Tired of how the traditional sales model commoditizes your lawn and landscape services? You can revolutionize your sales strategy by emphasizing service through your revenue-generating trio.
This trio are your sales representatives, field technicians and customer service managers.
“Americans want a positive experience, and they want to be catered to, and they want it all about them,” says Duane Cashin, owner of Cashin Sales. “They don’t want to be sold to. They don’t want people pushing things on them, but they do want to buy because they’ve got needs.”
Cashin will highlight how these three departments can work together to create a cohesive client experience and drive revenue during his session, “The Revenue Generating Trio” on Monday, Nov. 4, at 9:45 a.m. at ELEVATE.
He says leaders, sales reps, and customer service team members can all benefit from attending this session.
“Nothing is going to happen in any company unless the ownership and the leadership fully embraces the initiative and understands this cannot be the flavor of the month,” Cashin says. “They have to go deep into it. They have to learn it themselves. They have to understand how important it is, and then they have to give people objectives and hold them accountable to the performance of those objectives.”
Consultive Selling
One major aspect Cashin notes sales teams struggle with is failing to differentiate themselves from the competition.
“A buyer has a really hard time seeing who’s different,” Cashin says. “It’s up to the salespeople to be able to be the face of the company.”
He says that salespeople need to have an amazing discovery phase where instead of selling a lead, they are learning everything about that person’s concerns and the philosophy of the property.
“The representative has to think like a business person,” Cashin says. “People buy properties to generate revenue, so the representatives need to understand that and then engage in conversations to make it all about that owner.”
With inbound sales calls, Cashin says that many times, the rep starts selling immediately instead of talking to the client about their concerns and how they use a space. For instance, if you find out they entertain or have a dog, then you know whether offering mosquito or flea/tick control services is relevant for that person.
“They have to understand that they’ve got to make it all about that caller, and this isn’t about selling,” Cashin says. “They have to understand that they’ve got to follow a process, which starts with a very thorough discovery because that’s the foundation for providing solutions, for handling objections, for closing. If they have to follow up, they’re going to leverage the information they got out of discovery.”
Cashin says you need to establish your credibility early on by asking relevant questions.
“In a heartbeat, a listener can see how knowledgeable we are by the questions we ask,” Cashin says. “The questions show we have an understanding. The representatives need to be questioning experts and make it all about that buyer, and then listen to them and feed it back.”
Covering the client’s concerns, what they’re trying to achieve, their vision and their budget provides vital information and shows the client you care.
“The representative needs to be themselves, and they need to be very knowledgeable about the technical side because they’re a doctor in a sense,” Cashin says. “They’re going to uncover the pain. They’re going to diagnose the situation. They’re going to listen to what that buyer really wants, and not interrupt them and make it all about them, and make some intelligent suggestions on how this buyer can get exactly what they want.”
Training Your Team
Cashin says running your sales team is no different than running a professional football or baseball team.
“It’s no different because if you’re the coach, and you stop doing trainings or you dramatically cut back on the practices and the study of the plays, that team is going to go right down the tubes,” Cashin says. “If we don’t work them out daily and focus them and teach them and continue to work with the finest athletes on the planet, they will fall down to the not-so-great athletes on the planet, at least in terms of their results. Selling is no different.”
Another part of the revenue-generating trio is the technicians. Cashin understands they don’t want to be salespeople, but they need to be trained to be observant and point out other opportunities on a property, like when ornamental bushes are covered in aphids or if there’s a hazardous issue on a site.
“They need to be trained,” Cashin says. “They need to be given objectives, and they need to be held accountable.”
Cashin says they should have a short list of issues to keep an eye out for.
“The technician’s job is to be taught to be very aware,” Cashin says. “Their head should be in a swivel when they’re out there observing. They’re not just doing production.”
Meanwhile, your customer service team members need to be able to handle when a customer wants to cancel their service. They should let the customer express themselves without interrupting and that they appreciate the client for sharing. Then, they can ask if the client is willing to give them another chance to take care of the issue on the property.
Cashin says your customer service team needs to be phenomenal at making the experience all about the customer.
All three roles need to consistently and accurately log conversations and next steps in the CRM so the team can continue to provide personalized service to customers.
Want to learn how to empower your team to generate more revenue? Register for ELEVATE and we’ll see you in Charlotte, North Carolina!
