DOWNLOAD PDF SOFTWARE SALES BUSINESS PLAN

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1 Chapter 1 : Software Sales: Six Key Elements to Selling Software Corporate Software Sales software sales business plan executive summary. Corporate Software Sales is a start-up business that specializes in providing customized business planning software solutions to companies with extensive sales forces or many franchises or subdivision. Providing great products and services is wonderful, but customers must actually know those products and services exist. But keep in mind marketing is not just advertising. Marketing--whether advertising, public relations, promotional literature, etc--is an investment in the growth of your business. Like any other investment you would make, money spent on marketing must generate a return. Otherwise why make the investment? While that return could simply be greater cash flow, good marketing plans result in higher sales and profits. Do your homework and create a smart marketing program. Here are some of the basic steps involved in creating our marketing plan: Focus on your target market. Who are your customers? Who will you target? Who makes the decisions? Determine how you can best reach potential customers. Know your competitors by gathering information about their products, service, quality, pricing, and advertising campaigns. In marketing terms, what does your competition do that works well? What are their weaknesses? How can you create a marketing plan that highlights the advantages you offer to customers? How customers perceive your business makes a dramatic impact on sales. Your marketing program should consistently reinforce and extend your brand. Before you start to market your business, think about how you want your marketing to reflect on your business and your products and services. Marketing is the face of your to potential customers--make sure you put your best face forward. What problems do you solve? What benefits do you deliver? Your marketing plan should clearly identify benefits customers will receive. Focus on what customers get instead of on what you provide. Your products and services have to stand out from the competition in some way. How will you compete in terms of price, product, or service? Then focus on providing detail and backup for your marketing plan. Key questions to answer: What is your budget for sales and marketing efforts? How will you determine if your initial marketing efforts are successful? In what ways will you adapt if your initial efforts do not succeed? Will you need sales representatives inside or external to promote your products? Can you set up public relations activities to help market your business? The Sales and Marketing section for our cycling rental business could start something like this: Marketing Strategy Our marketing strategy will focus on three basic initiatives: Access to the forest is restricted to a few primary entrances, and visitors reach those entrances after traveling on one of several main roadways. Since customers currently rent bicycles in the local town of Harrisonburg, road signage will communicate our value proposition to all potential customers. Our website will attract potential visitors to the resort. We will partner with local businesses that serve our target market to provide discounts and incentives. Pricing Strategy We will not be the low-cost provider for our target market. Our goal is to provide mid- to high-end equipment. However, we will create web-based loyalty programs to incent customers to set up online profiles and reserve and renew equipment rentals online, and provide discounts for those who do. Over time we will be able to market specifically to those customers. Just like in the Market Opportunity section, you may want to include a few more categories. For example, if your business involves a commission-compensated sales force, describe your Sales Programs and incentives. If you distribute products to other companies or suppliers and those distribution efforts will impact your overall marketing plans, lay out your Distribution Strategy. The key is to show you understand your market and you understand how you will reach your market. Marketing and promotions must result in customers--your goal is to thoroughly describe how you will acquire and keep your customers. Also keep in mind you may want to include examples of marketing materials you have already prepared, like website descriptions, print ads, web-based advertising programs, etc. More in this series: Page 1

