Knowing that action overcomes inertia

In taking positive, decisive action today, you need to overcome the inertia that may be holding you back, and only you can make this change. You need to do so to provide the correct mindset for new business sales success. As you find out throughout this chapter, you can do a number of things to proactively make the change to being action oriented.

The first thing to do is to actually get moving, because physical action stimulates your brain to respond and follow. Get up from your desk or wherever you find yourself and get into a place where you can take action. If you’re procrastinating about a phone call, for example, then pick up the phone and dial the number; don’t think about it, just do it. This works for me every time when I’m delaying making a call. I just force myself to get on with it, and my action overcomes my inertia. Don’t allow procrastination to rule you; use today’s action to win the battle.

Sometimes the biggest changes come from the smallest beginnings. If you have 20 or 50 or 100 calls to make, just pick up the phone and make the first one. After that, continue with the next, and it becomes easier. Make it a habit, for example, to not have your first coffee of the day, or even to sit at your desk, until you’ve made the first five calls, and this will become a pattern quickly, giving you a victory over inertia.

Understand that sometimes you’ll have less motivation than at other times, so don’t beat yourself up about it. It happens. Action and results drive motivation, so focus on the small victories until the bigger ones come along, but keep taking positive action to win new business.

You need energy to overcome inertia, and you need to supply energy in the new business sales role. Lead from the front, not letting inertia hold you back. Just get on and do what you need to do but in a deliberate and focused way, and inertia will soon be consigned to history. For example, I didn’t want to write this particular subsection of the book at the moment and was trying to convince myself that I could do it later. Guess what? I just sat down at the keyboard and began typing; I let my actions overcome my inertia.

Improving your focus by setting and writing down goals

When I was in my early thirties, at the beginning of my move into a full winning new business role, I was told about the importance of goal setting and specifically about the importance of writing down your goals. To say that I rebelled would be an understatement. Of course, I knew better, or so I thought. Writing down goals was plain stupid and a total waste of time, which is what I told anyone who would listen. I had a sales mentor at the time who decided it would be a wise move to stay away from the subject when discussing new business planning with me. That was probably the right move for him from a self-preservation point of view but the wrong move when it came to helping me with winning new business. Single-handedly, this probably cost me two years of lack of correct focus, but it was only later that I had an aha moment and realized just how important both setting goals and writing them down really are.

If, like me, you have some form of resistance to establishing, committing to, and writing down your new business goals, then please don’t wait two years for your own aha moment to maybe arrive — just do it (to borrow a phrase). Genuinely, this is one of the real cornerstones to success in winning new business. Laser-sharp focus is a natural follow-on and an essential part of your winning new business tool kit, but without a committed, directed, written set of goals to train that focus, you’re seriously weakening your sales arsenal.

So why is goal setting so important? You can find a ton of academic research on this, but it all boils down to training your brain to focus on what really matters, and having written goals sets off a series of subliminal actions. It’s not a new concept; it’s a tried and tested element to successfully achieving a set of goals. Napoleon Hill was one of the early authors to expound this theory, and I recommend reading his master class Think and Grow Rich. Although it was written in 1937, it’d take a braver man than me to dismiss its relevance in winning new business today.

Goal setting is vital, but it also comes with a word of warning that I pick up on elsewhere in this book; don’t spend all your time setting and revising goals. Do it once and review it according to a regular schedule that you define — and then get on with the job of winning new business. Don’t overplan or hide behind revising the plan as an excuse for inaction. Don’t be someone who’s so busy being busy that you don’t have time to be busy — that doesn’t allow you time for the tasks and actions that deliver success.

So what type of goals should you set, and how should you do it? The following sections explain.

Considering a peer or mentor review

Having goals to achieve is a significant factor in driving you to take action today, but they’re more effective when you share them with a peer or mentor review. Knowing that you need to report back on progress toward hitting your goals prevents you from backsliding on them. For example, changing the due date on a goal is all too easy if you don’t feel like committing the time to it today and have no one to keep you accountable. Of course, doing this is cheating only yourself.

On the other hand, if you have to discuss progress on your goals with a peer or mentor on a regular basis, then you’ll likely think twice before just changing a date or skipping some action because you don’t feel like doing it. Be accountable in your review and see it as a positive force to keep you on track. Try to make sure that you have a review weekly, and remember that it doesn’t need to be formal or time-consuming; in fact, it shouldn’t be time-consuming at all if you work it into your normal daily routine.

There’s no point in reviewing your goals with your boss or someone further up the management chain for the simple reason that as a new business salesperson, you know how to package a message in the way that they want to hear it. Having an informal support network, such as sales colleagues, is far more effective, and it doesn’t necessarily need to be in the same company — they don’t need to understand the details, just be able to ask you how many “x” you’ve hit each week. Being honest and knowing that this question is coming and that you’ll have to justify missing the goal is usually enough to keep you focused on hitting the goals. It works for me. Give it a try for yourself and find the power of the peer or mentor review.

