Other Side Of The Fence

At the end of last year, my job title changed to “Sales Director”.

Firstly, it seems like that job title change is a dream trigger to get entered into automated cadences!

On a more serious note, it’s been very interesting and eye opening experience to be other side of the fence as a prospect.

The breakdown of attempts to capture my attention have probably looked something like this:

90% email

5% cold call

5% other (LinkedIn mainly – however, I did receive a hand written letter once!).

Yes – Sales Directors inboxes are well and truly flooded with emails!

Here are some of the observations and lessons from being on the receiving end so far…

Disclaimer – none of this is rocket science or ground breaking stuff but probably what a lot of salespeople out there need to hear!

#1 – Pick up the phone more!

As the numbers above suggest, just by picking up the phone your doing something that many others aren’t.

The only next steps I’ve agreed to have come from phone calls.

#2 – Be persistent

I regularly get missed calls off unknown numbers that have only tried to call once.

One SDR in particular was incredibly persistent with the phone. We had a meeting, decided the timing wasn’t right for us, but I’ve since recommended someone to them that could benefit from their offering.

This opportunity wouldn’t have been created if they didn’t pick up the phone (more than once!).

And when the timing is right for us, they will be the first business we contact.

#3 – Be Human

Chat GPT (yawn – but can you really write a blog in 2023 without mentioning it?) and AI is no doubt going to change things big time. However, as it stands right now, it is still blatantly obvious (from my experience anyway) when you’ve just been added to a standardised cadence or campaign along with 100’s of others.

Anything that’s obviously automated get’s deleted straight away (and I’m sure this will be the same for most prospects)

A good exercise to do is to send yourself an example email so you can actually see how it looks and reads in your prospects inbox – put yourself in their shoes!

If it doesn’t read like it’s just meant for them, it probably won’t get acknowledged.

#4 – If you say you’re going to do something, do it.

Yes, I did say this wasn’t rocket science.

In sales (and in life), we’re often remembered for our actions but also remembered for our inactions.

Example – I received a cold call on the 28th of December in between Xmas & New Year. I was heading out, but this person instantly stood out for doing something that no one else did.

The brief call was left that this was something that was actually on our radar but now wasn’t a good time to speak, they would follow up with some information later that day.

This was a deadline they stressed, not one that I was fussed about (it was Christmas after all, my time was being spent eating pigs in blankets and watching the Darts World Championship!) – first week in Jan would have been fine.

The follow up arrived in late Jan…

If you’re going to do something to get your prospects attention, make sure follow that up with simply doing the things you say you’re going to do!

It’s tough out there at the moment, but we can all do better by just doing the simple things well.

If you’re looking to add to your sales team or up-skill your existing team, please give myself or one of the team at Prime a shout!