Sales Prospecting Perspective Weekly Recap - Week of August 13, 2023
Another great week has passed and we had some really great blogs posted and shared.
First I wanted to recognize a video series done by OpenView Labs along with popular speaker and business strategist Dan Waldschmidt. In a series of 4 videos, Dan provides four sales strategies to warm up cold calling and connect with customers. In his first point, Dan discusses warming up cold calling and that it can be effective. “[You] can engage customers that you’ve never met before, if you have the right value,” he says in this video. “You need to have the right solution for a pain that they might have.” Dan's second strategy talks abouts value propositions and that even the most experienced sales professionals need to continuely work on their delivery and the best never stick with one approach. The next video is about the value of emotional intelligence and the ability to understand people and read situations. Dan uses football players like Tom Brady and Brett Favre to demonstrate how this quality can be a factor in your sales success. The final point discusses having an unconventional sales process due to so many competitive options for prospects to choose from. It's a great four video series and worth checking out when you have the time.
On to the recap.
Monday, August 13, 2023
Stephen Wolff, one of our senior business development representatives, led off the week with some tips for reps who find themselves in a funk. In his post Have You Lost Your Mojo, Stephen provides three ideas that have helped him pull himself out of a funk or "find his mojo". The first thing he recommends is talking to a co-worker and using them as a sounding board for new ideas. Get your mind off of things and approach your objections from a different perspective. Listening to music is Stephen's second idea, giving your mind the opportunity to relax a refocus your energy. The final tip from Stephen is to find something to stimulate your brain; trivia, a crossword, or his favorite, sudoku.
Tuesday, August 14, 2023
On Tuesday I wanted to share a great book that had been recommended to me by my father, Charles Duhigg’s The Power of Habit. In the post How To Change Bad Habits, I discusses Charle's book and a flow chart he released explaining his theory. It requires three main steps in order to try and change a bad habit; The Cue, The Reward, and The Routine. With the cue, you must determine what is causing the urge that leads to your bad habit. What/who is around you? What emotion are you feeling? What time of day is it? The second stage requires substituting a positive, or a reward, in the place of your bad habit. Instead of going to a bar to drink, maybe you go to the gym. Cementing this new reward into your routine is the final phase to accomplish when looking to change a bad habit. The book is definetly worth your time reading, as well as the blog (ok so I'm biased)!
Thursday, August 15, 2023
Director of Client Operations Craig Ferrara provided Thursday's post in There's No One Road Map To Inside Sales Success. Craig had recently sat in on a training session with one of his inside sales reps. He has always talked about the value in letting inside reps contribute to the messaging and the call plan, feeling this brings a higher level of comfort to the rep. In this particular training session, the rep took a different approach to finding the appropriate contact within a target organization. Instead of asking for the name on her list, the rep asked the administrator who would oversee the target department. She included the name on her list as reassurance to the admin that she had a contact at the organization, but she didn't want to waste time attempting to connect with an inappropriate contact. This was a great example to Craig that there is always multiple ways of acheiving the same goal and that giving your reps a little freedom to come up with their own style can have its benefits.
Friday, August 16, 2023
Our final post of the week is a two part look at what it takes for sales reps and inside sales managers to have a successful month. In the first post Inside Sales Monthly Success Tips: Two Perspectives, Laney provides the management perspective and gives her five tips for a successful month. 1. Meet with your reps on the first day of the month to discuss next months goals and to close the loop on the previous month. 2. Set up weekly meetings with your reps as check in points for the month so you can address any concerns or trends in a timely fashion. 3. Be a sounding board for your reps and have an open door policy so that you are always available and willing to listen to your reps. 4. Help your reps with marketing automation tools so that you can schedule out weekly emails that allows your reps to cast a wider net. 5. Make sure you are reviewing your use of training and automation tools and that you are using them properly and effectively.
That's it for this week's recap. We are getting close to the end of the month, so make sure your reps are on pace for goal, start studying what bad habits you want to change, and if you think you've lost your mojo, don't call Austin Powers, just read Monday's post!