Common Time Wasters of Sales Professionals
Common Time Wasters of Sales Professionals
Case Study – Real Estate Agency
A well-known agency insisted that its sales staff spend an hour a day door knocking their neighbourhood, introducing themselves to home owners who might be potential sellers. At the same time it did not insist that telephone contact was undertaken, and nor was there any strategic approach to telemarketing.
Statistical collection and analysis showed that the door knocking was not an effective use of the sales team’s time, and that more coverage, with better outcomes, could be obtained by having a strategic in-house telemarketing program that developed strong loyalty and public profile.
Other Time Wasters
Here is a brief list of other activities that are too inefficient for the sales person to spend time on and/or actually prevent sales staff from engaging in sales activities:
Hanging around shopping centres handing out pamphlets
Letterbox dropping (unless it's part of a well-planned, integrated strategy)
Sponsorships (unless they are a well-planned strategy, not just a self-contained action)
Casual drop ins (unless they’re existing clients, and have been scheduled, not just to fall back on because prospecting is seen as the tougher option)
Giving gifts/corporate souvenirs to people before they even become clients (it’s like a tacky bribe!)
Doing deals on the basis of a verbal agreement – no paperwork, doh!
Not having a proven schedule of activities, not diarising, documenting, tracking or analysing these activities
Being unaccountable
Allowing proven selling activities to be shoved aside (eg, not turning up to a networking event because a client called and wants to reschedule. Unless that client is leaving the country, this one is plain dumb because you are killing the goose that laid the golden egg!)
Turning office time into a social exercise
***
How to Assess Activities So You Choose the Most Effective
There’s only one way, and that’s to know your stats. Have a written plan of your sales activities, schedule them on a very strict basis, track their results, and analyse results regularly. If an activity cannot justify its existence or compete against better-performing activities, drop it like a hot cake!
If you set this up on a well-formulated spreadsheet it will spit out the meaningful statistics automatically, on a daily basis. Very few companies do this, and that’s why so very few companies actually survive. No-one would argue against the fact that it would be stupid to try to run a company without keeping financial records – and yet the majority of SME’s run their sales team without keeping adequate activity records! They track every dollar and cent, but they don’t track how time is used. Somehow it’s OK for that part of the business to be some kind of black box.
Very rarely do companies keep the sort of statistical data necessary to develop each sales person’s Unique Selling Equation with precision. The USE that you develop in this way will serve as the basis for concerted action on the part of the sales person, and will need to be refined over the coming months.
Analyse the data as you collect it, for each person as well as for the whole team. You want to know conversion rates, and the efficacy rates in ratio to each activity. For instance there may be an overall conversion rate of 30% of appointments. However one sales person may easily have a 30% efficacy rate converting referrals to appointments, while another may have 10%, and yet their overall appointment conversion rate is the same. This data is absolute gold to you and your company because it allows you to precisely pinpoint where and how superior performance is happening (and teach this to others) as well as precisely pinpoint where substandard performance is happening and address it.
If a sales-oriented company is not keeping and utilising these kinds of records, it is flying blind and surviving on pure luck. It’s only a matter of time before they’re overtaken by a disaster they didn’t see coming.
More help for sales professionals is available on www.betterbusiness.speedbusinessnetworking.com.
Common Time Wasters of Sales Professionals - To learn more about this author, visit Christine Sutherland's Website.
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So very few small businesses collect and use statistical data about the effectiveness of activities relating to the sales process, and as a result many business owners and sales managers are insisting that their staff undertake activities that are wasting time, and robbing both the company and the sales staff of income.
Case Study – Real Estate Agency
A well-known agency insisted that its sales staff spend an hour a day door knocking their neighbourhood, introducing themselves to home owners who might be potential sellers. At the same time it did not insist that telephone contact was undertaken, and nor was there any strategic approach to telemarketing.
Statistical collection and analysis showed that the door knocking was not an effective use of the sales team’s time, and that more coverage, with better outcomes, could be obtained by having a strategic in-house telemarketing program that developed strong loyalty and public profile.
Other Time Wasters
Here is a brief list of other activities that are too inefficient for the sales person to spend time on and/or actually prevent sales staff from engaging in sales activities:
Hanging around shopping centres handing out pamphlets
Letterbox dropping (unless it's part of a well-planned, integrated strategy)
Sponsorships (unless they are a well-planned strategy, not just a self-contained action)
Casual drop ins (unless they’re existing clients, and have been scheduled, not just to fall back on because prospecting is seen as the tougher option)
Giving gifts/corporate souvenirs to people before they even become clients (it’s like a tacky bribe!)
