Technology is changing rapidly and with this change comes the challenge of keeping up with The Joneses. For cable MSOs, The Joneses are the competitors who offer voice, data and wireless services. Yesterday's double play of video (TV) and data (internet) are not enough to meet consumer demand for additional voice (telephone) and wireless (cell phone) capabilities. Cable and their competitors rush to be the one stop shop for consumers.
The Role of Company Image in Selling
R&D departments, strategic vision and a platform for deliverables are great. But can you sell it, and why will a customer buy from you versus your competitor? Not surprisingly, these are questions any business must ask itself. Company image plays an important part in finding success in selling and arguably the image of a cable company is relatively low tech compared to a wireless provider. However, this does not mean that the business is any less complicated. It only means that the changing landscape of services and technologies must be met with equally changing methods of communicating and selling the consumer. This is best done with the integration of a Customer Relationship Management tool like Sales Force Automation (SFA).
Changing The Image of the DSR
A great place to start is with the people who have direct face-to-face contact with the consumers and this is the Direct Sales Representative (DSR). Polishing the image (Verizon is already doing in some markets) of a (DSR) with SFA is to give them the tools necessary to:
- Access promotional information online using handheld devices.
- Speed up the sales process by reducing credit check time, real time promotion checks, reducing the sales cycle time.
- Have greater knowledge of the customer through online history making for a smoother approach and better objection handling.
- Make up selling and cross-selling easier
- Make more sales calls in a given period of time through more efficient scheduling, faster sales cycle, less time spent on administration and less time calling in orders.
- Makes the DSR look much more professional and capable in the eyes of a consumer.
Efficiency gains lead to additional time available for training and professionalization
SFA has additional value particularly to Sales Managers and back office staff. These advantages include:
- An increase in coaching time with DSRs by decreasing the amount of time spent manually producing schedules.
- Lowering turnover by enabling DSRs to make more and higher quality sales calls (with manager supervision/training) within the first 90 days.
- Reduces administrative time spent on approving sales, preparing reports, reporting commissions and filing paperwork.
- Back office staff (call center) spends less time handing questions and issues from DSRs resulting in faster customer response and greater customer satisfaction.
The advantages of using a CRM include image enhancement and productivity gains both of which will result in higher sales and less churn to competitors. Keeping up with The Joneses doesn't have to be hard if you are smart. Tell us what you are doing to increase the technical image of your DSRs.
Like an old broken record (yes - I did say record) you hear the sales management team make excuses for poor performance of DSRs. You can hear their echo in your sleep as they profess that they just don't have the time to make sure Johnny and Suzy are:
- making sales calls during peak periods in the evening
- handling objections correctly
- managing their route and schedule effectively
- up-selling and cross-selling after listening to customers
- using the sales tools given to them
The Missed Opportunity
The reality is that maybe sales management is missing the opportunity to spend time training in the field because they are being restrained by antiquated manual processes. If your sales management are each spending upwards of 10 hours/per week on administrative tasks then they are being under utilized. Ideally, sales management should not be spending more than 1-2 hours per week on administrative tasks such as gathering sales information, generating reports, and scheduling routes
Lowering Administrative Tasks to 1-2 hours/per Week
The solution to this dilemma is using a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system with mobile technology. Integration of a CRM computerizes customer, sales and marketing information. Direct benefits include sharply reduced time spent:
- gathering data for report generation, statistics and upper management as all sales information is entered and updated real time
- producing reports report generation is as quick as pressing a print button
- generating more timely sales routes on the fly based upon preselected variables and information
Additional Benefits
The result is sales management will have an extra 1-2 hours of time each day to spend coaching and training DSRs both new and experienced. Greater office efficiency is not the only benefit. In addition there are numerous other benefits both direct and indirect including:
- reduced turnover within the first 90-120 days
- getting new reps making sales quicker
- DSR professionalism
- faster sales approval process using online credit checks
- less time doing payroll
Installing a CRM will eliminate many of the pains that sales management must handle. Isn't it time you stopped the nightmares and let Johnny and Suzy sell?
