All businesses that are focused on growth should measure the effectiveness of their sales and marketing strategies. In an increasingly digitised world, the quantity of data elements to analyse has risen steadily. Moreover, this huge quantity of data is disjointed. Your measurement calculations can go skew-whiff rapidly, due to the diverse metrics and channels involved. This results in costly, substandard marketing. Happily, it is possible to manage this overabundance of data – by realising that some of it is not important, and concentrating on the aspects that are.

One of the things we’ve been working on at JDR throughout lockdown is looking at ways we can help customers take advantage of new technologies and trends, to get better results from their marketing and sales efforts. The biggest communication trend of 2020 is, of course, video. With physical workplaces closed for several months in some cases, businesses across the country have turned to video platforms, such as Zoom and Vidyard, to keep in touch, host meetings, and deliver services.

Let's be honest: the 21st century has been a series of struggles – or at the least a rollercoaster ride – for many businesses. As we weather the economic fallout from coronavirus, it's even more important to fine tune your conversion rate and make each sale count. However, despite hard work and dedication, for many businesses the same objections and barriers come up time and again, with promising inbound leads falling by the wayside. Get better sales results from today by overcoming these essential barriers.

Whether you're a new start-up or you've been in the game for a while, sales targets can cause difficulties. Often they're too ambitious, ending up as pie in the sky and causing friction as workers struggle valiantly to meet them, or they may be too low, so that they fail to motivate your team to their full productive potential. Here's how to ensure that your sales targets stay realistic to your means but ambitious enough to deliver prosperity.

At JDR, we have been using one-to-one video for several years - and in the increasingly virtual post-COVID world, we have been using it more and more. These are quick videos where we record a video of our screen, or using our webcam, or both, and embed these into emails.

In this article we will share 11 ways you can use video emails as part of your sales and customer service process.

Judging good sales leads is essential to business success. A steady supply of leads is invaluable, but they must also be likely to convert to sales. The best, or most qualified leads are those tending toward significant purchases, at a good price and with ongoing repeat sales opportunities. But how do you identify them? Start by asking the following questions:

If you own a small or medium-sized enterprise (SME), you may still be handling sales yourself, particularly if you haven't been in business long. That means you'll almost certainly have run into ‘gatekeepers’. These are the people who protect key decision makers by deflecting your sales calls or emails, often front of house, reception, or customer service staff. So, how can you get past them so that you can seal the deal? Here are five tactics you can use.

While the modern business world has dealt with downturns before, the current situation is unlike any that we've previously experienced. This doesn’t mean the worst predictions are necessarily accurate – they rarely are – but it's hard to predict what's going to happen. However, by taking steps to maximise the return that you're getting from your investment in sales and marketing now, you'll be better placed to grow your business whatever the future brings.

If you own a small business or start-up company, you might not have a dedicated sales or marketing team in place. That means you'll need to drum up business yourself, potentially with the support of a marketing agency or business development partner. Working with a garden-variety agency may bring you increased web traffic or sales leads, but without in-depth sales knowledge, it can be tricky to deal with prospects' initial objections to your proposition. However, if you give up too soon, you could miss out on lucrative deals. Here's how to tackle four of the most common arguments that salespeople hear.

How does a small to medium business achieve sales in uncertain times? It’s definitely possible but preparation is key. Without a carefully constructed sales plan, including battle-proven business development strategies, it can be hard to get a growth plan off the ground. In this article, we introduce four straightforward steps that can be followed by almost any business, regardless of sector, to create a custom sales strategy. Each step will help you focus on a different aspect of your sales proposition, to focus your efforts, help close more deals and bring in more revenue.