Doing deals on the basis of a verbal agreement – no paperwork, doh!
Not having a proven schedule of activities, not diarising, documenting, tracking or analysing these activities
Being unaccountable
Allowing proven selling activities to be shoved aside (eg, not turning up to a networking event because a client called and wants to reschedule. Unless that client is leaving the country, this one is plain dumb because you are killing the goose that laid the golden egg!)
Turning office time into a social exercise
***
How to Assess Activities So You Choose the Most Effective
There’s only one way, and that’s to know your stats. Have a written plan of your sales activities, schedule them on a very strict basis, track their results, and analyse results regularly. If an activity cannot justify its existence or compete against better-performing activities, drop it like a hot cake!
If you set this up on a well-formulated spreadsheet it will spit out the meaningful statistics automatically, on a daily basis. Very few companies do this, and that’s why so very few companies actually survive. No-one would argue against the fact that it would be stupid to try to run a company without keeping financial records – and yet the majority of SME’s run their sales team without keeping adequate activity records! They track every dollar and cent, but they don’t track how time is used. Somehow it’s OK for that part of the business to be some kind of black box.
Very rarely do companies keep the sort of statistical data necessary to develop each sales person’s Unique Selling Equation with precision. The USE that you develop in this way will serve as the basis for concerted action on the part of the sales person, and will need to be refined over the coming months.
Analyse the data as you collect it, for each person as well as for the whole team. You want to know conversion rates, and the efficacy rates in ratio to each activity. For instance there may be an overall conversion rate of 30% of appointments. However one sales person may easily have a 30% efficacy rate converting referrals to appointments, while another may have 10%, and yet their overall appointment conversion rate is the same. This data is absolute gold to you and your company because it allows you to precisely pinpoint where and how superior performance is happening (and teach this to others) as well as precisely pinpoint where substandard performance is happening and address it.
If a sales-oriented company is not keeping and utilising these kinds of records, it is flying blind and surviving on pure luck. It’s only a matter of time before they’re overtaken by a disaster they didn’t see coming.
More help for sales professionals is available on www.betterbusiness.speedbusinessnetworking.com.
Common Time Wasters of Sales Professionals - To learn more about this author, visit Christine Sutherland's Website.
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Linda RichardsonLinda Richardson is the Founder and Executive Chairwoman of Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company. As a recognized leader in the industry, she has won the coveted Stevie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Sales Excellence and she was identified by Training Industry, Inc. as one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals.” Ms. Richardson is credited with the movement to Consultative Selling and is the author of ten books on selling and sales management, including Sales Coaching — Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach, and Stop Telling, Start Selling. She teaches sales and management at the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton Executive Development Center. Linda is a frequent speaker at industry and client conferences, has been published extensively in industry and training journals, and has been featured in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Nation’s Business, Selling Power, Success, and The Conference Board Magazine. Learn more about Richardson's sales training and performance improvement solutions at http://www.richardson.com web - Visit Linda Richardson's Website |
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David AchesonDavid Acheson is the founder of DCJA Consultancy. DCJA Consultancy is a management consultancy business specialising in B2B sales consultancy. They offer bespoke and packaged sales consultancy including Sales Optimisation Review, Interim Sales Management, Sales & Marketing Review, 1:1 Sales & Management Staff Analysis, Management Training, Solution Sales Training, Creation of New Pay Plan, KPI's, run Customer Feedback Campaigns, assist with Recruitment, Coaching, Appraisals and set up Strategic Marketing Campaigns. David spent his early career in accountancy and then moved into sales in 1982, working in Office Equipment, IT, Advertising, Training, Outsourcing and Consultancy. He has held many Senior Positions in SMBs and Global Organisations including Head of Sales Operations & Head of Business Development. His knowledge, skills and great experience of the Sales Industry has led to David making keynote speeches and running educational sessions to key businesses through organisations including The Chamber of Commerce and Business Link. - Visit David Acheson's Website |
