Jul 18 2007
Carpe Phonum
“Whatever you believe you can achieve, you will; and whatever you believe you can’t do, you won’t.”
Allowing self-limiting beliefs to constrain salespeople’s performance, will in turn limit sales results because like everyone, salespeople hold stubbornly to private beliefs about themselves, clients, markets, competition, and even the economy – beliefs that can have an enormous impact, either positive or negative, on their sales performance. If salespeople don’t see themselves as providing value for their prospects and clients, they’ll tend to approach customers in ways that appeal to reasons for buying other than the customer’s genuine business need.
This is what sometimes leads salespeople to oversell (for example, pressing a customer to “act now” in order to get a low price) or to be too accommodating It also can lead salespeople to adopt unethical behavior, because they may try to sell a customer something that they neither need nor want. If they don’t take care of their clients’ best interests, salespeople will fail to build long-term relationships and lose customers.
All of this leads me in nicely to an excellent new book, recently published by a friend I have known for only a few months, but she is someone who has impressed me immensely with her professionalism, dynamism, application and knowledge of selling. Her name is Tammy Stanley and her book is called “Carpe Phonum”. As the title suggests, it focuses on making those calls that you keep putting off: But that doesn’t really tell you even half the story – I have decided to reproduce the preface in it’s entirety - it’s that good!
“Everyday all over the world sales professionals are waiting. What are they waiting for? They are waiting for the right time to call their prospects. No matter how much they visualize calling prospect after prospect on the drive to work, they quickly fall prey to a berating little voice that always suggests to keep waiting for seemingly good reasons:
If you call too early in the morning, you’ll be considered a noisome pest. Go get a cup of coffee and plan out your day. If you fail to plan, you know you’re planning to fail.
Better check your e-mail before making any calls. You never know when an existing client might need assistance. You shouldn’t keep existing clients waiting.
People are getting ready to head out for lunch. No one wants to be bothered by a sales person, when he’s getting ready to leave the office.
People are just returning from lunch. They don’t want to be bothered by a sales person, when they’re trying to get settled in.
Now would be a great time to call, if only you felt more confident in your script. If you don’t feel confident, the results won’t be worthwhile. There’s no sense in putting time into making calls if you aren’t going to get the good results you desire. It would be more advantageous to get online and learn about effective sales calling techniques.
Calling certain prospects could really influence your business in a big way. When you’ve mastered the new techniques/scripts you learned, you’ll be able to advance very quickly. It’s best to master those techniques before calling such influential prospects. You don’t want to ruin your opportunities just because you weren’t better prepared.
You need to be really organized before you make those prospecting calls. After all, once you make all those calls you’re going to have a host of new business. You had better organize your files and desk and put together an effective calling regimen.
It’s too late to call prospects. They’re getting ready to leave work. Arrive here all the earlier tomorrow morning, and you can get all those calls completed before noon.
If any or all of those suggestions sound familiar, you probably know what it’s like to hear a voice chastising you on your drive home from work because you didn’t make the calls you were supposed to make. Strange, isn’t it? It sounds quite like the voice that talked you out of making any of those calls all throughout the day.
Learning how to “seize the phone” requires investigating the voice that talks one out of making the necessary prospecting calls that advance anyone’s sales business. There are plenty of programs to assist sales professionals become more efficient during the call, and certainly it’s always beneficial to hone one’s skills. But too many of the sales professionals I’ve met and clients I’ve worked with report that it isn’t the sales process that trips them up – it’s getting themselves to actually pick up the phone. There always seems to be a reason why it would be better to call later.
Most sales professionals understand on a gut level that waiting for a better time to call is only cheating them from further expanding their sales business today. But getting past a relentless, fear inflicting voice in their heads is no easy task. Of course, if it were, top sales professionals wouldn’t be so desperately needed or so highly paid.
From my own experience, I’ve learned that the best time to call a prospect is as soon as I think about calling him. Waiting for a better time usually results in one of two things – never finding the right time to call that prospect, or waiting so long that by the time the call is finally placed, the prospect is already doing business with someone else and no longer requires the suggested product or service.
So how does one get oneself to the point that one can walk right past all those nagging reasons to wait and call later? In order to get sales professionals to “seize the phone”, a process is required. I prefer to compare that process to a baseball player going up to bat, and naturally having the goal to hit the ball, run to each of the bases, and finally cross over the home plate and score.
Getting to first base involves coming face to face with the voice that talks one out of making all those calls. That voice must be presented, discussed and revealed as the liar that it is, before the sales professional can move on to second base.
Moving to second base requires learning how to detach oneself from the persistent voice that nags and distracts but never points one in the right direction. The sales professional needs a secret weapon that effectively dismantles the seeming hold that fear has on him, so he can move on to third base.
Getting one’s feet firmly planted on third base occurs when the sales professional sees more to his business than the exchanging of goods and money. By opening his eyes to recognize the potential ongoing value he creates and the good that unfolds simply by contacting others on the telephone, he learns the greater aspects and opportunities of his business.
Finally, the sales professional must learn that getting to home plate is only accomplished when he takes his foot off of third base. He must come to grips with the fact that the sales process is a continual cycle, that everyday he must walk out of the dugout of fear, pick up a bat of immeasurable value, put himself in the game and start playing.
That is what this book is all about.”
This really is an excellent piece of work and I cannot recommend it highly enough:
Tammy Stanley founded and directs The Sales Refinery, a sales training firm that combines irresistible insights and humor to transform the bottom line in corporate and individual sales. Because of her self-revealing style, her captivating story telling, and her depth of analysis, Tammy is often referred to as “a true meat and potatoes presenter.” She analyzes and presents the often over looked fundamental aspects of the selling process.Through her keynote presentations, workshops, books and audio CDs, and weekly ezine, The Sales Refinery Insights, she inspires audiences to develop habits that yield success. Learn more at TammyStanley.com
Footnote:Tammy is one of only three authors who have who have been nominated more than twice by the Top Sales Experts adjudication panel at Top 10 Sales Articles which is a huge testimony to the quality of her work - JF
