in april 2024, i was offered a position to join Fresh Prints, an apparel company that focuses on creating merchandise for college organizations. being a business student whose goal is to adventure into sales, this job was exactly what i was looking for! my job as a campus manager is to reach out to my contacts in different organizations, or make cold calls, and work with my clients to help them create the perfect merch. over my past few months working at this company, i decided to keep a log of my takeaways from different aspects of the job as a time capsule of my journey with sales! here they are:
training modules - april 14th-10th, 2024
this was week was my first, official week working as a Campus Manager at Fresh Prints! my goals were to finish the training modules in order to learn more about the general company, how to use the website tools, and how to make sales. over the course of the twelve modules, one of the main takeaways for me was to keep trying when it comes to selling. this point was incredibly emphasized, and the training modules encouraged reaching out to potential consumers several times before giving up. of course, it makes me a little nervous because i don't want to come off as badgering the client, but i'm looking forward to testing out this sales technique! another thing i learned was general knowledge about the products Fresh Prints sells, types of printing methods, how the transactions occur, etc. as someone who has only ever been the receiver of merch, it was really fascinating to learn about the various aspects that go into creating them! for example, having to recommend to clients whether to use screen or digital printing, cotton or mixed material, etc. overall, i learned that, in this job, my job is to help consumers get their perfect merch not only design-wise, but also cost-wise! from what i've seen so far, this job seems much more customer-facing than i am used to, but i look forward to communicating with clients and letting them take the lead on their products.
finding connections - april 28th, 2024
as continuation of my training, my first task has been to make a list of all possible clients i could have and reach out to them. over the past few days, i've been trying to do this but it is more nerve-wracking than i thought it would be! the first thing i realized is how many possible clients i have off the bat---before this process, i truly thought i had no connections to anyone in organizations that would want to order merch. however, i'm starting to realize that connections are everywhere! whether it's people that i'm close to, have spoken to just a few times, or simply follow on social media, anyone can be a potential client as long as i reach out. coming to this, sending that first message was totally intimidating, but worth it! although the client wasn't planning on ordering because it was close to the end of the school year, they now know that they have someone reliable to help create merch for when we return in the fall.Â
first client! - may 1st, 2024
today, i got my first client! i sent a message to an organization that already worked with Fresh Prints asking if they any more merch needs for this school year---they replied saying that they did! my first goal is to figure out what products they want to order and how i can secure this client. i want to make sure that i communicate well, and keep the client in the loop about what i'm doing. as i learned in the training module, transparency when it comes to clients can be the make-or-break for making a sale!
first sale - may 8th, 2024
i made my first sale!!! some things i think really helped me throughout this process was being consistent with communication to the client; i made sure to always reply to her messages as soon as possible and do my best to fulfill her exact requirements. another thing that was helpful was adopting the client's vision and predicting what she wanted before she asked for it. being well prepared in this sense made the sale time much quicker. one more thing was keeping good relations with my client by texting respectfully, yet efficiently. this proved to be really helpful as my client referred me to someone else as well. overall, this was a really insightful experience and i can't wait to make more sales.
next few sales & gaining more clients - summer, 2024
i was able to make a few more sales before the school year ended, but the main hurdle i'm facing now is a quieter market since it's summer vacation. however, i continued to look for clients by making cold calls and sending out emails to event-based organizations. as it gets closer to school, however, i've been able to reach out much more people and have gotten many leads! juggling these opportunities at the same time has been time-consuming, but i hope to secure a few deals by the time summer's through. from this experience, i've realized that a sale can be to more than just the prime client (which, in this case, is a college organization)---sales applies to any possible consumer!