Your Sales Process is More Important Than Ever Before
There is never a more important time than now to get your sales funnel process system working optimally. This is because of 3 reasons:
There are more fitness offerings than ever before
Digital and online competition
People are more time poor than ever before
If you get the attention of the prospect, even if it is for a brief moment, it is critical that your response time is within the window of motivation and attention that your customer has. For most people in today’s world, it’s 48 hours. How do you ensure that customers have engagement within this period? Implementing a thorough sales system and managing this system on a daily basis.
Autoresponder
When a prospect sends their lead enquiry through, you can have a generated response straight away back to them via email or sms. This welcomes them to your club or studio, acknowledges their enquiry and lets them know of the next steps ahead. There are AI platforms and chat bots that can even generate a conversation and qualify and book your appointment straight into your calendar for a tour.
Call
There is no better time to call a new lead, then as soon as it has come through. The prospect is more than likely available and at their peak of motivation to find out more. The quicker you call then, the more likely they will answer and you’ll have them booked in that morning and attending class by the afternoon. Some people are ready to start and can join online, but for most people, they will need human connection to reduce the risk, reassure them they can achieve their goals and to help them start.
Follow Up
If you prospect hasn’t taken forward steps by booking a tour via AI generated chat, responding to the welcome email or picked up the phone call, then follow up that afternoon again with another call and have a set sequence of due calls, ideally 4 contacts in the first 2 days and then daily or every second day after that for the rest of the week. Your scripts and language can change from call to call to continually add value, connection and service to the calls to help reduce the risk, build the relationship and help the prospect move forward with their decision to get started.
System
On a daily basis, I continually see notes in CRM systems where staff members haven’t had the prospect pick up a call over a couple of days, so they make a judgement that the prospect doesn’t want to join and pushes the next lead call back a few weeks or worse - closes out the lead! It is not our place to judge, we need to follow our sales process and systems. The prospect is more than likely busy, could have a big project on at work, can’t pick up the time they were called, has sick kids, or on holidays, you just don’t know. This doesn’t mean that they don’t have a fitness or wellness need that they need help with. Follow the system and keep calling until you make contact and allow the prospect to make a decision, rather than judge them, make excuses or give up on them. Remember a system is not a system, unless everyone does everything all of the time.