Where to apply slight pressure (and very little time) to leverage massive improvements in prospecting quantity, quality and closing ratio.
You will learn: 7 pressure points for more sales success.
The 4th biggest lie in America is that quantum leaps in sales productivity result from massive efforts.
Not true.
Assuming that someone has a basic skill set and entry level experience, quantum leaps in sales productivity come from slight pressure applied in just the right places.
If you know where to apply pressure (and invest a little time) you can see massive improvements within weeks.
Let me share 7 pressure points with you.
1. 90 minutes. Profile best targets to communicate with. Shockingly, it is not uncommon for salespeople to spend 50%, 60%, 70% or more of their time with people who are low-probability. Why wouldn’t you invest 90 minutes to insure that 100% of your time was invested with high-probability prospects? They are out there. Why not communicate with them first?
2. 2 hours. That is what it takes to get set up and trained on a contact manager. I prefer Goldmine, but others are more than adequate. If you are not using a contact manager you are not really in sales. If you are using a paper system, Excel or Outlook it is like going swimming carrying a bowling ball. You won’t be moving very fast. Invest a couple of hours ONCE and you will pick up an hour minimum of productivity EVERY SINGLE DAY.
3. 12 minutes. How do you distinguish between high-worth v. low-worth, high-margin v. low-margin, short-term v. long-term suspects so that you can consciously allocate more of your time to higher worth targets and less and less time to lower worth targets? You set up a simple coding system.
4. 15 minutes. Call or communication process. How often do you call or communicate? When? By what means? How can you schedule and keep track of it all. When is enough enough and where is the point of diminishing returns? Are you working your best process consistently? Do you know what it is?
5. 35 minutes. Write down what you will say when you hear a decision-maker say “Hello.” To those of you who say, “I don’t like scripts,” I ask… what is it you don’t like? Bring prepared? Saying in 30 seconds what now takes you 2 minutes? Not wasting words? Getting to the point? Communicating value clearly? Communicating specific benefits important to your prospect? If your fear is you don’t want to sound scripted… then solve THAT PROBLEM… but prepare and think through the best sequence of words to use to accomplish your sales objective.
5. 45 minutes. Write down the common objections and forms of resistance you hear. Craft responses to each one (there usually will only be 5 or 6) that could accomplish your sales objective. Be ready next time. See #4 above.
6. 20 minutes. Even when you don’t speak to your identified decision-maker, you can still reap tremendous benefit from a call. If you are aware of a few techniques you can obtain recon info on the potential worth of your suspect (so you spend more time with those worth more, less time with those worth less) and info that will greatly increase the chance of having a conversation the next time you call (direct dial and extension numbers.) This isn’t rocket science.
7. 60 – 90 minutes. Assuming you are calling a high probability target audience, if you don’t get a meeting, the odds are high that that decision-maker will buy your product/service from someone within 3 – 15 months? What is your Plan B? What do you do to get them into your sales process at a level lower than a meeting, communicate your value and worth consistently and touch them repeatedly, so that when they are ready to buy, they call you, know you, get your value and you are a step ahead of your competition. Plan B is critical to a high ROI for prospecting. Just a little bit of time reaps massive results.
So these are some areas for you to focus on. I was reminded of these when thinking about the results achieved by some recent coaching clients. The software person who went from 3 to 15 appointments a month. The person selling marketing services that doubled appointments (and with better prospects.) The employee benefits salesperson that went from 2 to 11 appointments a week. They all had basic skills and learned where and how to invest a little time for big results.
Best wishes for sales success,
Scott Channell
