Addressing business slowdowns in 2024

Slowdowns can actually help a manufacturing business by leaving room to evaluate, reestablish sales goals, and plan for the future. Valiantsin Suprunovich / iStock / Getty Images Plus

I attended the FMA Annual Meeting in Clearwater, Fla., in February. It was a great event and an even better location. The sun was hot, the food was excellent, the programming was informative—but the sales outlook from most executives was soft.

Everyone reported slowing sales for 2024. Most contributed it to an election year and expect things to open up in Q4 regardless of the presidential race outcome. Most also communicated the dip in revenue as much needed relief from the boom years post-COVID.

The consensus was that sales are down, but the outlook is optimistic. We are experiencing this in our own business as well, and I’m not worried. My focus is on what to do in the waiting period. We have a good strategy in place for the next nine months, and we will do a couple of things while we have the time.

Shifting Sales Activity

Last year was a busy year for us and for most of our fabricator colleagues. We more than doubled our volume, and most of Q3 and Q4 was focused on account management and onboarding new work.

My sales efforts focused on existing customers, making sure quotes got done, raw materials were ordered, the schedule was managed, and product was shipped. I spent many hours on the phone and email making sure we met customer expectations.

Moving into 2024, orders slowed, and I realized the pipeline needed attention. I admit, this is a rookie mistake not to be expected from a veteran sales rep, so I got busy building out our 2024 activity schedule.

The best way to feel better about slow sales is to beef up prospecting. I can’t count the number of times I’ve preached that activity leads to sales, so it was time to take my own advice. I met with our sales team and set goals for phone work, cold calling, and existing customer appointments. We created a calendar and set a meeting cadence for check-ins to hold each other accountable.

Most people work to deadlines, and I am one of them. Setting up a regular meeting schedule ensures that everyone is getting their work done and keeps the team in the loop.

I also spent time reviewing our prospect list. Creating a robust pipeline starts with having enough qualified prospects to call on. I look at customers we already serve and find three to five new businesses in the same industry. I also look at existing account locations and find businesses to cold-call when we are in the area for meetings. I recommend a prospect list of at least 75 to 100 potential customers. Once you have businesses to call on and a schedule for activity, it’s time to hit the road.

Marketing

I love marketing. I’ve done plenty of it and got great training when I worked in the medical device industry, but the pace of the marketing industry’s evolution has made it hard to keep up. I’m starting to outsource more than I once did (to a firm in the Twin Cities), and I get great ROI.

To set the record straight, sales and marketing are not the same thing. Sales is responsible for direct customer engagement. Salespeople knock on doors and handle account management. Marketing feeds the sales team with resources. Marketing also casts a net over the industry to build brand awareness and capture customers that the sales team misses.

I have several consulting clients in manufacturing, and I’ve found this industry generally struggles to accept and adopt marketing strategies. Manufacturing is a very hands-on industry. Marketing feels like fluff to a lot of business owners, but it’s not. It’s just harder, but not impossible, to track the effect of these tasks.

A slowdown in sales is a great opportunity to increase marketing efforts, and it doesn’t always mean spending a lot of money. However, it does take time, so refocus some of the time you were spending managing orders.

Some of the areas we’re focusing on are literature creation, direct mail campaigns, social media, tradeshows, and web. We use a targeted lit piece for various services we provide. You could also consider something industry specific.

I just worked on a piece for a client that focuses on the customers it wants to serve in agriculture. Targeted direct mail can be very effective if you have qualified targets that have been hard to reach. Sending them something catchy and engaging will warm them up for the follow-up phone call.

Most of your customers will never set foot in your facility, so having a modern website that performs well is critical. This will be how they tour your company. It can also drive lead generation if you invest in SEO.

Social media is a less formal and more cost-effective way to get content to your audience. You need to find a point guard for posting content on various channels.

Also, consider tradeshows. I like attending tradeshows to learn more about industries we serve and potential customers. Look at Q3 and Q4 and find one or two shows to attend.

2025 Planning

Yes, I said 2025 planning. Our business plan is very defined for 2024, but it looks out 10 years. This is our roadmap, and I use it throughout the year for planning, meetings with bankers, employee and customer communication, you name it. I can communicate our vision in detail, and that builds trust with our stakeholders. If you do not have a business plan for 2024, take this time to start working on one. Implement something for the last half of this year and set a timeline for fine-tuning it for 2025.