I don’t have to tell you most people are sick of the recession, rising unemployment, and the credit crunch.  Some will do nothing more than wallow in self-pity and cry “woe is me”.  You aren’t like that though.  You’re a fighter.

When you get served up lemons you make lemonade.  Well, your tax dollars are serving up the lemons in the form of a recent government report.  Here’s what the SBA is saying…

“U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) Office of Advocacy’s 2009 edition of The Small Business Economy: A Report to the President.

Some surveys have shown that owners are less willing than
in previous years to expand their small businesses, to hire additional workers, to invest in new plant and equipment, or to borrow money.”

Let’s take these sour lemons and make some lemonade.

We aren’t Expanding

You contact a sales prospect and say, “I’m wondering if you would be open to some ideas to grow your business without expanding”

At the closing table your prospect tells you they can’t buy because they aren’t expanding.  You say, “Aren’t expanding?” and listen to how they fill in the blank.  Then you lead into, “That’s exactly why you need this because the option we just talked about will help you grow your business without expanding here’s how…”

We aren’t Hiring

You say to your sales prospect, “I’m wondering if you would be open to some ideas to make it possible for one man to do the work of 3.”

At the closing table… “How would it impact you if I could show you a way for the employees you do have to do the  work of 3 people without working harder?”

We aren’t Investing in New Buildings or Equipment

To a sales prospect… “Would you be open to some ideas to extend the life of your existing equipment while reducing repair and maintenance costs?”

At the closing table…  “How much could you save if I could show you a way to extend the life of your existing equipment while reducing repair and maintenance costs at the same time?”

I’m not Borrowing Money

To your sales prospect… “I’m wondering if you would be open to some ideas to get (insert appropriate outcome) without borrowing or risking a penny.”

At the closing table… “Borrowing money?”  Listen to their response then adapt accordingly.  So for example, if the response is the potential buyer does not have the funds to make a purchase of that size at this time you might then continue… “If it weren’t for funding is there anything else keeping us from moving forward?”  If the response is “no” then you might respond… “What would work for you as far as funding?”  Then come to terms on a payment option.

These are merely objections not rejection.  What are the objections you’re hearing?

How will you turn those objections around and transform them into sales?

Coach Cheryl

Do it Yourself

Do it with a Little Help

Do it with Guidance

photo credit: Näystin

When you have no prospects all you can think about is finding a way to get prospects.  When you get those prospects you quickly find yourself overwhelmed because now you have the obligation to follow up and follow through with all those prospects until they either buy, or exit your sales funnel.  My friend Jonathan Farrington recently wrote a post about dealing with feeling overwhelmed with prospects.  His post got me thinking.

I get a lot of calls from people who tell me they need more prospects.  They are convinced what they want is prospects.  Yet, it doesn’t take long to get to what they really want.  Even though they are asking for more sales prospects or leads, what they really WANT is paying clients.

Money in the Bank Today

They want paying clients because those clients mean money in their bank accounts now.  They want clients yet they mistakenly think they have to ask for prospects to get those clients.  When that really isn’t the case at all.

Even though it can seem like mission impossible when you have zero prospects getting prospects isn’t all that difficult.  Because it’s not really all that hard to get prospects you quickly discover that once you get what you ask for… you start feeling overwhelmed.  You quickly find yourself overwhelmed because you try to manage those prospects manually when there is no need to do that.

Automate the Relationship Process

There is no need to manually manage all your prospects even though you think you have to.  The reality is it’s very easy to nurture and develop relationships without a hands on one-one-one approach.  Once you can do that you open the door to leveraging both your resources and your results.

Here’s the reason you ask for prospects when you want clients.  You ask for prospects because you already know your message is not powerful enough to trigger an action, or unearth motivation.  You are trying to push prospects to you when you could easily lead them along a path they already want to follow.

Tug of War

So rather than coming together in a positive way you end up in a tug of war with the very people you want as clients.

When you ask for prospects what you are doing is trying to find ready buyers among all the prospects you’ve gathered.  Rather than helping the people who are already looking to buy find you, you are trying to push the people you’ve connected with into a buying decision.  As you already know that’s a tough sell.  Plus it forces you into trying to control things you can’t control.

You can’t control when someone will become a ready buyer.  Some of the prospects in your sales funnel are apathetic about buying your services.  They know they probably should, and they’re thinking about doing some BUT they just aren’t motivated to do anything about it now.  Some are thinking they need to do something and are in the process of researching their options.  The ready buyers have already decided they need to buy and they are ready to do so right now.

Circumstances outside your control, frequently outside the control of your future buyers, can instantly change an apathetic prospect into a red hot buyer.  These sales prospects move from potential money in the bank to real money in the bank right now.

Every business needs both sales prospects and people you are ready to become clients right this instant.  The thing is you don’t have to settle for just prospects and work yourself to death trying to push those prospects into ready buyers.  You can set you primary focus on the ready buyers.  The prospects will follow.

This is so important I wrote “How to Get More New Clients in 9 Days” to help you get those new clients in your business now.

