Sales process

Selling can be tricky. You must tackle many nuances, be a manager, a psychologist, or whatever. But you are here to find solutions. And you’ll do.

This guide will provide you with the ultimate 7-step roadmap for winning deals. We’ll also reveal how Snov.io solutions can boost your selling process potential.  

What is the sales process?

A sales process is a set of stages that lead to closing a sale and converting prospects into customers. Sales process steps make a uniform system aligned with the stages of the sales cycle.

Sales process vs sales methodology: what’s the difference?

The terms are often misinterpreted, yet they are entirely different notions.

The selling process refers to a rep’s actions to close a deal and convert a customer.The sales methodology is a foundation framework for selling successfully. It tells you what to focus on while sealing a deal.

Why is building a sales process important?

With a smooth and well-managed selling process, you: 

• Follow the ultimate plan to convert prospects efficiently.
• Start predicting how many deals you might close based on current conditions.
• Cut low-value tasks and focus on high-ROI activities.
• Target high-potential prospects and close deals faster.
• Identify and solve what’s confusing or bothering your prospects and customers, improving their experience.
• Speed up the onboarding for new reps and improve your training programs.

The complete 7-step sales process explained

You may come across various sales process examples. Some experts advise following the 5-step sales process, while we’ll stick to the traditional 7-step structure. Let’s walk through all stages and see how Snov.io tools may automate your key activities.

Stages of a 7-step selling process:

1. Prospecting
2. First connection
3. Qualification
4. Pitching
5. Objection handling
6. Closing a deal
7. Nurturing new customers

1. Prospecting

Among the 7 sales process steps, prospecting can be one of the most challenging parts.

To make this first stage less complicated, let’s break it into simpler steps.

1. Create an ideal customer profile

An ideal customer profile is a detailed description of the type of business or individual who would gain the most value from your product or service, making them the most likely to become and remain a loyal customer over time. 

To create an ICP, examine your customer’s basic demographic or firmographic details. Research goals, values, and pain points your ideal customer must have, as well as their buying behavior patterns.

→ Read more about how to create an ideal customer profile

2. Find prospects

You can use various online and offline approaches to find prospects. Offline methods include customer referrals or attending multiple industry events. Online methods involve browsing web pages where you get their contact information for further outreach. 

How to streamline prospecting with Snov.io:

Snov.io offers a complete toolset for finding prospects and their emails in its database, on websites, and on LinkedIn. 

With Snov.io’s LI Prospect Finder and Email Finder, you can easily extract users’ email addresses from their corporate websites, LinkedIn profiles, or LinkedIn search pages.

Prospects found? Great! Add them to your list and prepare for the next stage—outreach.

2. First connection

Now that you have your contact database, you can start reaching out to your leads via cold emails, social media, or cold calls.

No matter which channel you prefer, remember that personalization is the key. Your approach must be tailored to the prospect’s interests and needs.

👀 Did you know? According to HubSpot’s The State of Marketing research, 96% of marketers say personalization leads to repeat business, and 94% say it increases sales.

How to enhance cold outreach with Snov.io:

Snov.io automates both email and multichannel outreach, combining LinkedIn interactions with 

email messages.Snov.io Campaigns automate your email outreach without any risk to personalization. No matter how many prospects you want to contact at a time. This is owing to the embedded AI Email Writer, a library of ready-made templates, and email variables.

Snov.io LinkedIn Automation Tool helps you build complex campaigns from automated post likes, follows, connection requests, or InMails. You may program your sequences based on the prospect’s behavior so the whole communication looks natural.

You can test your email variants and track the performance of your cold campaigns – all under the roof of a single Snov.io workspace.

3. Qualification

Lead qualification is commonly broken down into two stages:

Research

During the sales process stages, research is all about uncovering insights into your prospects, their industries, and competitors, empowering you to personalize your approach and boost your chances of sealing the deal.

How can Snov.io help you with company research?

With Database Search, you can look up information about thousands of companies and prospects all over the world, including company size, location, ownership, revenue, and whatnot:

Qualification itself (scoring)

Okay, you’ve got information about your prospects. Next, you should record this data to actually qualify prospects—understand which of them to focus on further and which to filter out. Resort to a lead scoring mechanism to evaluate each prospect with a score based on how well they fit your ideal customer profile.

→ Read the step-by-step guide on lead qualification with Snov.io.

4. Pitching

Once you’ve filtered prospects out, you’re ready for the next step: pitching. This commonly involves a presentation or demo of your product or service. Start by preparing and sending invitations.

During a demo call, showcase your product’s impressive capabilities and address the prospect’s needs and challenges. Invite a tech specialist or executive to address any technical inquiries you may not be best equipped to answer. 

How can Snov.io help you at this stage?

Encourage a prospect to join you for a demo call through a chain of automated email follow-ups. The Campaigns tool will help you program and promptly send as many of them as needed. 

In addition, thanks to the integration of Snov.io and Calendly, your prospects can book demo meetings with one click right in your emails.

5. Handling objections

It’s perfectly normal for prospects to show some resistance or appear a bit cold toward your offering at first. Don’t let that discourage you—view it as an opportunity to win them over!

