Posts Tagged Sales Performance Improvement
Confronting an Under-Performing Sales Rep
Posted by Rick Pranitis in GENERAL DISCUSSION, SALES LEADERSHIP on September 22, 2012
Every sales coaching workshop that I deliver I ask sales managers, “How many of you have a performance problem with a sales rep that is just unacceptable, and you know you need to address the situation?” Everyone raises their hand. Then I ask, “How long have you known this?” The answer I hear is often months, and occasionally years. Clearly, many sales managers have tremendous difficulty confronting an under-performer, and so they keep putting it off.
There are a variety of reasons why sales managers avoid this most difficult of all conversations. Sometimes it’s just a time management issue – the sales manager has many other more pressing issues to deal with. Another reason is that the sales manager blames him or herself for the salesperson’s lackluster results – “I haven’t provided the salesperson with enough ongoing coaching” or “I need to provide this person more training.” So the sales manager accepts personal responsibility for the rep’s performance problem, but that’s not right.
The simple truth for sales managers is that your team is only as strong as your weakest performer. You can say all you want to about sales performance, but your actions speak louder than words. Everyone on your sales team looks at the lowest producer as the minimum level of sales production necessary to stay on your sales team.
When you fail to address a sales performance problem you send a message to everyone else on the sales team – that you tolerate mediocrity. Face this issue now. Have the tough conversation. Don’t let another day go by without addressing this performance problem. And before you have this “positive confrontation” conversation, jot a few notes down next to the following checklist so you are properly prepared:
- What aspect of this person’s performance (and/or skills and attitude) is unacceptable? Be very specific about what the person must change. Be prepared to provide examples.
- Why has the person not been performing up to expectation? As the sales coach, you must assess the performance problem. Is it the rep’s lack of skill, a lack of will, or both? During the meeting, ask questions to either confirm or disprove your analysis of the situation. You never know what might come out here. I once had a salesperson break down in tears in my office about his marital problems.
- Why should the person make these changes? Remember that Skill + Activity = Sales Results. All too often sales managers, when communicating expectations to the team, focus on the outcome expected (sales quota) rather than the inputs necessary to achieve the outcomes, and the importance of each step in that process. When you explain “why” a certain task must be accomplished with a certain amount of quantity or quality, you are also explaining why it cannot be avoided.
- What should the consequences be if the salesperson does not make these changes? Another conversation with the manager? A written warning in their personnel file? Termination? You must be prepared to explain in very clear terms exactly what will happen if the changes are not made.
- The “Two-Roads” Discussion One sales manager with whom I’ve worked refers to this is the “Two Roads” part of the discussion. “Ms. Or Mr. Under-performer, you have reached a fork in the road. If you continue down the path that you have been on this is what the consequences will be… However, there is another path for you to choose, and it leads to greater sales performance, more money, etc.” Ultimately, the responsibility for change is the rep’s responsibility, not yours. If coaching or training is required, or would help the situation, then do it now.
Peak performance sales managers do not accept mediocre performance. They realize that their entire sales team is watching how they handle the under-performer. They accept the responsibility for their role, and if someone is not performing up to expectations they address the problem sooner, rather than later.
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This article was originally posted on the TopLine Leadership Blog by Kevin Davis on September 18, 2012
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Does Your Sales Dashboard Have The Right Indicators?
Posted by Rick Pranitis in GENERAL DISCUSSION, SALES LEADERSHIP on September 20, 2012
The idea of a sales dashboard is appealing. What business manager wouldn’t like to run their company like a well-oiled machine, with the help of a few select indicators? But in practice, it is ironically the choice of these indicators which can stall the effectiveness of the sales dashboard…
Every company is certainly different, and it goes without saying an industrial equipment maker cannot manage its sales process (for example) like a travel agency, or a service provider. However, here’s some tips on zeroing in on the right indicator can be helpful in the majority of situations.