Seeing that success leads to more success

One of the reasons for building sales momentum is that success really does lead to more success. Lecturing about systems and processes and expecting people to take it on board is all well and good. They may remember 50 percent of the information and act on half of that. By rolling up your sleeves and getting on with the job rather than just talking about it, you make all the necessary difference to results; early success is quickly followed by further success, and the pattern repeats, all because you build and sustain momentum. It really is that important in winning new business.

When I begin a new client project, I always tell the client that my role is to help him build and maintain momentum and to do all that I can to ensure early sales success, which will lead to a step change in his approach to winning new business.

Subconscious programming of the mind is one of the reasons behind this reality, and you can read about it as much as you like, but only by doing and implementing it can you realize the power behind it.

When discussing momentum, the first thing that generally comes to mind is that it’s a positive thing; momentum drives you forward and toward your goals. You need to be aware, however, that negative momentum prevents you from achieving success just as effectively.

Negative momentum is a dangerous trap that a new business salesperson can easily fall into. You decide to take a day off making calls because you don’t feel like it. A day turns into two days, and two days turns into a week. You can’t get that time back or reverse those decisions, however hard you try to convince yourself otherwise. This always has an impact further down the line as new opportunities that you’ve missed out on are no longer in your pipeline and you struggle to hit your metrics and ultimately your sales numbers.

Some years ago, a respected psychologist proposed a three-step model for changing momentum in individuals, and it’s relevant today in new business sales:

• A form of disruption or unfreezing of mindset is needed.
• Change takes place as a result of the disruption.
• Refreezing of the new state takes place.

This may sound a little dramatic, but if you think about it for a few minutes, you’ll see the logic as applied to new business sales. The disruption required can be your wake-up call to change perhaps a realization that you’ve fallen into a negative momentum spiral.

Momentum, positive or negative, by its very nature takes a little time to produce an impact, but when you decide to really hit the ground running and make those calls today, tomorrow, and every day, you’ll find that real and sustainable sales results follow. Your pipeline fills, your deals stack up, and you achieve your numbers.

Another way that success leads to success is through association. This is among the reasons sales conferences generally lead to an upturn in sales results. Take a group of new business salespeople and expose them to high energy, positive energy, and people, and they have newfound motivation to succeed. Surround yourself with positive, can-do achievers, and avoid associating with negative influences, and then measure the results after six months. It may surprise you.

Always be qualifying

Old-school sales training taught people to always be closing, and to an extent, this remains valid for some consumer sales, such as the more irrational or left-brain purchases like clothing, cars, and maybe even real estate. It has no valid role in business-to-business sales, however, where today’s buyers are sophisticated and market savvy. A much more realistic approach in business-to-business sales is to always be qualifying.

Qualifying is a continual state done throughout a sales cycle, not just once at the beginning. You have to accept that prospects change their minds sometimes, that needs change, that new internal and external influences come to bear, and that priorities change. Just because you qualified last week doesn’t mean that qualification will still be valid tomorrow, so make sure that you keep on top of events.

I’d go so far as to say that qualifying is the single most important part of a new business salesperson’s job. I rate it as being more important than prospecting, presenting, handling objections, and structuring the deal, all of which are vital components in the new business salesperson’s role, but qualifying is right at the top of the pile. By continually qualifying, you continue to build momentum in your sales cycles as you’re always forward thinking and always looking for the next reason to move quickly.

The bottom line with the importance of prospecting is that you need to keep your pipeline full and to understand how your prospects are developing. If you never take your eye off the ball, changing events won’t catch you by surprise. Qualifying is one of the best practice principles of winning new business. Flip to Chapters 9 and 19 for more about qualification.

Planning for tomorrow

In building and maintaining a sense of momentum, you need to make every minute of your working day count. So, for example, don’t arrive at your desk in the morning and spend the first half-hour wondering what you should do. Being able to get your working day off to a fast start just takes a bit of organization and a lot of willpower to avoid the usual distractions, but achieving it can set you up for a winning start to the day, which can then propel you forward.

Consider the following ideas:

• Make a habit of checking your schedule the previous night, and at the end of each working day, arrange your calls for the morning so that you really can hit the ground running.
• Depending on your role and your sector, you may not be able to ignore early morning emails, but try to look for anything important while getting ready to leave home so that when you arrive at the office, you can get straight down to productive work and leave email catch-ups for later in the day.

Technology also has a role to play here in getting you organized. (I cover the role of technology in Chapter 4.) Consider how you can make some significant gains to time, especially first thing in the morning, by taking advantage of the help available to you with technology. Anything that makes the job of a new business salesperson easier to plan and execute has to be worth exploring.