Coach Cheryl

Do it Yourself

Do it with a Little Help

Do it with Guidance

photo credit: Toronto Rob

It can be extremely frustrating when you see other business owners doing the same things you are getting clients when you aren’t.  It can be downright maddening, in fact.  You begin to wonder if the problem is you?

Well, if you have a pleasant personality and you sell a service that produces outcomes people are willing to pay for it isn’t just YOU.

It isn’t so much what the people who excel at sales prospecting do that empowers them to get clients.  It’s in the way they approach it including the order they do things.

Lots of service professionals offer a free coaching session or consultation as a first step in their sales prospecting process.  Once upon a time when no one else did this it was a successful prospecting tool.  That is, as long as you understood how to handle that free session and didn’t make the mistake of just giving away an hour of work getting nothing in return.  Ian Brodie shares my sentiments that giving away free coaching sessions or consultations no longer works.

Here’s why those “free” sessions aren’t working.

First, those free sessions have become so common prospects immediately recognize them for what they are… sales appointments.  It’s no different than your insurance agent offering you a “free” insurance review.

So, that free session does one thing.  It triggers your prospects defenses.

Once you trigger a prospects defenses it’s very difficult to overcome that defensiveness and gain their trust.

The second reason those sessions aren’t working is they are used in the wrong order.  Just think about it.  If you use a free session as the first step in your sales prospecting process you are making this offer to a complete stranger at the point they are most skeptical.  A “free” consultation or coaching session should only be offered after you’ve established a certain level of trust with the sales prospect.

Those who excel at sales prospecting develop these skills:

1. Research - They do their homework on their sales prospects
2. Science - They develop a sales prospecting process that respects the natural science of the relationship building process
3. Processes - They develop and automate the relationship building process
4. Listening - They listen and respond accordingly
5. Attraction - They pull their sales prospects toward what they are already looking to buy rather than trying to push them in a direction they don’t want to go

Increase your sales prospecting effectiveness by improving your skills.  Then if you want include a “free” session in your sales prospecting process rethink where you put it in the sales prospecting process and how you use it.

Coach Cheryl

Do it Yourself

Do it with a Little Help

Do it with Guidance

If my clients in the insurance and financial services industries are any indicator then I would have to say every sales manager in the insurance industry must tell every rookie that sales prospecting is something you have to hit hard when you are getting started.  However, they also tell those insurance rookies that once you have a client base you won’t have to prospect hardly ever.

REALLY???

If that makes sense then I suppose you believe that if you eat a really great meal on Thanksgiving you won’t have to eat again until the next big holiday meal…

If that were true I wouldn’t have people 15-18 years in the industry begging me to help them get sales prospects because they’ve found buying leads, sending out pre-approach letters, begging for referrals, cold calling, etc. just isn’t cutting the muster and paying the bills.  Here they are at a point in their business when they should have financial security with an eye on retirement.  Instead they see their revenues falling with little hope for increasing their sales.

Sales prospecting is a necessary process in EVERY business just like the other processes required to operate your business.  You either develop an effective process that produces the results you want, or continue to deal with sales prospecting problems.  You wouldn’t keep patching the tire on your delivery van if you ran a distribution business hoping it won’t go flat.  So, why would you accept an ineffective sales prospecting process?

Sales Prospecting Problems Don’t Go Away Unless You Make Them Go Away

Even if you work REALLY hard in the beginning.  You gut it out playing the insane numbers game.  Somehow you manage to build a business yet you will always need a sales prospecting process that produces new highly qualified prospects for you without having to work that hard to get them.  Once you have a client base you simply won’t be able to work harder at sales prospecting because there won’t be enough hours in the day.

Facts are Facts

Even if you have a huge client base now you will always lose clients through natural attrition:

• Some will move away
• Some businesses will close, some clients will even die
• Plus the needs of others will change

That means if you struggle to attract sales prospects now… the problem won’t go away.

Rather than having good prospects coming to you, you will have to go out and hunt those prospects down.

So, if you think sales prospecting is time consuming when you are starting out and only have a few clients, how will you feel when you have enough clients to keep you busy?

My clients tell me they feel like they are at the end of their rope.  They already have a lot of work to do: managing employees, taking care of clients, keeping up with their training and certification, etc.  Plus it’s been so long the thought of getting out there again and sales prospecting literally makes their stomachs churn.  They don’t want to do what they did to get where they are now the way they did it in the beginning.

Sales prospects don’t magically appear the only way to make them appear is to develop processes and systems that make them appear.  And does it in a way that doesn’t require you doing all the work.

I talk about this in “The Blueprint for Increased Sales” and go into the exact details for how to make it happen with my clients.

If getting sales prospects is a challenge then make the commitment to do what you need to do to develop an effective sales prospecting system as soon as possible.

Coach Cheryl

Do it Yourself

Do it with a Little Help

Do it with Guidance

If you absolutely dread prospecting you aren’t alone.  You don’t like doing it because of the way it makes you feel and the way your prospects react to your prospecting efforts.  No one wants to do something they already know will produce a negative result.

Yet, you have to have people to sell to so even though you don’t like prospecting you have to do it.

Is there a way to get prospects and actually enjoy the process?