Choose indicators which are useful throughout the sales process – As the saying goes, you shouldn’t count your chickens until they hatch. Nevertheless, you want to manage your sales process continuously, not just once a quarter. It’s important to avoid indicators which only become meaningful at the end. For example, “Actual/Projected sales” is more useful when compared to its historical average at that stage of the quarter.
Be selective – you start with the laudable intention to stick to the essentials, but find yourself a few months later with a computer screen that looks more like a spacecraft cockpit than the clear-cut dashboard of your dreams. To be more selective, ask yourself this question before adding another indicator to your sales dashboard: is it directly related to what your company is trying to achieve (i.e. prospects progressing along your pipeline), or is it merely informative?
Choose actionable indicators – avoid indicators which look sexy but don’t bring anything tangible to the table. A traditional indicator that clearly points you in the right direction is better than a “sophisticated” one which needs to be explained to everyone and even leaves you scratching your head.
Favor dynamic indicators – one which measures a sales team’s progress. A static indicator only measures an activity. For example, “Number of leads qualified/Week” is a dynamic indicator, while on the same subject “Number of qualification calls/Week” is a static indicator. From this example we can infer that a dynamic indicator is naturally outward-looking (i.e. focused on prospect dynamics) while a static indicator is often inward-looking (i.e. concerned with your team’s processes).
Beware of environmental indicators – those which are focused on your company’s environment (e.g. “Number of RFPs in my sector”) are most certainly outward-looking. Yet, do they belong on your sales dashboard? Not especially. You’re interested in your company’s performance, which only indirectly depends on its environment. Environmental indicators are rarely actionable, unless you are matching them to a triggering threshold. For example, you could decide to re-contact your existing client base systematically when the number of RFPs in your sector falls below a threshold of ten per month.
Certainly there are others, more specific to your particular situation. The objective here is to give you a starting point. Get you thinking about what’s key to steer your sales process to success. As always I’m interested in what you think and what you’ve found to be effective in your sales dashboard. I invite your comments, ideas and suggestions.
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Five winning strategies of the world’s top sales organizations
Posted by Rick Pranitis in GENERAL DISCUSSION, SALES LEADERSHIP on September 12, 2012
The team at McKinsey and Company evaluated the results of over 700 sales projects and identified the companies that consistently delivered industry-leading sales performance, that is companies which grew their revenues an average of 48% faster and their EBITA 80% faster than their peer groups over a five year period.
What were their common characteristics? It turns out that size, geography and what they sold had little effect on performance. It was how they sold which drove the differences.
Here are the five common strategies which McKinsey determined characterized the top performers:
They found growth where their competitors could not. Top-performing sales organizations tended to both look far ahead – an average of 10 quarters – and uncover growth opportunities in the near term. Perhaps most telling, top performing sales organizations practiced micro-segmentation. They divided their potential markets into as many as 100 or more cells and identified areas where significant growth potential existed even when the overall market growth appeared slow or stagnant.
Key take-away: take a look at your current approach to market segmentation and targeting. Are you looking at a sufficiently granular level to identify the pockets of segment-leading growth potential?
They sold the way their customers wanted to buy. There’s no excuse any more for basing your sales process and sales pipeline stages around sales activities, rather than stages in the buying decision process, and the results of the top sales performers validate this strategy. In a striking validation of the “Challenger Sale” philosophy, McKinsey also pointed out that top performers focused their attention on the prospects for which they had something original to offer.
Key take-away: even if it means dramatically restructuring the way you manage your marketing and sales processes and pipelines, you must refocus your efforts on understanding, tracking and facilitating your prospect’s buying decision process.
They freed up their sales people to sell. Sales people in the top-performing sales organizations tended to spend far more of their time on customer-facing front-line sales activities rather than wasteful back office administration, and it’s no accident that these organizations used technology and process as key weapons to make their sales people more productive.