2 Chapter 2 : Sample Business Plans - Software Sales Business Plan Software Sales Business Plan The Corporate Software Sales is a startup business which has presented a software sales business plan that is comprehensive and well researched. The cash flow predictions are realistic and achievable. Typically, the SaaS business plan describes a business model that does not fit the traditional software company selling a fixed price product. One of the major differences is found in the fact the SaaS cash flow stream is usually subscription based. It is often not possible to charge the total contract period price at the time of sale because of the large amount involved, and yet there are upfront costs to acquiring each customer. This creates a negative cash flow situation for an extended period of time, and that is not appealing to investors. The business owner needs to spend considerable time developing an accurate cash flow statement because business success depends on revenue timing, low customer turnover churning and the regular influx of new customers. The website model utilizes online marketing strategies to produce leads and to convert leads into paying customers. Direct selling models normally involves a mix of online and offline sales strategies directed at the B2B market. As a technologically advanced business, it is also important to ensure all cost categories are included on the financial statement, including web hosting and data storage. Other information the SaaS business plan includes is as follows: What are the staffing costs associated with management, software engineering and maintenance, pre and post sales support, accounting, and marketing Does the business plan include planned growth strategies, i. What security issues exist and how have they been mitigated? Who is developing the technology? What are the risks of the product being duplicated or of new competition entering the market with an enhanced version? Does the business own the Intellectual Property? Are there legal documents to support ownership and property rights? Investors considering supporting the SaaS business plan will look closely at the technology and how that supports business development. A major concern is risk management strategies. For example, how will the business maintain viability through the first five years by implementing key personnel retention plans? Investors need to know that the money they invest will go to the business model as described, and that includes the management. If a key person were to leave, like the original software developer, how would the business continue? Investors will also want to look at a prototype, if at all possible. However, if a prototype is not available due to lack of funding, the slide deck must be very detailed as to product specifications. OGS Capital can help SaaS business owners develop a detailed business plan that addresses all the technology and other factors of interest to investors. Contacting us by completing the simple form is a first step towards success. Page 2

3 Chapter 3 : Business Plan Software and Sales and Marketing Software - Palo Alto Software Corporate Software Sales software sales business plan company summary. Corporate Software Sales is a start-up business that specializes in providing customized business planning software solutions to companies with extensive sales forces or many franchises or subdivision. Sales Plan Design and Monitoring king-ict. It helps them to define their strategies to enhance the sales while also keeping in close touch with their target and goals. Keeping a sales plan example handy ensure that they just need to customize it to come up with a new plan or alter the existing one. There are a wide range of sales plan templates available online like Real Estate Sales Plan Templates etc. However, if you still want to design an example yourself, here is how you can write it. The top most section should be designed for putting in the summary. This should be followed by a segment where the description of the products or services should be entered. The next segment should be attributed to industry analysis. This should be followed by the section where the customer details and analysis is included. The next section should be one where the competitive advantage of the sales should be elaborated upon. This should be followed by the section where the sales and marketing plans are listed. The last segment should be the one where the conclusion should be put in. Whether you are designing a sales plan for yourself or for your organization as whole, you can always make use of the wide range of plan templates that are readily available online. Here is how you can develop a sales plan for a product or a service. In case you have a marketing plan, first things first review it in the sales plan to see cite your progress. Put in a comparison of the products or services that you are selling with their respective sales volume and the profit made. Take an account of the areas where you seem to be performing better. Go ahead and review these channels to find out which ones you should focus more upon and how you can get everything into place. Include a segment to give some thought to the budget that you are willing to set aside for advertising, branding and promotions. Create plans for advertising and publicity. Set the goals on a monthly, quarterly, half yearly as well as annual basis. You can easily develop a sales plan for individuals by using the Personal Sales Plan Templates. Why is Sales Planning Important? No wonder then sales planning is such an important part of every business. Let us take a look at the importance of sales planning. It helps in identifying the actual profile of the end users of the products and services. It helps the companies and sales personnel to identify their target audience and their prospective customers. It helps to get a grip on the sales cycle. It plays a key role in setting the financial goals of the organization as well as that of an individual. What to Include in a Sales Business Plan? A sales business plan comes in handy for an organization to plan its sales in an organized manner to ensure that its goals and objectives are achieved. However, a sales business plan should be designed with a lot of care ensuring that all the essential segments are included in it. Users can get some idea of these by taking a look at various templates online like the IT Sales Plan Templates etc. Here is what you should include in a sales business plan. Page 3

