Screen Printing - February/March 2020 - 10

THE MARSHALL PLAN

NEW SALES IDEA
GENERATOR
Follow these four tips for an increase in
customers and profit.
MARSHALL ATKINSON

T

he first quarter of the New Year is underway, and I'll bet
you a bag of donuts you've spent a good deal of time
considering how to generate more sales for your business.
We would all love to add a few zeros to our sales dollar
figure. Wouldn't it be nice to go from $10,000 to $100,000?
Or $100,000 to $1,000,000? However, there's a small problem
in making that magic happen. You actually have to ideate
the way to do it.
I've created my version of the four best ways to handle
that issue for your business. You may know these, but it helps
to get a refresher every now and again.
1. Increase the size of the order.
2. Increase the frequency of your customers' orders.
3. Add something to the order.
4. Find new customers to place an order.
Before we begin discussing these ideas, I want you to do
some math homework. Yes, I know. Homework sucks, but if
you play along I guarantee you'll get more out of this article
than if you simply read it. We'll refer to the answers to these
questions throughout the article.
In your system, go back and review each fiscal year
for sales. Last year certainly, but three to five years is
better. Here are the things you need to know like the back
of your hand:
1. Top 20 percent of your customers based on topline
sales volume. Sort your customers by total sales for
each year. How many total customers do you have?
The top 20 percent of these customers will give you
80 percent of your total revenue each year. Identifying
these customers is mission-critical.
2. For these top 20 percent, chart their orders. You need
to understand the business trends before you chart the
average size of each order. When did they place the
orders? What are they ordering? How are the orders
being placed with you?
3. If you can, show everything per month. We want to
be thinking six to eight weeks ahead in our sales
planning at a minimum at all times. Understanding
your sales order history by month can help you plan to
set aggressive, but attainable sales goals.
Got it? I know it's a lot to ask, but understanding where
you've been can help you determine where you want to go.
10

SCREENPRINTING

Marshall Atkinson is the owner of
Atkinson Consulting, LLC, based
in Mesa, Arizona. He coaches apparel decoration companies on
operational efficiency, continuous
improvement, workflow strategy,
business planning, employee
motivation, management, and
sustainability. He is a frequent
tradeshow speaker, author, and
host of two podcasts, as well as cofounder of the Shirt Lab educational
company. He can be reached at
marshall@marshallatkinson.com.

Gut feelings or intuition simply won't cut it. Pull up your real
numbers and facts.

INCREASE THE SIZE OF THE ORDER
Let's start with the notion of understanding how increasing the
size of an order can lead to better sales growth. Where
we start on that discussion is with minimums. What is the
minimum quantity order for your shop? 12? 24? 36? Why?
Usually, this is because the shop feels the need to be able
to help customers with smaller size orders. But if you look at
the research you've completed, these small-order customers
are in the bottom 80 percent of the orders taken. And because
the orders are not as large, they only account for about 20
percent of your overall revenue. That's 80 percent of the work
you're doing for only 20 percent of your money.
Look at your top 20 percent. Are they placing a significant
amount of these smaller orders? Probably not. If your
minimum order size went up a level or two, what type of
impact do you think that might have on your sales total? Let's
say your minimum order was 12 pieces. Starting now, the new
minimum goes up to 36 pieces. What would that do?
Sure, you may lose a few customers, but they aren't driving
serious sales dollars to your shop in the first place. A new
quantity minimum will help you define better work to take
while eliminating a chunk of the smaller orders that clog up
your production schedule. Run your numbers and see how this
might work for your shop.

PSYCHOLOGICAL NUMBERS
Another strategy might be to use psychological-based
numbers for your pricing breaks. Instead of 48 pieces or
72 pieces that determine the price break, what if it was
based on multiples of 50? Most pricing matrices are built on
pricing based on multiples of 12 until you get to 1000 shirts.
What if the pricing matrix was based on multiples of 50?
To get to that next level of a pricing discount, the customer
will need to order 100 instead of 72 or 150 instead of 144.
How would that play out for your shop? Would your
customers order a few more shirts to get the discount,
thus increasing your order average?
Screen Printing - February/March 2020

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