Key take-away: look carefully at what your sales people are currently spending their time doing, and systematically eliminate or offload any tasks that are not directly contributing to the customer sales experience.
They focused on developing their people. The top-performing sales organizations not only recruited thoughtfully, they also implemented induction programmers that served to turn “rookies into rainmakers” far faster and more effectively than their competitors. They established a tempo for reporting and targeted intervention that helped the sales people with potential to realize that potential faster. They inoculated the whole sales organization with the winning habits of their top performers, and they refused to leave new hires to “sink or swim”.
Key take-away: the consequences of making a bad hire are horribly expensive. First, make sure that you recruit for attitude and not just experience. Then, involve every new hire in a carefully crafted skills transfer, induction and mentoring program.
They expected exceptional performance. The top performing sales organizations drove growth from the top. They set stretching targets, challenged the status quo, established role models, and created a culture that expected results. The pains they took to equip their sales people to be successful were balanced with the expectation that their sales people would succeed, and persistent poor performance was constructively addressed.
Key take-away: if you have taken pains to establish a winning environment (and only if you have), and invested in recruiting and developing the right team, it is reasonable to expect your sales people to rise to the challenge.
So there you have it: five winning strategies which have driven exceptional results for the organizations that have put them into practice. Together, they make a smarter approach to accelerating revenue growth. It should be noted: none of these winning habits require huge budgets or large staffs. All they require is smart thinking, focus, discipline and willpower. So if your organization hasn’t yet put every one of these principles into practice, what’s holding you back?
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This article was originally posted by Bob Apollo in the Inflexion Point Blog on June 12, 2012
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Turning Customer Complaints into Productive Communication
Posted by Rick Pranitis in CUSTOMER SERVICE on September 10, 2012
Fielding complaints is often considered the most difficult and least enjoyable part of a career in Sales and the Customer Service profession. However, in their book Complaint Management: The Heart of CRM, Bernd Stauss and Wolfgang Seidel assert that it is also the most important element for any successful business. The authors found that effectively handling complaints doesn’t just keep a company from losing customers – it actually builds happier, more loyal customers. In short, someone who lodges a complaint and walks away satisfied becomes a better customer than those people who keep their gripes to themselves.
Dealing with a fired-up, dissatisfied customer doesn’t have to be a nightmare. In fact, when handled with skill and understanding, these interactions can be rewarding experiences, both personally and professionally. Here’s some advice to keep in mind to help you keep things positive;
It’s Not Personal – anger is an off-putting emotion. It pushes the recipient to respond in kind and leap to a defensive position before launching a counterattack. Customer service professionals know better. They step back and assess the situation. What do angry people need? First and foremost, they need to blow off steam. They need to feel they have the listener’s attention, that they are being heard and understood. They are not angry with an employee; they are angry with the product or service that has failed to meet their expectations.
During this initial phase, it is important to give affirming verbal cues. If the customer is lodging a complaint in person, the recipient’s body language should be open, understanding and earnest. As is often the case in any business interaction, keeping quiet is probably wise at this stage of the game. In the best-case scenario, the customer will talk himself/herself through the problem and may even reach a solution that works for all parties involved.
Work to Understand – effectively managing a complaint is dependent upon accurate and insightful fact-finding early in the conversation. Asking the right questions shows the customer that the company’s representative is anxious to resolve the problem. It also should elicit feedback that will help the company improve its product and process. As Stauss and Seidel make clear, there are two objectives in handling a complaint: to satisfy the customer and to aggregate and report data provided from these interactions to prevent future occurrences.
Assuming the customer service professional stayed calm and listened to the content – rather than the emotion – of the complainant’s opening salvo, this step is the logical follow-up. If parts of the complaint didn’t make sense, this is the time to fill in those gaps and get a complete picture of the situation.
Genuinely Empathize – the most important aspect of customer service is taking responsibility for the customer’s experience, from initial contact to resolution. That means making a personal connection. In today’s automated, hyper-segmented business world, consumers can feel adrift in a sea of buck passers. True customer advocates are rare and valued.
