Listen to the multi-tasking champions of today's inside sales world share their secrets for managing desktop distractions.

Josiane moderates this great panel discussion with Allison Hayes from OTN, Sherman Hu from LinkedIn and Jamie Kronick from VeriSign.

The challenge for inside sales professionals is how can we effectively manage multiple screens on our desktop, instant messaging, phones, PDA's and still help our customers?

Learn how these champions have it down and certainly positioned to survive. They all have something in common: They're fast, efficient, smart and organized.



MP3 File

In this month’s issue of Psychology Today, there’s an article on Procrastination titled, Getting Out From Under. We all procrastinate– that doesn’t mean we’re all lazy or that we can’t manage our time. Some describe procrastination as “a misguided sense of activity” and in today’s highly distracted working environment, procrastination is a growing problem.

So why do we procrastinate? Some reasons may be: lack of self-disipline, saying you work best under pressure, lack of deadlines and doing the easy and trivial first and postponing the difficult for later.

What about our customers and prospects? What happens when we call on busy and distracted decision-makers who may be procrastinating on reviewing your proposals, quotes, or email?  We’ve heard it before when we call on a prospect who says, “this is something we want to look at but not this quarter, call me back next quarter.” How can we create urgency when we know they are procrastinating?

The worst part about procrastinating is that it can be contagious and harmful to your sense of priorities. When people procrastinate, they exclude the urgency but keep the importance of it.  Unless we remind our prospects of the value we  bring and the results we’ve achieved, they will not take the time to prioritize you as a vendor.

People are drawn to formulas because they like something tangible, a road map, a plan, anything that guarantees results. We all know the drill when we start in inside sales capacity, we’re given a quota, told to make 25-50-65-75 outbound calls per day and set appointments, or hand over leads or close oppotunities.

Whenever I ask a rep what their “Success Formula” is, they usually outline activities they do each day. This includes making outbound calls, answering emails, responding to RFP’s, sending quotes out, trouble-shooting issues, researching new prospects, etc.  These activities are all ingredients to help design your formula.

When designing a formula, the best way to start is by your quota/revenue goals for the month or quarter and then work backwards from there. Here are some variables to consider:

Monthly Quota__________

Number of Business Days per Month __________

Daily Number___________

It’s still a number game so how many outbound calls will you make per day? Remember our connection rate is somewhere between 8-10% so if you make 55 outbound calls per day, changes are you will only connect with 5-6 and when you do, how qualfied will they be?  How many qualified conversations will you have per day?

How long is your sales cycle? How many presentations or demos do you have to make? What’s your conversion rate on these presentations?  If you make 5 demos per week and your conversion rate is 50%, you will have to include that into your formula.

The most successful salespeople put a value on their time and each day they work, they know they must hit a certain number and understand what it takes to get there. Set up your formula for success, post it on your monitor!

Listen to Josiane’s interview on Sales Rep Radio titled, “Sharpening Your Inside Sales Skills.”

Learn about the important first impresion and the best way to reach busy decision-makers. Check out:

http://www.audionewsletter.com/salesrepradio/042406.htm

I paddle in an outrigger canoe and feel so lucky to be on the San Francisco Bay- life can’t get any better than this. An outrigger boat has 6 people and everyone must paddle together. A good boat is one that is synchronized where everyone’s blade hits the water at the same time and it comes out of the water at the same time. It is precise and requires teamwork. You have to maintain a high level of focus as you work together with a team.

Everything in life is about timing and especially sales. It’s one of those professions that is completely intangible and that’s why it attracts people who are good at controlling their outcome when faced with intangibles. Everyday we plug along, make our calls, generate quotes, make our presentations and forecast with hopes of closing opportunities. We are never certain of the exact day something will close just like we don’t know if a sale could just go south on us.

However, we do believe that opporunities come into our lives because of great timing and the good ones feel like they were choreographed and synchronized because they are just perfect.

Keep your focus, stick with your team and watch your timing.

Everyone has certain Power Calling hours during the day where they make calls and generate activities. If you want to create new opportunities and increase your lead flow, revenue numbers and grow your pipeline, setting a non-negotiable time each day is your answer. Here’s how it works:

1. Determine a time in your day when you have the most energy to make outbound calls- this should ideally be no later than 90 minutes after you’ve come into work.

2. Block out about 2 hours as your Power Calling hours- no less and no more. Any less means you will never get to it and any more is too much.

