Qualifying

Mike Montague interviews Brian Jackson on How to Succeed at Your 30 Second Commercial. Brian is an award-winning Sandler Trainer in San Diego, CA.

Troy Elmore, Sandler trainer, shows you how to succeed with the attitudes, behaviors, and techniques needed to be more successful at dealing with the competition and selling a crowded marketplace. Get the best practices collected from around the world.

Listen Time: 21 Minutes

When I was rejected for a job at McDonald’s I faced an existential crisis over the fact that I was unemployed and likely unemployable. I went from being a handy-man to a painter and out of that built a construction business. Somewhere down the line, with 40 employees, I realized I had no idea what I was doing. I spent most of my time firefighting and being over-protective of my business to the point that I believed I was the only one who could solve the problems of my business.

Upon this discovery I set out on a series of goal setting determining where I wanted my life to go. I wanted to expand and grow my business and I wanted to spend time getting to know my children and being a part of my own family. These goals were at odds, as I was spending more than 80 hours a week working and getting to know my children’s most comfortable sleeping positions.

When my oldest son was 9 and my oldest daughter was 14, I have very little recollections about their experiences over the next four years. I had built so many commitments to clients and prospects that I neglected my commitments to my family. I needed help and bought a Sandler franchise to get training by the promise that, while I could not guarantee a monetary return in a month, I could get control over my schedule and see my family. If you’re interested in some of my story read my transparent blog on the actions I took to take ownership of my life.

Having a big pipeline of “prospects” is typically seen as desirable. The more prospects you put into the pipeline, the more will eventually emerge as customers. At least that’s the theory. And the theory is partially true. Some of the people you put in the pipeline will become customers. The question is, “How many will be customers and how long will it take for them to materialize from the other end of the pipe?”

At Sandler Training, we believe in not solely talking about features and benefits during your sales call, but rather focusing on the prospect’s needs. However, there is a time for presenting, once you have qualified the opportunity. Once a prospect is fully qualified in Pain, Budget, and Decision, then it is time for you to make the presentation, and you want to make that presentation as persuasive as possible.

If your goal is to find more prospects, get more and better referrals, and make more commission dollars in 2016 than you did in 2015, consider upping your social selling game. Here are four quick tips that will help you to avoid some common mistakes online.

Creating an effective sales pipeline can be a massive headache for sales leaders because reps have been known to stuff the pipeline with opportunities that have zero chance of closing. In a previous life, I took over a product specialist role selling a web-based media monitoring and crisis communications program. My first six weeks in that role was spent culling a $3 million pipeline down to $160,000 of real, qualified opportunities

Does this sound familiar to you? Prospect A says, "This looks very good. I think there's an excellent chance we'll do business." The salesperson thinks, "I've got one." Prospect B comments, "Your price is higher than we expected." The salesperson thinks, "I'll have to cut the price to close the deal." Prospect C reveals, "We were hoping for a shorter delivery time." The salesperson thinks, "I'll have to push this through as a rush order to get the sale."e