Five Critical Sales and Marketing Processes For Driving Revenue Growth

by Bill Poole | Feb 4, 2020 | Strategy

Ask any management consultant and they will tell you that processes are the key to an efficient business. We find processes in departments throughout a business like finance, H.R., service, production, and fulfillment.

Why is it that when it comes to revenue growth, sales and marketing teams typically have few, if any, documented processes?

In the Entrepreneurial Operating System, Gino Wickman asserts that process is a core part of an organization’s success:

“This is the secret ingredient in your organization. This means systemizing your business by identifying and documenting the core processes that define the way to run your business. You’ll need to get everyone on the same page with what the essential procedural steps are, and then get everyone to follow them to create consistency and scalability in your organization.”

While most departments have well thought out processes in place, sales and marketing teams are often left to wing it. “Go sell something.” “Manage our social media.”

The challenge is that when you have unpredictable processes, you get unpredictable results.

Because of this, many companies experience either inconsistent or flat revenue growth. This is a shame since revenue is the lifeblood of any business.

What are your processes when it comes to revenue growth? The Revenue Growth Engine™ itemizes the core sets of sales and marketing processes you need to drive net-new revenue and cross-sell current clients. Let’s consider these four process areas.

The Revenue Growth Engine™ Model

Net-New Business Processes

To drive net-new business you need defined processes for the two types of buyers: those who are actively looking and those who are not.

Process 1: Inbound Marketing

These processes ensure your company gets found by buyers looking online. It defines processes for converting visitors to leads, mining data for leads, qualifying those leads, and handing them off to sales.

Process 2: Outbound Selling

For every buyer that is actively looking for what you sell there are many more who are not actively looking but could benefit from your value proposition. Documented sales processes define who is the ideal client, how data will be managed, how reps prospect, and how they influence the buying team throughout the sales cycle.

Cross-Selling Processes

What additional products, services, or solutions could you provide to your current clients? Most companies could quickly double their revenue if they got this right. Without defined processes in place, most companies experience anemic growth in cross-sell revenue. Both sales and marketing have a role to play here.

Process 3: Client Management

What happens after the prospect says yes to your offer? This is where most businesses drop the ball. Processes should be defined for onboarding a new client, conducting periodic business reviews, and renewing contracts. Without process, balls get dropped and cross-selling does not happen.

Process 4: Client Communication

Survey most clients and you’ll hear, “You never write, you never call, until it’s time for me to renew my contract.” Client communication processes ensure your clients feel valued. Documented processes need to exist for segmenting clients, managing data, communicating consistently with relevant messages, and delivering client loyalty programs.

Process 5: Update Your Message

In addition to sales and marketing processes to drive net-new and cross-sell, you also need processes in place to continually update your message. Your message is the fuel for your Revenue Growth Engine™. Make sure to have documented processes to refresh your website, sales collateral, advertising, and social presence.

How Are Your Sales and Marketing Processes? Do you have any? Are they documented?

Are you unhappy with your flat or inconsistent revenue growth? Maybe you should look at your sales and marketing processes!

If you’d like to take a deeper dive, consider inviting the team at Convergo to conduct a Revenue Growth Workshop with your team. Our team will help you diagnose your current Revenue Growth Engine™ and develop a plan to create and document processes to help ensure consistent results.

Originally published on Revenue Growth Engine.

Why Great Companies Need To Grow Revenue

by Bill Poole | Jan 15, 2020 | Strategy

Yesterday morning at Dallas Love Field, I crossed paths with a guy I know who leads a sales team for a $10 million company. Over breakfast at Cantina Laredo (love this place!) I shared my concept behind the Revenue Growth Engine.

We talked about his team and their revenue growth. “Darrell, we’re OK at net-new, but cross-selling… we get too busy and good intentions rarely happen.”

I hear this over and over again from businesses. They are good at net-new business but struggle to cross-sell.

Probing further, I asked, “Why do you think that is?”

“We just get caught up in the day-to-day fires taking care of our customers.”

There it is. In the attempt to provide great customer service, cross-selling goes to the bottom of the list and rarely gets done.

As a result, this company is only growing in the low single digits.

Here’s the problem with this. I happen to know of the owner of this company. He’s a great person. He cares deeply for his employees, creating a good work environment. He also is a giver, generously supporting his church and other local non-profits.

I also know of my friends who work for large, faceless companies. These companies RIF employees at will, discarding them like yesterday’s trash when they need to pad the earnings. The only time they give back is for positive PR.

Good companies need to grow—they must grow. As they do, they create great jobs in good work environments. They provide for the churches and non-profits that make our world better.

So, why was my friend’s company not growing? What stood in the way of their best intentions to cross-sell? Two things: Strategy and Execution.

STRATEGY

Growing revenue doesn’t magically happen. Growth requires a strategy. This strategy needs to have two components: net-new business and cross-selling current clients. The strategy should align marketing and sales. Revenue Growth Engine provides the roadmap for this strategy.

EXECUTION

To grow, you must execute consistently. In the case of this company, poor operational execution ended up hurting their sales efforts, hence the flat growth. To fix this, I recommended the Entrepreneurial Operating System as outlined in the book Traction by Gino Wickman. Applying these principles supports consistent execution company-wide, freeing up bandwidth to be proactive at net-new AND cross-selling. These operational principles can also be applied to drive marketing and sales excellence as you deploy your Revenue Growth Engine. Plus, these operational principles will help the company handle the (good) issues that come with growth!

WHAT ABOUT YOU?

How is your company doing? Is your revenue growth in the single digits or low teens? If so, what’s holding you back? Do you have a revenue growth strategy? Are you good at execution?

When great companies fix these two issues, they grow. This creates new jobs and more opportunities for existing employees. It generates cash flow that can fuel local non-profits.

Are you ready to grow? Let’s get to work building and fine-tuning your Revenue Growth Engine!