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Author: pippa@aurik.com

Channel sales

Growing revenues through indirect sales channels

Written by pippa@aurik.com on . Posted in Aurik Business, Lead generation and conversion.

Effectively growing your business revenue needs a lot more than just a regular sales effort. Developing and implementing sales channels is a key strategy to get to the next level, and build your business into an Asset of Value. But, before you begin utilising specific sales channels, consider how effective they will be for building your business. You must first understand where, why, and how, your customers want to buy your products and services. On The Money Show with Bruce Whitfield, Pavlo Phitidis shared different types of sales channels, and how you can use them to grow your revenue:

Listen to the podcast here:

WHAT IS A SALES CHANNEL?

A sales channel is the mechanism you use to sell to your customers. These can be direct or indirect, and creating a variety of sales channels is imperative to remain ahead of your market and competitors. But, beware: poorly considered sales channels will not deliver the results you want. In fact, they may well generate more complexity, mixed messaging, cashflow bleed and cannibalized sales. Here are a few that you should be using:

1. DIRECT SALES CHANNELS

Direct sales channels involve selling your products to your customers, face-to-face.

Advantages include:

  • The ability to easily explain and demonstrate complex products.
  • The opportunity to learn more about your customers’ unique problems and desires, while delivering a specialised service.
  • The potential to use and improve your sales skills.
  • The chance to build a personal relationship with your customers.

Disadvantages include:

  • Direct sales channels can be expensive to run, requiring a larger team, premises, and travel expenditure.
  • They are people intensive, creating a variety of performance management and customer experience challenges.
  • Replicating your success in other regions can be difficult: A successful business in KwaZulu-Natal may not be as successful in Gauteng.
  • In growing businesses with ambitions to spread their reach and drive sales, opening new branches is a common strategy.

2. INDIRECT SALES CHANNELS

Adding indirect sales channels to your sales generation activity is vital if you want to grow beyond a small, survivalist business.

Indirect sales channels can help you build your business because they:

  • Change your cost of selling overheads and enable you to reach customers that you would not be able to reach through a direct sales channel.
  • Enable you to reach and service customers who are not located geographically close to you.
  • Equip you to sell your products and services in bundled formats, saving you both time and money.
  • Learn more about your new target market before you invest in creating direct sales channels to serve it.

Using indirect sales channels to build your business can help to build your business revenues, but getting the implementation right is key. Carefully consider your relationship with your channel and design it to become stable and reliable. A watertight agreement, including clearly defined terms and conditions relating to pricing, supply, service, stock, and benefits is important.

3. DISTANCE SELLING

Israel provides the perfect example of distance selling done right. It attracts 38% of all global venture capital investment and is widely regarded as a global startup hub. Israel is, however, surrounded by sea, hostility, and constant conflict. How did Israel get it right? Through the purposeful implementation of distance selling methods. Distance selling means selling by phone, television, or the internet. Using distance selling, you can:

  • Approach hard-to-reach customers, who may be geographically located far away from you.
  • Support repeat orders from established customers.
  • Reach potential new customers and establish your share in new markets through the internet.

Distance selling can be a relatively low-cost way of reaching potential new customers, that enables you to get through to hostile markets, and can translate into subscription or membership-based sales and annuity revenues. Distance can creates a hostile barrier to sales, and demonstrating your products can be difficult, unless you’re able to effectively communicate the ins and outs of your product using the internet. Building relationships of trust can also be difficult through distance selling. Keeping your customer acquisition cost in check is important, especially when using distance selling methods.

4. OUTSOURCED SALES CHANNELS

Using a sales agent, or listing your products with a retailer, means you can build your sales without having to make heavy investments. You won’t need to recruit, train, and pay for your own team, and can take advantage of the agent or retailer’s existing customer base. They may already be selling complementary products, which means they’re able to sell your products cheaper than you can.

Outsourced sales channels can help you build your business into new markets. Again, a watertight agreement is imperative, including clearly defined terms and conditions relating to commission, pricing, supply, service, stock, and benefits. Offering exclusive rights for your products to a sales agent or retailer could effectively cut you off from other potential target markets, so ensure that your contract ensures success for your business.

Building effective sales channels for your business isn’t easy. Aurik can help, as we help you build your business into an Asset of Value.

