From time to time marketing terms appear that seem innovative and start to be applied in mass even though many do not know exactly what the term refers to. Inbound sales is one of them!
Used by many educational institutions in the hope of increasing the number of enrollments, this concept has been increasingly discussed.
However, for many, the tool has not generated great results and, most of the time, the fault is not even the strategy itself. When well used, inbound sales contributes to achieving those goals that seem distant, helping your institution to sell more.
If you are using inbound sales, but are seeing little result in the strategy, it is time to analyze what you have been doing and understand "where the error is" in fact.
That's exactly what we're going to talk about in today's post!
- What does the active sales process look like?
- What is Inbound Sales?
- What are the main mistakes within Inbound Sales?
Let 's go?
What does the active sales process look like?
In the more traditional sales model, the commercial team is actively involved in the entire process, from customer prospecting, scheduling visits and the visits themselves. In this case, the sales process almost always depends on this team's ability to conduct good prospecting (go after the right people) and convince this potential customer of the quality of the solution your company is offering.
Because it is a very manual process, there are some problems related to this strategy.
First, there are several expenses involved in these outings. Generally, costs with transport, food, in some cases the use of gifts, etc.
Then there is no certainty that those leads found by the commercial team are interested in what is being said and even in the product. This very "one on one" relationship also takes into account the empathy, tone of voice, approach and several other characteristics of the commercial professional.
Lots of expenses, high cost in acquisition of new students and poor customer conversion result in one thing: loss.
Within this scenario and as a result of inbound marketing, inbound sales emerges as a strategy opposite to this way of selling.
See also these contents:
- Growth accelerated by Sales Enablement;
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- How to create a landing page? 7 best practices!
What is Inbound Sales?
Inbound sales is a term that refers to sales that place the potential consumer's needs, pain points and expectations at the center of the sales process.
Prospecting is not done randomly, assuming the buyer's interest, but based on real information generated within your inbound marketing strategy.
Inbound marketing and inbound sales are closely related concepts. In the first, there is a focus and need to approach the potential customer through - mainly, the generation of relevant content that can make a difference in his life in some way, and this will lead him to have confidence in the company. With inbound marketing, it is possible to acquire valuable information about the lead, which will be used at the time of inbound sales.
In the second, we have a well-structured sales process already focused on meeting the information collected in inbound marketing. Data transformed into information is the key to an assertive sales process.
One of the greatest advantages of this process is being able to direct specialized people to each topic to be addressed. If you have a well-structured inbound marketing strategy that collects the right data, your sales team will have enough baggage, experience and knowledge for a more targeted and strategic sales process.
Now, as important as knowing what to do, is knowing what not to do in inbound sales! So let's get to know 3 mistakes that your educational institution may be commenting on and failing to generate results with this strategy!
What are the main mistakes within Inbound Sales?
We did this resume to understand if you, in fact, knew what this inbound sales was. Wassup did you know? Tell us in the comments of this post if you already knew and take the opportunity to ask questions about the topic.
If you already knew and are already applying this concept in your institution but do not see results with the actions, you may be making one of these mistakes:
Are you generating too few leads?
The generation of qualified leads is one of the keys for inbound sales to work properly.
These leads are those people who have already consumed all kinds of information about the service and who are really interested in them.
If your institution is investing little in lead capture and if, in addition, your inbound strategy is not helping you to capture the necessary information about these leads to understand the next steps, your strategy is probably wrong.
Keep in mind that the process must be cyclical (just like in Inbound Marketing): you must invest in relevant content, capture data, follow your lead's life cycle, invest in nurturing actions and then, yes, have enough inputs to direct the commercial team to have contact with that lead.
Your Marketing and Sales team may be misaligned
For the inbound sales strategy to generate results, it is necessary that the sales team and the marketing team work together.
Sales need information generated through marketing, and through this information, it is necessary for marketing to act with actions to cure the future customer's pain so that when he arrives at the sales team, the team is already ready for the sales process.
This means that the goals and objectives of both teams must be aligned and move in the same direction, complementing each other's strategies at each stage of the process.
Lack of a sales process
Sellers must act with actions that can foresee the problems/paradigms that prevent each sale. That is, all the information generated by the marketing team should prepare the team so that they know what to do in each situation, from knowing who to refer the future student to in specific cases, to knowing how to deal with that student profile.
Increasing the number of enrolled with inbound sales is a simple task, when all concepts and principles of the strategy are followed.
The results are not immediate (as well as inbound marketing), but you can be sure that they will be lasting in the task of keeping the classrooms always full!
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