How can you speed up your sales cycle?

We know just how important your sales process is to the livelihood of your business. It always has been, but in our increasingly accelerated market, leaders everywhere are trying to pinpoint how to increase the speed of their sales cycle. What processes need to be in place to decrease the time it takes to turn a lead into a customer?

While every prospect will differ, there are some general tips for increasing the velocity of your overall sales. From focusing in on your planning to outsourcing your sales altogether – what do you need to know?

How can you speed up your sales processes?

1. Put ample effort into the presales process

The Harvard Business Review (HBR) found that businesses with strong pre-sales abilities achieve win rates of up to 50 per cent with new business and up to 90 per cent with renewal business – considerably higher than the average. Additionally, pre-sales capabilities can:

• Improve revenue by 6 to 13 per cent.
• Accelerate the speed of moving prospects through the sales process by 10 to 20 per cent.
• Give way to a five-point improvement in conversion rates.

So, what are presales? According to HBR, they are “a specific set of activities that lead to qualifying, bidding on, winning, and renewing a deal.” In essence, it is the preparation process for identifying, courting and securing high value prospects. When businesses can lay down the groundwork in the front half of their sales process, they can expedite the actual purchase process considerably.

Sales technology can help you organise critical information and in turn decrease the time needed to identify ideal prospects.

2. Embrace sales technology

While you can’t rely exclusively on technology to speed up your sales process (human relationships still make up a HUGE part of effective sales), there are plenty of sales enablement platforms and software that can considerably improve your current sales processes.

Well-known resources, like customer relationship management (CRM) software or lead generation platforms, help you organise critical information and in turn decrease the time needed to identify ideal prospects and close deals. Our access to customer data helps us better cater deals and pitches to suit our unique customers. Embracing technology (if you haven’t already) is a huge step in optimising your sales cycle. Anything to help your sales team close those opportunities, right?

3. Make incremental closes

According to HubSpot, a great tactic to prime your customers to make a purchase involves offering up small commitments leading up to the big close. When people make little promises they inherently become more invested in the process. These agreements to little steps also get your prospect in the habit of saying ‘yes’.

Before hopping on a call, consider what request you want to make. Are you aiming to leave with a direct phone number? Are you hoping to schedule a meeting with their budget leaders? Map it out, secure the commitment and lay the groundwork for faster sales.

Planning around your business data can help accelerate your sales cycle.

4. Call in the professionals

When there is a proven rhythm in place for the sales process things naturally start to move more smoothly thus speeding up the overall rate of sales within your business. 

For almost 20 years Leading Edge has provided custom built sales solutions to New Zealand companies, including our largest partner Spark. We provide high-performing, locally based sales teams that can help businesses achieve outrageous growth. If you're interested in seeing how sales outsourcing could work for you, contact us here.