Pick Suspects with Care
Not all prospects are created equal, and it’s best to think of them as suspects until they are screened and qualified. This is a fact that seems obvious but is often forgotten.
The reality is that it’s very easy to jump into selling mode and mistakenly waste time dealing with someone who will never become a customer. Without a process for assessing the potential of a prospect, you are rolling the dice. You might get a customer, but more likely you’re going to get someone who will take your time and not offer anything in return.
Categorize Prospects
When you have multiple prospects, it can be a challenge to keep tabs on where each one is in the selling process. A touch-point management strategy is a must.
From sales quoting to billing and beyond, companies of all sizes need to make sure that these vital touch points are handled on time and effectively. Without them the relationship will most likely come to a screeching halt. Sensitivity to what a prospect or a customer is experiencing is crucial, as is knowing that the proper handling of the most basic of interactions can be what is required to ensure long-term, fruitful relationships.
Improve Your Prospect’s Situation
You can have the most wonderful product or service in the universe, but if it does nothing to benefit your prospect’s situation, he or she is not going to buy it. Take the time to understand your prospect’s situation, his or her needs and wants, and then show how you can help.
Never assume that what you’re selling just sells itself. In the vast majority of cases, it won’t. It’s your job to sell.
Move the Process along the Sales Pipeline
Often the sales process heats up early on and then fades before anything is closed. If you’ve done your homework and know that you have a qualified lead and a potential sale, don’t let the momentum die. Follow through, keep asking questions, and offer your assistance.
Don’t let a sale slip through your hands due to a lack of follow-through, and by all means, don’t expect your prospects to move the sales process along themselves.
Close New Business
Discussing the features and benefits of what you have to offer may come naturally, but it can be unnerving to take that final step of closing new business. This is often because many of us associate closing a sale with hard selling.
However, closing a sale is not a cutthroat maneuver; it’s just a necessary part of the sales process. If you’ve taken the right steps throughout the sales process and recognize that your prospect is ready to buy, he or she will appreciate the honest, mutually respectful discussion towards the sale.
About the Author
Adrian Miller is a speaker, a consultant, and president of Adrian Miller Sales Training. Her firm works nationwide, providing highly customized sales training solutions and business development consulting to companies across a wide diversity of industries. Adrian works with companies that range in size from solopreneurs to Fortune 500 firms, and her high-energy programs are well known to be practical, informative, results driven, and fun. Widely read in business publications, Adrian is also the author of The Blatant Truth: 50 Ways to Sales Success, and she is currently at work on her next book. She can be reached at 516-767-9288 or amiller@adrianmiller.com.