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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Leanne Hoagland-SmithAre your sales where you want them to be? Will you be one of the few who achieves sales or business success or one of the many who have failed to change? Are you tired of being told you are like everyone else? Then you may find my first book on sales of interest. Be the Red Jacket in the Sea of Gray Suits, The Keys to Unlocking Sales available at Amazon or at http://www.processspecialist.com/red-jacket.htm. This book is a reflection of my no-nonsense approach to improving sales to overall business results. If you are truly committed to making sustainable changes, then I can help you secure a positive return on your investment because I focus on executable solutions not telling you the problems you already know you have. From training to corporate (group) coaching to executive one on one coaching, my approach is to assess, create awareness, build a goal driven action plan and then execute. The bottom line question is "Not do you or your employees know it, but do you or they want to do it?" Please call for a free strategy session at 219.759.5601. - Visit Leanne Hoagland-Smith's Website |
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John BrennanJohn Brennan Ed.D. Dr. Brennan is President of Interpersonal Development, LLC, a training and development firm. Interpersonal Development has provided sales training and coaching to more than 3,000 sales reps from over 100 companies. A native of Australia, Dr. Brennan received his doctorate from the University of Rochester. His dissertation researched the effectiveness of Behavioral Modeling Technology in training people in interpersonal skills. While he has spent most of his career designing or delivering training, he was also a Vice-President of Sales of a training and development franchise with operations in 25 markets. Dr. Brennan has designed and delivered sales training in North America, Asia, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. He has been a guest speaker at numerous national and regional professional conferences. When Microsoft wanted Best Practices articles on sales for their web site, they called Dr. Brennan. The results are at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/FX011387391033.aspx His firm’s clients have included Volvo, The Prudential, Merrill Lynch, Eastman Kodak, Gannett, Equifax Europe, the Economist Group and countless small businesses. - Visit John Brennan's Website |
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George LudwigGeorge Ludwig is a recognized authority on sales strategy and peak performance psychology. An international speaker, trainer, and corporate consultant, he helps clients like Johnson & Johnson, Abbott Laboratories, Northwestern Mutual, CIGNA, and numerous others improve sales force effectiveness and performance. Though it's George's strategies and processes that help corporations increase productivity and performance, it's his tremendous energy and dynamism that spark the transformation. Again and again, clients remark on his amazing ability to unleash human capacity and inspire men and women to break out of their comfort zones. The result is a whole new type of salesperson. His customized presentations teach achievers to make stunning advances in their lives. From helping salespeople realize cherished dreams to helping corporations exponentially accelerate revenue streams, George Ludwig leaves audiences and individuals empowered, emboldened, and clamoring for more. George is the best-selling author of Power Selling: Seven Strategies for Cracking the Sales Code and Wise Moves: 60 Quick Tips to Improve Your Position in Life & Business. - Visit George Ludwig's Website |
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John PowerJohn Power, founder of Biltmore Franchise Consulting, has extensive experience developing and marketing franchises and business opportunities. He has been in and around franchising for over twenty years. From 1980 through 1990 he conceptualized, organized, and developed the American Video Association. He grew AVA to 2,000 national members, before selling the company it 1990. It was later merged into another home video marketing company. From 2000 to 2005 he worked as a contract marketing and human resources consultant to several local and national companies. In 2005 Mr. Power began working as a franchise development consultant on a full-time basis. Since that time he has helped more than three dozen companies initiate and develop their franchising program. He notes that there are many companies interested in developing a franchise program, and who need his specialized assistance. Mr. Power is a “hands-on” franchise consultant. He said, “I am the ‘nuts and bolts’ person who tends to the details for my clients.” Mr. Power holds a B.S. degree with a major in Marketing. See: www.biltmorefranchise.com You may contact Mr. Power at: jpower@biltmorefranchise.co - Visit John Power's Website |
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Anne BarrAnne Barr has over 26 years experience in sales and marketing, six years as a franchisee. She has assisted over 367 business owners and purchasers to achieve their goals in career change, transition and exit strategy. She holds the designation of Certified Franchise Executive from the International Franchise Association, Certified Business Intermediary from the International Business Brokers Association and Board Certified Broker from the Texas Association of Business Brokers. Anne is active in professional organizations, networking groups and volunteers for non-profit entities. As owner/operator of four successful businesses, Anne has proven people skills and enjoys helping clients find the right "fit" in business ownership. Visit www.FranchiseOpportunitySpecialist.com for more information about me and my company. - Visit Anne Barr's Website |
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