Did your sales fizzle this spring? Now is the time to add a Summer Sizzle Prospecting Blitz to grow your business!
Yes, we all want to enjoy the great weather as lockdowns are finally easing up. Summer is the time to be enjoying the beautiful weather, taking holidays, and spending time with family and friends! It can be easy to put prospecting on the backburner when there are so many other (more enjoyable) things that you could be doing! That said, this Summer is NOT the time to procrastinate, with 2020 spring sales being impacted by Covid. We need all Salespeople on deck (no, not the boat kind) to turn this economy around and set up a stronger pipeline to create a booming 2021.
We all know that prospecting can be hard, tedious, and sometimes even discouraging – making for the perfect “procrastination-storm”. I’ve been there! I learned a few years ago when planning a great trip in September, that putting prospecting into high gear during the summer months when everyone else was taking holidays, allowed me to capture new clients and business before everyone else started their sales blitz in September. Luckily, I’ve been able to overcome my own objections and I have put together a list of the top 7 prospecting tips to help you get motivated, get busy, and get your pipeline sizzling as much as your grill this summer.
Top 7 Summer Sizzle Prospecting Tips:
First, create your Hot List of at least 50-100 Customers and Prospects. Go through current customer lists, past customer lists from the last few years, webinar leads, tradeshow leads and your LinkedIn connections to create your Hot List. Further break down your Hot List into groups of 10 prospects you’d like to contact. Identify these 10 prospects the day prior to reaching out, so that you’re prepared and excited to call them.
Tip #2 once you’ve made your Hot List; do your research! Use your prospect’s website or their LinkedIn profile so you can create your compelling reason to meet and build rapport. When interviewed, Buyers stated that they wanted their meetings with salespeople to feel natural and conversational, less like a pitch. A great way to increase your chances of securing a meeting is to find common ground! Is your prospect into sports? Is there any interesting news or new developments in their industry? Showing that you’ve taken the time and put in the work to prepare and personalize your prospecting attempt is sure to catch attention.
The 3rd tip: your messaging must be focused on how you can help your prospect improve their business, not on how you want to sell services. Avoid selling too soon in your prospecting emails. Your objective is to create interest to secure a meeting, not the sale – yet!
Tip #4 is to block your time in your calendar – the earlier the better. I find early mornings from 7:45am – 8:55am is a great time to prospect, before customers get into 9am meetings. Take into consideration when your buyer will likely be available to answer your call or email live, as this varies by industry. As a rule of thumb, at least 10 calls each day allows you to get your mojo going – try aiming for this and allow yourself the required time to do so!
Another important practice that is a prospecting-must is tip #5; the Double-Whammy method! The Double Whammy refers to the practice of following-up a prospecting phone call with a second touchpoint such as an email, text, or video. This seemingly simple method can improve your response rate by almost 50%! It shows tenacity, ambition, and makes a prospect feel as though you truly want to get a hold of them – they were not just another mass-email recipient!
Speaking of emails, that leads us to tip #6; make the first 10 words count! Many customers read their emails on their mobile devices. On a mobile device, when looking at your inbox you can typically only read the first 10 words of an email without opening it. These first 10 words of your email must be compelling to get a Buyer to click “open” and avoid the delete button. Along with this, an interesting or catchy subject line of 3 to 5 words can play a part in whether your prospect takes the time to give your email a read.
My 7th and final piece of prospecting advice; be creative! Try something different like sending a video email to break through the clutter of a Buyer’s inbox. Video Emails have been shown to get 81% more responses than traditional emails! Platforms like BombBomb and Covideo both offer 14-day free trials, so you can test this new creative method and get comfortable in front of a camera. Video emails can be fun, personalized, and help to put a face to the name (especially if you haven’t been able to meet your prospect live). It brings a more human element to emails, which Buyers say would make them more compelled to respond.
Implementing these tips and committing to making those phone calls and emails is sure to make for a fruitful prospecting blitz – then you can grab a towel and hit the beach!
To aid in the launch of your own prospecting blitz, visit https://teneoresults.com/sales-tools-templates/ and download our complimentary 90-Day Prospecting Blitz Activity!