Case Studies
Problem Statement:
A local internet based company was looking to spin off a new business and could not afford to hire a sales person, and yet, if they did not hire a sales person, they would not have enough sales to grow the new business.
Background:
Our client was at the critical junction where they needed to grow their sales. The President of the company was the only sales person. When he was focused on selling, the operations branch of his company floundered because of lack of leadership. When he focused on operations, no new sales were coming in. He had tried to hire a commission only (no base salary) person unsuccessfully. He had gotten very creative in trying to identify a sales person who would share the risk associated with growing the business. The President also wanted to take a calculated and conservative approach to growing the business; venture capital or temporary lines of credit were not an option that would be initially considered.
Solution: |
The first step in any problem solving methodology is to simply watch and listen; to systemically and holistically understand how all the pieces of the puzzle fit (or do not fit) together. After studying this company’s business model, several proposals were suggested. Many of the proposals were of an organizational emphasis and of course, there were a number of recommendations around solving the original problem statement. In the process of providing these recommendations, the company was able to see new interdependencies between the various divisions of the company. Regarding the need to grow sales within the original constraints, one of the proposals involved taking a disruptive approach; an approach that; upon examination, seemed intuitive and had huge potential: Knowing that potential customers included local and national interactive agencies, we proposed that our client could license the interactive agencies to sell these internet based services as part of the Interactive Agency’s portfolio. |
This way, our client would not need to hire sales people. And most importantly, by performing a thorough examination of the market segment of this service being provided, we were able to identify that interactive agencies were scratching and clawing over each other to differentiate themselves and provide their customers something that their competition could not offer. This made for a great match for both the interactive agencies and for our client.
Result:
The client is currently in the process of closing a deal with a local interactive agency and will soon be realizing huge potential revenue gains without the need for additional sales personnel.