You should prepare for common sales objections such as:

• “We don’t understand how your product can help us achieve our business goals.”
• “Unfortunately, we don’t have the budget to afford your solution currently.”
• “We’ve found a similar solution with more features/ at a lower price.”

6. Closing a deal

This stage is always the most desirable in your 7-step selling scenario. It’s the moment where all your efforts—building rapport, addressing objections, and tailoring solutions—culminate in securing the agreement.

A successful close not only signifies the end of the sales journey but also the beginning of a valuable customer relationship.

How can you manage your deals with Snov.io?

Snov.io offers a free CRM where you can track all your deals. You can see the number of deals created/won over a certain period and the total value of won deals. You can also monitor each rep’s performance and, with effective coaching, improve it further.

With Snov.io, you can also run a deal loss analysis to understand why you’ve failed to close the deal.

7. Nurturing new customers/prospects

Even if you’ve closed a deal, your selling journey map is never complete. The wheel should keep rolling no matter what. If a prospect has made a purchase and you’ve got a new customer, congratulations! Don’t stop here. The next step is to lead them to repeat purchases with excellent service, great onboarding, educational content, etc. 

If a prospect hasn’t made a purchase for some reason, nurture them anyway. You can re-engage with them later. 

How to create an effective sales process?

1. Audit your current activities
2. Outline the buyer’s journey for your prospects
3. Bring in qualified leads
4. Focus on building relationships
5. Train your staff

1. Audit your current activities

Analyze recent sales data to gain insights into current practices and identify areas for improvement. Remove activities that yield low returns on investment.

For example, if cold calling brings minimal results, focus on other channels with higher success rates. These can be targeted email campaigns or social media outreach.

2. Outline the buyer’s journey for your customers

Develop content and engagement strategies tailored to address your prospects’ pain points at every stage of the buyer’s journey. This approach helps you gain a deeper understanding of your customers’ needs, boosting your chances of achieving successful conversions.

3. Bring in qualified leads

Analyze and refine your lead generation strategy to attract more qualified leads. If needed, rebalance inbound and outbound practices, but always use them in the mix.

4. Focus on building relationships

Don’t be obsessed with the intent to close a sale – provide value to your prospects instead. Share relevant insights and valuable resources, demonstrating a genuine interest in the customer’s success.

This approach helps you establish strong connections, leading to more closed deals and boosting customer loyalty.

5. Train your staff

Provide regular training sessions to guide your reps in optimizing their performance. Identify their unique talents and tailor responsibilities based on their strengths.

How to improve your sales process: common mistakes and solutions

Mistake #1. Lack of a defined plan

Mistake #2. Reliance on one methodology only

Mistake #3. Too much emphasis on deal won

Mistake #4. Neglecting follow-ups

Mistake #5. Ignoring analytics

Mistake #6. Misalignment of sales and marketing

Mistake #1. Lack of a defined plan

You won’t get very far if your selling strategy just lives in your head. It’ll be hard to figure out what’s working, spot any roadblocks, and keep things consistent—leaving you with more confusion and missed opportunities.

Solution: Clearly outline and document all sales process steps. Share it with your reps and provide training to ensure everyone is on the same side.

Mistake #2. Reliance on one methodology only

It’s difficult to fully prepare for selling process challenges with only one strategy. Developing a roadmap for changing market dynamics, a diverse customer base, or varied sales scenarios is crucial for success.

Solution: Use a hybrid approach that combines elements from different methodologies, such as SPIN selling, solution selling, and challenger selling.

Mistake #3. Too much emphasis on deal won

With the main focus on winning a deal, you might often overlook the real customer’s needs. This results in lost deals, overall customer dissatisfaction, and high churn rates.

Solution: Be more customer-centric. Emphasize relationship-building activities to establish trust and enhance customer retention.

Mistake #4. Neglecting follow-ups

According to Invesp research, about 44% of reps stop after one follow-up attempt. How many opportunities do they lose?

Sometimes, prospects may miss a message in their inbox. Meanwhile, you are wondering why life people don’t respond.

Solution: Implement an ultimate follow-up strategy to stay engaged with prospects after each touchpoint.

TIPS FROM SNOV.IO: According to the recent research from Woodpecker, the optimal number of follow-up emails is 2-3. So, never give up if your first email got no response.

Mistake #5. Ignoring analytics

If you don’t track your performance, you won’t be able to find the root cause of stalled deals. 

Solution: Establish clear and measurable Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that align with your sales objectives. Use a CRM system to capture and analyze customer interactions, track activities, and store relevant data. This central repository will provide valuable insights into customer behaviors, areas for improvement, and successful strategies.

Mistake #6. Misalignment of sales and marketing

A lack of synergy between these teams results in inadequate lead qualification, an ineffective customer journey, and deal losses. 

Solution: Foster a SMARKETING culture in your company whereby both teams establish common goals and share technologies. Through this collaboration, you’ll ensure a consistent strategy that will bring you to lead conversion and business growth better.

Wrapping up

Now that you know how to build a complete 7-step selling process, you are ready for a revenue-bringing adventure. Just forearm yourself with a reliable automation tool like Snov.io and see how smoothly your sales wheel is rolling stage by stage.

From prospecting to outreach.

From outreach to pitch.

From pitch to deal winning.