Sales Process Steps

Compliments of our partner from HubSpot

 A sales process refers to a series of repeatable steps a sales team takes to move a prospect from an early-stage lead to a closed customer. A strong sales process helps reps consistently close deals by giving them a framework to follow.

• ·         Sales Process Steps

• ·         Prospect.                                         

• ·         Connect and qualify leads.                                         

• ·         Research the company.                                         

• ·         Give an effective pitch.                                        

• ·         Handle objections.                                         

• ·         Close the deal.                                         

• ·         Nurture and continue to sell.

1. Prospect.

Prospecting is the process of sourcing new, early-stage leads to begin working through the sales process. It's a vital part of the sales process — one that most reps generally fold into their daily or weekly workflow. The term “prospecting” covers a broad range of strategies, activities, and methods — the combination of which can differ from sales org to sales org. Some prominent prospecting methods include:

• ·         Cold calling

• ·         Cold emailing

• ·         In-person networking

• ·         Leveraging social media sites like LinkedIn

That list isn't exhaustive, but hopefully, it gives you a sense of what this stage generally entails — contacting and connecting with ideally good-fit, potential prospects. Prospecting might involve online research on sites like LinkedIn or Quora. It also might take place at conferences or industry events. Additionally, you can prospect by asking current clients or colleagues to refer individuals who might be interested in your product or service.

Hot Tip: Try to solicit referrals from your existing customers when prospecting. Word of mouth might be the most powerful resource sales orgs can tap into when connecting with potential customers. People trust the people they know more than an SDR on the other side of a cold call. Keep your customers happy, and try to have them put you in touch with their peers.

2. Connect and qualify leads.

The connect step of the sales process involves reps initiating more involved contact with those early-stage leads to gather information. From there, your team can start qualifying new leads — deciding whether or not they're a good-fit lead for your solution and, in turn, worth the time and effort that comes with a sales engagement. Reps generally identify qualified leads over a “connect” or “discovery” call — a conversation where a sales professional asks questions tailored to tease out the kind of information that indicates whether a prospect's business has the need for and interest in an offering like yours. You can generally get there by asking qualifying questions like:

• ·         “What is your role within your company?”

• ·         “What do you do day-to-day?”

• ·         “What problem are you trying to solve?”

• ·         “Why is this a priority for your business?”

• ·         “What other solutions are you evaluating?”

Hot Tip: The BANT — budget, authority, need, timeline — framework provides one of the better-structured, more straightforward avenues for determining whether winning your contact‘s business is viable and if they’re the right person to be talking to.

3. Research the company.

Next comes the research step — which is exactly what it sounds like. It‘s the stage where reps take a more focused look at qualified leads to get a more fleshed-out sense of who they’re talking to. In the context of a sales process, research generally entails scouring a prospect's business public-facing resources — including financials, company websites, profiles on company leadership, mission statements, and other elements that can provide context into why a company is considering your offering and how to best appeal to its decision-makers.

Sound, thorough research can help you put yourself in your prospect's shoes and allow you to frame a specific value proposition that accommodates their most pressing pain points. The crucial part of this stage is understanding each prospect's challenges and needs and establishing your product or service as the solution. While you might find that the companies in your vertical run into similar challenges, consistently raise similar objections, and have similar goals, no two businesses are exactly the same — so conducting the kind of research that reveals unique aspects of the business you're engaging with is invaluable when trying to speak to them on a more focused, specific level.

Hot Tip: Research shouldn‘t stop with you understanding a prospect’s broader business interests — you also want to identify a deal's most relevant stakeholders and determine an effective (but not overreaching) way to appeal to them personally. If you can, use this phase to determine whether your contact is the right person to be talking to. In some cases, you might be able to get that person to champion your solution, only to find out that they lack the authority to move a deal along.

4.      4. Give an effective pitch.

Once you've established contact with a relevant stakeholder and made enough of an impression to pique their interest, you typically move onto the presentation stage — this step generally entails booking and conducting a formal product or service demonstration. This step is time-consuming, so it typically comes later in the sales process and is reserved for more qualified prospects — making the connecting and qualifying step so critical.

You don‘t want to waste the time and effort a demo takes on a prospect who’s not poised to or interested in actually buying. Tailor each presentation to meet the specific prospect's unique use case and pain points. Additionally, a rep might bring an engineer or executive to the meeting with them to demonstrate the level of service the customer will receive when doing business with your company. This also allows them to answer more technical questions the rep might not be best suited to answer.