Digitise

Webinar: How to digitise your business for a social distancing world

Written by pippa@aurik.com on . Posted in Aurik Business, Innovation, Leadership, Mindset, Operational systems, Positioning.

Things will not go back to the way that they were, even after the lockdown ends. For businesses operating in this new reality, it’s no longer a choice, you have to digitise.

Pavlo Phitidis hosted a 60 minute webinar in which he unpacked practical, actionable insights to understand:

  • What the future looks like for your business
  • What can you digitise in your business?
  • How to go about digitising parts or all of your business?
  • What digital skills do you need to develop to stay relevant in the future


Watch it, share it with your team, and start now to get your digitisation strategy right.

Collaboration

Collaborators will be the kings of the Corona Economy

Written by pippa@aurik.com on . Posted in Aurik Business, Innovation, Lead generation and conversion, Leadership, Mindset, Positioning.

Whatever you did to achieve success pre-Corona is not going to be the same as the things you need to do to achieve success in a Corona world.

Our whole way of interacting with the physical world, and with each other, has changed and will stay that way for a long time yet. Our priorities as human beings and consumers have altered drastically. Things that used to feel like necessities – the cappuccino on the way into the office; the cars we spent hours in, the gym session to clear our heads – none of these is essential in a world of social distancing.

As a business, if you’re waiting for things to go back to ‘normal’ you’re waiting to close your doors. You must reset your business for the new reality, which means understand the new problems that your pre-corona customers will now face, and rebuilding your business to service them.

We have developed three strategies to get this right. Red, during lockdown, is all about resetting your business. Amber, the 3 to 6 months post-lockdown, is what you need to do to turn your insights gained during the red phase, into a rebuilt business during this phase. Finally, green, once you have seen and understood what works, is the time to accelerate and reignite growth.

Remaining positive is crucial. The right mindset, irrespective of your current circumstances, will yield positive outcomes if you act against these 3 strategies. At a recent Aurik client roundtable with 15 business owners in industries as varied as restaurants and rubber manufacturing, we came up with ideas that saw collaborations between these unlikely partners, that fit each of these categories.

In the Red zone, business owners in computing, airfreight and distribution identified that there are not enough laptops in South Africa to meet the demand caused by remote working. So the three of them are exploring the possibility of chartering a plane to bring in these new essential resources.

In the Amber zone, an auto dealer, rubber manufacturer, virtual reality services and computing hardware provider are looking into digitising an outbound sales force.

In the Green zone, a coatings specialist, exhibitions company and a restaurateur are coming together to design a series of physical distancing solutions for retail and industry.

Collaborations are going to be key going forward, to ensure that we can act as quickly as possible to solve the new problems that the corona economy presents.

We’ve hosted a series of webinars that go into depth on many of the points touched on here, visit www.aurik.com/corona or reach out to our team who can support you on your recovery and growth strategy – www.aurik.com/contact

To open or not to open in Level 3?

Written by pippa@aurik.com on . Posted in Lead generation and conversion, Leadership, Mindset, Positioning, Team.

Most businesses are now able to operate at Level 3 but Pavlo Phitidis argues that this doesn’t mean that you should rush back without considering the implications.

His point is that all the costs you negotiated down to keep your business afloat during lockdown will probably be due once you go back to work. And are you able to cover those costs yet?

Listen to the podcast of Pavlo’s discussion about this with Bruce Whitfield on The Money Show on 702 & CapeTalk:

Re-negotiating with these suppliers, based on a percentage of revenue, for example will enable you to re-start without suffocating under the burden of full costs as per pre-lockdown, when your income is not going to be back to where it was pre-lockdown.

Pavlo advises:

Be cautious

Do not take bets, which if they fail, will sink you altogether. He uses the example of learning to jump from a 3m height. You don’t start at 3m – you start at 30cm and practice jumping perfectly. When you have that, you go up to 45cm – and only move on when you land perfectly, 500 times over, at that height – it has to be safe before you can proceed

Be customer-led

Only choose 2 or 3 of all the products and services you could take to market post-lockdown. See what your customers need – and concentrate on those rather than chasing the ones you THINK will generate the biggest revenues.

Go to the money

Focus on your customers and categorise them into Red, Amber and Green – in terms of their likelihood to survive lockdown. It may feel very callous but if you are struggling, you can’t afford to invest in your Red clients, who may not be there next month. You need to go to the money – those who will likely pay, and will likely be there next year.