As the management training company MTD Training discusses in its e-book Dealing with Conflict and Complaints, if a company has not implemented or acted on a strategic complaint management system, there is a good chance a customer service rep has dealt with the same complaint multiple times in the same day. The trick is to beat back complaint fatigue and step into the customer’s shoes. It may be just another call to you but to the person on the other end of the line, it’s a make-or-break deal that will dictate future business decisions.
Know the Corporate Culture – everyone has heard the cliché: “The customer is always right.” It sounds good but it may not be de facto policy in all companies. In order for customer service professionals to be effective, they must be familiar with the decision-making models and tools at their disposal. In general, small, up-and-coming businesses will do whatever it takes to retain a loyal customer base. In contrast, large corporations have the flexibility to undertake a more complex cost-benefit analysis, asking the question: “How much is the continued business of this customer really worth?” It sounds harsh but it may be the reality for some big businesses.
Customer service employees must understand what their supervisors expect of them and how much authority they have to resolve complaints. That way, they can steer angry customers toward officially sanctioned solutions, whether that means refunds, replacements, store credit or other perks. Ideally, managers will give their employees the autonomy to handle conflicts. Not doing so simply creates a cumbersome bureaucracy of middle management, not to mention increasingly agitated customers who are weary of demanding to “speak to a supervisor.”
Communicate Openly and Follow Up Often – again, it’s all a matter of taking responsibility for a customer’s dissatisfaction to ensure they feel they have a trusted friend on the inside. If the complaint and proposed resolution are complex and require a supervisor’s approval, it is vital to stay in frequent contact with the customer and provide status updates. If the matter is simpler, a quick synopsis of the plan of correction should suffice, with a follow-up call to ensure all went as expected.
Successfully defusing an explosive situation can provide a feeling of great accomplishment. In many ways, customer service professionals are the frontline heroes of the business world. Not only do they keep customers satisfied and coming back for more, they provide the rest of the company with crucial data necessary to improve operations and increase the all-important bottom-line.
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This article was originally posted on the CustomerThink Blog on August 9, 2012.
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Sales Pipeline Review and Evaluation
Posted by Rick Pranitis in GENERAL DISCUSSION, SALES LEADERSHIP on September 6, 2012
An important and vital responsibility of a Sales Manager is a regular review of their sales peoples’ pipeline. But repeated pipeline reviews are often a source of stress between sales managers and sales people. As you might expect, there are the usual focus points when it comes to questions at a typical pipeline review:
- What deals will close this month?
- What cover does the sales person have to meet their quota?
- How much of the pipeline is new business versus add-on?
- How does the pipeline feel relative to other months?
- Is marketing delivering on their lead gen targets?
- What are the next steps in the sales process?
- Is senior management from the prospect engaged?
- What is the average deal size?
- Where is the competition on individual deals?
Invariably most sales people, who are under pressure to deliver, will try to concentrate the discussion on Marketing’s contribution to inbound leads. While this may be a valid concern it can quite often hide the fact the salesperson’s own management of their pipeline is poor. A good salesperson will generate continued input to their pipeline in the absence of leads from other sources. A bad salesperson will hide behind Marketing and try to mask their under performance by inflating their pipeline with opportunities which are not likely to close.
So what is a good leading indicator of this, or where should the manager look? The place to start is the average age within the pipeline of new business. If the average age of closed/won business is significantly lower than the average age of open or closed/lost opportunities, then it’s highly likely the sales person is holding onto deals which won’t close instead of creating and adding new opportunities to their pipeline. The tendency to “beat a dead horse” rather than cold call is very strong in inexperienced sales people or those who are accustomed to a regular supply of leads from Marketing. A simple view of the average age of the pipeline by sales stage will highlight if there is an issue. If the average age of open opportunities is more than one and a half times that of closed/won deals then further investigation is required.