In some industries, sales has a tendency to slow down at the end of the year as sales staff prepare for the holidays and many potential clients are away. In the cable industry, this holiday season is the ideal time to be selling. The reason; new HD TV's and new PC's brings a needs for services. Multi-service offerings can bring in new customers while they are excited about their gifts or purchases.
5 possible holiday sales pitches are:
- Get the most from your new toys: "Why waste a bunch of new equipment without taking advantage of high speed cable internet and HD cable TV channels? We are currently offering over XX HD channels ....."
- Tie new services to new equipment: "Show us a receipt for an HD TV and/or PC purchased within the last 30 days and you get free installation".
- Offer technical expertise: Many purchasers of new equipment have no idea how to install the equipment correctly or learn all the features. Offer 1 hour subscriber install/training for multi-service purchases. If you don't get to the client, someone else will and possibly suggest minimizing cable costs by suggesting other internet/service options such as viewing content online.
- Lower competitor impact: New TV's and DVD players are coming with Netflix software or other revenue stripping products pre-loaded. Getting to the client during initial install is critical in order to highlight the advantages of cable over products like Netflix.
- Referrals: Subscribers love to brag about their new toys and at the same time are likely to hear about which neighbors have new toys also. An easy question might be "Do you think they need help installing their new HDTV? If you refer someone who becomes a client you can have a free month of cable or discount of ...."
The holidays represents an opportunity to makes sales that should not be missed. Getting off to a fast start in January will lower the pressure of making numbers later in the year as well as increase a DSR's paycheck.
What are you waiting for? Tell us how your DSRs will take advantage of this golden opportunity.
"What is the point of all the millions spent on the last mile when only pennies are spent on the last two feet?"
Ty Abrahams,Mintek
Cable companies spend hundreds of millions of dollars advertising to attract new subscribers or trying to get them back with the latest in digital TV, internet, and telephone options. Multi-service options for subscribers are fantastic door openers. The question is how many potential sales are lost at the point of sale due to the image a DSR has with the potential subscriber?
Imagine your Direct Sales Representative (DSR) as they approach a potential subscribers residence. 30 years of cable history has already set the image of the person knocking at the door and it is not of a polished sales professional. The great news is the second the door is open the potential subscriber has the opportunity to change their perspective. The answer is in the final two feet.
Changing the DSR's image by adding SFA:
Adding Sales Force Automation (SFA) with mobile technology into your sales program will greatly enhance the DSR's image by:
- Giving the DSR a cleaner look by eliminating a clipboard type appearance and replacing it with a sharper technology persona
- Proving the DSR with client history (if applicable) particularly past subscriptions
- Speeding up the sales call via on-the-fly credit checks and real time no-phone-call order entry and scheduling
- Handling subscribers questions and objections more efficiently
Knowledge plays a key role making a sale. The more information the DSR has access to the faster the sales call and the greater amount of respect is shown for the subscriber's time. This enables word of mouth referrals because a subscribers is more likely to speak highly of the DSR and cable company if their experience has been pleasant and efficient.
It is easy to see that adding a SFA to your sales tools will have an impact on your cable company by modernizing the image of your sales force. Isn't it time you tool the final two feet?
In today's economy is money better spent marketing to potential new customers or addressing Churn? The cable industry spent hundreds of millions of dollars in the last few years in search of new clients, competing with Satellite/Direct TV, Telecommunications giants (like Verizon and AT&T), all for a piece of the same shrinking pie. In business schools these days they call it fishing in the same Red Ocean.
What is Churning:
Churn is the loss of subscriber base as percentage of the overall client base due to both controllable and non-controllable issues. In many industries this is called client retention ratio.
Non-controllable issues include losses such as:
- a customer has moved to a non-service area
- customer has passed away
- customer has gone out of business
Controllable reasons include:
- poor service
- price
- economic factors
- gone to competition
- dissatisfaction
- theft of services
It is the controllable reasons that cable companies should pay more attention to. The acquisition cost of a new customer is on average 5-10 times as much as retaining a client. For discussion purposes let us say the cost of a new sale is $800. Therefore, if you are going to spend $250 million on attracting new clients you might get better results by spending just 20% (using just 5x ratio) of that amount building your client retention programs.
