products or services. Do you know who the decision-makers is? Do you know who is likely to influence the decision-maker and other important stakeholders? When writing your content, it’s imperative to know to whom you are speaking.

With a heightened sense of your ideal client in mind, evaluate, refine and expand your company’s online presence and popularity with content designed to fill the sales funnel with prospects who have authority, who make decisions, who have influence. Create email marketing subject lines that catch the eye and resonate with those prospects. Align your white papers, blog, newsletter and case studies to address goals and questions that are meaningful to your prospects. Appeal to what motivates prospects to take the leap and do business with you. Post content to Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook to expand your reach.

Finally, why not experiment with developing relationships through online communities? Investigate LinkedIn groups, for example, and search for one or two that seem like a good fit. Follow conversations and learn what active members discuss. When you feel ready, pose a question or respond to one. Whenever you participate, your LinkedIn contact info is accessible to interested parties and the seeds of follow- up are planted.

The sales landscape has changed for the time being, but the fundamentals of selling remain. If your product or service solves a problem, provides a solution, for a potential buyer, if a price can be agreed upon a sale will be made. Pursuing introductions and attempting to build relationships with new prospects in the virtual space is not without challenges but it also brings certain advantages. Geography is no longer a barrier.

Moreover, most prospects begin the buying journey online, searching Yelp and other rating sites to find out who can and cannot be trusted, cruising through social media and visiting websites that appear in the top 10 of their text or voice searches (those would mostly be big companies, for those wondering why there is no mention of SEO here).

Buyers are acclimating to the virtual space, becoming more accepting of the new normal and what it entails. The scope of relationships hatched in the virtual space may not be quite what we’re accustomed to, but I predict that both buyers and sellers will adapt as necessary to do business.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: Athena, a special guest character on Lost in Space (CBS-TV 1965-1968) appeared in season 2, episode 16, of the series on January 4, 1967.

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Survey Discussion: How Freelancers Market Our Services (2016 – 2017)

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Today we have recommendations on how Freelance consultants and small business owners can implement as needed the results of a survey of 1,700 of our peers that was conducted in December 2016 by FreshBooks, a Toronto company that sells cloud based accounting solutions designed for Freelance professionals and small business owners http://FreshBooks.com .

Given the limited time that Freelancers and small business owners have available to devote to new client acquisition and once we’ve accepted the fact that the pool of new clients must be constantly replenished, it is essential that what we do has a very good chance of delivering the necessary results.

The survey indicates that devoting one’s marketing activities to tactics that are ranked as highly effective across all three age cohorts and then diversifying the tactics utilized, has the potential to reap tangible benefits for all age cohorts, despite the fact that each has a clear preference for certain activities and an ROI track record to defend those practices.

Exceeding client expectations of the work you are hired to do is the recipe for obtaining referrals from satisfied clients. Building relationships with peers that you meet at the chamber of commerce, on volunteer boards, at the gym, or at your religious institution, for example, is often a highly successful marketing and business development tactic for Baby Boomers, with 67% relying on referrals to find new clients. The ability to obtain referrals from business and personal relationships will become more accessible to Generation X and Millennials over time, as their personal and client relationships expand.  There is no more effective advertising than word of mouth.

Millennials have made hay with content marketing tactics and 42% of the age cohort use that marketing tactic. I will guess that a certain percentage of what is called email marketing, which has an adoption rate of 24% across the three age groups, overlaps with content marketing because email is how newsletters are sent. Generation X and especially Baby Boomers are advised to step up the use of content marketing if for no other reason than several surveys have demonstrated its satisfactory ROI.

Content marketing is poised to surpass the use of paid advertising because it seems that B2B prospects find advertisements insufficiently credible or engaging and they have gravitated to the brand story approach that is content marketing. Commissioning a marketing case study to put on one’s website and can be used in other marketing activities, is another highly effective method of content marketing (but it is not inexpensive).

Public speaking in the form of teaching, speaking, training (and I will stretch to say it also includes podcasts, webinars and appearing on a panel as speaker or moderator) is acknowledged by 39% of  survey participants across all three cohorts as being a highly effective marketing tactic and I respectfully suggest that you adopt the practice if you have not already done so.

It may be a little intimidating for Millennials to assume the role of expert, but appearing as a guest on a webinar or podcast seems less of a stretch than teaching business courses or speaking at professional association meetings. Your diarist is in the Baby Boom generation and I’ve done a fair amount of teaching and speaking over the years, but I’ve never directly received either a client or referral from any engagement. Rather, prospective clients are always seem impressed when I mention those activities, so be advised that you may see your teaching and speaking ROI indirectly.

Finally, since the survey explored financial management, we might pause and consider that topic as well. While only 20% of survey responders financed their businesses with bank loans, that doesn’t mean that they don’t need help managing the business finances (and their personal finances).  One third of the responders has a relationship with a bank and yet 52% report that they feel big banks are not a good fit for small business owners and Freelance consultants.

Survey findings indicate that Freelancers and small business owners with the greatest financial acumen operate the most successful ventures and enjoyed self-employment the most.  That description applied to 25% of responders.  Overall, responders are wary and uninformed about new financial software that might help them better understand and optimize their financial record-keeping data and learn how to use either what they already own, or software they could buy, and learn to understand and manage the financial aspects of their businesses.

The FreshBooks people recommend that Freelancers and small business owners invest in financial management training.  Courses are either regularly or sporadically available at adult learning centers, libraries, business networking groups, professional associations and the Small Business Administration.  https://www.sba.gov/business-guide/manage/manage-your-finances-business-credit

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Photograph: Falmouth (MA) Road Race August 21, 2016 courtesy of Joseph Cavanaugh