Be a Member of the Survivors Club

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The collective brain-trust of the piano dealers are scrambling to grab the lifeboats, get them in the water and get boarded. The curve balls thrown at them by the economy and the ongoing demands of the manufacturers to place orders have been hard to hit, to say the least. I wanted to be positive and a bit braggadocious and title this article “Be a Member of the Thrivers (not survivors) Club”, but I thought that addressing the immediate need and not the possibilities would be more appropriate to the current mindset we’re experiencing. 

We are a tech company so this statement, as true as it is, should not surprise any readers: “The answer to survival in this new normal is to use technology in an efficient and smart way.  The goal is to begin enough online relationships with consumers that it energizes your sales revenue.” In layman’s terms, “we need to work smart.” It is a reality and a fact that more and more relationships in all age ranges now start online. It is also a fact that it will continue to be an escalating number. Society’s tech addiction and dependence is here to stay. That Genie is NOT going back in the bottle. The future is here. The time to adapt is now; anything less spells extinction for the vast majority who don’t embrace the new sales and marketing tools in the tool box. Sorry to be so straightforward, but the truth is that there is not a list of options for retailers. They must build a sales culture capable of turning online relationships into sales, or look at a stark, ever more lonely, parking lot and a more and more silent business phone line.

It is extremely irresponsible to be a bearer of bad news without a solution but I’ll go one better than that. Not only can you survive in this sales landscape, you can take advantage of the tech tools at your disposal and thrive in it! Job number one is to assess the ability and mindset of your sales and marketing staff in order to identify how tech savvy and willing to learn they are. Pardon the blunt nature of this statement, but if you have dinosaur sales personnel not willing to stretch out and learn new things then their only value is their experience and people skills. Their generation can contribute greatly to what does and doesn’t work once you get in front of a prospect “live”, but unless they are techy by inclination they usually do a poor job of talking folks out of cyberspace and onto the showroom floor. Being “good on the floor” but not at trolling for opportunities online is not a recipe for excellence in today’s sales environment, just as techy young folks having no people skills and no ability to make friends isn’t either. Today’s prime piano sales candidate is a younger, gregarious sort who grew up with technology but is a people person dying to learn from the old guard. Oh, and here’s some more advice born from observation: you don’t need a piano industry retread. Young people that love the instrument can be taught product knowledge and trained on how to demo well. As long as there’s an old closer around to learn from so that deals don’t walk it’ll all work out fine. LOOK for new blood; the industry needs it!  

Your staff needs to be in tune with the communication proclivities of the new buyers as well the old school consumers. Believe it or not, Millennials will be approaching middle age soon. They are the next generation of fine piano buyers. They need to be educated on the benefits of fine pianos and who better than someone from their own generation? You already know the definition of insanity and since the only constant is change, it is time to retool, hire and and start making friends online, where all the activity is these days. The salvation of the piano industry is to learn how to mobilize and learn how best to talk piano interest leads from cyberspace onto the showroom floor. It’s not simple. It takes experimentation, scripting, practicing, refining, automations and work, but we’ve seen it done expertly by many piano sales people who are indeed making GREAT money in a shrinking industry, so allow me to address that term, “shrinking industry.” I will not argue that it is but I will emphatically argue that it doesn’t have to be! I can even back it up: Since 2015, Prospects International has harvested over 2 million piano interest leads in seven countries. Listen closely – there is no lack of piano interest, NONE. Our industry simply hasn’t figured out how to engage and capitalize on it. Oh, there are individuals that we serve that have and they sell 15-20% of the leads they work; then there are piano sales associates who can’t talk an online lead into a sales appointment if their life depended on it… and sorry to point this out but in today’s world their piano sales life DOES depend on it. My point? There is a right way and wrong way to work digital leads and it has everything to do with the attitude a follow up person has towards them, and whether or not they are willing to employ some modern techniques to them. There is a growing number of sales individuals who are learning how to make enough friends to enjoy a six figure plus income in today’s piano sales world. They are members of, not only the survivors, but the thrivers club. We serve up leads to them, watch and learn from them. In short, we know what does and doesn’t work and we know many folks that have figured it out. Percentages being what they are, it’s like the 80/20 rule in reverse and THAT has to be reversed! 

Let’s examine both some things to and not to do, so I provide a healthy level of “takeaway” from this article.  For some things not to do, think about some things you should stop doing. 

STOP:
Doing what you’re doing that isn’t resulting in enough sales.
Using inordinate amounts of energy on branding instead of direct response.
Believing that all analytics are created equal; only the conversions that result in a person to talk to (lead generation) have a lot of value in a survival circumstance. 
Depending on the economy to get better, your job is to sell something to somebody somehow no matter what goes on in Washington DC or your state capital. 
Hiring retreads… unless they embrace technology.
Acting like you need a sale, especially when you do.
Having a negative attitude when there is SO much online activity to learn to sell to.
Thinking that the piano industry has to be a “shrinking” industry because you hear it all the time.
Thinking you aren’t in a great place to excel. Every economy presents unbelievable opportunities; figure out how to sell using the new tools in your tech laden tool box and pass up those around you, thereby improving their attitude and lot in life.    

THINGS TO DO:
Have regular sales meetings of substance that improve your sales staff’s ability to use technology in order to reach out in a technologically based consumer population.   
Create an email deployment series that isn’t always running a sale but positions you as the best place to get dependable piano information. This is excellent reputation management and positioning. 
Make sure you babysit your social image and use it to create excitement and awareness about what you do. It is very often a great educational opportunity. 
Have a strategy that harvests more positive reviews than your competition. Get the whole team (whether it’s one of you or ten of ya’ll) concerned about the positive SEO that reviews provide your website.
Think about how to excel at or hire a marketing person or company who excels at lead generation. There is nothing a sales professional needs more than someone to talk to.
Figure out how to engage with more people who have taken the initiative to visit your web site…once more what sales professionals need most is people to talk to. 
Find or create a strategy that dominates the new homeowner market. This is the new market share in any market whether people are moving in or moving around. They buy more than any other segment because of the time in their lives that it is. 
Share approaches and techniques that work with one another and create a culture that values figuring out how better to help one another sell more. 

In Summary: Treat this time as a time to “shine” and be the best version of your sales self. Pianos aren’t going away. As we have proven since 2015, that there is a TON of online piano interest to turn into friends. Become the concierge that promotes how much better lives are with music in them regardless of what is going on in the world. Promote music as fun, educational, therapeutic and essential to optimum happiness. EVERYONE making music is happier and healthier, so you have an extremely valuable gift to take to the world. Quit belly-aching and be a part of the survivors club and then graduate into the thrivers club. Belief always proceeds action, so be inspired about how much interest we have found and make it fuel for piano evangelism. 
Deeply consider making the part of the world you come into contact with a better place. The money will follow the embracing of the new tools and their creative application.    

“A sale is not a thing in and of itself, it is the result of quality activity.”
        – Jack Klinefelter

Jack Klinefelter
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