Sales Calls

Seth Godin has a terrific post on the sales call and where it’s headed. Frankly, his observation is right on but I think he’s a few years too late with the observation. In the last five years or so in my career I’ve seen this happening to me personally. The buyers, or the engineers, don’t have anymore time available to them than the sales person does. They are being asked to do more with less just like you are. Couple that with the fact that decision makers are increasingly difficult to get too and you have a decreased ability to increase the volume of opportunities to sell your product or service. The sales meeting as we know it is dead.

Sales people need to be in contact with their customer base on a consistent basis in order to have a chance at the buyers need for a solution. Most companies drive by and hope they hit a decision maker at the time they want to buy. Unfortunately, the reality of this happening is practically nil. About 50% of the sales people will move on after one engagement with a prospect. About 79% of the sales people will move on after the fourth engagement with a prospect that hasn’t bought anything. On the buying side, they aren’t even taking you seriously until the 5th engagement. And by engagement I mean, a marketing touch of some sort; letter, fax, email, phone conversation, meeting, etc.

Staying in touch, keeping what Gil Cargill calls “top-of-mind-awareness,” is imperative in today’s business climate. In order to have a buy meeting as Seth Godin says, you need to be at the top of the customers mind when that need arises. You can do this in a variety of ways but it needs to be consistent, pertinent and specific to the buyer if you want to get the call when they are ready to buy.