Boat sales reached a 13-year high in 2020, and demand continued to soar throughout 2021. Despite the frustrations around order backlogs and product shortages, the past couple of years have been a great time to be in the marine industry.

For some in sales, it may feel counterintuitive to keep the pressure on during a period of unprecedented success. But if we’ve learned anything from marketing mistakes by major businesses — remember Nokia? — it’s imperative to avoid complacency. Success comes from adaptation, focus and investment in ourselves and our futures.

Because of supply-chain issues and current economic concerns, we’re starting to see the red-hot market cool somewhat. Boat-sales organizations need to have a long-term view of their sales and marketing strategies, specifically for their sales teams.

We work in a relationship-based business where boat sales happen person-to-person. As a brokerage or dealership, your sales representatives are essential to your company’s continued success. They’re responsible for closing deals, building networks of prospects and maintaining customer relationships. Keeping them motivated to perform at a high level will help your business through the unpredictable market variables.

As a business owner, brokerage marketing director or sales manager, the question becomes: How do you inspire the sales team to maintain a high level of professionalism and activity? Without employee motivation and a sense of urgency to perform, your company’s bottom line will suffer. At the same time, think about how the process of buying and selling boats has shifted. More people are searching for boats digitally from their phones and computers. In 2020, MarineMax CEO W. Brett McGill told The Wall Street Transcript: “We had to sell boats without ever coming in contact with a customer. That solution was driven by our digital marketing and our ability to work with the customer remotely and allow them to see, almost feel and experience our products without physically having to come to the dealership.”

The Internet is currently our primary way of seeking out information, and consumers know they need to be informed before making a purchasing decision. Among the younger generation of boaters, the Internet is used almost exclusively as a means to communicate. Although pressing the flesh is still important to building and nurturing relationships, clients and prospects will likely find your business and interact with you online.

Digital Marketing Matters

We’ve seen brokerages and dealers spend immense resources on digital marketing strategies — creating sophisticated websites, email funnels, content marketing and the like. We’ve also seen many of these brands achieve more sales, leads, customer engagement, and improved productivity and efficiencies. The bottom line is that the brands innovating in marketing are winning big. We know that our target audience spends hours per day online searching for boats, and that selling boats is a relationship-based business. That said, let’s apply some digital marketing strategies for the sales reps.

First, more visibility means more opportunities to close deals and increase repeat business. So leveraging each member of your team as another marketing funnel will amplify your reach by hundreds of thousands of boaters. “Marketing yourself creates relationships that can last throughout a career, which is why each individual broker should be marketing his own listings, as well as him or herself,” says Steve Doyle, consultant for Apollo Yachts and owner of Yachts by Steve.

But how do you guarantee that your team members are taking action to build and manage their digital presence? Providing them with automated tools will be the most effective way, since many sales reps don’t have the time or resources to market and promote themselves. Their goal isn’t to be marketing experts; their goal is to sell boats. Still, your sales reps are an extension and representation of your brand. Therefore, it’s important that your reps show up in the digital realm. They each need a digital uniform that showcases the individuals’ skills, stories and services.

Take sports, for example. A sports team wears the same jerseys, but with different individual numbers. Each person playing on the team contributes a different skill set, all working toward one goal: to score. The same goes for your sales team. You wouldn’t want your sales team to show up at a boat show in an unprofessional outfit representing your brand. Providing them with a brand-approved digital uniform has the same impact as a boat-show uniform.

A basic digital uniform will consist of professional social pages and email campaigns cross-marketing to drive traffic back to a representative’s branded personal website, with backlinks to your company’s website. All updates from your company should be shared to each channel of this uniform, multiplying your reach by the number of sales reps you have. For example, Denison and United Yacht Sales provide websites to select brokers to showcase their business. Rick Obey Yacht Sales is another great example. The brokerage provides digital support to a number of its sales reps. These reps all have uniform websites and social media channels to show up professionally.

With this strategy, each sales rep shows up professionally as a representative of your company, improving your business’s reputation; your reach drastically increases, improving marketing ROI and increasing opportunities for leads and sales; and you create a white-glove user experience for clients and prospects by promoting your company at the person-to-person level. A common concern is that the digital footprints of sales professionals can cannibalize the brand’s marketing efforts. If done effectively, the opposite will be true, providing more opportunities for a customer to interact with the brand.

Team Play

Marketing teams create content that, in addition to being promoted at the brand level, should also be promoted and advertised by every member of the sales team to support the company’s overall marketing efforts. When marketing and sales collaborate to accomplish the same goal, it’s a win-win for your company.

The beauty of digital marketing is that it’s highly shareable. More exposure creates more opportunities for leads, sales and relationships with those who matter to your business. After all, whether the sale comes from a post on a broker’s Facebook business page or the company’s Facebook business page, it’s still a huge win.

Providing the tools for success, which include easy-to-deploy, easy-to-adopt digital marketing solutions for your team, will increase companywide sales and help your team be more productive. Providing top-tier systems can also serve as talent acquisition and talent retention (and growth) methods. 

Becca Eisenberg is the CRO and co-founder of ex.plo.re, where she helps marine sales brands and professionals stay at the cutting edge of digital marketing and technology innovation.

This article was originally published in the March 2022 issue.