3. Remember that non-negotable means you must only work on pro-active and not reactive issues. Some proactive activities include- cold calling on new opps, making introductions, following-up from quotes, navigating and building org charts. Reactive activities  include answering emails, trouble-shooting, researching, cleaning your Outlook inbox, building a new spreadsheet, talking with a field partner, entering notes into your database, etc.

4. Tell everyone about it- announce it to those around you, hang up signs saying, “9:00-11:00am is my power calling time” or “7:00-9:00am is my $$$$$$$$$$$ time” or “6:30-9:00am is my golden hour.” You will get more respect and support from those around you who may be tempted to walk up and ask you something.

5. Stick to it at least 3x per week for one month and I guarantee you’ll see results.  

Everytime I take on a new project, I encourage my client to submit call recordings of their team members. It’s a great way to learn about the group, their products, market, customer requirements and identify skills. After listening to thousands of recordings over the years, I can tell a lot about how someone manages their time. The followoing traits provide insights on how one manages their time and gets things accomplished:

1. Utilizing an authoritative tone that has influence and demands attention

2. Having a good, quick phone pace that creates urgency

3. Speaking succinctly and clearly and checking for understanding

4. Asking strng qualifying questions before presenting a solution

5. Demonstrating strong listening through information integration

6. Aligning the approproate solution based on the customer’s technical knowledge and requirements

7. Explaining your solution succinctly

8. Calling high and speaking with decision-makers who have both influence and authority

9. Setting action steps and gaining commitment before hanging up from the call

10. Saying “no” to consultants, field partners, internal customers who may take up too much of your time

Everyone is multi-tasking today- but how efficiently are we doing it? We’ve coined the concept of “skill-shifting” because it addresses how different tasks require different skills. It is important to align your skills and energies with each task and “batch” these tasks based on similar skill requirements.

For example, if you are researching a customer SAT issue, the skill requirements includes: resourcefulness, customer-focused attitude, service skills, strong follow-through, analytical, diagnostic, problem-solving, ability to set expectations and customer retention skills. These are very different skills than the skills you need to prospect.  For prospecting, you need to be brave, focused, persustent, aggressive, organized, have the ability to think on your feet, strong momentum, strong verbal and written skills, etc.

Pay attention to the various skill requirements in everything you do throughout the day and align these skills with the various responsibilities you have. Many people start their day reading and responding to email before making their outbound new calls. This can kill your momentum if it takes up too much time and requires different skills. The more you batch and align tasks, the faster and more efficiently you will work.

Some startling statistics indicate the average salesperson actually sells for 90 minutes per day because 80% of their day is spent on non-revenue generating activities. Here’s our top 10 list on what keeps people from selling:

1. Not spending enough time on the phone- general phone activity is down all over

2. Leaving too many voice mail messages- not trying to get to live voices

3. Not knowing where to find good prospects or recognizing them once they find them- need for stronger qualification

4. Holding on to leads for too long or letting go of good leads too soone- need for stronger qualification

5. Not understanding the importance of “skill-shifting”- more on this in next week’s blog

6. Not asking important questions early in the call- must have a strong qualification criteria on each call

7. Not calling enough contacts within the organization- don’t hang out with just one contact within the organization

8. Spending too much time speculating about issues beyond their control- will the company be sold, merge?????

9. Creating self-restricting rules on the best time of day to contact a new prospect- just dial

10. Not setting a non-negotiable time- power calling times

I was in a book store the other day and found another book I wished I had written. It’s bright yellow cover jumped out at me and it’s title Crazy Busy is very timely. It explains that Crazy Busy is a modern phenomenon of brain overload which is becoming a national epidemic.The author, Hallowell states, “we’ve plunged ourselves into a mad rush of activity, expecting our brains to keep track of more than they comfortably or effectively can” and concludes with “it all adds up to a state of constant frenzy that is sapping us of creativity, humanity, mental well-being, and the ability to focus on what truly matters.”

I’m convinced the secret to properly managing one’s time is about the choices one makes with their time. Usually when we are running in frantic mode, we haven’t taken the time to really understand where our time is going and plan what we want to do with that time.

Okay, well…..um…. back to prospecting? Siince it’s the beginning of the month, take time to plan, think and be strategic about your plan of attack so when you get to quarter-end you won’t be as frantic.

The planning phase includes researching target accounts, verticals, key decision-makers and determining your approach. Take the time to do some pre-call planning prior to dialing. Whenever I coach a team member, I ask them who are you calling? what are you going to say? what do you want to get out of this call?