Whether you have five minutes or five days before your next call, use these tips to get yourself mentally prepared for sales success.
Salespeople aren’t always known for their patience, but a good salesperson gets used to waiting. Unscheduled delays in airports, reception areas, conference rooms, and offices can and do take up a remarkable amount of time for many reps. Don’t waste that time. Get yourself mentally prepared for your sales call. Use that time wisely—and these tips—to hone your readiness skills to a razor’s edge.
1. Frame your thinking to the positive.
There’s a reason you are on this sales call, whether it’s because of your own successful prospecting or because your supervisor thinks you can win on it. Either way, your organization doesn’t expect you to fail. Why should you? Focus your thoughts on walking through a successful sales call and the probability of that happening will go up. Now you’re getting mentally prepared.
2. Rehearse your questions/presentation.
You want to make your very best first impression on everyone you might meet. How will you introduce yourself to the receptionist? To your prospect? To anyone else you encounter? You have scripts—formal or informal—that you use for meetings like this. Rehearse your words, phrases, questions and statements until you can deliver them naturally and not sound scripted. Confidence will emerge.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yr7ujtiFB2M
3. Anticipate your prospects questions and objections.
From what you know of their situation, anticipate what those might be. Ask yourself what you would say to a salesperson from your company if the positions were reversed. Generate thoughtful responses. Also, think about what you’ll say if they ask something unexpected. Write them down so they are easy to access. This will help to get you mentally prepared.
4. Review the steps of the sales call.
In your mind, walk through the major milestones of your meeting. Remember your goals and the questions that you must get answers to so that you can move on to the next steps of your sales process. Be sure you’re clear on everything you want to accomplish. Each milestone completed successfully leads you to the next step of the process. That’s how you drive sales forward.
The best salespeople focus on their goals. Don’t fill your final moments before a sales call with worry about its outcome or the distractions that clamor for your attention from your smartphone. Take control of your time and squeeze all the value you can from each minute by preparing for the success of your next sales call. It all starts in your mind.