How to Automate Your Sales Process | Business Bootcamp

Hey, everyone, it's Mike Andes and you're listening to the Business Bootcamp podcast. Today I'm going to be talking about how you can automate your sales process. And I don't mean going and making a lead page or a click funnel or anything like that. I'm talking about automating your sales process and communication with your customer to make sure your bottom line is the thing that's improving. Before we get into that, though, a big thank you to a sponsor, which is Gusto. If you haven't already, go to gusto.combootcamp I know I've posted a few times online in some different forums and different groups, just the value of Gusto and what they can do for you and the price comparison to other products that are very similar, but just do not have the level of support or the ease of use for you or your employees. So if you're doing payroll, if you're doing benefits, this platform is fantastic. It's a great way to really create transparency with your employees around their compensation and their benefits. It out, go to Gusto.comBootcamp and try the whole package out for 90 days instead of the regular 30. Just go to Gusto.comBootCamp all right, now, today I'm going to be talking about something that I think I stray away from the word automate sometimes because nowadays with online digital media and with marketing and things, it's very in a lot of the ads that you see on YouTube pre rolls that are absolutely annoying to me of basically get rich quick things, buy my course and you can make $100,000 a day on Amazon or buy this book or attend this webinar and I will show you how to make a million dollars doing nothing from your home. Basically just a few clicks a day. I don't believe in that. If they said, hey, it's gonna take five years and it's gonna take a ton of work, maybe that'd be a little more realistic for me. But basically the reason I stay away from the word automate sometimes is because when you talk about automation and automating your business, people think that's easy. And they think it really does get blended in with the whole get rich quick, don't have to work at all doing it. Sit on a beach, tap your finger a few times on a keyboard, and you're gonna make a bunch of money. And that's not how I see automation, but how I do see automation is doing twofold. Number one, improving the customer experience, and number two, increasing the efficiency in which your Business can operate. So, specifically today, I want to talk about automation in the light of automating your sales process. And so when I talk about sales, I'm not just talking about awareness or, like advertising, getting your name out there, brand awareness. That's not what I'm talking about, only that's a part of the sale, in my opinion. But I think that's just the beginning of the sales process. I think the sales process goes right from when that customer says, yes, I'm interested, right into the point when they actually make the sale to then when they actually have to. You are constantly trying to get more sales from them. You're getting either referrals or you're getting that recurring revenue from that individual. And so I feel you can automate this. I feel like technology is really what we need to, as small business owners, tap into, to automate our businesses in a much more effective way. And I think most everyone who's listening to this podcast knows, like, if you're running your payroll and things through Excel and you're running your scheduling through a flipbook or a binder, that's not gonna fly. But using technology, I generally believe you can automate even to a further extent, the process of your sale. So I'm gonna actually talk about a couple examples in my own life, whether in my businesses or just recent experience, that I felt the experience I had as a customer or the experience I create for customers is one that is automated in order to make a certain sale, actually transact. So the first one was. So I have this. I have had a dentist for several years, and basically what happened is they called me a few weeks before my appointment to confirm it. I said yes. And then of course, I forgot. It was on my calendar, but somehow I forgot. And they call me 10 minutes after I'm supposed to be there and say, hey, just making sure you're okay. You know, just a reminder that it's a $99 cancellation or no show fee. So I was like, oh, man. Well, the thing is that I never answer my phone. And so I hadn't received the message from the day before that was confirming my appointment because I never checked my voicemails, but maybe once, once or twice a week. And so I didn't get that message, the voicemail. Now I asked, could you remind me via text? And that was not an option. And so I was like, okay. And I literally made the decision. I literally made the decision to switch dentists because my current dentist could not remind me about my appointment via text message because I'M not gonna be able to answer the phone, and then I'm not going to be able to get the voicemail, usually within the first 24 hours of it being left. And so I made a decision to literally switch dentists.

