Do you know why you're showing up?
- Why are you doing all this?
- Salespeople keep score.
- What can you repeat?
What is your primary goal when you're calling on prospects? Is it to develop a relationship? Generate interest for your product or service? Educate the prospect? Establish credibility? If you ask a dozen salespeople, you'll likely receive a dozen different answers. While each of these activities play a part in the development process, they are not, and should not become, the central focus of your call.
The goal of calling on prospects, of course, is to close sales - that is, to go to the bank. Going to the bank is the reason you're doing what your doing with the prospect.
In the sales game, the score is kept in dollars - sales completed, commissions earned, profits generated, and so forth. Salespeople are recognized and given awards for reaching or exceeding quota, for opening the most new accounts, for reaching a certain level of profitability, and so on. They are not given awards for "developing the warmest relationships," or for their "exemplary performance educating prospects." And they're certainly not given awards for "winning approval from others."
Invest your time in the activities that take you measurably closer to the bank. Don't spend a lot of time and energy on the activities that don't - like worrying about what the prospect thinks of you as a person.
Stay focused on qualifying opportunities up-front, using specific criteria as benchmarks. Stay focused on moving those qualified opportunities forward in a predefined manner - toward the bank. Don't waste time on vague "benchmarks" like developing good relationships in the hope that one day, one of those "relationships" will somehow be so "good" as to result in a sale. You can't measure "good relationship!" Ask yourself: What has to happen in this relationship to get me closer to the bank?
How much time should it take to develop and close an opportunity? Let history be your guide. For instance, if it typically takes 60 days to close a particular class of sale, and you're 120 days into the process, you probably went off track. If you have misjudged an opportunity - if it has stalled, dragging on without measurable progress - let it go. Don't continue to "hang in there" because you and the prospect have a great "relationship," or because of the time you've already invested. If the prospect doesn't measure up, abandon the pursuit and redirect your energy on those opportunities that do.
Disqualified today doesn't mean disqualified forever. If there is a clear understanding - that is, an understanding that both sides can articulate - that he circumstances disqualifying the prospect today will change in some specific way in the future, resume your development activity at that time.
When you have specific criteria by which to judge an opportunity and when you make a commitment to apply and abide by those criteria, you improve your efficiency on each individual sale, and you expand your own potential for closing sales more quickly. With practice, you will learn to minimize the time spent with tire kickers and unqualified prospects. Your selling cycle will be shorter and your closing ration will increase. You will find yourself going to the bank more quickly...and more often.
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