Prospecting - Your Future is Dependent on Your Present
One saying seems to be appropriate in my business life and it
starts with, "if I had only... "It seems that hind sight is
truly 20/20. But when I think of all the decisions I should have
made or the actions I should have taken one fact stands out very
clear. I knew what I should have done; I simply didn't do it!
There are many good reasons why we don't do the things we know
we should. For example, when the doctor told me for the 5th year
in a row that my cholesterol was too high, I once again assured
him that I would start exercising and watching my diet.
About two weeks later I was at a meeting and during one of the
breaks a friend said that his neighbor had dropped dead of a
heart attack while taking a shower the day before, he was only
37. The next day I was talking to another friend, who said that
one of the men in his company had died of a heart attack over
the previous weekend, he was 35!
I was 47 at the time and started thinking, "If I had only
started that exercise program and diet control 5 years ago when
the doctor had first warned me, I wouldn't be so worried right
now." So I did, better later than never. (I had a good excuse
however, we were out of the country for 32 weeks one year and
everyone knows how hard it is to diet and exercise when you are
traveling. If I had died, they would probably have said, "If he
had only taken the doctor's advice and watched his diet and
exercised...") When I started sharing that story with a friend
one day the conversation immediately shifted to a discussion
about our experiences in sales.
For all of the training that we do in the art of Prospecting, I
am one of the best examples of the guy, who says, "If I had
only..."
You see, I have the same problem most sales professionals have.
That is the tendency to let other activities interrupt my
prospecting. The result is I often get to the point of where my
other activities start to run out and I realize that "if I had
only" kept up the prospecting, I would be comfortably busy, not
scrambling for more business.
It is really amazing how often we let the more comfortable
activities take precedence over the less comfortable, even
though we know that we will suffer for it in the future.
Knowing this I have tried to develop a system to prevent it from
happening to me and, being a sales trainer, I want to share it
with other sales professionals.
Business got slow for us a few months ago, because I had slacked
off a few months before that. (Just like I had told the doctor
for 5 years, I will do something about it, but really didn't).
So I simply began to use our system called Statistical
"Prospecting" ControlTM (S"P"C). With S"P"C you simply determine
how many people you need to contact each week in order to
achieve your new customer goals, and then just do it. Sounds
pretty simple and it is. But it does require some organization
and control.
We at least have all of the organization needs in our company;
the control is where I over extended. My problem was a tendency
to be overzealous. I figured that since I developed the system
for prospecting, therefore I should be able to use it most
effectively. So I decided I would make 10 prospecting calls a
day, to new prospects I had never talked with before. That is 50
a week. I was doing this strictly by telephone.
Well sure enough, the volume of activity I created very quickly
overwhelmed my ability to follow up and I had to cut back after
two weeks. I suppose I should read our own book where we talk
about not over doing it, but simply doing a constant number of
prospecting calls every week, week after week.
The conclusion is simple, regardless of how you feel, do the
things you know you need to do. Pre-empt having to say "if I had
only..." Because we all know that your future is dependent on
your present.
Sell Well and Often
Bill Truax Bill@BlitzCall.com