WHICH IS THE FAVOURITE FOOD OF HUNGRY SELLING SHARKS

In the last article we concluded that salespeople’s time spent on actual selling can potentially be increased up to two or three times, and proportionately we can also grow sale numbers. But here we are going to address the next important challenge – where does salesperson gets enough qualified leads from to pitch at the expense of free time?
In 2017. Pace Productivity published research which showed that traditionally salesperson spend 1/3 of her time in selling and 2/3 for other additional and administrative actions. According to these statistics, we can say that there are lot of possibilities to lessen salespeople tasks or reduce a big amount of time they spend on looking for clients, client base management or other administrative tasks. They can save up to 49% of time that they spend on these tasks. After implementing the suggestions when the salesperson has additional time at her disposal for actual selling, it means that she needs more leads to find and the time they spend for looking for these will also increase.

What selling sharks like and what not?

Overall, 40% of salespeople think that the most challenging part of their works is prospecting which means identifying potential clients. This part of the job, creating the first interest through cold calls, often requires major effort even from the best ones. Without access to the great client base and the fact that first interaction doesn’t always bring you the results straight away makes it more difficult. Research made by Ovation Sales Group shows that average salesman makes 8 contacts per 1 hour and communicates all together with clients 6,25 hours to get one meeting. TOPO data says that it takes 18 calls to get one buyer, but average salesperson could make 45 calls per day, that usually ends with 2-3 potential buyer.
It is not a miracle that 63% of salespeople think that making cold calls are the most annoying part of their job and 71% thinks that the hardest part is closing the deal (based on HubSpot research). This shows exactly to which side salesperson prefers to focus. But at the same time cold calling has not lost its relevancy at all in the overall sales. The Annuitas Group data says that nicely warmed up and mapped leads will have 20% higher engagement and their conversion to sale are 47% higher. This brings us to the question where does the salesperson needs to spend her time and where to get validated potential clients to her dinner table?

How to feed selling shark?

Prospecting is one of the hardest tasks of a salesperson’s daily routine. We find that every salesperson needs to use a highly qualified and professional knowledge about their products especially in selling work and closing deals, because research shows that during last six year the sales cycle is getting longer from first contact to closing the deal has increased by 25%. This clearly shows that getting into deals is hard enough work for sellers, that takes more commitment and time.
Nowadays with technology it is possible to facilitate finding clients and reaching out to them. When the seller is active enough to make cold calls herself, then we recommend investing in great data base or tools like Fontakt App, that makes it easier for her to find the prospects quickly that matches the right profile and make calls by herself or with the help of automated assistant (read artificial intelligence). When salesperson wants to dedicate even more time and focus only on selling, then it is possible to get the best results by providing support with liaising with services that help with generating prospects. This would bring the relevant and warmed up contacts on the selling shark’s table. Fontakt specialises in providing a solution for this or you can use as standard service through the Fontakt App. With this approach all the selling work is going to be more efficient, and salesperson is going to be more satisfied than ever before.