Are you spending your sales and marketing efforts in the wrong area? Are your prospects clicking away without action? How are you delivering your messages and information to those most important to your business success? The majority of sales and marketing efforts are based on outdated thinking and assumptions that these same executives are viewing your emails and online information from a desktop or laptop computer. The truth is that these people who hold the key to your sales success are not at their desks while viewing your emails or even doing research about you or your company. They are on their smartphones. Results from a survey of 23,500 executives conducted by IDG Global Solutions verified what we should already know –
“Most senior executives are using a smartphone to research business products and services”
Look at those results.
- [inlinetweet prefix=”” tweeter=”” suffix=””]77% of senior execs used their phone to research your product or service. Are you prepared?[/inlinetweet]
- Half have bought IT products for business from their phone.
Based on this research, the majority of sales efforts online are going to waste. Why? You can find the answer to this question yourself by going to your own company website from your phone. How does it look? Try this exercise the next time you have your sales team gathered together. For maximum impact, invite your marketing and web teams to this meeting.
- Ask everyone to bring up your company website.
- Navigate to the area where your products/services are presented.
- Take action to get more information.
- Ask a question online.
- Navigate to your “Contact Us” or “Request More Information” area and submit a request. Just try to fill out one of your forms on your phone.
- Discuss your experiences and results. Share what you feel going through these activities.
- Open a recent email you have sent to a prospect or customer. How does it look? Is it clean and readable?
I used these steps and visited over 100 websites and over 50 email messages that I have received. Almost two-thirds of those visited had significant problems that either frustrated my navigation to a point I left the site or I couldn’t take action in a meaningful way at all. Over 60 sites that simply failed to create the desired result. Take a look at your emails you send out. Focus in on any formatting and graphics you are including. Also take a look at the signature area of your email (you are taking advantage of a signature in your email right?). Open one of your messages on your smartphone. How does it look on your phone screen? What is a spectacular creation on a desktop or laptop many times turns into an unreadable number of lines and text without formatting, and if that logo you added even comes across, it will frequently look oversized and out-of-place.
Key points to understand and act on:
- 77% of Executives are using their smartphones to research your product or service.
- 50% have purchased IT products for business using a smartphone!
- Mobile-optimize your online sales presence and activity to work flawlessly on a smartphone screen.
- Create your email messages to be viewed easily on a smartphone screen.
I understand that this will take some work to get cleaned up. I cannot think of many projects that are more important than getting your message effectively displayed and actionable for 77% of your future and current customers. Are you mobile ready?
