Sales collateral is the support material used by the salesperson of the company to make the overall selling process easier. Whether you are selling a product or a service, sales collateral forms an integral part of your company’s marketing strategy. Growing curiosity and awareness among customers about different brands necessitates that your company creates a right mix of collateral that enhances not only your sales but also builds your brand image. As a company, your business may be dealing either with B2B or B2C customers. Given the circumstances, utmost care should be taken in designing sales collateral keeping in mind the corporate identity of your brand.
Let us see how your sales collateral should look like:
• Website content –
Every company big or small must have a web presence as it is the first thing which comes to customer’s mind to know about you. The website content should not contain vague or copied information. Maintain originality and quality of the content posted. Also, make sure the website loads quickly and is easy to navigate. Your website should be interactive in nature to let the customers post their queries, chat with your sales executive and even email you. You can make a great website by hiring a professional designer by closely feeding him details about your company, product or service.
• Blog –
Blogs have gained huge popularity among customers as it gives you the opportunity of sharing knowledge with your prospects. Blogs don’t talk specifically about your products rather they emphasize more on the broader picture of the market, innovations, scope of advancement and many other interesting topics you may think of. It is not limited to anything specific but it should be interesting enough to generate revisits. Do not forget to include social media sharing buttons and RSS feeds on your blog to enable wider circulation of your blogs.
• Presence on social media platforms –
It is extremely important to be present on social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Google + etc to engage directly with the customers through comments and likes. Customers interact freely on social media and are in a better position to express their true opinion about your product. In addition, it gives them the opportunity of sharing the links of your website/blog or product information with their friends and family members.
• Visual aids – Customers ought to remember what they see more than what they hear. Visual aids may include both electronic and traditional/paper medium. Your visual aid may include sales presentation, word documents, other computer files and product videos in electronic form while it may include technical data sheets, brochures, catalogues, direct mailers etc in paper media. Traditional materials can also contain product pictures, bar diagrams, charts to add to the sales process. And fortunately, all traditional content can be presented in the electronic format. To add to the visual image, corporate identity package plays a crucial role in representing your business professionally.
• Webinars –
Webinars are catching up faster than any other medium to assist your sales team in organizing group demos of your product and explain about the services you offer. Webinars provide a virtual experience of sales presentation to a group of customers. It is a two-way communication platform wherein customers get an equal chance of raising their queries.
• Sharing customer success stories –
Highlighting the customer success stories brings a smile on your customers’ face. They try to experience the same satisfaction virtually as generated by the satisfied customers. To verify the authenticity of your sources, you can even request some of your old and loyal customers to share their detailed experience and their contact details. You can share their stories through your website or sales presentation.
• Awareness surveys –
The product awareness survey is an indirect method of generating awareness level among your leads. It is usually in the form of structured questionnaire. The surveys enable your salespersons to have a clear idea about what the customers think or know about your product or company. It also enables them to be prepared for a better confrontation with your prospects. So, though such surveys may not be directly given by the salespersons but they do form an essential part of your company’s sales collateral.
