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There’s no getting around it…for most of us in sales, times are tough. Sales managers everywhere are faced with shrinking travel budgets and getting pressure to reduce their cost of sales. One way to go is simply to stop traveling. This cuts costs, but is death to new business, and ultimately leads to a failed sales plan…and a failed business. In tough times, you need your sales force on the streets more than ever, knocking on doors and bringing in the new business that is still out there. Yet companies have significantly curtailed business travel.A new survey by the Association of Corporate Travel Executives found that 71 percent of travel managers foresee spending less money on corporate travel and events in 2009. “Business travel is down in the range of 20 to 25 percent on a global basis,” according to, Sam Gilliland, Sabre Holdings chairman and CEO, speaking at a recent business travel News symposium. “Even with large corporations, and in particular financial services, you see travel down in the 30 percent range” according to Gilliland.So as corporate belts get tightened we continue to cut travel budgets, and end up seeing fewer prospects in the bargain. Seeing fewer prospects results in less sales, leading to tighter travel budgets…and a downward spiral that’s tough to pull out of.You don’t want to stop traveling, but you still need to cut costs. Here’s how you can reduce your travel costs, while at the same time, increasing your sales. The solution is to help your sales force plan smarter sales travel – maximizing the amount of sales calls they make, while expending the least amount of travel effort and dollars.As the old saying goes, ‘prior planning prevents poor performance’. So drill it into your sales reps that when planning sales travel, they need to think ahead. Make sure that whenever possible, they schedule sales calls with companies that are geographically close together. Ensure they create an efficient route that moves logically from account to account, taking the quickest routes that cover the least miles. When looking for hotels, restaurants and other business services required on the road, make sure your team makes every effort to choose locations that are on their route of travel so that they save time and fuel.So how do you help your sales force work their territory more effectively, intelligently planning out a sales strategy that maximizes time in front of prospects while minimizing travel expenses? First, make sure they have the right tools. Tell them to purchase a laptop travel planning software. There are several products to choose from, including Microsoft Streets and Trips, MapPoint, Garmin Mobile PC, Delorme StreetAtlas, ESRI Business map and more. Most laptop software packages are in the $30 to $50 range, and most offer a bundled GPS receiver, with several of the combined packages running under $80.With a laptop mapping solution, your team can import their prospect lists into the map, so that they see each account plotted right down to their street address. They’ll assign unique identity pushpins to groups of prospects and customers to instantly identify the type of accounts in an area. Seeing the ‘big picture’ will help your sales people to spot opportunities they might have missed.Laptop mapping programs incorporate planning tools that help sales people easily plan the most efficient and practical way to get in front of the account with the least amount of effort and expense. They are much more powerful than a Personal Navigation Device (PND) because they allow reps to find prospects and generate ‘what if’ routing scenarios based on their calls. PND’s are great for helping you get to where you already know you want to go – but for sales people, it’s more important to decide where you need to go to in the first place.Choosing a combination package with a GPS Receiver helps your sales force travel more confidently, receiving turn by turn directions right to the prospect’s door. Since they need to carry a laptop anyway, using a GPS receiver with planning software will save you a couple hundred dollars per rep as compared to buying them a Personal Navigation Device . And, it’s more convenient for them, since all of their accounts are right there on the map, ready for them to route to.You may be asking yourself – why should I have my team purchase software to run on their laptop when there are free online mapping services…I’m trying to cut costs – right? The answer is – when it comes to comparing online mapping versus laptop mapping solutions, it’s best to remember – you get what you pay for.The features and functionally of the laptop packages far outweigh their online cousins. Laptop trip planning software allows you to load thousands of prospect and customer locations into your map quickly and easily. Your reps can have the map with them at all times, without being dependent on an internet connection.They’ll update their maps with information that is critical to them while traveling their territory, and be able to respond to changes quickly and efficiently. A new prospect just called in? Plot them on the map and see if they fit into the current trip plan. Have a meeting canceled while on the road? Use the search tools to find a new prospect that’s within a specified drive time. Need a restaurant with free Wi-Fi on the way to the next client? Quickly search the map and add it to the route.Planning more efficient sales trips that maximize time in front of prospects, and reduce wasted travel time and dollars will increase sales and reduce costs. Sure – times are tough for those of us in sales. But when the going gets tough, the tough look for new ways to get the job done. Laptop mapping software will help your sales team get it done.

