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Manage Prospects
Manage Prospects by turning them into Customers
You must know the total elapsed time of how long it takes you to move an enterprise or individual from prospect to customer. Take a moment now and divide your total sales cycle time into the following three priorities:
Priority One: Revenue-Generating Activity. Prospects in this area are your "highest-risk" prospects—the ones you've got the most time and resources invested in; the ones that you've educated, nurtured and given your best ideas to. Therefore, these prospects could be easy pickings for your competition. As we all know too well, this is also the place where things can go suddenly and mysteriously wrong. Prospects can get cold feet, priorities can change, and opportunities can vaporize.
Clearly, your first priority has to be to take all the steps necessary to manage prospects and to make the sale happen with each prospect that sits in this area. We have to make turning these prospects into customers, making sure their experience with your organization is superb, a top priority.
If you're not sure who falls in this area, use the following rules of thumb:
- You and your prospect have agreed to the terms and conditions of the sale, and they have an approved budget.
- The decision-maker of the sale has agreed to the time frame to begin the business relationship.
- All that's left now is for the decision-maker to sign your contract.
Priority Two: Qualifying Activity. The next priority is to move anyone who is in your sales process (that has shown initial interest in whatever you sell) to the next level of the buy commitment. In other words, these are the prospects that you've met with or talked to over the phone that have a need for what you sell and have the budget to purchase what you sell. They have more than a casual interest, you need to manage these prospects with extra attention.
Priority Three: Conversion Activity. This is where you move your best prospects from priority two into the final stages of making your sale happen. This typically involves product demos, responding with written proposals, finalizing the numbers and perhaps providing referrals.
Three Steps to Close
Work your sales process by first closing all the opportunities that are "ripe." Next, go out and qualify each new opportunity. Finally, move each qualified opportunity into the final stages of your sale. Follow those three steps each and every working day, manage your prospects first, and don't tackle any administrative or other duties until you've addressed these three priorities in this order. You'll find that your ability to manage and control the sales process will take care of itself.
The key to closing more sales
Manage prospects with a solution that is an industry-leading customer management tool. It helps you stay on top of every prospect—from the moment customers find you, call you, or visit you, to the moment they sign on the dotted line. Your sales staff can use this solution to manage prospects throughout the entire sales process—and see higher closing ratios.
Go from prospect to sale in minimum time:
- Manage all prospective sales: e-mail inquiries from all sources, phone prospects, and web referrals
- Organize customers, appointments, and all contacts—for each salesperson
- Keep a contact history for each prospect
- Track your sales department's performance and marketing results with customized reports
Use with incredible ease—we provide all the training you need, so you can manage prospects with a few mouse clicks.
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