How to Dominate your Business Environment: Revealing Lessons from a farmer.

Aside from sowing and reaping, what can we learn from a farmer? The other part of the farmer's philosophy is that he loves to dominate the acreage where he plants crops. Suppose he has three acres of land? What usually comes to mind is how many tons of crops he can plant and harvest per acre? Or if he is an animal farmer how many units of livestock can he develop on the land that he has at his disposal? Every business man who is interested in making maximum yield from his business ought to learn how he can dominate his area of operations. One practice that we have taught in sales is for the department that supervises sales and marketing to divide the territory into sectors and put people in charge of each sector.
 The whole idea is to see how each operative can cover the area given to him and bring maximum yield from it. Dominating the environment is ensuring that the goods and services that you supply are recognized appropriately in the area under view. The philosophy brings to mind an experience with an award winning sales manager of a soft drink in Ghana. The manager shared with our marketing class his approach to meeting the demands of his product in Osu,the business district of Accra, Ghana. He kept records of food and drink outlets, listed the managers in charge, determined their consumption over periods of time and got them to sign standing orders for supplies and the periods they would need to replenish were noted. In sum, we can say the Sales Manager got to know his customers so well that he knew the consumption patterns. No wonder he was an award winning sales manager!
If we can replicate the strategy in whatever business we do, we are bound to make progress in whatever manner of sales we are involved in. Here his how its done:
1. Do an assessment of the area in which you operate
2. Divide it into sectors
3. Determine what the possible yield is from the area
4. Get to understand the people who are customers and the potentials in the area
5. Keep records and learn about the tastes and preferences of your customers and make it as detailed as possible.
The strategy takes time to work. But the time you spend studying the environment is worth your while.
The embedded philosophy is that your customers invariably want you to come to them. Its important that you know where they are and what their tastes are like, so that you can take the goods they prefer to them and make sure the competition does not have too much leeway so that it would difficult for them to take over the customer.
Like the farmer, who consistently keeps tabs on the crops and makes sure that they are not threatened by weeds or disease, we have to keep tabs on potential customers as well as buying customers so that our product or service is stamped on their psyche consistently and their purchase of what we sell becomes part of their buying habits.