Maintaining & Growing Sales During a Partial Liquidation
Are you in the process of liquidating part of your business? The transition can be challenging while going through downsizing efforts. You may be left with no other option than to sell of equipment, layoff employees, and shake hands with a few of your clients as you part ways. It is a difficult season but closing part of a company’s operations is sometimes necessary in order to keep the company running with the resources it has left.
Something that many businesses struggle with when downsizing or liquidating is how to keep on top of their sales. It’s a fine line to walk indeed. Many companies can get so wrapped up in staying afloat that they don’t bother trying to fully maintain or grow their sales. Which makes sense – clearly a company wants to make sure that everything internal is under control before approaching the market with their services again. However, if the majority of a company’s revenue comes from direct sales, a downsizing can seriously affect profits if sales are not prioritized. There are several things that a company can to do make sure that they are keeping their sales up even during a partial liquidation.
Be transparent with your employees:
Most likely you will have had to layoff at least one if not more of your employees in this downsizing process. Whenever this happens, moral tends to be low and productivity lags. Your company culture can take a major hit when people are worried about what is coming next. Sit down with department heads to make sure that responsibilities have been reorganized properly so that everyone can work as efficiently as possible. Make sure to keep your employees updated on the status of the company. Outline clear expectations for the organization moving forward to make sure that employees know that they need to focus on sales. If needed, find initiatives you can give to back your requests – people respond to initiatives. Once employees understand where the management wants the focus to be, they will work to align their roles, becoming more productive and driven to help the company grow its sales efforts.
Invest the money from the liquidation back into the company:
While some of the money that you gain from selling off your assets (either in a traditional sale or in an auction) will have to cover payments that your company owes, it is important to reinvest it back into the company itself. For example – give it to your marketing team to beef up your advertising capabilities. Get the word out about your products or services so that the world knows where to find you. Pick a new target market to focus attention on or put more money behind your paid social media. If you want to focus on new sales, you need to put your money where your mouth is.
Improve current client relations
If clients know that your company has been going through a partial liquidation they may have some questions concerning your capabilities and what they should expect moving forward. You will want to sit down with them to address any of their concerns and show them what your company is still capable of. Additionally, consult your clients to see if there is anything you can improve on to provide them better service. Ask them if they have needs that are not currently being met by your business and go back to the drawing board, start to brainstorm how you can better your business for your current clients. Determine the main needs of your clients to set a more precise focus to center your services around. In a downsizing or partial liquidation process
you won’t have enough resources to perform all the services you were doing in the past, so asking your customers what is most important for them will help you dictate where your finite resources should go. Plus, it will show your clients that you are still dedicated to serving them to the best of your capabilities and will increase their loyalty. This will keep sales strong from your current clients in order to keep your operations going.
Just because you are going through a partial liquidation doesn’t mean that your sales have to stop and that your company can’t grow. While management should take the time to properly evaluate company health and current capabilities, there is no reason that a company cannot continue to focus on their sales during a partial liquidation.