Qualifying your customers

Customers are demanding – and rightfully so.
They’re spending hard-earned dollars with us, and we should recognize that.
Now, not every customer brings the same value, as some buy more than others…. and some demand more time from you than others, regardless of how much they’re buying.

The bottom line is that your customers deserve to be treated right – they should have a rep that takes them seriously and helps them with the product they need in the best possible way.
Good customers that is. There is nothing wrong in deciding that some customers just don’t match with the value you can bring.

So, the limited time you have, should be spent with customers you determine are worth spending your time on. How do you decide? Well – here’s some help on how to qualify your prospects and customers. If you can answer these questions, you should be going a long way:

- What individual client’s needs need to be met to secure long-term competitive advantage for us? (is it really just price?)
- What advantages does your company/product offer to meet the individual client or prospect’s needs? (e.g. international presence, flexibility, speed of delivery, product knowledge, availability, product quality (compared to competition in your market space) etc)
- Can you name your top 20 clients and top 20 prospects? What shared characteristics do they offer? What similar needs do they have (if any)?
- In what way does this compare to the answer in the 2nd question. (apparently, you have something special to offer that client. It has allowed you to build a long-term relationship with them. You should sustain that advantage, so you need to be aware of what makes you special)
- Do you have any customers that are costing resources (money/time etc) so that they are not worth keeping? (asking too much time in product advice compared to actual business, too many quotes with little orders, need too much help from pre-sales etc). What are their characteristics?
- Are you spending enough time on your top 20 customers and your top 20 prospects? Are you spending time on customers/prospects that aren’t worth it?
- Who are your most ‘growable’ customers? Do they share any characteristics – similar needs?
- For prospecting; Is there a vertical that has an apparent need for the competitive advantages that your company/product offers? Have you been particularly successful in a certain vertical and can you copy those best practices into a strategic approach? Can you share references with prospects?
- Is there any rationale/validation for expected future loyalty amongst your top 20 accounts?
- How can you ‘build a fence’ around them to protect their value and loyalty?
- Are there opportunities for up-selling or cross-selling in your existing client base? (other products, complementary products, accessories etc)
- What collaborative value is present? Are they willing to communicate / meet with you face-to-face / respond to questions about their business and needs / open to receiving marketing/sales info?
- Have you identified the preferred medium for interaction with the key identifier? (e-mail, face-to-face, phone, IM etc)
- Are there ‘prestige’ accounts that you have or need to grow in order for you to be successful in a certain vertical? Can you develop those accounts into a referral?
- Have you identified the key influencer or key decision maker in each of your accounts? (have you fully penetrated the account when comparing actual sales to how much that customer spends on the same product on a yearly basis – if it is less than 20%: find out who you’d need to talk to so that you can identify opportunities prior to the order being sent, rather than being transactional.)

Think about it - it's really this simple.

Have a wonderful day!

Cold calling Blitz

May 6th, two months before the vacation season starts. Typically business slows down in the summer, but it means that business is thriving now, because most companies need to get a lot done before everyone's out on the beach.

No better time to pick up business than today.
Today, we're having a cold calling blitz. Pick up 5 new companies you've never spoken to before. Pick up 5 companies that you've called and have potential, but aren't a customer yet and pick up 5 that have done too little business to be able to call them an actual customer.

No procrastination - just calls.
Make 40-60 a day and your business will thrive, make 10 and it will be ok, make none and you're going to struggle eventually.

Besides, we're in sales - what else are we supposed to do? Answer e-mails? Not really.
Now let's get on the phone and dial for dollars.

Back to work

Two days of fun and relaxation - now back to biz.
While the sun is out there (finally), we're closing deals.

God I love this job ;-)

P.S. Did you ever read about motivation?
Motivation to get out of bed and go to work. To pick up the phone and make those calls. To be prepared and make things happen. To change your attitude. To prepare for being a winner.
To be the best salesman you can be, and most important of all: to be the best parent you can be.

If you want to learn from the best, there are many ways to be introduced to motivation, but there's one thing that inspires me to great length: sports athletes. Athletes train in anonimity, sometimes for years, to be able to eventually achieve great results on events like the Olympics, or European championships, national leagues, climbing the Mount Everest and more.

Yesterday, I was at someone's birthday party (don't we all frequent these and end up speaking with someone completely new to you who has a wonderful view on life and does things we'd all like to do ourselves), spoke to a guy who's a hardcore mountain biker. We ended up talking about the Iron Man series, and I looked into it later that evening, to learn more about the challenge.
Here's what it is: 3.8 km swim / 42.2 km run / 180 km bicycle.

In other words: people stumble over 'just a' marathon, or 'just a' 180km bike ride.
These guys do it all - at once. Unbelievable. I read through some websites giving training advise, and found a sentence that epitomizes what this is all about:

" Be optimistic. Your mind can burn endless energy worrying about factors that will never become issues ."

There are many things you can train for physically, but mental preparation will ultimately separate the good from the great. When training: show patience and pacing discipline. Why? Because in doing so, you 'train' your (brain)cells how to behave under extreme endurance, which will ultimately help you attain your goals. It is no different in life. Internalizing the important things you need to accomplish helps you preparing for success. But if you haven't laid out the things you want to achieve, how can you find a way to get there to begin with?