Avoiding headless chicken syndrome

The last thing you need to be doing is running around chasing every potential prospect that rears his head, regardless of qualification, in a desperate attempt to pull in some business. I’ve seen this happen too often, and without exception, it’s a sign of a process that’s either nonexistent or out of control.

Two things that help you take action here are planning and focus:

• Planning: If you fail to plan, then, as the saying goes, you plan to fail. Look at any successful salesperson, and you’ll see a definite pattern: He’s organized, follows a system or methodology, and plans consistently. He may not realize that he’s following a methodology because his actions and processes are second nature, but each sales cycle he runs is based on replicable processes, which is the very essence of a successful methodology.
• Focus: Successful salespeople are driven in pursuit of a goal, and you can guarantee that they’ve written the goal down and review it frequently, allowing nothing to get in the way of achieving it. (I talk about setting and writing down goals earlier in this chapter.)

Giving yourself the best chance of success

Success in sales isn’t by accident; it’s the result of very deliberate focus and planning. Sales in the 21st century is a solid profession, and one that you should be proud to be engaged in. I am.

As in any profession or occupation, you need to give yourself the best chance of success by consistently learning and applying best practices. Don’t accept second best. Nobody said that you have to play fair against competitors as long as you play ethically. Nothing is wrong with seeking to give yourself an unfair advantage by playing to your specific strengths. Don’t be pushed into playing by someone else’s rules; set the agenda for yourself. If your approach or solution lends itself to a particular approach, then load the dice in your favor and focus on this as the key attribute in the sale, and then get everyone else playing to your tune.

For example, if you discover that a competitor is focusing on a specific feature of a solution that you’re perhaps not a leader in, then turn the attention to something else. Find a reason to draw the prospect’s attention away from where you don’t want it to be and onto where you do want it. Use a case study, for example, or use an industry statistic to reinforce your message today and to keep the discussion where you want it to be. Learn a lesson from politicians here; observe how they deflect questions back to areas that they want to discuss.

Using replicable processes

If winning new business sales has a single absolutely key attribute, it’s making use of a replicable sales process or methodology that guides you through the prospecting and qualification steps in a coherent and consistent way, giving you a clear competitive advantage. Don’t try to reinvent the wheel with every sales cycle; go with a tried and tested system that’s designed for your situation.

The clue to delivering sustainable new business sales performance is to work smart, not just hard. Of course, you should work hard to justify your position and salary, but working hard in the traditional sense of long hours of labor won’t lead to sales success unless it’s aligned to the way you work, too. Smart working is the key. Understand the nature of your prospects, solutions, and processes, and use your sales methodology to guide you as to where to make the effort.

Take note of the following best practice principles, and apply them to your hard work to become a smarter worker:

• Qualifying: Nothing comes even close to being as important as the role of qualifying potential new business. You don’t have time to chase everything that moves, and you need to know where to invest your time for maximum return. By always qualifying your prospects, you get a much better understanding of how the sales cycle is developing and avoid any nasty surprises as the deal reaches its climax. (See Chapters 9 and 19 for more information.)
• Prospecting: You need to invest significant time and resources into adding prospects to your pipeline. Dedicate time every day to work on this or risk running out of potential new business somewhere down the line. You can automate many of the prospecting tasks, but you still need to drive the process. (See Chapter 9 for details.)
• Building relationships: Face time or telephone time with your prospects is of vital importance. This is where you handle objections and drive the sales cycle toward completion. (Find an introduction to making a good first impression in Chapter 3.)
• Structuring deals: In business-to-business sales, no two deals are generally exactly the same, and you need to be able to understand the requirements of all members of the decision-making unit to structure a deal that delivers a win-win solution. (Check out Chapter 11 for the full scoop.)
• Being solution oriented: This is as much a mindset as a physical attribute. You need to approach each sales cycle with an attitude of finding a solution to a need rather than looking for a quick order and moving on. Not many obstacles stand in the way of having a solution-oriented approach. (Flip to Chapter 5 for more information.)

I once had a new salesperson join my team who had been promoted internally from a more technical sales support role, and he had a penchant for working hard. He was in the office early and stayed until late most days, and he learned the ins and outs of the set of products that he was given responsibility for and got immersed in detail. His client-facing skills were nonexistent, but that would come with training and support. But he would just not take on board any feedback about how to focus on the things that mattered instead of drowning in detail at a product level. After months of coaching, he wasn’t getting any better, and eventually we had to conclude that he wasn’t cut out for a new business sales role.

Had he worked with a sales methodology and used replicable processes, like everyone else did, he could have been a success, but he “knew better” and was determined to do it his way. Sadly, his way was a one-way street out of a sales role.