Encouraging and training the sales person in understanding a better use of their time would be to do their own demand generation through cold calling or cold connecting in the social world is key. The salesperson will defend why different opportunities deserve to stay open. But ultimately if your company has a particular set of sales cycles/close rates/sales velocities then these are not likely to shift dramatically over time. The reality however is too many managers neglect to focus sufficiently on age when reviewing their sales peoples’ pipeline.
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Do You Know Your Customers’ Customer?
Posted by Rick Pranitis in GENERAL DISCUSSION on August 30, 2012
It’s often the simple or obvious things which escape notice leaving sales people frustrated and wondering what to do next. The knee-jerk response to this question is more times than not; “Yes!” But, if you stop and really think; How much do you know about your customers’ customer?
This may seem like an odd question, but it really is relevant. Sometimes I find that salespeople are incredibly knowledgeable about their product or service, but they forget to broaden their perspective to try to see things through the eyes of their customers’ customer.
Put in the effort to truly find out what motivates your customers’ customer. When you understand their decision-making process better, you will be more equipped to meet the needs and wants of your customer.
Obviously a good way to find out more is simply by being curious and asking more questions — and then asking more follow-up questions. Yes, you can find out a lot from talking with your customer, but it’s even better if you can find opportunities to interact with the end-user of the product or service.
You might be surprised at what you learn. And you likely will discover vital information that can be revolutionary to your selling process and bottom-line.
So, chew on this question for awhile and answer it honestly: Do you know your customer’s customer?
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This article was originally posted to AG SALESWORKS on August 28, 2012 in Sales Productivity
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Selling value – an innovative framing
Posted by Rick Pranitis in OTHER CONTENT on August 28, 2012
Anyone who knows me can tell you I am constantly scanning the web for interesting articles relating to Sales and Marketing. This article recently caught my eye, and I agree with the author’s comment it’s a new twist on an old – yet still very much valid – concept of value being key to successful selling.
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Source: www.salestrainingconnection.com
The Dangers of Discounting
Posted by Rick Pranitis in GENERAL DISCUSSION on August 27, 2012
This article is over two years old, but I think it is well worth repeating. Too often sales people fall into the trap of “I have to make the sale no matter what”, and forget the impact of their actions – not to mention the responsibility they have to their organization and fellow employees.
You know how difficult it can be out there to maintain your effective pricing strategy. How often have you been drawn into a price battle with your customer, with the biggest threat going through your mind that you’ll lose the sale if you don’t discount?
Before you do offer a discounted price, bear in mind the following dangers associated with lowering your original figure:
- When you offer discount, you set a precedent. The new price you offer is the reference point from which your customer will start negotiating. When you discount, it’s telling the customer that’s the starting point, and it’s going to be mighty difficult to raise prices again in the future.
- Your pricing point creates an image for your product and your company. By discounting, you effectively reposition your brand message. You are sending the message that your product isn’t as good as you say it is, and you turn it into a commodity, rather than something of value to the customer.
- You tell your competition you are willing to start a price war. When your competition see you discount, they will retaliate by cutting prices, and it’s a downward spiral.
- You are less profitable, and you earn less money. You become more dependent on a price-only strategy, eventually leading to a policy that focuses less on what you can do for the customer and more on cutting costs. This means you have less to invest in R&D and product enhancement, stifling your growth and leading to poorer quality.
- You send the message to your customers that, because your focus is on discounting, you might as well shop around for the cheapest price anywhere, because I have nothing to offer you but a lower price.
- Since the only way your company makes money is through the profits you bring in, you have to start looking inside your company to cut costs. You start asking questions like ‘how can we save a little on quality costs?’ and ‘do we need all these people to support our discounting salespeople? You have to cut costs on the inside because you aren’t making the profits on the outside.
- You tell the whole world that your products and services are not as valuable as you suggest they are, making the customer wonder where else you might not be strictly honest.
