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Share The medical device sales cycle can last anywhere from a couple of weeks to months, even years. From the sales experts we talk to in the market, eight months is the standard timeline. In a study by Demand Gen, purchasing cycles have lengthened due to the increase in decision makers in the B2B buying process. On top of that, buyers are investing even more time researching before buying, which means the sales team has less to explain, but the sales cycle does not shorten.
Your potential customers are at different stages of the Buyer’s Journey. Since this is the case, you have to guarantee that your sales content is aligned with their corresponding position in the sales journey. This will make it easier to educate your prospects, will help them progress to the next stage, and will help to convert them into full-fledged customers eventually. Awareness phase – At the start of the sales cycle, you do not have a good idea of what they are looking for yet. This is why this stage is known as the ‘Awareness phase’ of the buyer’s trip; prospects are looking to recognize issues that have to be fixed and objectives that they wish to pursue. For that reason, before establishing a sales meeting, make sure to provide your prospect with instructional content that helps answer the questions they may have. This can be anything from accessible content on your websites such as articles or infographics, to premium content such as ebooks or white papers. As you help your leads to identify their troubles, you can determine who your qualified leads are by seeing if your medical device solution can help them or not. Doing so will help you prioritize things correctly; you can concentrate on assisting leads that you have identified as qualified as opposed to those that passive or apathetic about your solution. Consideration phase – At this phase, leads understand their trouble or difficulty and are now trying to find a fix for it. Consequently, there are looking at all possibilities that could fix remedy their issues. For that reason, you need to supply content that both poses you as an authority in your industry and outlines different solutions to your potential customers’ problems. White papers, webinars, case studies, and expert guides are appropriate mediums for this stage to convince prospects that you are the right solution. But wait! Your content for the Consideration Stage must not state anything regarding your medical device firm’s solutions right now. Your content needs to concentrate on enlightening your leads and providing the best instructions to resolve their issues. A fine example of Consideration Stage content is Buzz Sumo’s professional webinar series where leads can get suggestions, techniques, and ideas from various content marketing experts. Decision phase – At this phase, your potential customers have actually chosen which approach they’ll require to fix their problems. They are currently contrasting the pros and cons of various solutions from various medical device businesses and are attempting to determine just what would function best for them. Content such as demo videos, comparison charts, trial offers, and product descriptions are appropriate at this phase. Other methods of leveraging content include industry-specific case studies, blog articles that contrast and display your medical device remedies’ strengths, and online calculators that help your medical device leads to find out what their ROI would be if they were to use your solution.
According to the Salesforce State of Marketing record (2017 ), 67% of the marketing and sales leaders make use of automation. It also specifies that over the following 24 months, another 21% are intending to begin using automation. You could reduce your medical device sales cycle dramatically by automating your initiatives. For example, rather than manually writing and posting social media content and sending out Lead Nurturing Emails, you could make use of a program to do that instantly. The content linked from your automated e-mails and social media posts will nurture your potential customers over time and will make it much easier to convert them. Automating your sales initiatives will not only reduce your medical device sales cycle, but it will also lower the cost per lead generated. Additionally, automation will allow you to maximize your time and will let you to concentrate on more important parts of your job, being the busy sales rep that you are.
One thing that you know your prospect will want to know about is the cost of your solution. If your medical device solution is widely known or competitively valued, you can place a ‘Request for Quote’ button on your website. This will help you to start the conversation to find out about their need (before providing a ‘cost’), then position the value of your offering accordingly. This allows you be receptive to energetic leads in the Decision phase of their Buyer’s Journey and can help reduce the length of your medical device sales cycle.
Blog posts, social media posts, white papers, case studies, and reports are all fantastic ways to get in touch with your leads throughout your medical device sales cycle. However, as a busy sales representative, you want to reduce those cycles as much as possible, and picking up your phone and calling your leads can help you do that. Phone calls let you have a more personal relationship with your prospects. Calls also give you the chance to respond to issues in real-time. A study by The Marketing Donut found that 80% of sales need five subsequent telephone calls after meeting the prospect. Nevertheless, the objective of your call should not just be to make a hard sell. Rather, you want to show the prospect the value of your solution. A call can come in handy at any point in the Buyer’s Journey.
Medical device sales cycles can be very long, and it’s important to shorten it for as many prospects as possible. The suggestions described above, collectively described as the Inbound Sales Methodology, will undoubtedly help you to strategize your approach so that both you and your potential customers feel content and your prospects needs are addressed throughout the medical device sales cycle. It can be daunting to do all of this alone! We at Responsify team up with medical device sales and business development professionals to offer strategy, support, and help to execute these tasks. By collaborating we help marketing and sales teams tactically bring in unique site visitors, convert them into qualified leads, and speed up the sales process. We’ve assisted several skilled salespeople to weave the Inbound Methodology into their complex sales process. Don’t hesitate to schedule your free strategy session now to help you examine your properties and gain insights and recommendations to help you reduce your medical device sales cycle!
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