Closing the Loop: How to Easily Make a Sale

No matter the type of business you run, knowing how to close sales is crucial to your success. Retailers need to be able to close a lot of sales to sell the products in their shop or website. Those offering services need to do the same to convince clients to take advantage of their offerings.

The good news is that with a few simple tips and the help of text messaging solutions for business, you can close more sales. Take a closer look at some best practices for making a sale. 

When do customers drop during a sales cycle?

Part of learning how to close sales and collect payment from customers requires you to acknowledge when customers drop during the sales cycle.

As a refresher, the sales cycle refers to the process you go through to find potential leads and convert them. It involves connecting with your leads, qualifying them, overcoming objections, and closing the deal.

Importantly, you may lose customers at any point in the sales cycle. In many cases, the reasons that they drop out of the cycle and the stage they are at in the cycle are connected. With that in mind, the following are some of the most common reasons you lose customers during the sales cycle.

• You didn’t personalize the process.
• You didn’t confirm the lead was qualified before putting in the effort to convert them.
• Your messaging isn’t effective.
• Your messaging doesn’t reach the leads.
• Your product or service doesn’t solve the right problem.
• You didn’t make a compelling argument.
• Your product or service doesn’t add value.
• You didn’t give the lead the information they wanted.
• You didn’t focus on the customer experience enough.
• You didn’t build a strong enough relationship with the customer.
• You didn’t target the right person (for B2B products or services) or couldn’t reach them.
• Your product or service costs too much.
• You don’t offer convenient payment methods.
• You didn’t create a sense of urgency. 

How to close sales 

Now that you have a better idea of why you fail to close sales consider what you can do to change that, from text message marketing to getting to know your audience. 

Step 1 – Choose your communication method

One of the first things you need to do is decide how you will communicate with clients. This might be in person, via text message, online, or over the phone. You can also use email or other text messaging platform options, such as Facebook Messenger.

Text messaging services for businesses tend to be among the most valuable and effective options. That is because 98% of text messages are opened, making text message marketing highly effective. Additionally, customers prefer to contact companies via SMS messages. This applies to both B2C and B2B businesses. People appreciate the convenience of texting, and you get to take advantage of the fact that most people have smartphones. 

Step 2 – Know your audience

As you decide what communication methods to use, be sure to think about your audience. For example, if your audience spends a lot of time on their phones, text message marketing makes sense. If, however, your audience doesn’t text frequently, you should stick to other communication methods. Audiences that don’t like text message marketing campaigns are now rare and mainly include the elderly or tech-avoidant groups.

But knowing your audience is for more than just deciding whether to use text message marketing. It is also crucial as you work to improve the customer journey. After all, learning about your audience lets you decide the type of experience they prefer. This gives you an idea of how pushy you should be with your sales.

Most importantly, take the opportunity to get to know your audience’s pain points. Remember that one of the reasons you don’t close more sales is that you don’t address their pain points enough. This is easily avoided if you know the problems customers have. That way, you can directly advertise how your product or service overcomes those pain points. 

Step 3 – Reach your audience

Now that you know more about your audience, it is time to start reaching them. Go back to your decisions about communication methods and your audience’s knowledge. General advertising and digital advertising are important ways to reach them. SMS marketing is also crucial, especially with the modern preference for text message marketing. Don’t forget to consider email as well. Just remember to get opt-ins before sending emails to leads.

As you plan how you will reach your audience, remember that lack of personalization is one of the reasons you may not be closing sales. Segmentation lets you deliver that personalization by targeting customers better. It is as simple as dividing your leads or customers into various lists depending on relevant factors. For example, you can use your text message marketing service to separate clients based on their location if you offer your products and services online. Or you can segment them based on other demographic data or even goals. You can even segment based on pain points. 

Step 4 – Train your team

At this stage, make sure that your team is well-trained, including both sales and customer service teams. They need to be familiar with your audience and your products or services. They should know how to use your text message marketing service and what sales techniques you plan to use. During the training, highlight the importance of building customer relationships and sending personalized messages. 

Step 5 – Collect payment conveniently (hint: through text messaging)

Remember that another factor that can hurt your ability to close sales is your payment methods. If you don’t accept customers’ preferred methods, they may go to a competitor. 1 in 4 consumers will abandon a sale if their preferred payment method isn’t available. Doing so not only boosts sales but also helps you get paid faster.

There are two elements to this. You want to accept the payment methods, such as credit cards and Apple Pay, that your clients want. You also want to accept those payments conveniently.

To start, think about the various methods your clients are most likely to want to use. Some of the most popular options to consider include:

• Credit cards and debit cards
• Apple Pay
• Google Pay
• ACH payment
• Echeck

When it comes to accepting payment, there are better options than having customers wait in line to pay at your store. Secure solutions can let customers pay online while minimizing the risk of online fraud. Online payments, such as via your website, have been popular for a while.

You also want to try text-to-pay. Although this is still a newer option, it is quickly growing in popularity. It lets you take advantage of the high open rate of text messaging and offers convenience for your customers. They can pay from anywhere with their smartphone. You can even use your text message marketing software for this payment method, at least in the case of the best platforms. 

The impact of using text messages to collect payment

As mentioned, text messages are among the best methods of collecting payments from clients. Customers will appreciate the convenience. While nearly every company will benefit from offering text-to-pay, you should be aware of the pros and cons before finding a text message marketing service that supports it. 

Pros

• Customers get the convenience of paying from anywhere without waiting in lines.
• Thanks to the high open rate and convenience for customers, you get paid more quickly.
• You can use the same phone number you use for other text message marketing services. That number is likely already in your text message marketing campaigns. That increases the chances of customers recognizing your number when they receive text marketing messages. This also helps with branding and customer retention. It can even be the same as your business landline phone number. 
• You can offer the payment methods, such as Google Pay, that your clients want via text messages.  
• Most cell phone plans include complimentary incoming messages, which won’t cost your clients anything. 
• You can send messages from your normal text message marketing service. This includes the ability to take advantage of mass texting for text-to-pay. 
• Automation makes it easy to create and use text message templates in your text messaging software. You can even set up automated reminders when payments are due. 

Cons

• You do have to pay to send texts, but the best text message marketing services have affordable rates.
• Customers need a smartphone to follow the payment link. 

Conclusion: SMS Marketing and closing sales

Communicating with your clients via text messages is an excellent way to help you close more sales. Text message marketing lets you communicate with clients the way they prefer, helping you build a relationship with them. You can even accept payments via text message, thanks to text-to-pay. The best text message marketing services will offer the ability to accept payments over text with the same number and platform that you use for your other SMS marketing.