The Front Foot

By Rachel Poon

Client Services

 

Recent news headlines have been full of woe in regards to unemployment, recessionary fears and basic global financial doom. This has meant most senior management focus has been on cost cutting rather than investment in future business. This is especially so for companies with long sales’ cycles, new business is starting to be seen as a cost that a company can no longer bear as freely. This attitude is reactionary, tactical and may not be beneficial in the long term.

 

Many say now is the time you should be selling to your existing customers and not new prospects – as it is easier, quicker and more productive than new business acquisition.

 

However, now is also the perfect time to build relationships with new prospects. At a time where everyone is reducing costs, if you are speaking to them, you will stand out in the crowd. As your competitors fall away, you are able to pick up where they left off.

 

In this climate, the ability to be seen swimming when everyone around merely treading water, provides prospects with a sense of confidence and stability. And when the doom is over, you will be the one on the front foot while your competitors are scrambling to get their teams back together and back in working shape.

 

Understanding that costs are still an issue, mass marketing is not the solution. Instead, personalised, localised and strategic targeting of key prospects and verticals is the way. Who do you want to be working with, and how do you want to be positioned post-recession are just some of the questions to think about.

 

Remember, the recession will end. Business will pick up.

The Marketplace: Our View

By Chris Moriarty

Joint Managing Director

 

Certainly these are interesting times. No doubt the first quarter of 2009 has felt like a down quarter. But it has not necessarily been one.

 

Strike Force Sales itself is up just over 20% on last year. The issue for our sales team has been that interest and enquiries have more than doubled, so there is a huge pipeline of interest.

 

I spoke to a colleague, a partner specialising in liquidations at one of the big accounting firms. He has experienced something similar. Lots of companies are talking about entering administration, but few companies are actually doing it.

 

Accounting firms are instead busy restructuring businesses to shield stakeholders from any future issues – there is a strong sense of future potential risk, but little immediate crisis.

 

I spoke with a senior executive at one of our big global clients and he noted an interesting trend… just about all of the job losses being announced in Australia appear well planned. People are being retrenched on the back of carefully thought out and well-executed planning, not on the back of emergency situations.

 

The point here is that if companies were in genuine trouble, they would lay off staff in a more haphazard fashion. What is really happening is businesses are using the downturn as an opportunity to re-size – actions are deliberate and planned.

 

So let’s thread all this together.

 

There is a strong sense that the future is uncertain and risks loom.

 

There is no real sense of panic.

 

Businesses of all sizes have used the first quarter of this year to sit down and carefully take stock of the current situation while putting in place plans to survive any sudden downturn.

 

Lots of businesses are re-sizing not because of immediate critical need, but rather because it seems prudent to do so.

 

A return to business fundamentals is taking place.

 

The most basic business fundamental is that all power comes from the barrel of revenue. So, while businesses are focussed now on their re-sizing programs, ultimately that can’t survive at all if they don’t keep on winning new business.

 

This means that over the next few months the whole economy is going to see a surge in sales activity. It will not necessarily result in a surge in buying activity – so we will see a hyper-competitive environment emerge, with fierce hand-to-hand combat being fought over every dollar.

 

Nothing is going to matter more than winning ‘that’ sale.

 

This is probably going to become the defining feature of the new economy that will emerge off the back of this global crisis. We will see a new hyper-competitive global economy against a background where risk is properly considered meaning heightened demand (and inherent competitive advantage) for accountability and transparency (the natural enemies of uncertainty).

 

It will be very exciting – in fact, it already is.

 

 

Ground Zero: Leveraging the GFC for Advantage

By Daiju

Operations Manager

 

 

As Operations Manager for Strike Force Sales I have the opportunity to not only make calls on each and every campaign we run but I also see the spread of data we receive from our many campaigns. One thing my operators and I are consistently hearing from all sectors of the economy is uncertainty, and uncertainty equals risk in business.

 

Risk can be dealt with in various ways depending on the business model and the management style of a company. Currently most Decision Makers are responding with a single-minded focus on “cutting costs” to protect the bottom line. However, paring back a business can also mean surrendering market share, it might mean your business falls father than your competitors. Thus, the second concern I hear expressed is “How do we take advantage of the current economic climate?”

 

These two concerns appear polar opposites, but they need not be. Cutting staff can lead to lower total ouput, but not if balanced with increased technology and/or training. Cutting costs while focussing on the future can lead to a leaner more productive and competitive machine which will be more able to capitalise on the inability of competitors to stay afloat in a hostile environment. Decision Makers know that this negative market will end in the not-too-distant future and the more savvy DMs are already preparing to be leading the forward as the conditions begin to change.

 

When I talk with my operators the first thing we do is examine the negative aspects of your product or service based on the bearish economy. Then we look at the way that our prospects can gain from the products offered by our clients in terms of future positioning. This is a process that continues all the way through each our campaigns so that common objections can be overcome.

 

We often point out to prospects that we understand their Pain in terms of the need to cut costs (be that staff, general expenditure or capital investment) while also reminding them that this is the perfect time to Gain from the relatively greater fall of competitors. We then insist this is in fact the reason why we have taken the time to contact them. Never directly pushing a product onto a wary market we instead aim to remind them of the fundamentals of business; adapt to and take advantage of the current economic climate.