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By Knight Kiplinger

The Kiplinger Washington Editors

July 2, 2009

By year-end or so, Congress will give the nod to a major rewriting of the nation's financial regulatory system. This week’s Kiplinger Letter explores whether the package will do more harm than good and what lawmakers are likely to include.

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I just attended a franchise seminar. The speaker represents a few hundred franchises that (he says) are hand picked. He has the prospect (aka victim?) answer some questions about themselves then he makes recomendations - based on your personality, capital situation, etc.. If you pick a franchise, then he does some due dilligence for you. If you both decide it's a good idea, he helps you get started. He says he offers this service free of charge, which means he gets a commission if he's able to sell you a franchise. Has anyone done this? Successfully? Unsuccessfully?

-- fender

How to Nail Large Accounts

A big sales score means a long patient effort involving teams from different departments that can figure out the target customer's need.

Worth Reading: The Quick Take from Kiplinger

November 2008

Nurture Institute

The Nurture Institute is a direct marketing solutions company that emphasizes cultivation of long-term customer relationships over forceful sales and advertising.

Selling to large accounts really is different from selling to smaller ones. The stakes are so much higher that competition can be cutthroat. More people are involved in making the decision to buy, and you need to appeal to all of them and their concerns. Large companies often have complicated cultures with lots of rivalries and cross-currents that need to be negotiated.

In a paper titled "Best Practices for Selling to Large Accounts," the Nurture Institute examines the special challenges of landing large accounts and discusses how to tackle them. As its name implies, the Nurture Institute's approach is the polar opposite of high-pressure sales tactics. Rather, the firm preaches building long-term relationships by understanding a customer's needs and how they change so that you can make sure your products and services can be the solution to their problems.

Many companies create special sales groups for large accounts made up of their best salesmen and women, the Nurture Institute writes. But "the most successful efforts we've seen operate a multi-discipline team using a systematic -- and entirely separate -- sales process to pursue large accounts." The paper breaks that system down to five key elements: research, strategy, communication, solutions and presentations. It suggests ways to ensure that all five of those elements are explored and exploited fully -- always with the idea of making sure the prospect's problems are known, understood and solved.

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