Churn Math:Lets see how that plays out with some simple math if we take 20% of annual expenditures and allocate toward client retention.
| |
Last Year Spending |
Suggested Churn Investment |
Suggested New Sales Spending |
| Industry Spending |
$250,000,000 |
$50,000,000 |
$200,000,000 |
| Cost of Sale |
$800 |
$160 |
$800 |
| Customers Sold |
312,000 |
|
250,000 |
| Customers Saved |
|
312,500 |
|
| Ave. Revenue Per Client/per month |
$100 |
$100 |
$100 |
| Impact per month |
$31,250,000 |
$31,250,000 |
$ 25,000,000 |
| Impact Difference when allocating 20% to reducing churn |
|
Additional $25,000,000/mo |
|
Average revenue per month may be higher or lower depending on the number mix of internet, video and telephone customers. The average revenue per churn client is only for customers that would have been completely lost (no revenue). Using this scenario you can almost double your overall return by investing in client retention tools.
Sounds nice right? The reality is Sales teams are largely rewarded by the number of new connects sales. Diametrically opposed to this are Customer service teams (operations) whose compensation is often tied to the churn rate. So who is going to get the money? Fortunately, the state of the economy is providing the direction. The answer is "where are you bleeding the most" and for cable companies this means the focus should be on client retention AND up selling or cross-selling services.
Best Practices for Reducing Churn:
- Merge Sales and Operations incentives. Make client retention a % of sales incentives and incremental sales a % of operations incentives.
- Get to know your customers. Make scheduled frequent personal contact. Provide them with the latest information on services, rate specials and customer service tips (frequently asked questions). Guard against wasting money on mailers or literature as most bulk mail gets thrown out anyway.
- Do a customer service survey. Find out what your customers like and dislike. Use special coding to identify customers who have a particular interest. For example, if enough customers indicate a desire for more or better access to International Soccer, run a special for the World Cup. Have pricing to reflect seasonality and prepaid sign ups.
- Make use of common sense. If a customer makes use of triple play services, cross sell accessories, up sell premium services. Customers with multiple service subscriptions are more likely to stay with you when they move if the service has been of quality.
- Train your staff. Train to better handle customer service issues and encourage your clients to speak up. An outspoken customer is easier to keep than a quiet customer. How you handle customer problems establishes the path for customer loyalty. Any expert in customer service will tell you that exceeding the clients expectations makes it very difficult for a customer to leave over marginal price considerations.
- Price Objection Handling. It is a tough economy and some people will decrease their service levels in order to compensate for less income. How much they decrease is a direct result of the value they perceive in your service. Everything you do needs to create value. Go back and visit the customers.
- Give the customers greater value. Content can be downloaded from the internet in several free or inexpensive venues. Adjust to the market, if you are offering something that one can obtain at little or no cost then there is no value. Adjust your content and service levels, create value.
- Decrease theft. The reality is customers that value content are willing to pay for it or find it at the lowest cost possible (including theft). There are many ways to decrease theft, these include but are not limited to:
- Tap Audits: Focus on highly populated clusters and areas of low service. Pay attention to the new pirates who tap into unsecured wireless networks. Offer customers an incentive to secure their networks.
-
Identify service downgraders especially those who live in apartment buildings, high cluster zones or who might have access to unsecured networks.
-
Train your Tap Auditors in the art of selling to persons obtaining free services. Train your DSRs to be on the lookout for potential fraud and of course train service personnel how to up sell and cross sell clients.
How important is churn? Reducing Churn just 10% can add millions to the bottom line.
Do you have additional Churn tips. We would like to hear them.
The increase in the use and acceptance of mobile devices is changing the way in which managers and executives are perceiving their value. Where an in increase in efficiencies and customer satisfaction were once the results mangers hoped to see, the integration of technology is now benefiting corporate wide objectives.
Top 5 Reasons to Use Mobile Devices for Door-To-Door Sales
- Reducing the sales order process time. Having customer, product, promotional, credit and communicative information at almost real time reduces the time needed to fill out paper orders, wait for approvals and ultimately waiting for the sale to go through.
- Employee productivity is significantly enhanced through a reduction in paperwork but also because there is an inherent productivity increase allowing more sales calls to be made. This increase in efficiency gives rise to reason # 5.
