Archive for Sales
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I intended on commenting on the US Dollar’s (USD) acquiescence to the Canadian Dollar (CAD) last Thursday when I received an email from Yahoo!, but I have been too busy to do so. As a result of a the half point drop in interest rates by the US Federal Reserve on Thursday we found for parts of the day (first time in 31 years) the CAD to be worth more than the USD. The reason I bring this up is that I wrote a paper 2 years ago on the projected value of the CAD for an international finance and economics course. The inspiration that made me choose the topic of this paper came when the VP of the Canadian Central Bank came to lecture our class on monetary policy and the future of the CAD. The findings in my paper paralleled most economist’s predictions about the CAD and how it was projected to make significant gains on the USD (It was roughly at around $1.25 CAD/USD the day of the lecture). From what I remember, I concluded that the CAD would surpass the USD and possibly by about $0.10 ($0.90 CAD/USD) based on the economic indicators of the time. I am not current enough in my knowledge on recent indicators to give estimates on the what is in store for the CAD (and I would have to brush up on a lot of theory…lol). I still think that the CAD will remain strong at least for a while purely based on what I have been reading recently about the international markets. This is especially rings true when we look at the Chinese currency peg to the USD and the huge amounts of USD China needs to achieve this and how global trade has shifted to demand increasing amounts of commodities from our resource rich nation.
This high dollar does pose a major threat to to all our domestic export oriented firms (although import oriented firms will be rejoicing). We have been blessed for a long period of time here in Canada with a trade surplus which has aided out economic growth and has sustained us in harsher economic times. The economy over the last 30 years has been subsidized by a less valuable CAD, and this has had a definite effect on our economy and the competitiveness of our firms. With a rise in the CAD we are starting to rely increasingly more and more on outsourcing to remain competitive and this will only increase. There is some positive in all of this that we must not forget. The extortion of corporations and the immoral and selfish behavior towards society by unions will hopefully loose ground as an increasing number of union jobs are relocated to countries with a competitive advantage in the labor market.
All jokes aside though, this actually really sucks for me. As the CAD increase, the value of Silverback Apparel sales in the US will diminish as long as I am living here in Canada and eventually converting profits back into CAD. I guess that means I might have to price everything in CAD if our dollar starts doing any better. Anyways I am expecting an early November launch of my first products (October 31th seem unlikely but I’m shooting for the Christmas shopping boom) online and in retail shortly thereafter. Keep up to date with my progress at the Silverback Apparel website.
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Writing To Get Your Readers Attention: Key Points
- Create a strong subject line that is clear and descriptive of the content.
- Sculpt the message body to make it easily scannable.
- Make the nuggets of information easy to find.
- Your introductory paragraph is vital: Your first impression counts for everything.
Important information in writing attention grabbing emails and posts. Spending time developing an email’s subject line and body is vital in getting your message across. If you are like me and get 30 or more emails per day you probably just quickly skimmed over emails unless something grabs your attention. I only make an exception if I am specifically expecting an email, if not I will generally read less than 20% of an email. Another problem is when I receive an email with a one word subject line such as “Hey” or “Hi” I will generally only refer to it once and then usually never visit it again. The reason is because when an email’s subject line is very descriptive of its content I immediately qualify the content either as desirable or not depending on whether I’m currently seeking information on what the subject describes. In a world where humans are getting increasingly efficient at filtering information, if the subject line describing the email is not clear and concise we automatically tune it out as irrelevant.
The reason I bring this up is because I was reading the July/August issue of Fast Company and on page 46 I came across an article called “Email Is Dead…”. In one of the case studies this article sites the author talks about how Capital One over the last 3 years has put its employees through workshops in order to “reduce email strain by writing better messages”. What they have found is that by writing “stronger subject lines” a recipient knows why they are receiving an email and in the future it makes it easier to refer back to emails. The little blurb about Capital One further expands on clarity by saying that a sculpted email body helps the reader scan through the main body of the message.
I believe that it is vital that companies teach their employees proper email etiquette and that doing so will save the company money and resources in the long run. Doing so will reduce redundancy in email communications and decrease employee stress. Also it should assist the clients in retrieving information efficiently and give them a reason to read entire emails if they pertain to something that they currently need to address. I am reminded of a couple years ago when I sent an email to my university advisor with a weak subject line, and in response she replied: “Remember to send e-mails with identifying headings to get a fast response. That’s how I file them”.
Clarity in the Subject line is not the only thing that you should worry about, because if the body is not easily scannable then your readers will end up ignoring the content and your message. What is important as my as one of my friends and associates stated last week is to make the nuggets of valuable information easily found and make your text easily scannable. Doing so will guarantee that readers will end up drilling more deeply into content and retrieve more value from your writings.
The final thing I have to say is that the introductory sentence of your body need to captivate your audience and grab its attention right away. You have very little time to peak the readers interest before they tune out. So make sure that the first sentence is your strongest and most captivating, because if it isn’t then you are not giving your reader a reason to keep reading.
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I have been thinking for a while about the many ways in which I would like to utilize Facebook for marketing and driving traffic to my websites. Driving traffic to this blog is not as big a priority as it is to my Corporate site (silverbackapparel.com) once it is fully operational. So far the two notable options in terms of marketing have to do with the groups and the applications features. I know that with a little effort and with the help of some expertise I should be able to drive a decent amount of traffic to my site. Through Facebook alone I have driven in the last 3 weeks 451 unique individuals (as of yesterday) to my blog solely by posting blog notes on my profile. This shows the potential that Facebook has in driving traffic and I’ll definitely be one of those people doing what he can to pawn his cheap goods. The reason I am mentioning this is because a friend of mine has just emailed me an interesting blog post about just this from John Chow’s blog (a blog I regularly read). He talks about exactly how much potential traffic and revenue a 1,000,000 member group in Facebook can bring.
