In our last newsletter we talked about how we manage our time. Time is money for us!  We only have so many "billable hours" per day.  We need to know how to fill those "billable hours" with profitable sales activities and know in which of those activities we need to improve. To know which of your selling activities you need to improve, you need to crunch your numbers.  Keeping track of your personal selling statistics will allow you to predict your own success.  You'll know how you are doing without your sales manager having to tell you.

 

 We need to be selling every day.  Prospecting is the activity that puts clients into your sales pipeline.  How does prospecting fit into your numbers?  Prospecting is calling on people who may or may not need your service.  Until you know if they are qualified prospects, they are suspects.  Some of these suspects won't talk to you.  Some won't need your service.  Some won't give you their time to discuss their needs and pains.  Of those who do give you their time, some won't have the money or be willing to give it to you to solve their problems.  As you go through the qualifying process, many of these "suspects" will drop out of your pipeline.  Those who are left become active prospects. 

 

To keep track of your numbers, you need to begin when you walk into someone's office or pick up the phone to call them.  We'll call this activity "approaches". Each time you actually talk to someone will be a "contact". This has to be a real, live person: voice mail messages don't count!  Much of the time, you will first speak with a receptionist or other gate-keeper.  Each time you speak to the actual decision-maker will count as a "dialogue".  Some of these dialogues will result in an appointment.  We define "appointment" as a face-to-face meeting with the prospect. (Those meetings which are cancelled don't count toward your numbers).  Of these appointments, some will result in sales.  Much of the time, the sale doesn't take place on the first call.  You want to keep track of the number of visits required to close the sale.

 

Here's what the numbers from a day of prospecting might look like:

 

Let's say your average order size is $1500.  At a 15% commission rate, you earned $225 on that sale.  That means that every contact you made on the way to that sale (every hang up, every turn-down, every "I'm not interested") was worth money to you.  Using the numbers from our example, every "approach" was worth  $15.00.

 

You can also use the numbers to figure backwards.  If you want to increase your income by $3150 in the next quarter and your average commission is $472 on each sale, you need 7 additional sales.  The numbers indicate that you need to schedule 28 "appointments".  To get these 28 appointments, you need to make 105 additional "approaches"..If you prospect every week, you only need to make approximately 8 more "approaches" per week.  You can do that!

 

Measuring your numbers will allow you to know exactly how you are performing.  It also can provide a road map to take you to greater performance.  This year, crunch your numbers! 

Pat Bryson has worked in the radio industry for over 25 years. During that time, she was one of the highest billing sales people in the radio industry in her market. She was promoted to General Sales Manager, managing and training both experienced and inexperienced sales people . Her career advanced to General Manager, where Pat  created a culture of over achievement for her stations.