Transforming Profit and Cashflow: Improve your sales and marketing processes

Many factors determine a company's resilience but, more often than not, they're underpinned by financial health. Profitability and the ability to generate free cash flow are the measures that mean businesses have a launchpad for growth.

Businesses have already entered one of the most exciting periods in decades - an industrial revolution perhaps - with businesses of all sizes entering the fray with technologies like AI and machine learning. Investment is rife. The opportunity for growth is stronger than ever yet there are fundamental areas key to that growth that businesses miss out on over and over again. One of these is marketing which drives sales.

If businesses choose to invest in their sales and marketing process now, this very decision could have the most significant impact on their profitability and cash flow position moving ahead. New business is the linchpin to growing cash flow and here are five ways we believe it can help.

1. Focus on where the margin is

Transforming (or even just optimising!) your sales and marketing processes should be able to get you to a position whereby you can focus your efforts on your most profitable products and services - move from a position of “selling whatever we can get” to a strategic profit-focused sales strategy. To do this, you need to leverage the right online tools that enable precise tracking of all marketing efforts that lead to sales. This level of detail leads to better, data-led decision-making that drives profitable sales.

2. Build a reliable and predictable sales pipeline

A streamlined sales process, propelled by targeted online marketing, lays the groundwork for a consistent influx of high-quality leads. Use the right tools to give you the data you need to calculate sales conversion rates and acquisition costs. This foresight empowers businesses to forecast cash flow more accurately, anticipating when leads will likely convert into paying customers. As a result, companies gain a more predictable revenue stream, which massively helps in building a process for robust cash flow management.

3. Diversification of Revenue Streams

We’ve worked with many businesses with an appetite for growth and we see that thinking and acting strategically about sales-led marketing almost always results in companies selling into new markets that they didn’t even know existed. This doesn’t occur by accident - it’s as a result of strategic positioning to the people out there who are actively looking for your solution that solves their problem. Through targeted marketing campaigns aimed at new markets, businesses can craft compelling propositions tailored to a wide range of demographics or industries. This approach can really help to reduce the dependency a company might have on a specific market segment or industry. By widening the net to new markets, you are better placed to attract new revenue which ultimately should improve the bottom line.

4. Revenue Growth

It sounds simple but simply focusing on metrics such as closed revenue and close rates (number of opportunities that convert into revenue) can have a hugely positive effect on sales performance. Building a sales pipeline is important, but closing the deals in the pipeline is paramount. An integrated sales and marketing approach supports the sales closing process. By harmonising efforts and focusing campaigns toward attracting ideal clients, businesses can significantly improve their ability to close deals by attracting the right kind of opportunities in the first place. Not only this, but marketing shouldn’t stop at the point of “opening the door” - it should continue to support the sales process right up until the deal is signed. Again, through the use of automation and technology, the marketing function can support and nurture a sales lead whilst the sales process is ongoing. 

5. Acquisition of New Business

Strategically targeted marketing campaigns that open up hot leads for the sales team to close, paves the way to achieving ambitious sales growth targets. By honing in on “ideal fit customers”  and deploying focused sales-led marketing strategies - the sky really is the limit.

In summary, the strategies we advocate for are ideally rolled out in a methodical manner, with an eye firmly on mid-long-term expansion. While it's possible to adopt these measures in a rush, crafting overnight success stories is a much more difficult task. The operative term here is 'strategic'—not merely tactical. Our focus is on elevating a solid business to commercial excellence through deliberate, structured, and strategic approaches aimed at sustained, significant growth over time.

Such recommendations hold immense potential for businesses considering or preparing for an exit or investment. They serve as key elements to substantially enhance the "exit value" of a business - we’ve seen this first-hand. Demonstrating that your business has the inherent capacity to generate new business—without over-reliance on individual personnel consistently—significantly boosts your attractiveness and valuation to potential acquirers or investors.

By continuously adapting and optimising the approach to sales-led marketing, businesses can not only weather the ups and downs of monthly management accounts but also carve out a pathway towards sustained financial success and resilience.