2 - Frito-Lay Your Clients

When I ran Bell’s Eastern region cell phone sales and marketing business, we created a new verb. We called it Frito-Laying. Frito-Lay sells snack food to just about every point of sale you can image. Many of these are Mom and Pop operations where the purchase decision is made on the spot. Frito-Lay had established delivery routes and visited every point of sale every week.

And this is the important bit: they did this whether or not anything had been ordered. Invariably when they went in to visit the customer, they would get an order for something.

At Bell we needed to stay top of mind with our reseller channels so, we ‘Frito-Layed’ them. My reps called on each of the resellers once a week with an aim of talking to every one of their sales people at least once a month.

Your current clients are the best source of new business. They know you. They know the value of what you do. You have an established business relationship with them.

If you or your sales people have not spoken to them (and I say SPOKEN ) in over a month - pick up the phone and call. Something has certainly changed in the last month or so with which you may be able to help them.

When they call they must have a reason and not be begging for business. What’s new about your company? What testimonials can you share? What awards did you win? What new features, products, prices, packages do you have? What did you read about that you wanted to share with them? Really anything of value for the client that will lead to a conversation and thus opportunities.

Do you track all your current clients to see how often your people are speaking to them? “Sent an email” is not good enough. I don’t read all my emails nor do you - why would your clients be any different? You should establish what cadence is appropriate, but be sure to measure and manage it.

So, an easy way to accelerate – simply Frito-Lay your clients to make sure they can snack on the best of what you have to offer.

We'll be starting a series of Business Podcast very soon - we'll post them on our website and let you know about them in future Tuesday Tune-ups.

If you want to learn more, drop me a note.