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The Happiness of Pursuit

Guest post by: Tibor Shanto

Article Overview: In sales the pursuit is the thing, real sales people enjoy the process as much as the outcome. Of course if you are not getting the results, it is hard to like the process.

The Happiness of Pursuit

I don't know what it is, but all too many sales people tend to give up on opportunities way too soon, perhaps it is ADHD (all good sales people share this condition, if you don't, consider another career), a lack of patience, or some other factor. Not sure, but the fact is that a lot of reps leave money on the table for their competitors after having done a good job of starting things off right. You see this not only when pursuing a lead to convert to a prospect, but also once they have engaged with a prospect, they give up when they could have converted the opportunity with a bit of planning and focus.

I want to be clear, what we are talking about are viable opportunities that with a proper plan, and execution based on a process, could easily be converted into customers. Not those where there is no decision at all, but the opportunities where you decide to move on, then your competitor comes along and wins the deal; they win not so much based on product or skill, but based on persistence and execution.

There is a fine line between productively pursuing a real opportunity, and being the dog with a bone that just will not let go no matter what. This is why it is important to have a clearly defined process for both things above the pipe, and opportunities in the pipe. Rules with clear definitions and workflows that help us understand and decide what we chase and when, and what we leave for another day, or completely abandon. Measured against those rules we can utilize our time on those activities with those prospects or leads that will produce consistent and desired results; at times those results will be realized in the near or immediate term, other opportunities will take longer to deliver results. The goal is to have a blended approach, or what may be referred to as a blended pipeline that will smooth out ups and downs, feed us regularly and get us to our target every month, quarter or year.

This is key, there are all too many sellers who squander potential opportunities, and even worse tee up opportunities for the other guy. It is encouraging to see that more organizations are doing a better job of nurturing leads, using Sales 2.01.15 tools to ensure that by the time a sales rep touches the lead, it is much more "primed" or ready for that contact. Many are utilizing rules to create workflow to determine what happens after first contact if there is no immediate engagement. Without such a "Contact Strategy" in place, and disciplined execution and adherence, many leads fall between the cracks and are never realized, at least by you.

Despite the strides made, many sales people give up on opportunities way too early, this manifests itself in a couple of ways. They are given a lead; they try it a few times (with varying degrees of energy) and then give up. Depending where you read, it takes as much as six to ten touch points before some leads will engage with a seller on any level; or more importantly will consider engaging on the topic or service you represent. Yet many reps will give up after five tries; "I don't want to stalk them", believe me the injunction order is much further on.

Remember the prospect is indifferent early in the process, touch points at this stage are not vendor specific, but just touch points. Many try four or five times (above average), and then move on. Then your competitor comes along and reaches out three times (more typical), but to the prospect these are touch points six, seven, and eight. After the eighth touch – bingo, the nickel lands and the lead responds, and your competitor doesn't even thank you for the set up, just goes in and makes the sale. "Man, wasn't their timing and skill just great"; no, it is more accurate to say that your timing was wrong; what was wrong was giving up too early.

How do you "touch" a buyer so many times without a negative backlash? Well first off, you don't do it constantly, one of the reasons for having many leads is the ability to rotate them, "campaigning" a handful at a time. Some will engage, some will not; of the ones that won't, you'll need to decide which are worth putting back into you "leads funnel" for further "nurturing", and which are abandoned or given a much lower priority.

Those leads are placed back into your leads funnel, and then continue to go through your "Contact Strategy" process until it's time to campaign them again.

But when they are being campaigned, seven to nine touch points in the course of two to three weeks is easy to execute, and as stated above, you will not have an injunction order placed against you. You will have to use a blended approach, voice, e-mail, voice mail, and or social media. This is why voice mail is so important, even if you do not get an immediate reaction or any call back; it is still a touch point.

Similar thought and execution process can be applied to converting prospects to clients, persistence does not have to be limited to converting leads to prospects. Real follow through is key; this follow through has to be built on two things, a plan, a variation of the "Contact Strategy"; the second is information obtained from the prospect matched against market events. With all the tools available today, following up at the right time for the right reason is child's play, yet many reps just don't do it. One thing I hear over and over from clients is that "your timing and persistence is why we chose to go with you." Both of those are easy to achieve, if you have nothing more than an Outlook calendar, access to Google News, and entry level Sales 2.01.15 tools like LinkedIn and Twitter you have the means to work on current live active opportunities, while staying on top of, priming, and passively managing inactive opportunities. Timing is not a random thing, it is a result of a process properly and methodically executed, the silver bullet is the execution.

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Article Tags: prospecting, renbor, Sales, sales success, tibor shanto



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Re: The secret to happiness - Happiness comes from within. We choose whether we want to be happy or not. Circumstances can influence our feelings, but in the end, it's up to us how we deal with our circumstances, positively or negatively. I admire anyone who can stay strong and be happy through adversity. There will always be challenges that we face, but I believe that if we face them with our heads held high, the odds of overcoming them are much greater. This reminds me of the movie "The Pursuit of Happyness." Happiness spelled wrong for a reason. One of Will Smith's greatest movies. I encourage you all to watch it as it's very inspiring.
Re: Are you really happy? - So true Yinka. Happiness comes from within. MichelleJ
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