Get to the coalface

If you consider this re-opening as a battle, you need to be right at the frontline of the battle, to listen to what your customers are saying, and to understand what is really working, and what isn’t, to make the calls on what to do next. You have everything to lose as the business owner – so you’ve got to be confident in the market insight that you have.

Get paid

Don’t be bullied by clients who are demanding excessive terms to secure their business – negotiate terms that give you some cashflow – maybe it will be monthly payments for the duration of the project rather than your usual upfront terms, but you cannot afford to invest any time and effort in anything you aren’t getting paid for. And you don’t know how desperate that client is and whether their promises to pay at the end are realistic.

Marketing messages

As we re-open, you need to tell your customers that you are open again. Without knowing what their circumstances and experiences are, you need messaging that is appropriate to the times. Maybe they aren’t opening, maybe they have had to lay off team members, maybe they are scared of re-opening. Consider your tone, approach and offer carefully to ensure your message resonates with their need needs.

 

positive mindset

Building a positive frame of mind in a negative environment

Written by pippa@aurik.com on . Posted in Aurik Business, Mindset.

We live in unstable times, and a brief look at the news headlines is almost always disheartening. Constant exposure to the news, along with a teetering economy, can make you feel deflated, frustrated, and ready to give up as a business owner. Here we look at what to do when you’re feeling despondent, by examining seven traits of successful business owners.

USE THE ANTIDOTE OF ACTION

The antidote for fear and depression is found in action. Your growing business is a direct reflection of your own self, so overcoming fear and committing to moving forward, despite current circumstances, is essential. By taking action, you are empowering yourself and your business. Work with what you have and take small steps in your business, taking time to reflect, learn, and build.

GO WITH THE FLOW

Circumstances may not be ideal, but that doesn’t mean you should stop. Rather, go with the flow, and adopt the Master Oogway (yes, the wise turtle from Kung Fu Panda) approach: “Your mind is like water, my friend. When it is agitated, it becomes difficult to see. But, if you allow it to settle, the answer becomes clear.” Your growing business is defined by your approach to it – agitate the waters of it, and it will be very difficult to navigate. But the moment you let things settle and go with the current of your business’ waters, you’ll see your way forward, far more clearly.

PICK YOUR COMPANY

Surrounding yourself with the right type of people goes beyond just who you pick to work with you within your business – it includes the people you spend time with, in any circumstances. Spend time with people who inspire you, and who utilise the positive approach you wish to adopt.

TAKE CONTROL

Circumstances may not be ideal, but that does not stop you from taking control. Just as German business people have re-engineered their businesses to take advantage of unique opportunities abroad, you too can adapt your business, and approach to the circumstances surrounding it, and keep flowing like water.

AUTHENTICITY IS YOUR ONLY CERTAINTY

The oracle of Delphi told people that they need to be concerned with being themselves, and immediately forgive others who expect them to be anyone else. By being real in what you do, and remembering that your authenticity is energising, you won’t easily be imitated, and you’ll retain your focus as you move forward, with certainty.

This was more recently (about a hundred and ten years ago) brought back into light by Wallace D. Wattles who published his book, The Science of Getting Rich in 1910. This unusual piece of writing will sow seeds of hope in all and any that feel the weight of despair in a the midst of negativity and recessionary economic activity. Mr Wallace talks to a mental technique that he called “thinking in the Certain Way, to establish a state of positivity and self-affirmation.

CLEAR THE FOG

The constant stream of ‘noise’ from the outside world can be difficult to ignore, but finding ways to clear your head, and clear the fog, is important. Having clarity of mind will help you to make good decisions, and take purposeful action, for your business.

DO THINGS DIFFERENTLY

Your ability to adapt and respond to new challenges will serve your business well. During uncertain times, you can try new ways of conducting your business, experiment with new marketing methods, or try a different sales approach.

If you’re finding it difficult to move your business forward through tumultuous times, get in touch with our team at Aurik. We’ll help you build your business into an asset of value, no matter what hits the headlines.

pavlo phitidis

Practical, action driven content to grow your established business

Written by pippa@aurik.com on . Posted in Asset of Value, Aurik Business, Innovation, Leadership, Mindset, Uncategorized.

