3
Why Planning Matters: Determine Your Approach
Top-performing sales professionals know a thing or two about planning. Most important, they know that planning is a skill that must be practiced routinely and consistently in order to increase the effectiveness of their sales calls. All too often, however, the typical sales rep overlooks and undervalues this critical skill, leading him to wing it during sales calls and not get the most out of each interaction.
Planning is frequently discounted by sales professionals, and it becomes easy to lose sight of how much value it provides to the sales interaction. Our own research proves this point: the importance of planning—and the beneficial impacts of it—are frequently overlooked. We see this time and time again. In fact, because of the changes in today's buyer, we see planning as an activity that is more important than ever. Your customers are more informed, and in order to meet them where they are in the buying process and add value to the sales interaction, you need to have a plan.
Studies have shown that there is often a disconnect between planning and sales: people don't plan because they believe (erroneously) that it doesn't matter as much as it actually does. In fact, according to Harvard Business School professor Frank V. Cespedes, about two-thirds of companies treat planning as a periodic event rather than an ongoing part of the sales process.1 Planning is not a sometimes thing. It needs to be thought of as a vital part of the process.
Understand That Planning Matters
“A goal without a plan is just a wish.”
—Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Hope is not a strategy, as they say, and no sales professional can just wish his way to closing more deals. In fact, we believe planning to be so important that it is the foundation for the entire Critical Selling framework, as shown in Figure 3.1.
Figure 3.1 Planning is Critical
As you can see, planning spans the entire process. It is the foundation of Critical Selling, and our research shows that it is more important now than ever before. Planning matters at every stage in the process, whether before the first call with a prospect, before opening a particular sales interaction, in preparation for making a presentation, or during the final stages of negotiation. Planning is always a critical activity. It's not a step any sales professional should skip at any stage during the sales process.
Planning before every sales call is critical because today's customers are more informed than ever before—and they expect you to be informed as well, not just about your product or service, but about their organizations and their options and alternatives.
Let's look at this a little more closely. We know that customers are better informed than ever. Chances are they've already done a lot of research before even connecting with you. They've researched you and your company as well as your products or services. They've looked into your competitors and the alternate options that are available to them. Your customers have planned for the sales call with you. They've done their due diligence. In fact, as we discussed in Chapter 1, some research indicates that buyers are as much as 60 percent of the way through the sales process prior to engaging with a sales professional. And even if some customers are not quite that far along, the facts remain that they are doing more and they expect you to be equally prepared. They expect that you will have planned the customer interaction so that you can engage each other in an efficient, effective, meaningful way at whatever point they're at in the sales process.
How much planning and research a sales interaction requires varies depending both on the complexity of the sale and on where you are in the sales process. The more complicated the sale, the more research and planning you'll need to do. A more strategic sale requires more research than a simple sale on a short cycle. A complicated sale might warrant a half hour of research and planning. But if you're selling a product or service that is more transactional in nature to a broad audience, you might spend just a few minutes planning. On the other end of the spectrum, a finalist presentation might require a few hours of planning, and that assumes that you've already done some research along the way. The amount of research you conduct should support what you need to accomplish at any given point in the sales process.
Notice here that we're not saying that you can skip doing any research on a prospect or that you can forget about planning if you're dealing with an existing customer. Planning is an integral part of the entire sales process, with any prospect or customer. You have to plan before each and every interaction with each and every customer, even if you're just spending a few minutes thinking it through.
Think about Planning
The top performers at organizations we've worked with, such as Northrop Grumman and Daimler Trucks North America, are disciplined when it comes to planning. They understand that highly effective planning involves gathering information and determining how best to use it. Planning helps identify the best approach to use with each customer based on where they are in the sales process. As such, it's critical to think these things through.
Planning is, at its heart, a thought process. We encourage sales professionals to set aside some time to really think about each customer and the best sales approach for that particular individual. Planning requires you to carefully consider your customer, his goals, his needs, and his expectations. Regardless of whether the sales interaction is simple or complex, top-performing sales professionals take the time to think about each call.
Our precall planning tool (see Figure 3.2) helps sales professionals spend time planning and thinking about the most important aspects of the sales call. These include:
- People and relationships
- Objectives for each call
- Rapport-building strategies
- Key information to share and find out
- Resources required for the call
- Resistance that might be encountered and strategies to overcome
- Anticipated next steps
Figure 3.2 Precall Planner Form.
© 2013 Janek Performance Group V3.0. All rights reserved.
Although a written plan might not necessarily be needed for each sales call, planning is always necessary. Writing things down can be a helpful way to keep track of key issues that characterize each customer and each sales interaction. Thinking about how you will build customer rapport, what key things you want to find out, and what resources you might need for the call will help make sure that you've covered all your bases before you get on the phone or head into a meeting—and that benefits both you and your customer.