And go through all the trouble of filling out paperwork and all the other stuff and switching to someone who's never seen your X rays, never seen your medical history, et cetera. I made that big change simply because someone did not take the time to think about the customer experience and think, how can we automate the process of following up with people to confirm their appointments? Because now the company I went with as soon as I went online didn't have to call anyone, thank goodness. And I have to realize that I am a certain demographic, a certain type of customer. And so as you're listening to me, everything I'm talking about, just remember I'm in my 20s. Millennials, they're gonna be thinking like me, there's gonna be a demographic of people that would only want to voicemail, they would only want a phone call, they would only want an email. And texting them or messaging them through social media is not gonna be the way they wanna communicate. And they're gonna wanna have that lot of high touch. But for myself and for a lot of people, even working professionals, that even outside the millennial generation, they're gonna want ease of access and speed, and they will make their decision, their buying decision, based on those things. So I literally switched dentists because the first one couldn't remind me via text message. So I switch. When I do the switch, I didn't have to call them. I went on their website, I filled out a form in like 30 seconds, said, Hey, I want the initial $79. It comes with a consult, a cleaning and an X ray. You know, full package, $79 for the first one. And so I was like, great, fantastic. I just clicked that box, I filled in my name and stuff. The next day they give me a call, said, what time works best for you? I'm saying, hey, look, I can't do it during traditional hours. I need to go either. Earlier in the evening, they say, okay, well, how early do you want it? I said, I can we do it at 6 o', clock, 6am for sure. So I get a dentist that is not opening at 10 o', clock, which was my previous dentist, but they would open up at 6am to have me in to do my cleaning and my X rays in the console. So, like, fantastic. I never knew you could do that. So 6:00 o'clock a.m. i'm scheduled to be there. And I said, first of all, I made sure. Will you remind me via text message, yes, we will. And so what happened then? Right after that phone call is the next day, I get an email. That email has all of the paperwork that I would usually sit in the office and do. They send it all to me. And I could fill out electronically for HIPAA and all the other stuff and questionnaires, filled it all out within about five or ten minutes, sent that. So that way I could show up at 6 o' clock and get right into getting cleaning instead of having to spend a bunch of time filling out paperwork, giving that to the office, them scanning it into my profile, then me going back, so saving me time there. So again, it was all electronic, all super easy. When I walked in the door this morning to get my appointment, have my appointment, there was no paperwork. I went writing. They knew my name, they knew everything about me in terms of the paperwork. They didn't have to ask me anything, they knew I was paying with cash, I wasn't using an insurance company, all the other stuff, it was immediately taken out. Time was taken out of the equation. And you heard me talk about this a lot. Take time out of the equation. Whether that be the buying decision, whether it be the follow up process, whether that be asking for referral or for repeat business, you must take time out of the equation. The new consumer, as, as, as people, as consumers get used more and more use of cell phones, devices that act fast and are very quick, they are going to have less and less time, they're going to have less and less patience for things that take up their time. And so, you know, this dentist, literally I made that decision based on a text message. And then I was thrilled by the fact that when I walk in the door, I don't have to fill out paperwork. It's already been done electronically, very simply on my schedule. It's very important. When you start thinking about your consumer, how can you let them do things on their time versus your time? How do you have it? Where they slot in what time they want to meet with you instead of you calling them and setting up an appointment and working around your schedule, Is that possible? How can you use technology to make that possible? Can you use Calendly or a similar product that allows people to book times with you and then it syncs with your calendar? Things like that, automating that initial phone call, instead of having to have like literally my previous dentist, they had a couple people up front. I guarantee you, one person, one of those receptionists. Out of the two, literally all they did every single day was phone calls for making sure people showed up, making sure payment, like all the things that could easily be done through text message with a link, easily done through email even, all those things were being done by a phone call. Taking time. And as a consumer, I have to stop what I'm doing and answer that phone call, or if it's an email or it's a text, I can then reply back at 2 o' clock in the morning when I have some time on my hands to do it. So these are the things you want to think about if you're targeting a younger audience or you're targeting an audience that really does value time. And in terms of their working professional, they're a business owner. They are valuing every single minute, every single second. And how can you take time out of the equation of your sales process and give it back to them is a very important question. So in my businesses, we have to think about the same thing. So for Augusta, my landscaping company, we're always asking, always testing every single week, trying to change something to make the sales process more automated. So we've tested everything from Instant Quotes, which basically uses an algorithm to. To scan the property from a satellite image, determining what is the square footage of the grass, not just the property, but just the grass, and then immediately fires them a number for an estimate. So literally, they are able to get estimates within three seconds of entering just their address into.