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The Quick and Painless Guide To Selling
The common myth about selling is that selling is difficult. Most people believe this and think that to be successful you need to be an actor change your personality. This is absolutely false and the kinds of people who do are horrible sales people who come across as sleazy, self-serving and fake. The best way to sell is to act naturally as if you were talking to a friend and telling him about the benefits of something that you have. To be successful as a salesperson you need to take on an advisory role and lead your customers through the process of understanding the benefits your product will bring them (needs based selling). Make sure that your role as an expert and adviser is credible by knowing everything about your product and industry and by being honest. Sincerity is vital in being highly successful (discussed in “The Problem With Outsourcing“) therefore it is important that you believe in your product and in most of its features. If your product is mediocre and has no real redeeming qualities compared to your competition’s you are better off cutting your losses and dumping the product before your reputation is tarnished forever.
It is hugely important to take a tailored approach to selling and to adopt the mentality that every customer’s needs are different. A scripted approach will only lead to your customer either feeling alienated or annoyed by your sales pitch. What is vital at the beginning of every sales pitch is a Q&A with your customer to find out more about them and to see whether your product can indeed help them out. If it cannot then don’t waist too much time on seeking an impulse purchase, but rather focus this time on qualified buyers who are going to benefit from what you are selling. Once you have enough information about your client from the Q&A, you want to move to your tailored sales pitch that will lead to his understanding of the benefit he will specifically get from your product. A lot of sales people when they sell tend to not gather enough information about who they are selling to and will often promote product features that the consumer is completely uninterested in. This leads to either consumer impatience (sales pitch too mundane) or consumer intimidation (sales pitch too technical) which means the client will walk.
The last important step is to ask for the close. Never expect that the client will tell you that he wants X amount of what you are selling. You have to ask the client directly how much he may want so that the sales pitch can move further down the funnel. If you know the amount that will maximize their utility then take the role as an advisor and suggest the amount they should buy and back it up with your reasoning.
Note: If you get a rejection when you ask for the close do not walk or run away from your pitch and the time you have invested in you consumer’s education. Instead quickly re-evaluate your consumer and your approach and then start from a different approach. It is important to note that if you have gotten far enough into your pitch that you have asked for the close, it means that you customer is genuinely interested and contemplating the purchase of your product. It is up to you to find out what the barriers to that close are and to address those as quickly as possible. You’ll know if there is a lack of interest in your product if you get a rejection soon after you start your pitch. If manage to get to asking for the close though sometimes you will receive several rejections from your client before you finally succeed in closing them.
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A fundamental necessity in selling yourself, your ideas, your products, or your services is to have answers to all the questions that the recipient of your sales pitch might ask. Especially obvious question!!! Last night I was solicited by a local politician named Kate Holloway of the Ontario Liberals who is running in the upcoming election in my riding (Trinity—Spadina). When I heard the knock on my door the first person to greet me was a gentleman whose job it is to cordially break the ice with the tenants. He is charged with the duty of informing the tenants of the upcoming elections and to keep them engaged in conversation until the time that Mrs. Holloway is done answering the previous tenant’s questions and arrives to engage the new tenant. So last night when the gentleman arrived at my door he quickly answered my question about the ideological stance of the Ontario liberal party (unfortunately unlike British Columbia’s Liberals they are left of center) and my other questions pertaining to the elections. Shortly after Mrs Holloway arrived and asked if I have any questions for her, and I responded by asking what the party’s political platform was.
Starting from the moment she opened her mouth to answer, everything she said worked to her disadvantage. She immediate when straight into a scripted response opening with, “Well we are going to be opening up new daycare facilities…” (Wrong answer)! In my mind as soon as she said this I thought to myself, in what way have I given her the impression that I even remotely care about day care spending (At the present time I neither have a wife or kids). She then went on and on and on about various unbudgeted social programs…”$130M of new street cars, $670M for subway expansion, $620M for Highways…$200M there…$1B there…$3.6B there…” The image I had in my mind while she was telling me this was little 18 year old Kate Holloway at the mall with a brand new credit card. “I am sorry”, I responded after a while, “but what are you going to do for business…”? Her reaction to my question completely caught me by surprise. She was completely dumbfounded, at a loss for words, and kept repeating “ah” and “um”. The gentleman with her interjected to give her the time to think, and brought the question completely off topic and into an illogical loop. Finally about a minute and a half later she proceeded to give me an answer about how a few years ago their party (still currently in power) fixed the price of renewable energy alternatives to remove price fluctuations. I felt like telling that price fixing actually hurts the overall business environment but instead I just thanked her for her time and wished her good luck.
Now the reason I brought this up is that she made many fundamental mistakes while selling herself to me that led to me not trusting her with my tax dollars. They include not qualifying me through a quick question and answer period (Q&A) to giving me a scripted pitch, to not knowing the details of her service, to not asking for the close. In my next post I have put together a guide that will address all of these fundamental mistakes. I talked a bit to her campaign manager in the elevator about 20 minutes later and told him that they have a lot of work to do. Well at least they now know what they have to work on for the debate.
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