Jeff Garrison

How Many Contacts Required to Make a Sale?--The Sequel

It was pure coincidence that I spoke with Mike Torticill of Cool Life Systems in Montgomery, New York about an hour after finishing yesterday's blog post.  After our conversation, he sent me some statistics from a recent blog post at the Cool Life Systems web site regarding contacts, leads, and sales.

Here is an excerpt. 

• 2%  of sales are made on the 1st contact
• 3%  of sales are made on the 2nd contact
• 5%  of sales are made on the 3rd contact
• 10% of sales are made on the 4th contact
• 80% of sales are made on the 5th-12th contact

And if that doesn’t get you…

• 87% of all leads are never pursued
• 45% – 63% of the all leads eventually buy the product or service from someone
• 48% of all sales leads that are pursued are dropped after the first call/meeting
• 80% of all sales close after the fifth contact/meeting (see above)
• 73% of sales people do not have a growth plan for their top five accounts

Actual percentages are going to be impacted by the type of product or service that you are selling and to what type of market.

However, to support Mike's point, the quality of your systems and the disciplined use of those systems will have a significant impact in some of these areas.

Are these numbers surprising or are they congruent with your experience.  Feel free to comment.

How Many Contacts Required to Make a Sale?

I worked with a business owner a few years ago who tracked how many times he had to "touch" a prospect with a phone call (voice mail included), e-mail, or letter before the prospect knew who he was.  For him, it was twelve.

Wendy Weitz, the Queen of Cold Calling, states in a recent blog post that a sale is made after the seventh contact.

Many have tracked the number of contacts required to get a meeting with a prospect or the number of contacts required to make a sale and the numbers vary sometimes by a lot.  However, there is one thing that is consistent among them all.

You can count on it taking at least six contacts on average to get anywhere with a prospect.

Here is the takeaway.

1. Don't give up on a prospect before six touches.
2. Start tracking to learn what is required for you to get your first appointment, a needs analysis conversation, a sale, or whatever you believe to be an important milestone in your sales process.
3. Build those "touches" into your lead nurturing/sales process.  Make it as automatic and consistent as possible.
4. Experiment with the type and timing of your touches to see if you can shorten the process.

What have you found to be the required number of touches and in what combinations?

Photo on flickr by batega

Sales Success is About Helping Clients Succeed

Helping clients succeed is the only reason in b2b sales to sell anything.  If a product or service does not somehow help a client to make more money (or prevent the loss of money), why would they buy it?

Helping clients succeed is more than just selling them a product or service that works.  It is about being a trusted adviser.  One aspect of being a trusted adviser is making sure that the solution provided is a great fit for the problem the client is trying to solve or the opportunity they are trying to capture.

How does one know if the solution will help the cient succeed?

BEFORE turning the focus to a specific solution, listen hard to understand their business including...

•  their market objectives and concerns
• their operational objectives and concerns, and
• their financial objectives and concerns .

Only at that time will the sales person know if their solution will help their client succeed. 

If the solution is a good fit, the salesperson is well equipped and morally obligated to sell his or her product or service.  If it is not the right fit, the salesperson is well equipped and morally obligated to suggest alternatives.

What!  Suggest alternatives!  Walk away from a sale?

Helping clients succeed requires more than market and product knowledge, asking great questions, and being a great listener.  It requires a Winning Sales Paradigm.  It requires integrity.  It also requires a belief that opportunities are abundant.  It requires a belief that helping a client by not selling them a poorly fitting solution will be good for sales in the long run. 

I guarantee the last one!  It will be good for sales!

Listening: Don't Hijack the Conversation

Hijacking the conversation is such an easy thing to do in sales when you have just met a prospect with whom you are thinking about establishing rapport and being memorable.  In fact, hijacking the conversation is a little bit like stealing the air people breathe.  They may not know why they are having trouble breathing, but until they get some air, they are not really focused on anything else.

Here is an example.  John was referred to Jane.  He is a good prospect and they have just met at his office for the first time.

Jane: "I see from the picture on your desk that you have a son who plays football."

John: "I have two kids in high school sports."

