Salespeople always start in the same place - with a new prospect. You probably pay your sales staff well to achieve results with new prospects. And, in your company, after finding, calling and meeting the prospect, where does your sales team keep the information on the prospect?

If you answered "I don't know" or, "in their heads" or nearly as horrific, "in a spreadsheet" - you have invested too much of your money into prospect information you don't really own or control. Aside from the obvious problem of a sales person taking the information with them if they leave, you must be technically equipped to effeciently move information from marketing to sales, to service delivery, to accounting, and back again to maximize profits and improve client service.

There are a number of database options available for the small and medium sized business. Microsoft Dynamic CRM, Sugar CRM, Goldmine and others are all great products.  Some companies want a very customized solution and have technical staff or hire consultants to create one for them. Either way, once you select a solution the real challenge is to create a process for USING the solution to achieve great results.

After clarifying your data and reporting needs, set up, train and begin using your system immediately. Import the spreadsheets, transfer the information from the stack of business cards, give your sales team time to enter their knowledge into the database. Once that's done, delete the spreadsheets, hide the business cards, and require everyone on your team to use the database exclusively. If you do, you'll find you have much better information on sales funnels, number of prospects being pursued, client sales activity and much more.

Using data to drive business decisions will make you more profitable and provide your clients with better service. To learn more, give us a call. Wilson-Mercer Marketing will help you get your sales on track with good data and great processes!

Wilson-Mercer Marketing founder Jill Mercer is pleased to announce the offering of our Interim or Part-Time Marketing Staffing solutions.  For small and medium-sized service firms and non-profits, WMM offers a cost effective and practical way to manage day-to-day marketing and sales challenges.  Services are customized to fit the need of each client as follows:

Marketing Coordinator: this administrative level staff handles sales support and basic marketing activity, including some graphic design and writing.

Marketing Staff:  as a staff level professional, this position is very customized to meet the need of each client and is a great way to meet a part-time need or a project need in your marketing department.

Marketing Manager: overseeing projects, communications plans, events and sales efforts, the Marketing Manager functions in a management capacity and handles vendors, staff and a variety of objectives on your behalf.  For this level, measurable goals are established and a well-documented work plan is implemented to meet each need.

VP of Marketing: best suited for start-ups, companies in a growth phase, or for those going through radical change, the VP of Marketing designs a solid marketing strategy, outlines communications tactics and identifies the vendors and personnel needed to meet marketing and sales objectives for each project. In this role, WMM performs as an interim or part-time member of the management team for each client.