It matters very little whether you are a selling rookie or a seasoned professional, sooner or later, you will find yourself mired in a selling slump. There are a number of actions you can take to shorten the duration of the slump, lessen the financial impact, and reduce the emotional drain that a slump can cause you.
This is ‘Tip 3’ in a series.
Selling slumps are as perennial as the seasons but they don’t need to destroy your career. Understand that they are part of the marketplace and they always will be. They are caused by a variety of factors but always keep in mind that you didn’t just wake up ‘dumb’ one morning. When you understand that fact, it will be easier to recognize that the situation is temporary. In old writings authors often used the term, “it came to pass”. They didn’t use the term, “it came to stay”.
Tip #3: Intensify your Qualification Process. One of the comments that I have heard many times over the years when dealing with salespeople who encounter slumps during times of abundant leads is that they feel frustrated with investing so much time only to ‘lose the sale’.
It’s hard to imagine a sales slump arriving during times of very high traffic. I assure you it does happen. The reason is quite simple. When there are many people needing service, there is pressure for salespeople to move quickly in order to get to all of the prospects.
When there is abundant traffic, there is also a greater number of people simply ‘looking’. These people may not be ready or able to make a purchase. Yet most will not easily volunteer that information. If you are going to avoid wasting your time and energy, you will need to intensify your qualification process so that you can flush out the real selling opportunities.
This strategy is effective at ‘event sales’ where a sense of urgency can be created in the mind of the customer. However, my general rule of thumb is that speed kills in the selling process. Therefore, this technique should be used only where prospect traffic is well above normal.
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