SPW editor’s note: Below is a blog republished from Sighten, to explain how its comprehensive software can help solar contractors with sales and leads.
By: Evelyn Fisher, Sighten
Evelyn Fisher, Sighten
You’re ready to grow your solar business this year, but what changes have you made to kick things into a higher gear? What are you doing to generate more leads? Close more sales? Hire and train more sales reps?
Here at Sighten, you could say we’re a little obsessed with helping solar companies grow. To that end, we’ve put together our solar sales cheat sheet: five tips that could be game changers for your sales numbers this year.
1. Get proposals out fast
How fast can your team prepare a solar sales proposal? Have you ever done it in less than five minutes? Not every lead will turn into a closed sale, so making sure your team can quickly and consistently produce professional, accurate proposals can dramatically improve your sales effectiveness.
Sighten allows you to go through the entire proposal workflow from site validation to system design, savings analysis, financial quoting and proposal generation, in less than five minutes. We’ve even seen several customers go from a single proposal per hour to ten proposals per hour in their first week. Accelerate your growth by making sure your sales team isn’t held back by a cumbersome proposal process.
2. Streamline your process
Walk through your sales process and count how many team members and handoffs it entails. When you map it out, is the process as streamlined as possible or are you making compromises and adding workarounds because of suboptimal tools?
We’ve heard from many customers that Sighten enables a significant improvement in their sales process by streamlining the number of tools involved in getting a proposal out the door. With a comprehensive software platform, onerous handoffs and endless data entry become things of the past, and leads move forward efficiently, quickly and accurately. Whatever your sales process, whether a single rep takes a job from lead to close or more specialized personnel handle different parts of the sales process, operating in a single platform will have a massive impact on your top and bottom line.
3. Provide the right financing options
How many financing options do you offer: Leases, loans, cash, PPAs, PACE and others? When selling financing, it’s important to simultaneously convey expertise and provide options, but doing both can be easier said than done.
Having effective processes across multiple financing programs can be tricky, and if you’re not careful you could end up with the dreaded “ten browser tab” problem; sales reps generate financing-specific quotes and proposals in many different financing-specific platforms. Sighten allows sales reps to access multiple financing options in a single platform, and have the tools to confidently convey expertise across financing products. Banish “browser tab-hopping” for good and give your prospects an easy-to-understand proposal that aggregates your financing options.
4. Simplify training
With the many complexities of selling solar (system design, savings, financing) training new hires can take a long time. To grow your sales team efficiently and get new reps selling sooner, choose easy-to-use software that accelerates the solar learning curve.
We find that customers get up to speed on Sighten quickly; the platform is user-friendly and automates much of the data entry and number-crunching needed for a proposal, so reps can focus on selling. We even recently heard about a sales rep that received a Sighten login and figured out how to effectively use the platform with no training at all! The faster new reps are selling and closing, the faster your revenue grows.
5. Focus on the close
You’ve talked to the homeowner, designed a system that will achieve maximum savings, and chosen financing options that suit the customer’s needs. But when you send out your proposal, does it look polished and professional? Will the sales document simultaneously engage the homeowner, provide sufficient information in a clear manner, and build your brand? Can you quickly follow up with easily-executable installation and financing agreements?
Founded by solar industry veterans, the Sighten team has seen lots of solar sales documents and we’ve developed our proposal templates based on best practices that lead to high close rates. We understand that customization and flexibility are critical to producing proposals and closing materials that truly differentiate your business and fit with your sales process. To that end, we’ve built admin portals that enable editing of all types of content quickly and easily. And with integrated installation and financing agreements as well as e-signature functionality, the Sighten platform ensures that a soft close turns into a signed contract in seconds. Put your best foot forward and watch your close rate climb and the referrals flow.
What else will your team try to boost solar sales this year? And how can Sighten help you get there? Let us know at feedback@sighten.io or if you’re not already using the tool today, request a demo at www.sighten.io.
This blog has been republished from Sighten.