Our website contact form. We ended up actually nixing that because it was too inaccurate and the technology just hasn't caught up yet. But. But what we do have is where they don't need an appointment. So what I found out when we were advertising and trying to do this scan from above thing, it was completely automated. They could get an estimate 2 in the morning, and you have prices for their mowing, the treatments, everything. And it wasn't accurate enough for us to keep. However, what it did make me realize, because again, you've heard me talk about this before, is test, test, test marketing. Like, test all different ways of doing it and find what works. And I found you. Yes, it wasn't super accurate, and no, we didn't keep using it. But what I did find is that a few words on those ads is what was catching people's attention. And what it was was no appointment needed. All right? So all I did was fill up. I said, need an estimate for your lawn? That was like the title. Number one was click the link below that Says Get Quote. Number two, fill out the form with your address. Number three, receive your estimate. And then in bold, with bold caps below, put no appointment needed. So they knew that when they clicked on Get Quote, they did not have to make it. They didn't have to call someone. They wouldn't have to set up a time to schedule with an estimator. They'd be able to get their estimate without having to make an appointment. And so what we did is even though it wasn't an instant quote anymore, the office would be able to take that information, make, you know, from an aerial view, get the square footage and send that estimate, no appointment needed. And so how do you do that? Well, that takes out the most expensive individual from having to go to do estimates. And that's the estimator. The estimator is usually the most experienced, cost the most for the company, and yet that person is driving around all over the place trying to do estimates. When using a piece of technology, you get the estimate faster to the client. It could be just as if not more accurate in its estimating. And furthermore, it improves the level perception to the customer that you're not going to waste their time, that you're going to put the time back in their hands. And if there's anything you can do to give your customers time, it'll make you successful. Everything from Uber to Airbnb, the reason they've been successful is the notion that they give time back to the consumer and people are willing to pay for time. And so if right from the get go, right from the very beginning of the relationship, I'm saying, look, I respect your time, you don't need to make an appointment. And within 30 seconds of putting your address in, you can send a form away to us. And the next day you're going to have used. The same day, you're going to have an estimate for your lawn care. And if you click Accept again, no phone call needed, no email needed, none of that, just click Accept. And as soon as you do that, we're going to get you set up and then it's going to automatically send you a form to fill out your credit card, which is then going to attach to your profile so you no longer have to send checks, you don't have to pay your bill every month, it'll just automatically come off autopay again, all those steps are automated. And so no appointment required was a big thing for us in terms of our Facebook ads and Google Ads, that worked really well. But then once the sale is made again, you're still in the sales process. In my, in my opinion, there's no funnel. It's more of a cycle. Like people constantly, they come through the sales cycle, then they come through it again. And it might be in the form of repeat business. Like you sell them the same thing again and again. It might be selling them other products or services, it might be just constantly asking them for referrals or other businesses that they could bring to your company. And so when you think about that, it's like, okay, we sold someone a product, for instance, like us, we did a landscaping job for them. But how do I automate the follow up? How do I automate the sales process? And so how do I automate where they're going to come back to me time and time again? How do I do that? Well, first of all, I'm going to make sure they're on some sort of a mailing list. They're going to be getting an email, a newsletter. I'm going to be making sure that they're going to get an automated thank you that's handwritten by all of the people in our office that is going to be sent to them automatically after the job is completed and with a couple of business cards and asking them for a couple referrals, they again automated. Now in between that point when you're asking for referrals and repeat business and sending them newsletters to stay top of mind and try to create them, get them back into creating another sale between that period and the time when they first heard about you, in between that you had to initially make the first sale. And so in that process you actually have to follow up with them. Maybe we send them an estimate proposal, for example, they fill out the form, they get the estimate and we don't hear anything back from them. Now you need to have a process. You have an automated process that's going to follow up with that customer. And so for us that's an email. Then the 24 hours after, three days after, seven days after and 14 days after, they're getting emails. And we're not just like, oh, just hoping you just making sure you got our proposal. Like on our end we can see if they've opened the email or not. Like most CRMs are going to do that for you now. So that's kind of like a, kind of like, hey, just making sure we didn't break up sort of thing. Like that's the relationship I feel you bring when you're like, hey, did you get my email? How we do it is when we Email them. We're trying to educate them and give them more information. So information based selling. So in that first email, follow up email to them the day after, we are basically saying, hey, we know that price is a big part of this decision and this is something that you should not stray away from. You should explain