Several weeks ago, I was invited to participate in the first ever Sales Services Kickstarter program hosted by HubSpot’s David Weinhaus and Dan Tyre. I have to admit, being an operations guy, I was somewhat hesitant because the last job on the planet I would ever consider myself to be qualified for, would be a sales job (Kudos to all you salespeople!) Nevertheless, my agency founders asked me to lead the initiative to build and grow our Sales Services so I accepted the offer and braced for what I expected to be a bumpy ride!
After a five week online course, I’m happy to say that I not only made it through unscathed, I actually learned some things I’d love to share!
1. Sales Services are a natural fit for a marketing agency.
Consumers are smarter and more empowered now than at any other time in history. According to Aligned to Achieve, 70% of a buyer’s research is complete before they reach out to sales. That’s a lot of research! And when that knowledgeable prospect reaches out to a salesperson and hears anything that doesn’t align with what they already believe they know to be true, that creates risk. And risk causes people to pause – that kills deals.
Today’s empowered buyer simply refuses to do business with companies who do not have alignment between sales and marketing. Luckily, as a marketing agency, we have the skills to create content for the sales team to continuously deliver value to prospects as they progress through their journey. And we can ensure that the messaging is aligned. We also know how to use tools like HubSpot to put technology and processes in place to make sales teams more efficient. Ultimately, sales and marketing teams have the same job: to increase revenue.
As a marketing agency, we are well-positioned to deploy our skills help attract new visits, convert them to leads, and now to close them to customers – and then delight them to get repeat and referral business.
2. Sales Services are necessary for businesses.
I am constantly surprised by the number of companies who use Excel or a piece of paper to track leads. Deploying CRM Implementation services followed by Sales Enablement services allows agencies like MINDSCAPE to really help sales teams sell more and sell faster. What business does NOT need this service? And what better way to prove agency value than being able to draw a short, straight line between agency services and their increasing client revenue?
3. Zoom meetings are awesome!
The Sales Services Kickstarter was held entirely online using Zoom meetings. Admittedly, it took me a few meetings to get comfortable turning my camera on. But, my word, in no time at all I was very comfortable and have grown to enjoy the format. It’s much more effective than a conference call and has great features to facilitate group meetings with cameras, audio, screen sharing, chat..
4. We are a growth agency.
One idea that was floated around during this training was the notion of a “growth agency.” I immediately fell in love with this idea. We help companies grow leads, sales, and/or profit. Our brand promise is to deliver results in the form of growth. With the addition of Sales Services to our offerings, we’re able to help clients grow even more effectively and that’s exciting!
5. Selling isn’t that scary.
For an operations guy like myself, I was hesitant to go into this training. I figured the only thing I learned about selling was reflected by the used car salesman I grew to loathe. Turns out that selling is really just understanding problems and looking for solutions that might help. That sure seems like something an operations guy could do.
I’m excited that MINDSCAPE is now offering Sales Services and I’m thankful that was able to participate in the Sales Services Kickstarter. I have no doubt that @DavidWeinhaus and @DanTyre will continue to refine their already great program and that I’ll be joined by more agency folks looking to further help clients grow.
