“ Your most precious resource is this moment of time.”
times, we just waste the reps’ time bringing them into the office,” he says. “The manager’s real job is coaching. You have to be in the field with them.”
Along with coaching value, field time cuts down on
office visits. “If you do a half-day sales meeting one day a week, that’s 25 days a year. That cuts 225 sale days per year down to 195. We see our people once a week, to catch up and socialize a bit,” says Jeffrey. But he doesn’t cut into prime selling time: “We hold our weekly sales meeting late Friday afternoon. When reps hit the office late Friday, time isn’t wasted.”
BIG SALE, EXPENSIVE TRAVEL
Consultative selling, with long sales cycles, long distances, and big dollar volumes, creates a different dynamic. The president of a management consulting firm says selling to CEOs and senior VPs has changed. “We used to travel about 70 percent of the time,” the
president says, “selling to senior execs in North and Latin America. Now, it’s less – more like 50 percent of the time.” Consultative selling requires deployment of highly-paid selling, business, and technical staff. Firms are much more sensitive to the costs of these resources. “When you sell software or logistics services, it’s a very complicated sale,” says the president. “It takes anywhere from six months to a couple of years to close.” And the Internet provides a new channel for getting information to clients. Companies in this market tailor travel and commu- nications for the long cycle, assigning only the resources they need for each contact. Travel time is actually up for some non-selling staff, ac-
cording to him. “Some of your presales resources – logis- tics, operations, and financial staff – have increased their travel because of increased demand for their services, and it is more difficult for technical people to communicate without travel.” At the other extreme, sending top executives is get- ting much tighter. “At the executive level, companies are far more demanding about the cost,” he explains. “If you want the executive VP or CEO to make a sales call, they ask: Who is the client? How far along on the sale are we? What is the competitive situation?” Senior salespeople are in the middle of this hierarchy. Often, the crucial question is, How else can I communicate? “If I have a client in Australia,” he says, “that’s easily a $5,000 airplane ticket. But I can send a 100-page docu- ment to them over a high-speed Internet connection. They
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can review it and get back to me on the phone or Skype or any of the other Internet communication tools now avail- able the same day. Years ago, I would have been in their face. Now, the Internet is not only my first thought but also the client’s.”
First thoughts and e-travel can limit trip lengths. “For a New Zealand client, I had a three-day training program due,” he says. “I cut the actual visit to one day and sent the other two days of lessons over the Web. We did it interactively from offices across the world.” One key to controlling all this is timing. “Companies have to get smarter about where they are in the sales cycle,” he argues. “You do not get on a plane for a second call following the first call unless you will get in front of a key decision maker.”
Even then, senior executives travel only after asking two questions: ‘What is my competitive position?’ and, ‘How likely is it I can improve my position?’” This president breaks travel opportunities into three basic categories: 1) We’re near closing and a clear winner, 2) We’re near closing and have, say, a 50-50 chance, and 3) We’re only about halfway through the process. The travel rule is straightforward. “You go for the best chance late in the cycle,” he says. “The other ones wait until the next quarter. Until then, you get on the Internet or email.” And, before you give any airline $5,000, paste this simple question on your best travel luggage: “Am I talking to the right people, at the right time, with the right solution?”
KNOW YOUR RATIOS
Another management consultant adds, “The average rep spends too much time in the office. Don’t write proposals during workdays. You can only sell from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Get out on appointments or contact clients during the day.” A lot of reps “bunch up” their appointments. “They are out for a day, then in for a day,” she says. That wastes every other day of prime selling time. Contacts depend partly on the sales cycle, she ac- knowledges. But do not let a long cycle fool you. “I know a company whose sales cycle is two to three years. They need only one deal a year to close,” she says. “I asked them, how much time do you spend on each sale? They could only account for 1,000 hours a year. That works out to an average of 20 minutes a day. So I said, ‘What do you spend the rest of the time doing?’”
The average business-to-business sales call takes three hours, including travel time: that’s three high-quality calls per day. Some reps can “touch” 25 customers per day, at least lightly, if they are centrally located.
The key to budgeting time intelligently is not the num- ber of calls, but the sales results. You have to know the ratio of results to efforts at each step of the process. She illustrates with this: “If I make 15 cold calls and get one new appointment each day, I get five new appoint- ments each week. Add in existing customers, and I make eight appointments per week. If I close one out of every eight, I average one sale per week.” Steps and pace vary
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