Net New meetings are the lifeblood of any dealership, and it is the fiduciary responsibility of the salespeople and their managers to make sure their dealership continues to grow and prosper. One aspect of this “Net New meeting process” is to prospect effectively using a variety of approaches, and this article will focus on one single aspect of prospecting: the Telephone Call.
When selling business technology products, there are three benchmarks that must be reached to achieve a sale.
These benchmarks, or “mini-sales,” can be summarized as follows:
- Should I meet with you? (Getting the meeting is the first sale)
- Should I let you make a proposal? (Writing & Presenting the proposal is the second sale)
- Should I implement your recommendations? (Closing the proposal, is the third & final sale)
Since we know that it takes 3-4 meetings to write a proposal and 3-4 proposals to close one sale, the typical sales rep should be setting a minimum of 6 to 8 Net New meetings each week to have a successful career. To achieve these goals, prospecting for Net New meetings is critical.
To answer the first question, “Should I meet with you?”, you must first convince your ideal prospect to agree to a meeting and, unless you have a well oiled machinery of constant referrals, the only other option is to prospect, and to prospect effectively.
In the business technology community most sales reps get paid a salary plus commission. We can break that structure into the following: the salary is for all the daily activity it takes to consummate and support a sale; as well as service, support and upsell your current clients. The commission is for your Net New sales results. It is both the right of the dealership to expect this performance and the fiduciary obligation of the salesman to fulfill his sales quote.
When accepting this arrangement (salary plus commission) it must be understood that in return for any salary, the dealership has a right to expect a sales executive to engage in a certain amount of prospecting activity as part of their daily and weekly plan.
How much time should a salesperson spend prospecting? Many coaches and academics propose that a salesperson should spend as much as 40% of their day prospecting. If done properly, your goals should be accomplished in about half that time.
To understand what someone should expect from their prospecting activity, here are some industry standard prospecting metrics:
- Phone 1/4 (Industry standards suggest that a rep should set at least one new meeting for every three to four decision makers they reach “live” during that calling period.)
- Email 1/15 (one meeting set for every 15 emails sent requesting a meeting)
- Foot Canvassing 1/10 (one meeting set for every ten companies visited)
- Social Media 1/6 (a rep should make one appointment for every six LinkedIn interactions)
With these numbers in mind here are some specific tips regarding the calling aspect of this program:
The prospecting for the week should begin on a Friday when the salesperson blocks out 4 ninety minute calling sessions in their calendar for the upcoming week, and the salesperson should set a goal of working on at least 40 prospective companies.
The best time to call is as follows:
- Monday afternoon (usually between 4:30 pm and 8 pm)
- Tuesday and Wednesday morning (7:30 am to 9:45 am)
- Thursday morning or afternoon (it may be effective to call during lunch hour as the full time “gate keeper” may be on break and the person answering the phones might be more likely to connect you with the appropriate party)
- Friday afternoon (many executives are surprised when I call late in the day on Friday and are usually quite impressed that I am working “as hard as they are.” This same theory holds true for calling on a weekend)
- Saturday (10:00 am to 12 Noon)
- Sunday (6pm to 8:30 pm)
Weekend prospecting can also be accomplished by sending a “delayed email” during the week that is set to send at a predetermined time. This is a great way to get your email to stand out from the crowd, and it also sends a message to the prospect that you are a hard working sales rep, and someone that a company president may want to partner with in looking at technology alternatives.
Call preparation: Each rep should have a list of 40 pre-researched firms identified along with some basic information before calling. This should include the name of the company, industry, executive name and title, nature of the business, and “how they make money.” You should also have an idea of the basic size and geographical information about the company to guide you as to the potential size of their technology before you call.
We have also discovered that it is far better to call 40 prospects 5 times each as opposed to calling 200 prospects, once. Calling the same prospect more than once shows tenacity, creates momentum, creates a better chance of opening a dialogue, and shows the prospect that you are truly interested and focused on getting that first appointment, and the odds of getting an appointment with that prospect are far greater than getting an appointment on a single call. Getting that appointment is usually called “luck”.
When calling a prospect, we follow this approach:
- Be prepared.
- On the first call, if he/she picks up, pitch for a meeting seven to ten days in the future. Otherwise leave a full voicemail pitch. Follow this immediately with an email, reiterating your voicemail and again, request a meeting.
- Follow this with a second phone call three days later and a second email five days later.
- When you reach a prospect, either set the appointment or move the prospect to a future list. At the end of the week, you should replenish the list to start every Monday with a full list, researched and ready to repeat the process. For example, if you made 8 net new meetings you would be left with 32 prospects to work on.
In conclusion, it is critical for managers to manage the prospecting activity of their reps. They need to collect the batting average sheet for each sales executive in order to help gain an understanding of where your sales executive is getting the most hits for Net New meetings, what’s the big ROI for their prospecting time, and what method best suits their aptitude (and territory). Knowing this information will help a manager or a sales executive create activity in the calendar that will bear the most fruit. Mapping that out over the workweek allows for managers to help salespeople accomplish their goal and do what they agreed to do when they signed up at your dealership. Spend adequate time effectively prospecting to set 6 to 8 new meetings a week.
Net new meetings are the life blood of any dealership and it is your sales reps’ fiduciary responsibility to the dealership to spend the time to get it done. Happy prospecting! And remember Make More Meetings, Make More Money!