Pavlo Phitidis from Aurik will share solutions-based content to help businesses in the R15million to R300million annual turnover bracket to accelerate growth and deepen value. This content can be accessed via the weekly Ince Connect Business newsletter. Watch him describe, in 1 minute, who should follow his content and why.

Reset Rebuild Reignite

Reset, rebuild and reignite your business in a crisis economy

Written by pippa@aurik.com on . Posted in Asset of Value, Aurik Business, Leadership, Mindset, Pavlo Phitidis.

Covid-19 has wrought havoc on the global economy and forced many businesses to shutdown or to drastically alter their operating conditions. Things are not going to go back to ‘business as usual’ and hoping they will is not a strategy.

In this webinar, Aurik CEO Pavlo Phitidis offers business owners a practical guide to how they can plan their strategy to not only survive the lockdown but to lay the foundation to thrive in the new economy. The principles he shares will build a business that is resilient to change, and will stand up to future setbacks and crises.

Watch it to gain an understanding of:

  • A likely 18 month view of the economy post-lockdown
  • Adopting a winning mindset to cope with uncertainty and stress
  • Using the lockdown to rest your business
  • Using the 3 – 6months after lockdown to rebuild your business
  • Using the 6 – 12 months after lockdown to accelerate growth

For more Corona Business Battle Plan webinars visit www.aurik.com/corona

As the economy gradually opens, how do you reopen your business?

Written by pippa@aurik.com on . Posted in Aurik Business, Leadership, Mindset, Operational systems, Positioning, Team, Trends.

How you re-enter will depend on what the lockdown meant for your business. Some were completely shut, others were considered essential services but with limited operations. In many cases their supply chains were affected, especially initially, which in turn affected their customers. No business has been left unscathed by Corona, but there are certainly degrees, and the degree to which you were closed will affect the speed of your re-entry.

Listen to Aurik CEO Pavlo Phitidis speaking to Bruce Whitfield about this on The Money Show on 702 and CapeTalk:

What to expect going forward?

Pavlo’s take is that we will see waxing and waning of the levels – a loosening and tightening of the phases as we need to contain outbreaks over the next months.

As there is not a lot of clarity around how this will roll out, there will be a lot of uncertainty and confusion, as well as the emergence of a new normal in terms of living and working in uncertainty.

What is critical to manage amid all of this change is your own morale. And Pavlo uses the Kubler Ross curve.

When it comes to opening you business again, you have to consider:

  • Changes in customers – their lives have changed and if you don’t do things differently your customers will move on to someone who understands their new needs.
  • Your supply chain – if you don’t prepare for changes in your supply chain, you’re going to be caught short as there have been major disruptions throughout the economy. It is uncertain how long it may take to get everyone back online.
  • ‘Spending money’ has been obliterated. And regardless of whether you deal with consumers directly, you need to understand the impact of this on your clients, who are dealing with consumers.
  • A realistic sales projection. If you have put all your reserves into surviving the lockdown, is there anything left to cushion poor performance when you reopen? If your sales are only going to be at 50% of what they were – what needs to change to keep you afloat at that rate?
  • Your negotiating position when you rush back to your physical operations. The landlord who gave you leniency over the lockdown will now expect full payment – can you afford that?
  • Some things won’t change: the things often complained about most before Corona will still need to be dealt with, from compliance around labour laws and BBBEE to issues with power supply. You have to be conservative – hope for the best but prepare for the worst.

Dealing with people

You need to deal with people with a completely different set of expectations than you had before the lockdown. Your team, customers, suppliers and network. Listen to what people say they need and test what works – then stick with that.

At the same time, be prepared for them to change their minds. There is a skittishness in the market, due to the uncertainty and which is often fed by social media news which plays to all our fears and all our biases.  So be careful of what you read, it can be detrimental and take you off your path of action.

Read from credible sources, then take a view. And stick with it. Don’t allow yourself to be distracted by bad news, fake news and hype.

Stay online: Develop a pattern of digital engagement and stick to this even if you are back in the office, so that it is very easy to go back to digital engagements if we go back into a lockdown situation.

What NOT to do?

Don’t go back with full force.
Pavlo uses the analogy of a goat vs a leopard. A goat has horns which curl back behind it’s head, and when it goes into battle it puts its head down and charges forth – but when the target moves the goat carries on in the same direction

Rather approach your re-entry like a leopard. A Leapard stalks its prey by creeping three steps, stopping to check the wind; assess the the lay of the land, then takes three more steps and stops to assess again.  Proceed with caution, check what is and isn’t working and keep making the changes needed that work for you.

