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Why Following Up To a Sales Meeting Could Give an Aspirin a Headache Unless You Do This One Thing

Guest post by: Michael Schell

Article Overview: It's vital that you have a list of options for "next steps" when you go into a sales meeting, because once the meetings over, you might be doomed to eternal followup. Read on to discover ways to make your meeting end with clearly defined next steps.

Why Following Up To a Sales Meeting Could Give an Aspirin a Headache Unless You Do This One Thing

The cold call

You made a solid introductory call to a decision-maker you had never spoken with before and you set an appointment. Your success was due in part to the knowledge you gained by researching the company before making the call. So far so good.

The sales meeting

The day of the meeting comes and you arrive at the call poised and confident. You have a list of questions prepared and plan on opening the meeting with a quick 30 second snapshot of your company. Everything goes well until the prospect says he's got a hard stop at 10:15 am. The time? 10:13 am.

Wrapping up the meeting real quick

Ouch...just 2 minutes left! You were taught to summarize the key points of the call and you do. It's now 11am and you're ushered out the door. As you get up to leave you realize you didn't suggest any next steps, and before you can come up with any, the prospect says "Thanks for coming in; follow-up with me in a month...I'll be on the road the next few weeks but back March 28."

The follow-up

You're no rookie, so you know this means you'll enter the follow-up information in your CRM, and you'll probably get his voice-mail every time you call. A month later you make the follow-up call as promised and surprise! You get his voicemail. Who would have thought? So you leave a message to show you followed up as promised.

And you don't get a return call.

But you're savvy enough to know you can't take it personally. Decision-makers are busy. It's possible the meeting you had a month ago has somehow taken a back seat to burning issues and searing opportunities.

And more follow-up

So the cycle continues...Every single time you call you get his voice-mail. So a week later you leave another message. Still no response. Aggh...you knew it! But you know there must be a better way.

A Better Way?

Before every sales meeting, make a list of every possible next step. Many of these 'next steps' will be contingent on what happens during the meeting.

Here are some ideas:

· If they were properly qualified during the call, can you offer a demo or a trial?

· Can you schedule an information-based webinar?

· If your product/service is technical, can you arrange for your tech support to meet with the prospect's tech support?

· Is there a key player or potential user of your product/service that you can schedule a meeting with to help the prospect more clearly identify potential value?

· Can you arrange to send an email summarizing the key points of the meeting which they can share with co-decision makers who weren't at the meeting? (With an agreement that you can call the next day to get their collective feedback re any next steps)

· If they were effectively qualified during the call, can you arrange for them to speak with one of your customers who have similar needs as your prospect?

These are a few thoughts to help trigger potential next steps that are relevant to your selling situation. I hope this information helps as you navigate through the sales cycle.

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Article Tags: b2b sales tips, followup to sales, followup to sales meetings, sales career, sales expert, sales meetings, sales questions, sales skills, sales training



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