your prices. Either you're high, you're in the middle or you're low. And if you're low, you make sure they know that. If you're in the middle, tell them why you try what you're doing to stay competitive. If you're high, explain why the value that you propose you give higher and above that of your competitors. And so we address right from the get go, if they haven't responded within 24 hours and they haven't clicked accept or reject on our estimate, they are getting an email that's going to explain about pricing. It's going to say, hey, look, these are some of the common questions about our prices. Here are the answers. Here's why they. You might think this is high. This is why you might think this is low. And that we're constantly striving to make efficiencies within the business to save you money as a customer. And we explain the price structure of the whole company. That's day one. You know, usually that gets a response back because they're like, well, I think thank you for addressing my concerns. Price was a big issue. It's a little bit more than we could afford. And we opened up the communication again with them to talk about maybe reducing the scope of work or doing something to massage those numbers in order to take away, to take away certain products or services or consolidate things or whatever in order to make that a reality and make that sale process. Now, if they don't respond after that first one, three days later, again, we're using information to educate them. If they did ask for a landscaping job. So for example, they want a paver patio that third day, I'm gonna make sure they have pictures and videos of paver patios. Again, automated. And I think in that seventh day they have a customer testimonial video. On the 14th day, if they haven't accepted our proposal. In our industry, like there's a really good chance they're probably never, we're never gonna hear from it again. So that's when we're like, hey, look, we're trying to get you on the schedule. It's filling up. When would you. And we propose a date down the road. Again, it's all automated. And so I really believe that everything from awareness and this is like when awareness is the thing that gets all the attention. That is like Facebook ads, Google AdWords, when you're trying to just make customer aware of your business, branding, your signage, all of that, that's awareness, awareness, awareness, awareness. But right from there all the way to the point where you've made the sale, everything's gone good, you've asked for referrals and then you start getting them, keeping them warm inside some sort of a cycle to keep them getting back repeat business, right? The entire process, you have to be asking yourself how can I save my customer time? And how do I automate the sales process right from awareness, how do I automate my ads? How do I automate. If you're doing Facebook ads, why would you want to make it where you have to go in and allocate funds to whichever ad is doing best? Why not do it under an ad set where there's multiple ads and then Facebook can figure out which one has the best click ratio, which one has the best cost per click, which one has the best engagement with your audience and then push more money towards and allocate more funds towards those ads. Again, it's just automating every single step from awareness all the way to the point where for example, like us, we are sending out thank yous and handwritten letters and at the end of the job and asking for referrals, asking for online reviews. All that should be automated, that entire process. And then even for example, just take another example for the gym that I own. We, you know, recently the franchisor at Anytime Fitness, they've allowed online signups. What that has is really addressing is the fact that there is a different type of consumer that is really wanting to not have to come in during staffed hours and is wanting to be able to buy a gym membership at 2 in the morning, is wanting to buy a gym membership after eating a pizza at 11pm and they feel like an absolute bum. And so that is the moment you have to have to reach them is when they're behind the phone. So much of the, the attention is on a cell phone and on those, the mobile device at this moment in time and on social media. That's where you're going to catch them. How you, if you're going to catch them on those devices. It's very like this, this is my philosophy where you contact a customer and they become aware of you is the mode of communication in which they usually want to transact with your business throughout the sales process. So for example, if someone comes through Facebook messenger and messages our company, there's a really good chance that they're going to want to communicate through Facebook Messenger. They obviously reached out to us via that mode. And so if they reached out to us via Facebook, I'm not going to be like, give us your phone number and we'll give you a call. Like, I'm going to communicate with the customer through Facebook Messenger. Now, if they are going to go through Facebook Ad, click on that and fill out a form on our website. I know that they're going to be giving me information like their email and their phone number. And now I can see which mode of communication is going to be best for them. But again, that should all be automated. And if someone's replying via Facebook messenger, you should reply via Facebook Messenger. If they come through your website and fill out a contact form, it's a really good chance you're going to want to ask for their email. So you can email them in that form of communication. If they go onto your website, though, and right below the form, there's a thing that says call now, and they click that and they call you, there's a really good chance sometimes they're the type of person that's going to want a phone call in order for the communication and the sales process to continue. And so throughout the whole process, that's something you're thinking about, who is my customer? What are their needs? What are they looking for? And so traditionally, Anytime Fitness, they have required people to come into the gym in order to sign up. And.

