How to sell in B2C markets

Answer to this question largely depends on what you want to sell. However, one strategy which as per an HBR article works the best is the word of mouth. Take the example of doctors, the best doctors, or their clinics in the country who do not advertise themselves. When people are sick, they ask for recommendations in their network and eventually go with the recommendation by their friends, and relatives. The growth of one’s sales is organic, and the business is gradually able to increase its supply capacity as the demand increases. Often businesses advertise themselves and are unable to cater to the overwhelming demand, generating a negative word of mouth, which is lethal for the business.

Often small businesses begin by direct selling in their family, and friends, and expect to generate enough word of mouth to attract enough customers to keep them afloat. If your volumes are high enough then you may want to talk about the existing retailers, even higher then you might have to involve a distributor as explained in the previous chapter. The decision to have your outlet depends if you are not too involved in the manufacturing rather taking products from a manufacturer. Running a manufacturing unit, and then managing a retail outlet are two different ball games, and may not be done simultaneously. One needs to be outsourced to a partner. Often in a family business, different members of the family take care of the supply side, the manufacturing side, and the distribution or retailing side.

If you want to sell in multiple cities, then eventually you have to either use an e-commerce platform, or partner with retailers in multiple cities. One can also invest in making an e-commerce website, and engage a courier service for delivery, and payment collection, however, that in itself a fulltime job. Therefore outsourcing to established platforms like telemart.pk could be an option.

Before anything else, what needs to be understood is that an economic transaction only happens when a social exchange between two parties has already happened. This social exchange is the basis of the trust that must happen before any economic transaction takes place, unless the customer is too desperate, and does not have any choice other than you.

So the question again comes back to the point of how you establish your credibility with any new person, including yourself. Ask yourself what would make you trust a business or a person trying to sell you something. What he or she should demonstrate before you could consider trusting the person?

Some of the things that I would like are how the salesperson is understanding my concerns or needs, and trying to address them instead of selling me the product or service. The doctor and the car mechanic I go to are the ones who ask me to go home even when I think there is a problem, and they do not find anything wrong with me or with the car. This demonstrates that both my doctor, and my car mechanic is concerned about me, and not just making money, which they can easily do when I am already convinced if there is a problem. This sends me a very strong message about their trustworthiness.

Another very important thing is the after-sales follow up, particularly when you are selling durable goods. Call them up, or preferably text them if they are satisfied, and need any assistance with the product. Ask if they need a free checkup of their device, it would cost extra, but if that enhances the image of your company in front of them then they are very much likely to recommend it to others. I complained about a driver’s behavior on one of these ride-hailing apps. Within minutes I got a phone call from their customer support, they did not just agree with my point of view, rather also returned me around 80% of the amount. Since then I am their loyal customer, despite one of their partners giving me unsatisfactory service.

Often giving your customer a little after-sales surprise in the form of a small gift for example can make lots of difference. A restaurant near my place would give goody bags to kids when the families would leave the place after dining. Further, they had a play area for kids. Because of this, my kids would never want to go anywhere else, despite the food was not as good as other places. However, these gestures could not save the restaurant as customers nevertheless go there to eat, and not have goody bags, and most customers do not have kids, implying if their food was at par with the competition, they would still be there.

So to summarize, understand what the customer wants, consider his or her interest a priority, be honest if you have something to fix or not, focus on building relationships, and not money, immediately respond to their concerns, give something extra, and do not forget to give little surprises.