Jane: "Really, I have three kids.  One plays baseball and the other two are into soccer.  A funny thing happened at my sons baseball game yesterday. . ."

Jane is thinking that rapport is being established because they are talking about something they have in common when in fact she has just hijacked the conversation.  It would have been better to ask John about his kids.  That's what he wanted to talk about.  For example:

• What grade is your son in?
• What position does he play?
• Did you play football as well?
• Is your other child a son or daughter?

There are a dozen questions Jane could have asked.  After a few questions, John would have asked Jane if she had kids or if she was a sports fan or something.

This is not some sales guru, rapport establishing, manipulation technique.  It is just allowing another human being to be the center of attention for a moment.

Jane could have asked something about John's company such as how long has he owned the company or how did he get started in the business. 

Regardless of how the conversation gets started, Jane should not be anxious to connect her background with John's. Be paitent.  The opportunity will present itself naturally.

Here is a practice tip.  If you think you do this (even sometimes), share this idea with someone you interact with regularly.  Ask them to help you break the habit by pointing it out when you do.

Do you have other thoughts about hijacking conversation?  Does gender impact how and when this happens or with whom?  Please comment.

Photo on flickr by dotbenjamin

Networking Objectives

I hear all the time in my work that "networking events" like at your local Chamber of Commerce don't work.  If one's expectation is to go to a networking event and have light conversation and trade business cards with people hoping to stumble upon a qualified prospect, then they don't work very well.

If one's objective is to learn about others and to look for opportunities to create and nurture strong business relationships, then they work great.  To succeed, one has to change their focus.

It is all about focusing on other people.

Be prepared and excited to just meet and listen to other people and to learn about their businesses and their roles.  Try to figure out how you can help them succeed. 

• Is there someone in your network they should meet?
• Is there an article you can send to them?
• Is there a book or a even a podcast you can recommend?
• Do you have an idea that might help their business?
• Can you inform them of other networking events?

Getting to know others in business well enough to provide value is a great networking strategy.  As you help  others, some will find ways to reciprocate in a way that their resources allow.

You will have more fun networking and you will wind up with more referrals in the end if you are patient and consistent.

Photo on flickr by CP

An Inspiring Personal Brand

One of the biggest challenges in personal branding for sales professionals is that they focus on what appeals to "customers" rather than "prospects."

For example, customers want ...

• Phone calls returned in a timely manner
• Quick answers to their questions
• The job done right
• The job done on time and on budget

These things and many others will become important to prospects at some point as they are converted to customers.  How well these things are done contributes to the companies reputation which is obviously a critical component to the overall brand. 

However, these are things that are expected and will not necessarily get people to seek you out.  They will just keep you from being deselected.

Your Personal Brand Must First Inspire People!

Your brand must be that you can provide extraordinary value.  In business that means you can make a client money or save them money one way or another.  You are the "go to" guy!  You are the fixer!  You want people to say, "You know who you should call?  You should call ..."

Call my banker.  He helped my company get financing.

Call my accountant.  He saved us a ton with his tax strategy.

Call my real estate agent.  He sold our house quickly and for a good price.

Call my web designer.  Everybody talks about our web site.

Call this phone consultant.  They improved our service and have saved us a lot of money.

What belief must you inspire first and foremost to get people seeking you out?  Does everything about you promote that belief in your prospects, customers, and your network?

Here is a test.  Ask five people in your professional network to describe your brand to you.  Don't be bothered if you don't hear what you thought you might.  Just create a brand strategy and execute it day in and day out.  Ask them again and others after about three months and see what happens.

Photo on flickr by cliff1066

Sales System Pitfalls

There are many sales system pitfalls that can slow down or stop the growth of an organization.  ("System" refers to policies and procedures, not necessarily an electronic system.)  Here are three pitfalls that I look for right away.

1.  No Sales System

Obviously if everything is done randomly and inconsistently, loads of opportunity will never be captured.  This occurs a lot with small businesses that market to get leads, but don't have a pre-determined method for working with the prospect to turn them into a client.

2.  Cumbersome Sales System

In an attempt to handle every detail and contingency or to capture a lot of metrics, the sales system can get in the way of real productivity, especially in smaller businesses where there may be little to no support such as a customer service center.  The sales person can wind up spending a lot of time navigating non revenue generating activity. 

