Keeping it Simple.
First up, apologies for the nautical references in this blog, but a) it brings this issue to life, and b) our office overlooks a harbour.
There’s an old saying ‘A rising tide lifts all ships’. So when things are going well, we all do OK. Maybe some of our systems aren’t the best they could be. Maybe some of our processes aren’t the gold standard that they once were. Maybe we could improve efficiency here and there. But, hey, we’re still doing OK. It ain’t broke [too much], so no need to fix it.
But things aren’t going so well in 2020. The tide is not rising anymore. It’s going out, and it’s going to keep on going out for a while. So now’s the time to take a closer look at how we could stay afloat, make safe harbour, ensure we’re fit to deal with the ebbing tide of income, and make sure that, whilst the tide is low, we’re still able to catch any waves of opportunity.
So what can we do to make sure our ship is in the best possible shape? Well, in our experience, one of the biggest drags on business success is complexity. All too often our businesses develop bit by bit, and we cope with the changes as they come through. Or if we acquire another company, we can inherit legacy systems that aren’t fully harmonised. It’s not ideal, but it works. And when the going’s good, a business can withstand a few process and people inefficiencies.
But the going is anything but good for most of us right now. We’re facing the triple whammy of headwinds – a global recession, Covid and Brexit, and we’re starting to see that the complexity we’ve grown accustomed to, and factored into our forecasts, is now eating into our margins, just at a time we’re starting to see our sales pipeline shrink in front of us.
Without wanting to sound overly simplistic, the way back to healthy margins is determined by 2 key factors – either you sell more or you reduce your overheads.
At neptik, we can actually help you with both. We’re a lead generation, email marketing and data processing service provider, and we can help reduce some of the complexity and inefficiencies, which typically exist in most sales functions. Having qualified sales people spending 20-25% of their time on prospecting is inefficient, and, having to chop and change between prospecting and actual selling adds a degree of complexity which actually makes them less effective in their role.
Outsourcing lead generation means your sales team can now commit 100% of their working day on the business they’ve been hired to do – generate more revenue for your company by increasing your customer base.
And outsourcing lead generation is also extremely cost effective. You have access to a team of technology enabled professionals (all of whom are totally focussed on the business of generating qualified prospects for your sales team to follow up on), you can turn us on and off, depending on your needs at any given time, and all for as little as £1.50 per prospective customer.
Sales up and costs down – both heading in the right direction