If you do a study on just how much your discounts actually cost your company. You may be surprised by how much your short-term thinking affects your long-term prosperity.
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This article originally appeared on The MTD Sales Blog posted by Sean McPeat – July 2, 2010
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Dealing with Those Dreaded Objections
Posted by Rick Pranitis in GENERAL DISCUSSION on August 20, 2012
This is a great article by Mike Schultz, publisher of Rain Today. He deals with an issue that continues to plague not just newer sales people. Even some of us veterans to the profession require subtle reminders, the occasional reality check and an attitude boost. I think he covers the topic perfectly, and his advice here should be a revisited regularly – regardless of how long you’ve been selling.
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Your price is too high…
It’s not the right time…
I don’t need your service…
Those five simple words in each sentence can leave you feeling like you just got back from a high school dance: undervalued, rejected, and ignored. (Really, it’s not you. It’s me.) Any of these might cause you to back away when you hear them. With this attitude, it’s no wonder so many sellers wilt upon the first sign of an objection. They shouldn’t.
In fact, objections are often a hidden indicator of interest. They’re always an opportunity to understand your prospect better, and more often than you might think you’ll move him closer to the sale while you address them.
Objections can be overcome. Here’s some insight into how.
Definition: An objection is an explicit expression from a buyer that a barrier exists between the current situation and what he needs to engage your services. In other words, it is a clear signal that you have more work to do in the selling process.
Your objective: Overcome the objection and make advances towards gaining commitment from the prospect with the following caveats firmly in mind:
- The close begins the relationship: In product selling, overcoming objections at all costs is the typical message sellers are taught. This does not work for selling professional services. If you just plow through the objection without addressing it fully, the underlying reason for the objection will usually come back to haunt you. Remember, you have to work with these people once you are done selling.
- Objections often have merit: Most sales training teaches us to “rebut” objections-counter them with logic, arguments, and sheer will power. In selling services, your purpose is to understand the objection fully, isolate it, and respond to it appropriately.
- Many objections take a process, not a quick answer, to overcome: Services selling is complex with many buyers and buying criteria. You may need to build a case for overcoming an objection instead of answering quickly on the fly. Some objections, on the other hand, may simply be questions that have to be answered.
6 Steps to Get Closer to the Sale
Objections are not such horrible things. When the prospect indicates that he is not quite ready to engage your services (he voices an objection), you should not be deterred. As a matter of fact, you now have the opportunity to understand your prospect better and move him closer to the sale by following these six steps:
1. Listen fully to the objection (don’t interrupt or anticipate). Fight the common urge to respond immediately to an objection. By doing so, you will hear what is actually on the prospect’s mind rather than what you think he objects to. You will be surprised how much you can learn about what is actually at the heart of the objection.
2. Ask permission to completely understand the issue. The simple act of asking permission to understand lets the prospect know that you respect his concerns. This further establishes you as a confident consultant.
3. Ask questions, restate or clarify the objection. Make sure you get it right and/or uncover the real objection. Many objections are hiding underlying issues that the prospect either can’t or is not ready to articulate.
4. Choose your response carefully and keep it short. Answer honestly and to the point. Long-winded responses very quickly begin to sound artificial and insincere.
5. Propose your resolution to overcome the objection. Simply enough, describe exactly how you are going to remove the barrier for the prospect.
6. Ask whether your answer or proposed solution will satisfy the objection. Don’t always take “yes” for an answer immediately. Many a prospect will accept the solution in the moment, but once you are out of sight, the objection still remains. Be certain you have moved the sale forward.
It’s important that you don’t disregard client objections. They are a crucial part of the sales process that accomplished rainmakers handle with finesse to move the prospect closer to the close.
