Selling to Retailers Correctly
This article deals with manufacturers or product-based businesses who sell to retailers or distributors. When I speak with these businesses, often times the topic of how one is supposed to view selling comes up.
If you sell a product, you are undoubtedly focused on the number of buyers (retailers) you can sell to in a certain month or year. This idea of sell-in however is only half the challenge.
As a manufacturing business, you need to be focusing on your customer’s goals as well as your own. By this I mean that you should be focusing on sell-through when presenting your product to potential buyers.
Sell-through is the ability for the retailer or distributor to sell your product to consumers, and this is extremely important and cannot be overlooked – unless you want sales to slowly become more and more difficult.
Sell-through helps to create a relationship between you and the buyer because when the buyer can sell more, he or she is happier. And when your buyer is happier, they continue to do business with you year after year.
How to focus on sell-through
You can help increase your retail buyer’s capability to sell your product through a variety of means. Some involve running promotions when sales start to slow down, another important factor may be setting your price correctly according to your competition and the market.
I’ve spoken with dozens of product-based businesses who have incorrectly priced their product because they fail to take into account certain fees and expenses involved in retail. This leads to increased difficulty to increase sell-through.
When trying to sell your product over the phone or in a meeting, besides concentrating on the essentials, emphasizing sell-through can be a great and refreshing topic for the potential buyer.
As a manufacturer competing for shelf space, you need all the advantages you can get. Sell-through is just the tip of the iceberg.