4 Chapter 4 : Sales Plan Template Free Sample, Example, Format Free & Premium Templates Sales strategies can include, but are not limited to: a detailed plan of best practices and processes set out by management, from how to research and qualify prospects, cold calling, pitching, and the sales presentation, to closing techniques and account management policy. Check out our other software marketing downloads here. Software sales cycles are changing. With the existence of Software-as-a-Service SaaS, cloud computing, and open source options, in many cases this can shorten the overall decision process for the customer. Do you have the right business model and pricing structure? For example, moving to or adding services revenue or subscription licensing can drive increased software sales. Check out our article on software business model planning. Find out more details here. Have a Strong Value Proposition. That is your value proposition. Remember that your "competition" may not be selling exactly the same type of product you are. If you are a licensed software vendor, your primary competitor may become a SaaS provider or perhaps open source software. Each requires a different type of value proposition. Make sure your value proposition is clearly spelled out in the beginning and end of your software proposal. Having a compelling software sales proposal is critical to come across as professional and convince your customer that your product or service will meet their specific needs. You can download our Software Proposal Template Package here to use as a starting point to developing your own professional sales proposal. It will really increase the effectiveness of your proposals, help you build credibility, and speed up your turnaround time to close the deal faster. Also, check this article for key tips on writing winning software proposals or you can start with this free software proposal outline. Identify your Profitable Customers. You must be able to write down exactly who your customer base is: Are they in small, medium or large companies? What other common characteristics do the right customers have? And who are the specific purchasers and stakeholders within your customer? Take the time to put together detailed target customer profiles for each of your software products or services. Sales time is valuable. Make sure you have a software sales strategy to reach these specific target customers. Do they have particular conferences they go to? Do they read particular publications or visit certain sites? If you have a lead outside of this target, you should think long and hard about whether you want to spend your time chasing it. Focus your sales efforts on the right customers. Build Strong Customer Relationships. Know who within your target customers you need to build relationships with, and have a software sales process that supports that. These should be the individual purchasers, stakeholders and influencers of your product or service purchase. Depending on the typical fee for your software or service, they might be at the CXO level or not, but make sure you are developing relationships high enough up in your customer organization to be able to influence the purchase decision. You may have great relationships at the IT manager or business unit manager level, and those may get you some good insight and informationâ. Your relationship-building efforts must include reaching out regularly to stakeholders at both existing clients and new leads. Getting face-to-face can be time consuming and expensive. However, excellent web conferencing tools exist that make it possible to hold effective sales meetings and presentations online. In addition, make sure you understand the impact the internet is having on B2B sales and the customer purchase cycle. More and more, B2B buyers are relying on the internet for their product research and evaluation, which means that when you get that first sales call they have already gathered quite a bit of product data and done a preliminary vendor short-list. The worst thing you can do in that case is to start with a "generic" sales pitch. A final critical part to developing strong customer relationships is established a strong channel network. This could include working with a software reseller, distributor, or complementary software vendors and service providers. Now you need to convince that customer that you really can deliver on your value proposition for them. Many software vendors do not take the time to think through and quantify all the possible areas of ROI, but in fact a strong ROI methodology is critical to your software sales success. Unless, of course, you have such a stunning value proposition that customers are willing to pay for it regardless. And make sure you have customer examples or case studies that reinforce your value proposition and ROI message also. Sales process is absolutely necessary, but make sure it does not get in the way of your sales people doing Page 4

5 their job, and make sure the comp plans are rewarding the right behavior. Your sales channel or organizational structure should be as effective as possible in reaching your target customers. Consider using a software reseller, making software resell rights available, or building an affiliate program. For more detail on commission planning, check out these tips for putting together an effective software commission plan that drives the right behaviors from the entire sales team. Most of these software sales points may seem obviousâ but without explicitly prioritizing these six areas it is easy to get defocused and not recognize the wasted effort that results. Next Steps to Ramp Your Software Sales Next, develop a strong, professional, customer-focused sales proposal that will convince customers to purchase your product or service. Use our Software Proposal Template as a starting point. For additional sales tools, templates, coaching and master classes, check out the Software Marketing Toolkit here. Page 5