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This article originally appeared in the RainMakerBlog ™ as “Dealing with Those Dreaded Objections”
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Steering Clear of Common (and avoidable) Sales Distractions
Posted by Rick Pranitis in GENERAL DISCUSSION on August 16, 2012
Ever get to the end of the day and wonder first, what happened with all that time and second why didn’t I get nearly as much done as I should have? Time is, as the cliché goes, the most scarce resource we have. Yet even though we know each day what needs to get done, we find ways to put it off just a little more.
Salespeople are no different. Even the most successful sales people will fitter away the day, and put off critical pipeline-building tasks that aren’t nearly as onerous as they feel when you’re in the midst of procrastination. Here are seven of the most common and deadly distractions, as well as some easy steps to mitigate or eliminate them.
1. Email
As a sales professional, you want to be responsive to prospects. But that doesn’t mean you need to respond within seconds, or even minutes. What’s most, the vast majority of email you receive isn’t from prospects or anybody that’s going to help you close more business. The majority of email you receive represents someone else’s priorities, not yours.
Do your best to distinguish the urgent from the important, but better yet, keep your email in offline mode most of the time. What you need to do right now likely has nothing to do with what might come into your inbox three minutes from now. And for the emails you want to receive but can easily read later, set up some inbox rules to automatically file them in folders you’ll check at the end of the day, or just a couple times a week.
2. Social media
Let’s assume for a moment you aren’t checking your personal Facebook every 15 minutes. That’s a big enough distraction on its own. But even if you’re actively practicing social selling, you can suck up hours a day and justify it as prospecting, even though you’re mostly clicking around without a real strategy or direction.
Social media is increasingly an important, daily tool for sales professionals to prospect and manage their pipelines, but this time (like everything) needs to be managed and contained. Have a strategy and process for how you’re going to engage in social selling each day. Use a checklist, if necessary, to get in, do your work, and get out. As little as 15 minutes a day can do it, if you stay focused.
3. The general Web
We’re all adults here, so I’m not a big fan at all of blocking Web sites in a corporate environment. Your team will just spend more time trying to get around that, or use their mobile devices. But sometimes when we face a difficult or daunting task, we decide to check the news headlines one more time.
There are sites and services that will help manage your time on these sites. Rescue Time, for example, will show you exactly how much time you’re actively doing productive work vs. killing time elsewhere. There’s nothing wrong with taking a quick brain break to check some scores or Hollywood gossip, just be cognizant of how quickly you’re able to get your mind back focused on what really matters.
4. Floor gossip
There’s a difference between sharing best practices and sharing gossip. Sometimes – when it comes to customer or prospect situations – it’s a pretty thin line. There aren’t any Rescue Time-like apps for people hanging over your cube. But be aware that this is probably taking more time away from selling time than you think. And you both have a quota to hit.
5. Caffeine
There’s a point of diminishing returns for the morning (and afternoon) Joe, or those silly little red bottles. You get the energy and high, sure, but that often comes with mental jitters. If you were likely to get distracted by something new or more fun or different before, caffeine makes it more so.
I don’t have a problem with using the caffeine source of your choice to help get started, but know it can have an adverse affect too.
6. Follow up tasks
After almost any sales call, you have work to do. Update records in your CRM. Prepare a proposal. Get details or coordinate next steps with a sales engineer. There’s no getting around these tasks, and they’re often instrumental to hitting your number.
But if you do them separately after each call, it forces you to engage in each system too many times over the course of the day. Instead, wait until several calls have been completed and tackle your follow-up duties all at once. Updating multiple records in your CRM at once will take far less time than logging in multiple times throughout the day.
7. Victory laps
You just had a great call with a prospect. They were engaged, and agreed to next steps. You’re excited, and you should be. But instead of channeling that energy into the next call, you get up and talk to others about it. Brag to your manager. Tell someone else on your way for another cup of coffee. And before you know it, it’s 30 minutes later and you’re still on that victory lap. Don’t cut the laps out entirely. Just be careful about their duration and frequency.
There are other distractions to be sure. Which ones are your demons? And what are you doing to keep them from holding you back?
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