Hot Tip: I just touched on this, but I‘ll stress it again — personalization is key here. You want to make your demo as immediately relevant to your prospect’s pain points as possible. A vague, broad-stroke demo that walks through the nuts, bolts, and features of your product or service won't do too much for you. You want to find a way to speak to the benefits and outcomes your prospect can expect to see as a result of leveraging your solution — both with respect to their business goals and personal day-to-day.

5.      5. Handle objections.

Objection handling is a frustrating but virtually unavoidable fact of sales life — that's why it has a designated stage in pretty much every sales process. You and your team need to have the composure, product knowledge, and good sense to allay concerns as prospects raise them.

It‘s easier said than done, but you need to know your offering and prospect’s circumstances well enough to anticipate the issues they might raise. Leverage the insight you‘ve gathered in the previous stage — along with the perspective you have about your vertical that you’ve accrued throughout your career — and use it to prep thoroughly enough to preempt the objections that might come up. And once you‘re actually in the meeting, be sure to meet objections with tact, empathy, and understanding. Don’t be rude, callous, or dismissive — even if you think your prospect's objections might warrant it.

Hear them out. Successfully handling a prospect's objections can go a long way when it comes to affirming your value proposition and framing yourself as a consultative, valuable resource as you approach closing. It’s not uncommon for prospects to have objections to your salesperson‘s presentation and proposal. In fact, it’s expected — which is why this is a specific step in the sales process. Your sales team should be prepared to handle any and all objections. Listening to your prospect's objections and questions can help your reps better tailor your product to fit their needs. Through their research and presentation preparation, reps should identify and anticipate possible objections, whether about cost, onboarding, or other parts of the proposed contract.

Hot Tip: Some common objections prospects raise revolve around:

• ·         Pricing

• ·         Your company‘s reputation (especially if you’re getting off the ground)

• ·         Whether a prospect actually needs a solution like yours

• ·         Whether the need for your solution is a priority for them

No matter the objection, you always need to actively listen to your prospect‘s concerns, affirm that you understand the rationale behind their objection, ask thoughtful follow-up questions, and ideally point to any social proof you have that demonstrates your solution’s effectiveness.

In short, tell them you know where their objection is coming from, and present concrete evidence that you can address it.

6.      6. Close the deal.

This step of the sales process refers to any late-stage activities that happen as a deal approaches closing. It varies widely from company to company and may include delivering a quote or proposal, negotiation, or achieving the buy-in of decision-makers. Closing a sale is what every salesperson wants to achieve. It should result in a mutually beneficial, contractual agreement between the prospect and the seller. Once a deal closes, the salesperson receives a commission on the price they negotiated with the customer, and the account usually passes to an account manager or customer success representative.

Be sure to track the revenue each sales rep brings to your company so they receive appropriate compensation. Platforms like HubSpot make this process easy — you can easily create invoices through its dedicated invoice generator and automatically add them to your CRM to easily monitor each close deal’s value.

Hot Tip: There is a wide range of closing strategies you have at your disposal. Not all of them will work with every prospect — but having some of these tactics in your repertoire to reference and build upon can be a big help.

7. Nurture and continue to sell.

Your sales process shouldn't end with closing. Taking the time to consistently and proactively nurture the relationships you establish will go a long way in minimizing churn and generating new business.

Happy customers are some of the most valuable resources your business can have. People talk, and potential customers generally trust word of mouth from their friends, colleagues, and peers more than any other potential outreach avenue you can leverage. Always confirm that your customers receive what they've purchased — and play an active role in helping customers transition to whichever team is responsible for onboarding and customer success.

The final step of the sales process also involves continuing to communicate and reinforce value to customers. This can provide opportunities to upsell and cross-sell, as well as opportunities to get secure referrals from delighted customers.

Hot Tip: Early on in the sales process, mention the service and customer success reps who will be helping your client onboard after the deal closes. That way they're familiar, at least by name, with the team who will be taking over, and the transition will feel less abrupt.

Dr. Millicent Brooks and the Elite Shedload Collective believe that it is through increasing profits – NOT REVENUE – is the single biggest factor in crushing the competition. 

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