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Earning the Income You Deserve

Will happen if you know how to painlessly and systematically prospect for new b2b business and you have your selling priorities in the correct order. 

FACT: There are NO SHORTCUTS in the DOING process. 

Training b2b sales professionals by helping them to understand and apply the tactical hands-on how-to’s is where I have spent most of my 25 years. Not in a training classroom but out on the streets in the sales territory. Yes, it is a long time. Let’s face it, it is the stuff of my life as Ben Franklin said “time is the stuff life is made of”.

When people ask me, as they often do, what have you enjoyed most about your sales training career? My answer is pretty much the same because it is what brings me joy and my feeling of accomplishment.  It is that I have invested my life, wisely that ‘my ladder has been leaning again the right wall’ in Stephen Covey lingo.

My answer is ‘seeing the light go on when a sales trainee finally gets it’. When that person realizes the currency of success in the selling game  is systematically filling the funnel with ‘qualified’ prospects who have an identified urgent need; true decision-making authority; and a concise understanding of what the sales person is selling. Once this realization becomes an urgent priority to be dealt with every week; then, my mission is accomplished.

It was 25 years ago, I believed that transferring the knowledge and skills was the difficult challenge to be reckoned with. Yet 25 years later, TODAY, to be exact (the day before my 65th birthday), I now realize it is really the second part which is the truly elusive challenge: that ’you have your priorities in the correct order’. This is what really matters most in sales. Getting my training clients to laser-focus on the essential activity of systematic and painless prospecting.

NOT checking e-mail or re-arranging the order of stuff on your desk; NOT hanging out at the corner coffee shop or the cooler down the hall. Having the iron-willed discipline to get down to the tactical business of speaking with real prospects; qualifying their needs; getting face-time and meeting their needs with your products and services.

In sales, everything else is secondary to getting the order and with it a check or purchase order to cement the deal. Chatter all you want about the up and down price of a gallon of gas (black gold) or the effects of IKE on the near-term price at the pump; the housing slump; the Recession, the War………..getting in front of qualified prospects……..determining their needs…………moulding your products and services to fill those needs; convincing the prospect that you can……….then, getting their name on the dotted line and their payment with their signed order………………….in sales…………THIS PROCESS is What Really Matters Most!

Three days ago, I sat down opposite a selling veteran I have known for some time who was making a lateral career adjustment. He was getting started selling a new service. He wanted me to analyze why he just wasn’t closing as much business as his new bosses thought he should be at this stage of this employment. I listened patiently through 2 cups of strong coffee and occasionally, I asked a question or two.

To my amazement, sat before me, a seasoned selling professional who, after all these years, had lost his way. Who was so distracted by the visions of sugar plums (fat commission checks) and promises of stacked commission spiffs that he had lost track of what really mattered most.

Yet, when I told him, he was almost indignant with surpise! Mark, ‘I said’, “you need to shelve all the crap and just get down to the business of prospecting’………….”FORGET everything else. Wrap your mind and your willpower around making the calls. Park that cute little PDA and sports car and plant your seat and start making calls”. He meekly agreed with me, when I asked to see his Calling Log Sheet and I pointed out how few calls he was making for each sitdown session. He was clearly a victim of the distraction of the trappings of selling success!

He was spending those commissions before he earned them. WHY wasn’t he making the calls? Was it a fear of rejection or, having to leapfrog the gatekkeepers; or, just doing the mundane task of making calls?

Make no mistake, if you and your peers, want to truly earn the income you deserve, it boils down to getting face-time with people who buy what you sell. Re-dedicate yourself to the PROCESS of systematically and painlessly prospecting. Every week, set aside whatever time it takes to book the number of ‘qualified’ face-time appointments it takes to exceed your weekly sales quota.

If you need a refresher course, I recommend you take a look at my newest eBook, titled “How to Get Face-Time with People Who Buy What You Sell”. Click on Purchase the eBook Now, in the right sidebar. My newest version is a PDF formatted version, chock full of stuff you can use to painlessly and systematically gain ethical access to decision-makers. It includes complete Phone Follow up Calling Scripts; a mailing campaign I used to get an 83% response; plus, how to get out of Voice Mail Jail. My newest version includes a FREE minibook you can download and read the Table of Contents; the Introduction and Chapter 3, How to Get and Use Ideal Testimonial Referral Letters; plus, my 1 Year Money-Back Guarantee. OK, that’s my shameless commercial plug!

Whatever you decide to do, I urge you to get back to the business of prospecting. My gift to you on my 65th Birthday is to remind you of this career enriching activity. Do it, NOW!

 

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