The mindset or the reasoning behind that is like, hey, we want people to see the gym. We want them to see what makes us different. We want them to see our trainers and our staff and the people that are here. We want them to see and experience that, and then they become a member. But the thing is, with so much digital media and social media, people can literally see every square inch of our gym by watching some of the videos on our Facebook page or seeing stuff on our Instagram. There's just no reason why they can already get so much information. So through Google reviews and Facebook reviews and recommendations and online stuff, there's just so much information there that they already can glean from that they can easily make a buying decision without having to be there in person. And if someone can buy a house online, there's a really good chance they can buy a gym membership without having to come and see the gym. And so recently they made that transition. No longer do you have to actually Be in person. You can be online, sign up, put your car information in, get everything set up. Basically come into the gym, get your key fob for 24, seven key card access, and be able to come in to every single gym in the world, 4400 of them, all through the click of a button, all saving time. Within five minutes they get signed up. Instead of having to drive the gym, make sure it's convenient during staffed hours, making sure that they, when they get there, that there's actually someone available, so they have to set up an appointment. And so all of those time, those hassles are taken out of the equation when you automate the sales process. Now, what happens if someone fills out like a seven day pass form, a free lead comes into the website and they don't sign up, but they ask for like a seven day pass for the gym? Again, we have a sales process to automatically put them through a certain set, a series and sequence of emails, text messages, all the ways that we can touch them in order to automatically get them to get back into the sales funnel. That is, if they get a seven day pass, we need them into the gym, we need to get them inside the gym. That's phone calls, that's automated text messages. That is making sure the sales process is going to get them to the next step. So if you offer a freemium model, if you offer a free package to get started, you've got to make sure that there's steps in place, an automated process to continually guide that customer through each step of the process. Right from, right from. Awareness. When they see your brand for the first time, they might see your trucks out driving, they might see your sign out next to the road, they might have heard about you from the barber for the first time. Awareness. You have to then automate how they get to the point of where they've made a sale with you. And not only are they coming back time and time again, they're telling their friends, they're telling their family, and again, you've automated the process of the sale. So I'd ask yourself two questions. I asked you. Ask yourself two questions. Number one, how can you save the time of your customer? How can you save them time? How can you allow for them to sign up online? How can you make it where they don't have to pay with check, they can pay with credit card and their credit card can be saved on file. How can you make it where they don't no longer have to come in and order or pick up the dog food from your store? That dog food is automatically shipped to them on a subscription based service. How can you do that in order to save them from driving to your location? This is the reason why retailers are getting wiped out. Because Amazon has taken time out of the equation where people can now pick up their phone and shop for whatever they want and no longer do they have to go drive to the department store, drive 30 minutes away to the largest mall and have a, you know, so they can get 40 different stores inside of that mall. No longer do they have to do that. They can go open up their phone and instantly have access to thousands and thousands of stores just with the click of a button. And so how do you differentiate yourself? How retailers differentiate themselves? They attack in the same way. How do they save the customer time instead of waiting two days for prime shipping? How can we get the customer the day of, how can we get them on a subscription base where they don't even have to ask for it, they don't even have to think about it. It's already done for them. That's the number one. How can you save the customer time? How do you save the time of your customer? Number two is how can you save your time as the business owner and as your enterprise? How can you save your time by automating the sales process from awareness to repeat business and referrals. I hope something in today's episode helped you. I know I talked about some specific in my business and in my, some of my experiences, but those things can be really taken across the entire board of industries and different types of businesses. You've got to be able to save time. Time is what is going to be the differentiator. That's why Amazon won, that's why Uber won. That's why all these, these new tech companies are winning because they figured out that time is the variable that is going to be the, that is going to tip a customer over the edge. It's going to make them decide over one, one competitor over the other is who's going to save me time and who is going to automate the process and and guide me through as the consumer through the sales process. I'm Mike Andes. You've been listening to Business Boot Camp podcast. Until next time be great because nothing else pay.