Often this one area can make the difference between a business’s success and failure. In today’s startup era, where many companies are valued in billions are bound to fail eventually because they don’t follow this most important rule.
Sales is one of the most important rule for any business to succeed. All the other departments hard work boils down to this area for success. It is because, however good all the other departments function, Sales plays the crucial role of bringing food to the table.
Why you need to Sell?
Even if people love your product and use it all the time. You can’t make money until you sell something. The conversion of an amazing product or service to money is only through sales.
Types of Sales
- Direct Selling – Sell a product for economic gain
- Indirect Selling – Offer value and trade it for economic gain.
For example, E-commerce websites sell products directly to their customer for profit or commissions. Other Websites use Ads and Donations to trade value.
What do Billion-Dollar Startup companies sell?
You might argue, Startups that are valued at billion-dollar don’t sell anything yet they are what they are. They may be valued at Billion-Dollar’s, but do they make that much in sales is a question that has to be answered.
It might look like they don’t sell anything. In reality they are selling a part of themselves through equity to the investors while raising funds. They sell hope that their product will give greater returns compared to the investment that anyone makes today though they don’t sell any products or service.
Other Startups business model involves selling ads, charging commissions, even the ones without ads, sell the value that they provide to get donations. For example, companies like Wikipedia and Mozilla ask for donations to run them because they don’t have ads. They sell their value of being useful to a global audience. Every business model must have an objective to sell either values or products to sustain.
Steps in the Sales Funnel?
- Find – Define your potential target audience and reach out to them.
- Ask – Explain the value proposition as clearly and convincingly as possible.
- Sell – Trade your product in exchange for something that you value like money.
For the idea that is buried in your head to take shape, the most important rule to succeed in business will be sales for ever.
