Frozen? Time to Thaw Out
As a salesperson, do you feel frozen in these uncertain times? Are you finding it harder and harder to make your sales calls or concentrate on your marketing because you feel in despair? Are you having trouble simply getting started in the morning? Welcome to the crowd. Yes, it is tough out there regardless whether you are selling widgets or real estate.
Here are the hard facts. If you continue to be frozen, your situation will become far worse and your future could be severely impacted. If your sales cycle takes time to develop and you have no business to count on now, you will be suffering through the next few months. However, if you apply yourself and work your business for the future you will at least have a "light at the end of the tunnel". If you spend all your time playing defense, looking at cutbacks, figuring out how to stretch your credit lines and do not spend time developing new business you will fail.
This is not an economy that will be working anytime soon, so you need to re-invent yourself quickly or face a potential real disaster. The old saying "only the strongest will survive" is truer today than ever before.
So, what do you need to do? Re-engage!!!!!!! First, you have to spend a few minutes everyday planning your next. You need to set real goals to develop new business. Cold calls--you will commit to cold calls from 9-10 each day. Marketing--you will schedule time and commit each day to developing and following through on a marketing plan. Networking --each day you will commit to attending or creating a networking event. This is not something you set forth to do but let random distractions interrupt; you must focus to maximize your results.
You need to make sure that you do not take one âto-do' and stretch it into a full day project --and think that you've accomplished something this day.
You need to figure out where in your market place there are opportunities. Someone's hurt means someone else's success. Figure out where in your marketplace you can concentrate your efforts for success. Talk to your competitors, talk to your associates, and try to figure out how as a group you can make money together. Someone may have a good idea but can't figure out how to finance it. Someone else has money and is looking to take advantage of opportunities but does not know where to put it. Find the players on both sides and figure out how you can put them together and make a buck for yourself in the process.
Treat this marketplace like a football game. Instead of being down by 14 points with two minutes left in the 4th quarter, think of yourself in the early minutes of the first quarter. Many of you currently have no significant business at hand. The results of that will hurt and there is nothing you can do about that. However, if you think it's the 4th quarter, the game is over, but if your realize that this is the first quarter and force yourself to "thaw out" and "re-engage" you still have a shot at winning the game and moving on to the next level.
- Hans Hansson, Starboard Commercial/TCN Worldwide