A successful home business or any business for that matter runs on how you will approach your marketing strategy. The most effective plans when starting a home based business is to make sure you can have a marketing strategy that will lead to success in your home business venture.The first thing to work on with your marketing plan is to make sure your business is in a market that is targeted to a wide variety of customers. For example, if your business only caters to a specific clientele then you actually minimize your odds of profiting. The only exception to this is if you’re the first business in this market to provide such unique services, but the reality is that any business even new ones in a less saturated market will eventually meet competition. This is why with a great marketing plan no matter what competition comes in your business you will be able to attract the right customers and keep a continuous cash flow running through the business. Starting a business out in a saturated market is by far the most easiest and effective way to have success. The reason being is because you can take review of what other businesses do and make sure you do what they don’t. Cover the marketing angles they miss, notice how they advertise, how they treat customers; your marketing must play to new angles your competitors have not approached the customer base with.The next step is to make sure that you have a local base of customers that are in need of your home business services. Relying on only one method of working with customers can lead to a block of business production if that one avenue of making money is effected. This could happen to online based businesses if the network crashes or a high volume of hackers interrupt payment services; which in these days could happen easily as more and more people learn how to infiltrate online services. This is why your home based business must be able to market both online and offline. Your local customers can save your business from any effects the market will expect. Knowing how to attract these local leads and effectively make them customers is crucial; one way of doing this is through outdoor sign marketing. This is where you create a brief ad with an easy call to action such as a phone number in order to gather new leads. Every step of your marketing plan must have further actions covered once the first step is in effect. For example, if someone calls from seeing your ad do you have a messaging system set up to gather all the right information needed in order to contact this lead? At best you would need Full Name, Phone Number and Reason for calling. You always want your leads to leave information as to why they are calling just to make sure they understand what it is you were advertising. I have had leads before not even know why I called them because they forgot what the ad was about; this could be one of two things. Perhaps the ad was not detailed enough, most of the times people just answer to ads without fully knowing what they are getting into. This is why when creating a local marketing campaign make sure you can briefly give enough benefits meaning “what’s in it for them” if they call your number or answer your ad, because once that is covered your lead no longer seems to be just someone calling now they are warmed up ready for you to reply once you have received their info or answered their call. Write down on a piece of paper what your home business benefits for it’s customers, things you believe prospects out there would want to be attracted to calling you.Next take note as to how you can connect with your prospects. Review possible costs and expenses. You want to start off with the most inexpensive methods available but remember free doesn’t always mean good when it comes to advertising. Your marketing strategy must be effective but not cheap. People will take notice to cheap and you could lose their attention therefore remember quality over cost when advertising. The best way to do this is to add some unique creativity when marketing what your business has to offer. Great examples are running online informative videos, creating local events highlighting a common problem in your area in which your business could solve, using social media to gain word of mouth with your business. A powerful tool with any business including a home based business in today’s society is having the ability to share what you can do and offer to those who are interested. Market to social media but don’t always follow what other businesses are doing; create a new lane in a different social media avenue to run and you will find results a lot faster in time.The major point is to develop a marketing strategy that is flexible enough to reach a variety of consumers and branch off in different directions when any avenue runs dry. For example, you could market locally with your home business while adding a small online presence. Remember, going online with marketing requires a tremendous time commitment which could hinder a start up small business. If you choose to market online utilize a means that’s both least time consuming and could be easily performed by you without doing a million things before you could get anything done. Make sure your business could market to a specific group of interests; you can resolve a problem many people both online and offline have an interest in.Also, realize that marketing is a continuing effort that you should always research and educate yourself to expand your business towards success. If you would like more information about certain marketing methods your business could utilize just connect with our business site and submit your questions.