Please! When we say we don’t have the time to do something, what we are really saying is that we chose not to do it. We all have the same number of hours in a day. The only difference is how we spend them. Let’s face it. If top producing salespeople can find the time to prospect, so can you. The key is how you plan your work.
You should schedule a certain amount of hours each day for lead generation, and preferably at the same time each day so you can develop a routine. Treat prospecting like a scheduled appointment, just as you would a meeting with a prospect. You wouldn’t consider canceling a customer call; therefore you shouldn’t cancel on yourself and your future sales success by failing to complete your prospecting activities. You need allocate the correct percentage of time for sales planning, growing existing customers, winning back old customers and prospecting for new accounts. The different percentage splits will depend on your specific mix of business and how many current clients you already have versus prospects.
When you prospect this week and every week, you should look to fill the holes in next week’s calendar. New meetings should be booked in the same geographical locations as the existing ones to minimize unproductive travel time. Proper planning this way will allow you fit more into your sales day. It will also free up some personal time as well. Remember that workout you never seemed to have time for? Schedule it!
What Would a Sales Rep Do?
Many business development relationship salespeople ask me how they can sell more solutions or products so that they can increase their top line revenue. One of the overwhelming observations I make is that salespeople easily get distracted by production issues, pricing, contract writing, internal paper work and many other necessary activities that take them away from selling. You must be aware of how much time you spend in Revenue Generating Activities. If you keep a journal of how you spend your time on a daily basis you will observe valuable time spent in non-sales activities.
We are all really selling our time, whether you are selling a professional service, a manufactured product or business solution. Time is our most valuable resource. It is imperative to analyze where and how we spend our time;
- Are we pursuing the correct prospects—do they buy what we sell?
- Are we spending time selling to the right clients—do they appreciate our value/are we making money?
- Are we calling on the decision maker?
- Do we know when to stop calling on a prospect and move on?
- Are we making progress in building a trusted relationship?
- Can you get an appointment to move the selling cycle to the next step?
We must be clear on how we spend our time so we can be as productive as possible. It is understandable that we all need to perform a certain amount of account maintenance activities and paperwork to satisfy the workflow and billing process. Try to delegate as much of these time suckers as possible and focus on market facing selling and relationship development. Spend more time in revenue generating activities!
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