Be very cautious of the debt relief schemes – placing yourself in a position of indebtedness is scary, even though these loads may have come through on very favourable interest rates.  The economy is going to take time to recover so be cautious.

BUT GO BACK.

Build together

Why SME growth is strategically important to the country – now more than ever

Written by pippa@aurik.com on . Posted in Aurik Business, For you now, Innovation, Leadership, Mindset, Positioning.

Through a number of webinars, meeting and other engagements, Pavlo spoke to roughly 5 000 business owners in a week, in South Africa, a few in the USA and a number in the UK. He also spoke to a number of corporates and through these discussions learnt why SMEs are so important – strategically and technically – to the economy.

He discussed why SME growth is not only possible but essential right now with Bruce Whitfield on The Money Show on 702 and CapeTalk. Listen to the podcast:

 

Why is SME growth so important right now, when survival seems more appropriate?

People don’t believe business can grow in an economy as depressed as ours. Pavlo agrees that big companies can’t as they require the whole economy to grow for them to grow.

But there are approximately 150 000 real businesses operating in the SME sector in South Africa, compared to between 1 500 – 2000 corporates.

It is clear where the tougher competition is – in the pool of 150 000. In the SME environment, you have to be one of those to get ahead, to get into a growth mindset, in order to take marketshare from their competitors who are sitting waiting. You have got no choice but to grow.

Your attitude: what you think, guides the way you act. And how you act builds up your lived environment. The mere fact that you have a growing mindset means that you’re looking out for ways to make things work, trying things that might work, and applying those that do.

It’s a great time to grow. We’re operating in an environment where everything you did to achieve success pre-Covid will have to be fundamentally different post-Covid.
For this reason if you can act very fast (and SMES are small enough to do this, while corporates are too big to respond this fast) and test and test and test to see what lands with your customers who are in a totally changed reality, you’re in a position to win.

How do you grow in the 5 stages of lockdown?

The 5 stages take us from hard lockdown to an open but fundamentally changed economy. The approaches in the different stages are very different.

In lockdown, growth might mean consolidation and shedding costs. It should mean engaging differently with customers, suppliers and staff to understand how client’s lives are changing and what problems they have, that your business can solve.

From there as it opens a bit, it becomes a great time to build. You can see what is working, and rebuild it to create scale – this basically means you can do more business without undermining your ability to deliver on your promise.

Then – if you’re growing towards the opening of the economy, you’ll be among the minority with any cash and you will be able to pick up stock and equipment at fractions of the cost, to source great talent who have been laid off elsewhere, and to pick up the customers from your struggling competitors.

The big opportunity is for corporates:

Other than getting their own business stabilised, a big company’s only chance for growth is to get their SME suppliers and SME customer businesses right. Each SME in the value chain is part of part of your network and everyone has to thrive to keep the ecosystem vibrant.

How does a country grow through it?

The biggest economies in the world have some sectors that are more competitive internally, others compete globally. If South Africa could pick 4 or 5 sectors in which we could compete globally and then invest resources on skilling up people, then creatinhg micro-enterprises, developing and supporting SMEs, and then businesses in these sectors, we will develop the capacity to become world-class players in these fields.

If you’re looking for your business’s growth plan through the Covid Economy, contact us. visit www.aurik.com/contact

reignite

Reset, Rebuild & Reignite your business for the new economy

Written by pippa@aurik.com on . Posted in Aurik Business, For you now, Innovation, Lead generation and conversion, Leadership, Mindset, Operational systems, Positioning, Team.

We are not going back to ‘business as usual anytime soon.

The habits, models, engagements and staffing that earned success in business pre-lockdown will not be the same that lead to success post-lockdown.

Now is the time to take the actions needed to reshape and rebuild that business into relevance.

Pavlo Phitidis hosted a 60 minute webinar that unpacked the following:

  • A likely 18 month view of the economy post lockdown
  • Adopting a winning mindset to cope with uncertainty and stress
  • Using the lockdown to rest your business
  • Using the 3-6months after lockdown to rebuild your business
  • Using the 6-12 months after lockdown to accelerate growth

Watch a recording of that session below and find all of our other Corona Economy webinars and resources at www.aurik.com/corona