6 Chapter 5 : Business Plan Software & Guide: Marketing Strategies, Sales Plans & Projections Software Business plan designed to aid and support new entrepreneurs in starting business in the software business. Check out our other software marketing downloads here. Traditional Software Business Models Do you think you have only one or two options for your software business plan? Traditionally this has been the case. Both of these software development business models can provide obstacles to new sales and growing your business. They can also limit your software marketing strategy and sales opportunities. This can be even more of a challenge in the current economic climate with shrinking budgets, while a strategy such as using a subscription or SaaS model can provide a lower initial adoption cost for your customer. In the case of one-time software license fees, the challenge is one of having to continuously find new customers for your software product, or figure out ways to get new license fees from existing customers upgrades, additional support, etc. In the case of the consulting services model, the challenge for a small firm is one of only having so many hours in the day available to bill â how do you grow your revenue base, beyond just adding additional consultants? Generally, this involves identifying ways to offer your product in some type of ongoing fee type model so that you can continue to get paid by your customers so long as they are using your product or service. We have found that a usage-model-based analysis works well to identify which business model is best for your business more on that below. Alternatively, click here for our list of the best other business plan templates, tools, and resources. We also offer a fixed price consulting service to review and provide written input on your software business plan and strategy. Other Software Business Models 1. Go With Subscription Fees Do you have a way to offer your product or service on a subscription basis rather than a one-time license fee? In some cases, a combination of the two is the best model. This can be an easy change to make, without significant impact to your software business plan. However, make sure you have the ability to provide some level of ongoing value-add to your customer additional continued support, ongoing consulting or customization, frequent component updates, etc. Stick with License Fees with a Menu of Smaller Offerings If your product lends itself well to componentization this can be a good way to go. Not only would you componentize your product in the software development lifecycle, but figure out ways to offer components individually priced and licensed. If your menu of options is large enough, with frequent changes or updates, this can provide you some recurring revenue without a substantial change in the software development business plan, customer base or sales strategy. Offer Software as a Service SaaS A lot has been written about the move toward software-as-a-service, offering software over the web as a subscription service, while the software itself is hosted by a 3rd party or by the ISV themselves. Business customers are now adopting SaaS in many business functions and vertical industries. SaaS can also lower the initial adoption cost for the customer, making the SaaS model more attractive in times of limited budgets. You could consider completely moving your product to the SaaS model, or offering two different options to your customers: Moving to SaaS is generally a bigger change to make, with new sales strategies and partners involved, and different business metrics compared to the software license model. But done right it could significantly grow your customer base and make it easier for your customers to get started with your product. For more about how the move to a SaaS model can impact your business, take a look at our article on the business implications of moving to a SaaS business model, and this article on SaaS metrics. However, make sure you do your up-front planning for the SaaS offering. Find out why having a solid SaaS business plan is even more important than for other software business models. Finally, try to think out-of-the-box to identify value-add business software services you can provide to your customers. This will allow you to maximize the pricing for your offering versus a more commodity service. Provide Software Consulting Business Services Finally, you could choose to supplement your software product strategy with additional for-fee consulting services to provide the customization and implementation support that traditionally might be bundled with a vertical high-price-tag software solution. Provide "Free" Software Yes, your company does need to make money. But there are many examples of software firms adopting some variant of a free software business model, providing their core software for free, and upselling to a paid version or finding their revenue in other ways support, value-add Page 6

7 services, paid add-on modules, or advertising Resell Software You can either resell software that another company has produced for example, if you do not have software development expertise yourself, or you can make your software available solely as a resale or re-branded product. Take a look at this article for more information on software reselling. As you can tell, there are various ways in which you can grow your software business by offering a variety of business software services. So how do you determine which is right for your product and target market? We have developed a usage-model-driven analysis to define the software business plan and marketing strategy and find the optimal market fit for your software solution. Utilize our affordable, professional coaching service and we can help you with planning the software business model and strategy for your company. Or contact us to discuss how we can help you with business plan consulting. Chapter 6 : Sample Business Plans - Software Sales Business Plan - Palo Alto Software Palo Alto Software offers Business Plan Pro, the world's leading business planning software, along with other business and marketing planning solutions. Chapter 7 : How to Write a Sales Plan: 12 Steps (with Pictures) - wikihow Learn the five critical components of an individual business plan and why you should make one as a sales rep. Free template included. Chapter 8 : Best Business Plan Software Reviews of the Most Popular Systems For additional sales tools, templates, coaching and master classes, check out the Software Marketing Toolkit here. You'll have access to all the tools you need to increase your software sales expertise and help you drive revenue from your software. Chapter 9 : Software Business Plan and Marketing Strategy Big picture aside, a sales plan is a month-to-month forecast of the level of sales you expect to achieve and how you're going to get there. It covers past sales, market concerns, your specific niches, who your customers are, and how you're going to find them, engage with them, and sell to them. Page 7