Last week on Tuesday November 17th the Managing Director Andrew France of Destined, was invited to inspire and educate 300+ Australian Private Business Owners at PlanToWin.

Along with speakers such as Collette Dinnigan, Tom Waterhouse, Angus Kennard and Jack Cowin – Andrew provided a unique perspective on how to drive sales and marketing. Below are some interesting excerpts from his presentation.

Your Company Message

Andrew kicked off with posting the following scenario:

“You are at a networking event with the type of people that you would like to be selling to. The key person you were trying to get to walks up to you, and they ask you – what is it that your business does?

He then left it up to the audience to speak to the person next to them about what they do. The person next to me, started talking about how they work for a property fund, which heavily invests in Texas, USA. Andrew then continued:

Often the first thing we talk about is ourselves…I work for…My Company is….

From whose perspective should we start? One of the most fundamental things we work on with clients is starting from the perspectives of the problems you solve. Suddenly the customer is being thought of. Get your message right.”

Your Process

“The piece that is so often missing in sales and marking is the repeatable process. The irony is that so many other parts of your business have strong process. Why is it that sales and marketing are neglected? Marketing is often not process driven because CEO’s and CFO’s often struggle how to measure it. I am amazed and the number of top ASX listed companies we have dealt with in the last 12 months who have little or no measurement of marketing. Sales has traditionally had a bit more process around it. However, it can be in name only. As soon as a sales person starts performing they are forgiven for following no process at all. This can be OK while they are hitting their numbers. However, the CustomerCentric Selling research shows that only 13% of sales people can survive this way. If you are not building repeatable process you are in strife. A couple of the key things you could do tomorrow to drive this improvement include:

1. Start with the customer journey you want your ideal customer to take.

Have you mapped it?

What is that experience really like?

What can you do to improve it?

2. Get some recycling in place.

What happens when sales get a lead?

Data suggests that 63% of leads are not even followed up. Of those that do get followed up probably the vast majority are not ready to buy. Your sales people will have actually started the sales journey, but because sales are often motivated by short term goals, those leads get thrown on the floor.

Further, it is suggested that around 70% of the people who do not buy from you today will buy from someone in the next 2 years. If you have a decent recycling program in place then there is a chance they will be buying from you and not your competitors.

3. Get on top of your data.

We talk a lot about BIG data – however for most organisations the fundamental challenge is your little data.

Are all of your clients data records complete – name, address, email and mobile number?

Are they are all kept in one location?

Do you have a process in place for keeping that data clean?”

Your Technology

“One of the ways we have helped clients in these areas