What Is a Sales Cycle and Why Does Speed Matter?

It doesn't matter if you're selling a service or a product, all sales process go through what we call “the sales lifecycle”.

The sales lifecycle is made of different stages that a potential customer goes through before purchasing the product or service. It is important to understand the sales lifecycle of your business, identify pain points, and optimize processes for improved efficiency and better results.

What is a Sales Cycle?

The sales cycle encompasses the following steps:

Finding Leads (or Prospecting): You can offer the most incredible product or service, however, it is not fit for everyone needs. And this is exactly what happens in this initial stage. It is when you identify potential clients who actually might benefit from your services, as you have a clear value to them. This could happen at events, online groups, or even using social media.
Connecting with Leads: After you have identified those who are your potential customers, you move on to contacting and introducing your services. It is important to clearly communicate the value you bring with your services. But, don't just do all the talking, as it is equally important to hear from the client about their needs and challenges, to move to the next phase. This could be done via phone call, email, or in-person meetings.
Qualifying the Leads: After this initial contact, it is then possible to assess and understand if the potential client indeed has a need for your services. If you've listened to the client and asked the right questions during your first contact, qualifying the client's need for your services could be almost immediate.
Presenting your Product or Service: Once validated the client's need, it is time to demonstrate how it meets those needs. Focusing on the value you bring is a game changer in this phase. This can be done through a presentation, testimonials of other clients, video demonstrations, etc.
Handling Objections: As you are well aware, clients sometimes have concerns or objections before closing the deal. It could be about your pricing, timeline, or results. In this stage, being transparent and keeping a clear communication with the lead is crucial to close the deal. You can use testimonials, case studies, certifications, or anything that can help building trust and credibility in your favor.
Closing the Deal: Finally, the stage that we all were expecting and like the most! This means the lead is officially becoming a client and have decided to purchase your services over all competitors. Congratulations, it's time to sign contracts and finalize the sale!
Nurturing and Follow-Up: Let us not forget that the sales cycle continues after the job has been done or the product has been delivered. You don't just want that client to purchase once and never come back. Ensuring customer satisfaction through feedbacks or follow-up calls plays a great role in fostering a long-term relationship with that client. Which in turn can result in repeated business with that same client or referrals from them!

Why Does Speed Matter?

Now that we have walked through the sale process, let's jump into a critical matter for it to be effective: speed. More than ever before, time is essential to conquer clients and close more deals.

Here are a few reasons why:

Customer Experience: Everyone is living in such a hurry, and expecting almost immediate responses. Which, in turn, means that quick responses and efficient service win the game. Business that can maintain prompt communication with clients, end up enhancing their customer experience, and, by consequence, conquering more clients. If you are able to inform the client in the first call you receive from them the quote and schedule, it makes it easier for them to make decisions, reducing frustrations and wait time for a response.
Competitive Advantage: For this one, let's imagine an example where the client has a leaky pipe that is damaging their floors and needs a plumber ASAP. Who do you think will get the job: the plumber who immediately gets the call, already giving a cost estimate and scheduling in the same day; or the plumber that only checks his missed calls once they get home from a busy day at work? In sum, being able to close deals quickly puts you first in the race for clients. And, I'm sure the client will always remember the plumber that saved their beautiful wood floor when a peer asks for a plumber recommendation.
Better Resource Allocation: As a consequence of the previous two, when time spent on each sale is reduced, you are able to handle more clients. Faster deal closures lead to quicker revenue generation, helping with your business growth and sustainability.

Speed is a win-win situation for both the business and the client. For the client, it generates faster responses, better customer service, and enhanced satisfaction. For the business, it improves its reputation, increases cash flow, and enhances productivity.

How Can You Speed Up your Sales Cycle?

Optimize and Streamline Sales Process: Establish a review process, to understand where in your sales process you could improve, eliminating bottlenecks for further efficiency.
Qualify Leads Early: Something that can be very harmful in the sales process is wasting a lot of time on low confidence leads. Assessing leads as soon as possible helps you focus on those that really matter and are more likely to convert.
Leverage Technology: Sometimes we just can't be as fast as the sales process requires us to be. Specially if you are independent workers or sole traders. In this case, technology is your friend! Technologies like Jane AI can help you with personalized and around the clock communication, answering clients promptly and identifying promising leads, so you can focus on the ones qualified as medium and high confidence.

Understanding the sales cycle is the first step to drive more sales and revenue to your business. Optimizing the process constantly by asking feedback from your clients and automating stages that slow you down can significantly impact on your business' success and growth.

Automate the first stages of your sales cycle with Jane. Focus on converting leads, while Jane's got the rest!