Week 8 EOC - Chapter 11 Speed Selling On The Internet

"The most important activity for any business to thrive and flourish is sale. You can have the greatest products in the world, the most advanced ideas, the highest quality Internet experience, the best customer service, but without sales, it all goes to waste.
Everything in your business is tied to sales and marketing. Everyone in your organization is in the sales and marketing business. Everything you do, from the Web site, to your order fulfillment, to your customer follow-up, is part of your sales and marketing program.

The irony is that most people fear sales and dread the very thought of making a sales call. The reason is that when you sell, you are on the line. There is no place to hide. Sales are a binary event --you win the sale or you don't, it's that simple. Add to this a lack of sales training and fear of rejection and you have a formula for mediocrity, or even worse, abject failure." (Success Secrets of the Online Marketing Superstars, by Mitch Meyerson, pg124)

The book states that sales and marketing go hand in hand. Marketing is used to generate leads, to capture the attention of a suspect and give them enough information so they can determine whether they are interested or not. A sale is to get that person who is interested and convert them into a customer.

When people visit your Web site there are several things that I have learned from this chapter that the Web site needs to accomplish. It needs to educate the prospect by having exciting information about services. This can be accomplished by using attention-grabbing headlines to lead the person to the things you want them to see. The copy needs to describe the benefits that are offered by the services/product. These should appeal to the prospects emotions. People buy on emotion and justify with logic. The copy needs to utilize the four major benefits that create a buying environment, it must answer one of the big four questions: Will this product make me healthier, wealthier, sexier, or save me time? (pg125) This should culminate with a buying decision.

If the prospect decides not to buy, a free report or more information should be offered in order to capture their contact information so that we have this and their permission to continue to market to them. Sales is information collection not information distribution. "You have to collect information on your prospects so that you can market to them. This should be one of the first steps in your sales process--get the prospect's e-mail, name, address, telephone number, fax number, their permission to market to them, and any other data your require. You owe it to your prospects, and you owe it to yourself." (pg131)