Prospecting can be like trying to find a needle in a haystack... I recently conducted a webinar for a client on prospecting. Leading up to the webinar, I asked what questions the client had in regards to prospecting so I could tailor the content to their particular challenges. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised when I only got one response. And that is not because they are masters of prospecting. Quite the contrary. It’s because they do so little of it and were unsure of what questions to ask. Like most sales people (50% according to Dave Kurlan’s extensive studies), they were doing little prospecting at all.1 While most sales people will tell you that creating conversations is important and must happen if you want to succeed in sales, the dynamics of how it works continues to baffle many. When sales people seek to understand it better they find conflicting advice. Different situations rightly call for different approaches, so some of the experts themselves are confused about what works and what doesn’t. If conflicting advice and lack of understanding is holding you back from prospecting and becoming a great sales person, let me break it down for you to its most simple steps.      

Last week I shared my top sales and business books of 2010. In this post I share part two of the "best of 2010" series with the best sales resources, blogs, and tweeters that I follow and find most helpful.      

The New Rules of Selling Consulting Services in 2011 Selling in professional services firms has changed. Gone are the days when repeat business and referrals were enough to grow your practice, when providing great service and results led to more business, when you were the only consultant, accountant, lawyer, or engineer on the block providing your specific service specialty. Prospects are busier than ever, there’s ten-times more competition, and price pressure is rampant. Despite these challenges, there are many service providers thriving in the new economy. To help you overcome the selling challenges and grow your firm in 2011, we’ve created the special report, The New Rules of Selling Consulting Services in 2011.  In this report, our very own Mike Schultz not only reveals the new rules for selling professional services, but also explains how you must transform the way you sell in 2011.      

Sometimes buyers don't know how to buy. Don't be afraid to show them. A recent conversation with my nephew reminded me how a little guidance can go a long way when tackling something for the first time. I was telling my nephew, a newly licensed driver, about my first experience piloting my ’68 Buick into the big city. The big city in this case is Boston, a labyrinthine tangle of one-way streets masquerading as a modern metropolis. Throw in aggressive drivers with a pathological penchant for double parking and you’re courting disaster the second your front bumper crosses into the city limits. As I nosed my Buick into the city for the first time all those years ago, everything fell apart…fast. Nothing looked familiar. It seemed like the entire city was on my rear bumper, and…darn, that was my turn. I needed a guide.      

Warp 9 Walt is a change agent with a strong sense of urgency. He's just one of the eight buyer personas... A while ago at a conference I had dinner with two people. The first, (we’ll call her Janine) I had known since we worked together six years earlier. The second person (Ed), Janine and I had just met. Janine described a sales challenge she was facing. She’d been working with two prospects at two different organizations, one for over a year and one for almost two. The typical sales cycle is 6 to 9 months, and these were both well beyond. She felt she was nearing a sale with both, but for all she knew, "nearing" might mean a year or two to go. This is a fairly common sales challenge: The sale looks good, but it’s taking forever. Janine happened to be facing two at the same time...      

Do your sales managers know how to coach and motivate your sales people? Your sales staff is underperforming, but you can't figure out why. You're pretty sure that you've hired the best possible talent, but some days it seems like your sales staff is the gang that can’t shoot straight. Where did you go wrong? Inconsistency and poor sales performance can be the result of a number of factors:  - Lack of necessary skills and knowledge  - Inefficient pipeline and process design  - Poor use of CRM and other tools  - Inadequate compensation and incentives And the list goes on…      

Keep your prospects engaged, and lead them to the next step. Imagine you’re a business leader, and you’re considering buying a new technology that could help your business succeed. You log in to the web presentation and, after a few pleasantries, the presenter starts in, "We started in 1978 by John Doe and have grown into the market leader in the space. We provide efficient effective solutions leveraging a unique combination of people, process, and technology to help you achieve results…Here’s a sample list of our clients…Now let me log in to the software. It’s all hosted online so you can login from wherever, whenever you need to…Over here is where you control admin rights of the users…" Boring. Unfocused. Unhelpful. At some point comes the time for every sales person to deliver a presentation. For some this may be early on in a demo of your product or capabilities, or to share a new approach to solving a problem. For others it may be later in the sales process as you present your proposed solution. In any case, delivering engaging sales presentations is a key to success. Why, then, do so many professionals and sales people put prospects to sleep during their presentations?      

It’s 4 PM on a Thursday and you’re about to meet the CEO of a major company you’d like to win as a client. The conversation starts as you walk into the office, approach the CEO, stretch out your hand, and say, "Nice to meet you, Jill. I’m Steve Webb." Fast forward to a meeting about 7 months later. You head into the office. Jill gets out from behind her desk and says, "Good to see you again, Steve. Here’s a check for $1.2 million. Let’s get started." Suffice it to say, a lot has to happen to get from, "nice to meet you" to "here’s a check, let’s get started." Yet two things are true:      

Is this "wuss factor" dragging you down? I had the pleasure of meeting Ed Rendell when he was the mayor of Philadelphia. He was pointed and direct, quite different from the other politicians I have met over the years. So it came as little surprise when early this winter, Rendell, then Governor of Pennsylvania, called NFL officials "wimps" for canceling a game between the Eagles and Vikings due to snow. When asked about the NFL’s decision the next day, Governor Rendell made his stance clear: "My biggest beef is that this is part of what's happened in this country. We've become a nation of wusses." This nation of wusses has extended into the field of sales. There’s no hiding that sales is difficult. Day in and day out you face rejection, you must constantly be filling the pipeline with new leads, you have quotas you must meet, and results are often inconsistent.  Yet too many sales people use these difficulties as excuses and let them hinder their own success - they wuss out. How can you tell if the wuss factor is dragging you down? Look out for the following 5 symptoms...      

Join us for this live webinar tomorrow, April 5! Much of your selling success depends on how well you lead conversations with potential clients - a lot has to happen between, "Nice to meet you", and, "Here's a check, let's get started." If you're like most sellers, you struggle to move these conversations towards the close. To help, join us on April 5 at 2:00 p.m. ET for the live webinar, The Keys to Mastering Sales Conversations - In Person, on the Phone, and Online with Mike Schultz, President of RAIN Group, Publisher of RainToday.com, and co-author of the breakthrough new book Rainmaking Conversations. During this webinar, you'll learn: How to convert more prospects into customers How to uncover your prospects' needs and sell the largest solution set - at the highest margin The secrets to running sales meetings that move you toward the close How web conferencing enhances the client relationship and cuts travel costs Special Bonus: 10 lucky attendees will receive a free copy of our new book, Rainmaking Conversations. Register today