Today I want to share some insights on why salespeople don’t prospect.
In our previous article, “how to actively prospect for new leads”, we mentioned that prospecting is not selling. As counter-intuitive as it may seem, prospecting is about connecting with people without the immediate outcome being a sale. It is about building the relationship of trust first. The logical next question is: Why salespeople don’t prospect?
Focus on building relationships.
Many salespeople only focus on the sale, and when they don’t get it, they get discouraged. This builds fear. By shifting your expectation away from closing the sale, you can positively shift your outcome to building a successful relationship. If building new relationships is your goal, it will strengthen your determination to make contact with new customers. Whereas if you expect to get the sale, you will feel defeated and like a failure within the first few calls. By not focussing on the right outcome of the sales call, you will build up a resistance very quickly, and it will be your first mistake which will prevent you from being successful in prospecting.
Continuously work on your prospect list.
Another vital mistake salespeople make when doing prospecting is that they don’t have a list of potential customers to call. Building a prospect list is just as crucial as making contact with potential customers. If you don’t have a list, then who are you going to call? Getting stuck without a list stops you from acquiring any new business. Mentally you can’t answer the question; “who must I call?” Work on ideas and strategies to continuously fill the list with names and numbers. Make sure that you don’t run dry.
Schedule your diary in advance.
In conclusion, the last problem hindering our ability to be effective in prospecting is our inability to plan our diaries. So let’s say you make the call and the prospect asks you when we can set up a meeting, and you don’t know when you will be able too, how can you respond to this? Well, you can’t! It is like having writer’s block. You will not be able to pick up the phone or write that e-mail because you don’t know when you will be in the area or when you will have the slot in your schedule—you’re pulling up the handbrake.
By planning your diary, in advance, maybe taking into account your physical sales area, you can schedule trips to outlying areas even though you don’t have a single appointment booked, yet! By knowing when you have time available, and when you are in a city, you will be able to pick up the phone with confidence. Make the call or write that e-mail, without hesitation, only because you know exactly when you will be available to give the prospect the attention they deserve.
Working on just these three things; we could get salespeople to overcome their fear of prospecting and start building a lead network that works! We have designed specific methodologies to on-board salespeople in Accrete where we share these insights and help salespeople attain prospecting success. Maybe it’s time to connect with us so that we can assist your team in achieving success with prospecting.
