Your Sales Call Should Have a System
New sales counselors who start
out without a structured approach often have no idea how to do their job. They
ask common questions like:
-
“How do I start a sales call?”
-
“Where do I take it once I start?”
-
“How do I end the sales call?”
Interestingly, even experienced
sales professionals are revisiting these questions due to the fact that sales
have become more complex today and they realize that they will be less
successful by using their old process or by trying to take it by “oido” in this
new environment.
Take golfers as an example. If
you are watching a golf tournament on tv, have you ever noticed the routines
they go through? Have you watched the way they stand behind the ball and just
look at it? Then they anticipate the flight and do their little wiggle. They
line up their feet and their hands and only when everything is right do they
take the swing. They don’t just do it
once. They do it every single time. The same ritual occurs with physicians
preparing for surgery. These professionals who treat their jobs seriously and
aim to excel have a disciplined process that they follow. The process is not
mechanical, but it is disciplined.
This brings us to the sales
professional. Amazingly, many individuals in sales do not have such a process,
or do not practice it. Do you have a systematized approach for handling the new
client? Do you follow a similar process every time you are in front of a new
prospect? If not, do you really fell like you are doing as well as you could in
making the sale? Top salespeople are disciplined and structured and will not
risk their level of success by entering a sales situation without a method. I
never realized this before but our sales manager often drilled us a system that
enabled us to have this kind of discipline too:
- I read my list of 40 prospects I will call during the day (I prepare my list the night before) taking note of the previous conversations I’ve had with some of them.
- I will clear my desk, turn off my monitor, check the positions I’m working on and the telephone numbers of the companies I’ll call.
- I’ll make sure that everything I need is on my table already: job descriptions, background about my clients, pen and paper and calendar.
- Stay silent for about a minute, rub my hands, pick-up the phone and start calling.
Do you have your own systematized approach to sales? If so, please do not hesitate to comment on the page below.