II.

PRE APPROACH
Prospecting is the process by which a salesman gets new customers. Prospecting is one of the most challenging components of sales process. A wise salesman knows that there are some Do's and Don'ts of successful prospecting developed by veterans in the area of selling. These are: DO'S OF PROSPECTING 1. Make a Time Schedule: Prospecting is generally expected to account for about 20 percent of the salesman's time, while different sales positions vary in their requirements. This allocation say equal to a day or a week, is difficult for many sales people. X's reason may be private fear of rejection. Y's reason may be simple forgetfulness. Sometimes, sales people just become so consumed by day-to-day urgent demands that the important tasks are left undone. Finally, prospecting success banks on the principle of Activity" - if you do not contact new prospects on a regular basis, then you will not generate obviously many new customers. The bottom-line, here is simple: "Keep moving." If you want to enjoy long-term sales-success, then you will have made a regular effort to contact new customers - no matter how painful the effort is. 2. Take it Step by Step: Salesman is not expected to make customers on his first visit. In fact, it is generally unwise to solicit an actual sale over the telephone. The initial goal of many prospecting calls is to get the customer's persuasion to send him or her piece of correspondence, some information about the company or to call back at time that is more convenient. Successful prospectors establish a specific, short-term goal, and then aim to achieve it and only it. Taking this step-by-step approach makes prospecting a daunting task. It is much easier to ask some one for persuasion to stay in touch than it is to request a meeting forgetting a commitment to buy. Getting that permission still requires the essential skills getting to the point quickly, for demonstrating the potential value to the customer, but sales person will be much less likely to delay if sales person sticks with manageable goals. 3. One is to be Enthusiastic: A straight or flat uninteresting message delivered in a soft, continuous voice is more unwisely to generate much prospecting success. As a rule's the sales person is to keep prospecting calls upbeat, attractive to the prospect and forced on fulfilling the missing of the call. Prospecting calls can be upkeep and attractive by offering value - the things the prospective interested in. These must be geared towards building commonly at the outset. 4. Be a Careful Listener: Another key to prospecting success lies in listening skills. Sales people need to listen extremely well while driving towards their own goals, striking a balance between empathy and focus. If sales person appears more concerned about attaining his goals than about what the prospect has to say, sales person come across as pushy and unattractive. Focused instead on the prospect's interests and situation at the tune of the call, so that the sales person can get his or her needs. Such empathy goes a long way towards establishing rapport, a seem of reciprocity and untimely, the potential for a long-term customer relationship.

5. Be Able to Deal with Rejection: Prospecting implies soliciting the business from people who are essentially strangers. Therefore, it is not surprising that sales people frequently face rejection. As rejection is a unique and painful experience, the ability to deal with rejection that is to remain persistent and focused & critical to prospecting success. 6. Plan Your Sales Conversation: The success of a steel heating is determined in the first few seconds of the actual contact with the prospect. Therefore, it is important that salesman plans his conversation well ahead of time. The possible key questions to be asked as a part of conversation are: i. What salesman knows about the prospect on the basis of which he can start his conversation? ii. What a particular prospect has in common with his other clients? iii. What he knows about this contact? iv. Why he is calling? v. Can his organization help the prospect and in what way? vi. Are there tier contacts to mention? vii. What sort of needs is of this prospect? viii. What are his calls of future needs? ix. What question will he ask? x. What objectives might prospect raise, and what will be his response? DON'TS OF PROSPECTING Veterans in sales field have given some Don'ts of prospecting. These are to be respected more than Do's. 1. Don't launch into a Monologue: Generally, it takes a few seconds for a prospects hearing and thinking to catch up with sales persons speech. Therefore, even though the first movements of a call are the most valuable that is the point where the prospect form an opinion of salesman and he has to offer - be sure of start the conversation units broad statements. Focus in making a favourable impression and the prospect interest in hearing more before you launch into the body of your presentation. Give se prospect true to catch up with salesman and then to start a two-way conversation.

2. Don't make Outrageous Claims: Making excessively bold claims can give the prospect points to argue and put salesman on the defence. Being confident is one thing, but arrogant statements are sure to delineate the prospect. Instead of saying say, "I know I can", for instance, it is better to say something like "I am very confident that we can............. ". That is, the sales person should take the prospect into confidence. 3. Don't sound Canned in Conversation: In a cold call or prospecting, salesman wants to appear quite genuine, helpful and direct, consultant, salesman should not use canned conversation; it sounds insincere and does not carry much meaning. One way of avoiding such conversation is to vary his sales pitch frequently. It is also valuable to rehearse the opening of salesman's prospecting call to the point where it sounds as natural as possible. Some sales-people use a tape recorder to review their love and voice. They practice this until they can hear themselves sounding natural, yet controlled and focused. 4. Don't be Curt: Wise salesman never burns bridges. Sometimes, salespeople are over abrupt or curt with the personnel who are answering the phone on behalf of the targeted prospect. Finally, these front line individuals can be critical allies in salesman's efforts to win business, it is wise to treat them accordingly. That is, it is the courtesy and modesty with meekness that helps in getting better prospecting. 5. Don't Use Business Jargon: Prospective customers are turned off by representative who uses excusive jargon and excusive technical language. It is true that a sales person's organization or his industry has is own terminology one that might not universally applicable. A word has different meanings in different situations or lines. Thus, the word "insult" in medical terms means 'damage' and not 'insult' as is understood; again, the word 'local' means 'partial' and local as is understood. That is why, one should be sure to speak at the customer's level of understanding. A jargon may be acceptable only if the customer is familiar and comfortable with it.