YES

Let’s think about why you don’t like prospecting now and what you could do to get real prospects interested in what you sell.  After all if the people most likely to buy your stuff aren’t interested in what you sell you can’t expect a lot of sales.

Take networking, for example.  Right now when you prospect you approach a complete stranger.  After introducing yourself you probably do one of these things.

• You make small talk and walk away having made a connection but not a connection likely to go anywhere.
• You tell them what business you’re in and the conversation doesn’t go anywhere from there.
• You give them your elevator pitch and the conversation comes to another dead end.
• You tell them about your business and what you sell, and they excuse themselves as soon as possible.
• You ask them lots of questions about themselves then leave without telling the other person anything about yourself.

Or some similarly unproductive connection.  It’s frustrating, uncomfortable, and time consuming to make all these connections and have nothing to show for your efforts.

You’ve probably witnessed those bells of the ball that come breezing in.  They initiate a riveting conversation.  And before they quickly move on they have everyone within ear shot handing them their business card and asking them to give them a call.  While you stand there like chopped liver.

photo credit: Fernando Sacasa SerieB

How Do They Do That?

The good news is it’s a lot easier than you think.  Right now your prospecting efforts aren’t working because…

• You don’t have anything of value to say
• You don’t ask the right questions
• You don’t have an offer they can’t refuse

Prospecting IS NOT Selling

Never forget that.  Prospecting is about opening a connection so you get the opportunity to continue that connection.  Prospecting is about making an acquaintance that you take actions to transform into a relationship.

That means when you prospect your goal is to:

1. Engage
2. Interest
3. Extend

Prospecting is about starting a conversation that engages the other person.  The quickest and easiest way to engage another person is to talk about them.  If you want to get their interest you’ll want to talk about what they are already talking about and looking for.

In your case you want to talk about what they are already looking for in relation to what you sell.  That automatically gives them a reason to be interested in what you sell… a reason to want to talk to you.

When talking to your potential prospects don’t ask a potential prospect for the wrong things.  You’ve just met.  In most cases they aren’t ready to meet you for an appointment.  Only ask for the things they are ready to give you.

Finally, don’t make the wrong offer.  Focus on offering something with immediate perceived value that they can get without risking calling you or meeting you for an appointment.

Most importantly be yourself and focus on the other person first and foremost.

Coach Cheryl

Do it Yourself

Do it with a Little Help

Do it with Guidance

How many times have you or the people you hire to sell your stuff either said or thought these words?  “I hate prospecting!”  Probably more than once.  Rather than dealing with the frustration overcome the challenge so you can say, “I love prospecting for sales leads!”

The problem stems from the fact that most people approach sales prospecting from the perspective of trying to find people to buy your stuff.  When you should be focused on making your business FINDABLE by the people most likely to buy your stuff.  Once you flip that paradigm you’ll love prospecting.

Here’s why prospecting is so hard when it shouldn’t be.  You can’t effectively answer these questions:

1. Who are the people most likely to have both the desire and the means to buy your stuff?
2. What are those people already looking for?
3. Where do the people most likely to buy your stuff gather?
4. Where can you interact with and engage those potential buyers?
5. When can you interact and engage with those people?
6. Why do the people most likely to buy your stuff want to connect with you?
7. How do they perceive getting what they want?
8. How will you develop a relationship with the people most likely to buy your stuff?
9. How will you transform strangers into buyers?

In case you didn’t notice the information you need to develop for your business is the same information a journalist would require to write an article about your business… Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How.

Don’t just answer these questions based on logic and features.  You have to get to the driving emotional motivator that gets people who would rather ignore you and do nothing to act.  You need a message that drives people out of their do nothing zombie state and transforms them into alert eager to act buyers.

The most important question is the first question.  Answer that question and then do your homework and learn as much as you can about those potential buyers so you can effectively answer the remaining questions.

I know you don’t want to hear this sales fact.  You don’t want to hear it because you don’t want to believe it.  You don’t want to believe it because if you believe it… a whole bunch of your excuses are taken away.

However, for those of you who are ready to hear it this is an important sales fact you can use to your advantage…

You Choose Your Buyers

 Yep, you choose and you get to choose who you sell your stuff to.  So if you’re tired of potential buyers who…

• shop based on price alone
• complain and whine
• blame you when they don’t get the results they should because they don’t use your stuff like you told them to

photo credit: Dushaun

Stop selling to the lowest common denominator.  Face it, if you want to work with a bunch of high maintenance complaining price shoppers go work at Wal-Mart.  Wal-Mart is full of your kind of buyers 24/7/365.

I’m not trying to tick you off.  I just want you to realize you don’t have to deal with the frustration you may be dealing with now when you try to sell your stuff to the wrong people.

You don’t have to sell your stuff to people you don’t want to work with.  If you want buyers who…

• appreciate value
• respect you and what you help them get
• do what they need to do to get the value from your stuff

Go out and get those buyers.  There’s no reason to sell your stuff to people who make your life miserable when you can sell your stuff to people you truly enjoy and enjoy working with.  All you need to do to make that happen for you is…

• find out why those people buy your stuff and how they talk about it
• change your message to get their attention
• get your message in front of them

Now go out and get your ideal clients rather than simply settling for the quick sale.