When designing the system, was it designed primarily as a support tool for talented sales people, or was it designed primarily to monitor the activity of of average sales people?  Be careful, a lot of policies and procedures are created in corporate America to try and compensate for poorly trained, poorly motivated, and poorly hired employees.

3.  Inflexible Sales System

This has to do as much with sales management as it does with the sales system.  Three successful sales people selling the same product for the same company in similar territories can achieve their success by employing different tactics. 

One may be extraordinary at prospecting with tools such as Linked-In or Twitter.  The second is extraordinary at prospecting IRL (in real life).  The third gets extraordinary results cold calling.

All three have leveraged unique strengths and styles that get great introductions that lead to sales.

A system developed with prejudice towards one style will obviously impede the other styles.  For the small business, it may cause them to go through several high potential sales people until they find one that fits their rigid system.

With a large businesses, it can cause the sales force to become homogeneous.  This may be appropriate in some businesses and even support a brand, but in others it may crush the diversity of your client portfolio creating some risk management issues.

It seems like common sense, but developing and managing the use of a sales system can be a real balancing act.

What are your thoughts and experiences regarding sales systems?  Does your company have one? Is it supportive and flexible or is it cumbersome and inflexible?

Photo on flickr by blisspix

Personal Branding and Twitter, etc.

It is getting to be common knowledge now that you want to control what gets posted online about you as it regards the potentially embarrassing picture or video on Facebook or MySpace.  A high percentage of employers are checking the web for content about candidates before offering them jobs.

We also need to think about Twitter and how it reflects on our personal brand.

• When oneRTs (retweets) something someone else has posted on twitter, what does it say about them? 
• When one tweets about an article, blog post, movie, concert, or a business, what does it say about them?
• When one engages in conversation on Twitter, what does it say about them?

Look at your last twenty tweets.  Are the messages you are sending congruent with what you want your network, prospects, and clients to perceive about you?  How will our messages motivate them?

As more and more people become internet savvy, it will become standard operating procedure to check people out on the internet.  Remember to keep your content consistent with your brand. 

A Fine Line Between Tuning Out and Tuning In

One of the ironic things about quietly listening to what a person has to say is that after a while, because you are listening so well, the speaker may begin to think you are not listening.

For example, have you tried to talk to someone before who leans back and closes their eyes.  Did you wonder if they were listening?

Have you tried to talk to someone who was multitasking?  Did you wonder if they were listening?

Have you tried to talk to someone who sits there expressionless?  Did you wonder if they weren't thinking of something else?

When someone has something important to say, it can take them a while to get it out.  Show that you are engaged by giving feedback with your expression, a nod, or by saying "ok" or "I understand." 

Of course, asking an intelligent question about what they just said is the best kind of feedback.

Anything that shows you are listening, but without interrupting their flow.

So, how does this impact sales?  Without feedback when engaged with a client, they will begin to feel "processed."  Whether you are just networking or doing a needs analysis, the client may perceive that you are asking them questions just so that you can complete your agenda and ask for an appointment of go for the close. 

They may stop talking and they will not be inclined to listen to you when you are ready with a proposal.

Do you have some listening advice?

Photo on flickr by babasteve

The Problem with the Networking "Event"

Going to networking "events"  or meetings usually looks like this:

1. Show up.
2. Mingle with people you know.
3. Meet a few new people.
4. Tell each other about your respective companies.
5. Exchange business cards.
6. Perhaps suggest a meeting at a later date.
7. Repeat next time.

The problem is treating networking like an "event" with a start time and ending time.

"Networking," or Connecting as I prefer to call it, is an everyday activity and it is not just about the elevator pitch. 

It is a Sales Habitude!

Connecting is about getting to know people and their business and professional goals first and then finding ways to help them get closer to achieving those goals.

Here is my guarantee!

If you will try and do something for somebody else to help them achieve their business goals at least a few times a week, some of them will start to talk about you.  Eventually, when you go to a networking event, people will be coming up to you saying ...

"John Doe said you and I should meet.  He told me you help businesses with ..."