ACTUAL SALES

DO
1) Listen to your client. The single most important thing you can do to make a successful sale is listen to your client. Understand how his business works. Understand what pays his bills. Then simply present a solution that makes it easier for him to keep doing what he does best. 2) Build a relationship and demonstrate your expertise. Business owners dont usually want to become experts. They just want to know an expert they can trust one who really understands their business and is interested in building a

long term relationship. 3) Present solutions to your clients problems. I dont make sales. I do my clients a favor by introducing them to solutions that will help them harness the power of the web for their business/organization. If I can present a solution to my client he will be grateful and it is less like making a sale and more like entering into a partnership. 4) Recognize the point when youve won them over. Youve won them over when they start asking questions about the solution instead of asking questions about you or your work. Youve moved from mistrust to trust. At this point, the rest is easy. 5) Communicate in the way (email, phone, in person) your client prefers, not the way you prefer. Each method of communication is only as strong as the preference of the recipient. If you know a guy is too busy to meet but he is a telephone person then you should call him. 6) Appeal to both emotion and reason. People buy on emotion but justify their decision with reason. Both are significant. You must inspire their emotions but also give them solid evidence that you are the right choice. You only hurt yourself if you dont deal with both sides of the decision making process.

DONT
1) Dont try to make a sale without first building trust. The worst thing you can do is try to make a sale or push someone into a decision without building trust. Build relationships instead. (see #1 and #2 on the do list) 2) Dont waste your time with clients who dont fit you. Another bad thing to do is to waste your time on someone who doesnt fit you well. You may need the business really badly and so you go after everyone no matter what, but the truth is that taking clients who dont fit you will be worse in the long run because they will drain your time and keep you from finding the ones that fit. 3) Dont waste money (and paper) on marketing materials. All I need is a net meeting tool and a demonstration website. Thats about it. Theres no sense in killing any trees for marketing because as soon as you put ink on paper youll want to change it up. I like to stay as paperless as possible. Naturally, there are some types of businesses that might require printed materials but if you can avoid them, I would. 4) Dont set unrealistic expectations. Your goal is to have happy clients who pay your invoices. Its extremely important to set honest expectations up front. To do this, you have to get very specific in defining the scope of your proposal. This will take more time at the beginning but will save you five times the

effort on the back end trying to defend an invoice or correct a misunderstanding. Plus, it will protect your reputation. 5) Dont nag, but dont give up too early either. Sometimes clients really are too busy to focus on your solution. So a no might just be a not right now. You dont want to nag them by calling too often. So instead, find out when it would be ok to contact them again. Then, get a good reminder system and use it faithfully. Dont get behind. Dont end your day until everyone you were supposed to contact that day has been contacted. ALTERNATIVE ANSWER MO ABUK.
DO 1. Compartmentalize the issues in your life and career. 2. Spend regular time in self-improvement and reflection. 3. Ask for the business. 4. Close a relationship, not just the sale. 5. Study the competition. 6. Know your product/service better than anyone. 7. Set goals and monitor your progress. 8. See rejection as a tool to learn about yourself. 9. Sell value not low price. 10. Keep accurate and consistent sales records. 11. Cultivate your support staff. 12. Work hard as hard to keep the business as you did to get it. 13. Listen more than you talk. 14. Tailor your sales message. 15. Listen between the lines. 16. Carefully observe early prospect/client signals. 17. Let poor prospects go earlier rather than later.

18. Get information before you give it. 19. Focus on what you want not what you don't. 20. Keep your ego out of the sales process. DON'T 1. Talk too much. 2. Give information before you get it. 3. Give redundant presentations. 4. Assume everyone buys for similar reasons. 5. Be afraid of rejection and failure. 6. Waste time on unimportant non-sales issues. 7. Promise a little and deliver less. 8. Sell low price. 9. Assume all sales resistance is negative. 10. Try and do it all yourself. 11. Give product focused presentations. 12. Deal in negatives; what you can't do. 13. Spend time with poor prospects. 14. Advertise your willingness to make concessions. 15. Assume selling and negotiating are the same. 16. Lose control of the sales process. 17. Just cultivate your client organization contact. 18. Cold call before you have done some research. 19. Assume a verbal yes, means yes. 20. Assume you will have the business forever.