- Customer satisfaction is increased due to less customer time being occupied by sales person. Skilled sales person will capture this opportunity to use the newly discovered time to pitch additional products.
- A positive corporate image is established. The proper use of technology will lead customers to believe that your company is technologically savvy and therefore delivering a quality modern product. This perception will not only overcome some sales objections but also flow into the overall public image. Very good for investors to see.
- Faster growth is achieved. The ultimate goal of any Sales Force Automation (SFA) system is to increase sales. The use of handheld mobile devices in conjunction with CRM tools provides the opportunity for well organized companies to manage the time of their sales representatives more effectively. When each sale takes less time than their is more time to make additional sales calls.
What does it really mean to Managers: More Calls = More Sales = More Revenue = Growth = Happy Stakeholders and Smiling Executives.
The ultimate goal of a Tap Audit is to reduce lost revenues through the elimination of unsubscribed services while simultaneously increasing sales through discovery and up-selling.
Maximization of revenue opportunities in this area is more critical now than ever before. In contrast to other countries where DSL dominates the competitive landscape, the majority of subscribers in the US Broadband market are cable subscribers. Fortunately, for cable operators DSL growth is not showing much improvement and competition is usually limited to a very few providers.
However, between the economic recession, market saturation and the expansion of fiber optic networks, DSL and cable growth rates are expected to decline over the next five years. The result is an opportunity to identify current subscribers who may upgrade and potential subscribers (those that have found a way to obtain free service) in your market.
Here are five types of customers that you should audit for cable, internet and telephone.
- Low level subscribers - Current customers with minimum service levels on subscribed to products. These subscribers may be unaware of additional opportunities or may have found a method to enhance their service level without additional fees.
- Customers who recently canceled a cable, internet or telephone service but still use at least one service. Reasons for cancellation may economic, the ability to remove blocks on the service line.
- Single service subscribers - example: only internet access but no cable. Great for up selling and also identification of unsubscribed for services.
- Apartment complexes - especially in low subscriber level complexes. High target area for pilfered services or unauthorized expansion of approved commercial contracts.
- City housing projects and other clustered living environments. Same as above.
Now you know who to target is it's time to develop the proper tools to enable your auditors to function most efficiently. The first objective is to train your auditors to recognize the opportunity to make a sale and then provide them with the skills/training necessary to be able to convince potential subscribers to become paying customers. Properly trained auditors are one of your largest strategic advantages for identifying possible sales that your competitors haven't identified (DSL, FIOS, satellite).
The second goal is providing your auditors the tools necessary to work most efficiently, have a current client history on hand, perform credit checks and be able to make on-the-spot decisions and the submissions of sales. Traditionally, this information has been available on street sheets (that could be out of date) and by calling for more information. Automating the process of providing this information to auditors is key to enabling them to be an effective first line of sales.
Equipping your auditors with mobile devices with relevant information is a best practice. Check back soon for an article Top 5 Reasons to Use Mobile Devices for Door-to-Door Sales.
Mintek Mobile Data Solutions is the CATV industry leader when it comes to Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tools. In an industry reaching saturation, finding ways to up-sell, cross-sell and turn free cable users into subscribers is mission critical to sustain growth objectives.
Lets us help automate your Door-To-Door sales efforts thru the effective use of CRM tools including WinTrack® SFA for Sales Force Automation and and WinTrack® TA for Tap Audits. These platforms are the only Door-To-Door CRM's that integrate with the three major cable billing systems. Combined with Motorola mobile handheld devices the WinTrack® Product lines will not only enhance but also increase sales as a result of online, real or near real time information available to the sales rep and auditor in the field:
Some of the information that is available includes but is not limited to:
- Payment History and credit check
- Current sales specials
- Current and past sales
- Immediate sales
- Reduction of sale time by ½ hour or more
- Target route scheduling
- Tracking of sales objections
- Tracking of controllable loss reasons
Learn more about "Using Mobile Devices to Increase Door-To-Door Sales and Converting Tap Auditors into Sales Agents by signing up for our upcoming webinar. Seating is limited so sign up today.