Look: no one wants to stumble through a poorly planned sales call. That wastes your time, your organization's time, and most important, your customer's time. Planning makes the difference.
Chances are that you're already thinking about each call (at least let's hope so), even if only in an abstract way. But imagine the chaos that would ensue if you just called up a prospect without any real idea of what you wanted to say, how you wanted to say it, or what you wanted to achieve during the call. That's a surefire way to squander a valuable opportunity.
Planning helps you avoid the kind of aimless sales calls that waste time and even alienate customers. Planning ahead helps you determine what you do know, what you don't know, and what you need to find out. It allows you to act with confidence during the sales interaction, knowing that you have thought it out and prepared well. Planning ensures that you are in the best possible position to meet your objectives.
It's crucial to note here that there's planning and then there's planning smartly. It's important to know what to plan for, which specific areas to investigate, and how to use key research items to get the most out of every sales call. We have identified critical areas of planning and research, areas that will help you make the most impact during each sales interaction. And that starts with knowing what you want to accomplish by the end of the interaction.
Set SAM Objectives
Call objectives are like a compass, helping to guide you toward a desired outcome. Measuring performance against clear objectives not only allows you to determine whether you've been successful in achieving your goals but also helps you plan the right approach to get there. We believe the best objectives have three characteristics: they are specific, appropriate, and measurable (SAM).
Our research shows that top performers who plan their sales interactions using SAM objectives more consistently achieve their call objectives and more confidently move the sales process forward. They understand that SAM objectives not only help them set goals but also help ensure that they've accomplished something of substance during each and every customer interaction. SAM objectives provide the kind of focus that saves time and helps ensure that sales professionals are engaging in productive conversations with customers and are able to ultimately add value to the sales interaction.
Specific. Appropriate. Measurable. Let's dig deeper into these characteristics.
Specific
Specific objectives describe in detail exactly what you want to accomplish. Top performers make the most of outlining specific, immediate objectives. In this context, we're talking about an objective that relates to the very next interaction you will have with a customer. Think about what you would like to accomplish by the end of the interaction and what success looks like at this point in the overall process.
The key is that the objective be specific. Vague objectives such as “improve relationship with Acme Company” don't really help much in terms of setting any kind of actionable direction for the call. “Secure introductions from Bob at Acme with three other people on his team before our next meeting,” however, is a much more specific goal. You should be able to look back after each call and know right away whether you've accomplished your objective.
Setting objectives that are clear and specific allows you to assess whether you're making the kind of progress you want to be making. Top-performing sales professionals evaluate their progress by analyzing what it means if they're truly meeting their goals—or if they aren't. Using the example above—“improve customer relationships”—it is difficult to determine what that means exactly and how to develop a plan to accomplish your objective. On the other hand, if you can detail your objective specifically—“make three more contacts on Bob's team”—you're in a much better position to develop a plan and a clear direction for the call.
Appropriate
In addition to being specific, objectives need to be appropriate. Top-performing sales professionals understand that specificity doesn't make any sense if the objective isn't appropriate for that particular sales interaction. The key is to set specific objectives that are appropriate based on where you and your customer are in the sales process.
That said, we know that determining what is and is not appropriate can often be the most difficult aspect of setting objectives. It can be a challenge to know whether the objectives you're setting are too weak or too strong given where you are in the sales process and on how a given situation is unfolding. You have to think about what can be accomplished under which circumstances and whether your goal is realistic.
The key is to identify the right objective based on where you are in the sales process. So, for instance, it might not be appropriate to try to close the sale on your first call with a new customer. That might well be too strong an objective based on where you are in the process. On the other hand, you might be at a point where it's appropriate to secure an on-site meeting to deliver a presentation to key decision makers and influencers rather than just e-mailing information to your contact so he can share it with his team.
Here's the bottom line: when determining whether an objective is appropriate, consider whether you're asking too much or too little—from your customer, your organization, and yourself—and whether you're making the right ask at the right time.
Measurable
Objectives need to be specific and appropriate, and they also have to be measurable. You have to know whether you've actually accomplished what you set out to do, and you can do that only if your objectives are specific, appropriate, and measurable—otherwise, you're really just guessing, which doesn't do anyone any good.
If, for example, your objective was to, at the end of the sales call, gain agreement from your customer to move forward and sign a contract, you'll know whether you accomplished that—the signed paperwork will be the tangible evidence you need.
Measurable objectives speak to the quantifiable evidence that demonstrates whether you've accomplished what you set out to do. Quantifiable. Evidence. We're not talking about anecdotal evidence. Measurable objectives allow you to monitor your progress as you work through the sales process. The dictum “you can't manage what you can't measure” applies in force here, and top-performing sales professionals understand that measuring progress toward meeting objectives is critical when it comes to accelerating the sales process and closing more deals.
