Three Rules For Growth

Find. Keep. Grow. Simple, yet not easy. When we begin to assess a company’s opportunity for growth, we often find that what’s missing is the fundamental disciplines involved in these simple rules. And, a gap in knowledge in understanding your company’s value proposition and how well it aligns with the needs of your customers. For more information on what your customer values, read The Art of the Relationship Review.

There’s a crucial intersection that should drive all your sales and marketing efforts. It’s the point where your company’s best offerings are of most value to a certain slice of the market because they meet the most needs and solve the biggest pain points.

The more precisely you can define this intersection, the better you can pinpoint prospects. This should be the mission-critical plan of attack for all your company’s marketing, sales and customer service activities.

• But before these plans can work, business owners and executives must answer several key questions:
• What is your company’s highest use in the marketplace? Where do customers see your value?
• Can you identify the best customers to sell to now and in the future?
• Do you know the products/services they want?
• Can you easily identify the real pain that you resolve for your customers and how your product/service alleviates that pain?
• Who are your very best customers (your MVCs)?
• Have you asked your best customers why they buy from you? Why they like you?
• Have you asked them if they’d refer you? Remember, referrals are an undeniable measure of customer satisfaction.
• Do you know the specific reasons you’ve lost business or lost certain accounts to a competitor?

Each component of the 3 Rules requires a separate sales funnel. To find new customers, the Acquisition Funnel must systematize the activities needed to turn suspects into prospects, prospects into qualified prospects and qualified prospects into customers. Then it’s time to move those customers into your Retention Funnel, where you plan regular activities to keep in touch with your customers, make sure they are buying from you consistently and also executing various campaigns to re-win lost customers. Focusing on lost customers and strategizing ways to win them back creates significant opportunities and extends loyalty. 95 percent of the customers you re-win are likely to become customers again.

The Development Funnel is used to grow customers. The goal here is to move stable, profitable customers through activities that convert them into larger customers by buying more products and services, or cross-selling products and services they were previously not buying. Applying the best practices of account management is especially important here.

Finding customers, keeping customers and growing customers. On the one hand, it’s remarkably simple. On the other hand, developing the systems and processes for each of the three funnels requires discipline and passion. It’s not easy, but it’s well worth it.