SAM objectives are specific, appropriate, and measurable. They help you focus and plan before each and every customer interaction. This kind of planning helps you identify exactly where you want to go with each customer every time you meet. Setting SAM objectives helps you navigate each sales call and the entire sales process. When you've planned your objectives, you have a better sense of the beginning, middle, and end of each interaction with your customers. When you've articulated to your customers what those objectives are and why they are important, then they, too, know how things will go. In doing so, you better manage their expectations and ensure that you're delivering value to them—all of which accelerates the sales process.
Plan Ahead and Reflect After
Our research has shown not only that top-performing sales professionals plan each and every interaction with their customers and set SAM objectives but also that they reflect and analyze outcomes.
Reflecting after every sales call is critical. It's important to assess what went well and what didn't. And, because it's so easy to forget critical information the longer you wait to record it, it's important to reflect after every call—right after every call.
We suggest taking a few minutes to write down your reflections after each sales interaction. It's easiest—and most productive—to reflect on a call right away, when it's fresh in your mind. If you try to recall information from a sales call two hours or two days or two weeks later, it's virtually impossible. Top performers understand this and consistently use reflection as a tool to establish better objectives for their next customer interaction.
Our postcall tool (see Figure 3.3) can help you reflect after you interact with your customers. Areas to analyze include:
- Were the SAM objectives for the call reached?
- What went well?
- What could have gone better?
- What challenges did you face?
- What key information did you learn?
- What are the next steps?
Figure 3.3 Postcall Planning Tool.
© 2013 Janek Performance Group V3.0. All rights reserved.
Planning and reflecting go hand in hand. As they say, if you don't know where you've been, you can't know where you're going. Without planning, a sales call could easily derail. Without reflecting, it's difficult to know how to plan for the next call. Salespeople who don't take the time to reflect on what they learned right after interacting with a customer risk misremembering what they heard during the conversation and failing to recall critical customer issues.
In addition, if you don't reflect on each customer interaction, it's difficult to evaluate how well you are moving the sales process along or whether you're making the kind of progress you need to. Stalled deals are one of the most difficult things to handle as a salesperson. It is much easier to stay on top of each interaction and capitalize on the momentum you are creating in order to keep the process moving forward. If you don't pay attention to the little things, you could be faced with a stalled deal before you know it. You have to be able to recognize what activities need to take place in order to move the sales process forward. Every time you fail to advance, you decrease the likelihood of securing the sale.
Postcall reflection helps you plan and determine your objectives for the next call so you can accelerate the sales process and close more deals. If you don't do this, you won't be able to adjust and make the next call more productive. Failing to reflect just makes it that much more difficult to plan for the next interaction with your customer.
Reflecting is simply good practice. It's a good routine to establish. It not only makes your sales interactions more efficient and more productive but also provides you with insight into where you might need to adjust your approach. Reflecting then becomes a form of self-coaching, helping you become more aware of the things you do well and the things you do not-so-well.
Planning and reflecting are crucial components of the Critical Selling framework. Top-performing sales professionals who plan each interaction with each customer are better positioned to build credibility, understand customer needs, and accelerate the sales process. Those who take the time to reflect on each sales call can more efficiently and effectively plan for the next call. Top performers understand that planning isn't something you do just once at the early stages of the sales process and then move on; planning must happen at every stage of the process with every customer. Top performers also know that it is critical to plan for each sales call and each selling conversation. Whether planning for an initial call with a new prospect, for a winning presentation, or for closing the deal, it's critical to set SAM objectives and assess progress. Once you have taken the time to plan for the customer interaction, the next step is to deliver a solid opening that gets the sales conversation going in a positive direction, which is where we're headed next, in Chapter 4.
Critical Selling: Lessons Learned
- Today's customers expect that you will have planned the customer interaction so that you can engage each other in a meaningful way. Top-performing sales professionals understand how critical it is to plan for each and every customer interaction, no matter where you are in the sales process—first call or last.
- Planning ahead helps determine what you know about your customers, their needs, and their expectations, as well as what you don't know and what you need to find out. Using the precall planner form can help you focus each customer interaction so that you are more confident, more efficient, and more effective.
- Top-performing sales professionals set clear call objectives, knowing that they help provide focus for every customer interaction, navigate each sales call, and manage overall expectations. SAM objectives provide a specific and repeatable framework for establishing the right objectives in the sales process.
- Planning and reflecting go hand in hand. Don't waste what you've learned from a sales call by not taking the time to reflect afterward. Top performers understand the importance of reflecting after each call, and they take the time to assess what worked and what didn't after every customer interaction. Doing so better positions them to make the next call more efficient and more effective while better managing customer expectations.