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Why We Dial the Next Number, Write the Next Email, Knock on the Next Door

I thought since this is Christmas week and most of my favorite shows are in re-run that I would dig up a few "Blast from the Past" blogs that are still located on the BlogSpot site.

Today I found my self a little out of sorts. I had scheduled five appointments for the day, as the day wore on one appointment forgot that I was scheduled and then another had to reschedule.  Dang, I thought......., and these were probably the best appointments out of the five.

With only nine selling days left in the month,  I found myself 6 miles from home and 28 miles from the office with one hour left in the day. 

What would you do?

Ok, I lost two appointments and I'm not sure when I can make those up, I've got nine days and don't have my numbers in yet.  I could do one of these:

  • Call it a day and go home
  • Go home and answer emails
  • Go to the office and leave for home once I get there
  • Knock on a few doors on the way home
  • Knock off early, get a coffee and relax at the coffee cafÉ


I opted for the knocking on a few doors on my way home, plus I made sure they were accounts that I've never stopped in before.  I was able to stop at five places, the first four were typical, dropped off my card, tried to get the name of the decision maker.  What is it with securing the name of the decision maker, I tell you it's like you're asking someone to give up their first born nowadays, don't they realize I can just go to the web, or better yet do a "view source" on their web site and 8 out of ten times I can get the right contact!

So, as the saying goes "The Harder I work the Luckier I Get", the last cold call was the cream of the crop and they had interest in one of products and was willing to meet in a few days to discuss.

I could have packed it, thrown in the towel for the day, however I elected to do my job and work.  BOO HOO, to the books and the naysayers that say cold calling is dead. 

Note: You can't predict the future, one more phone call, one more email, one more door to knock on could get you the order of your life.  All we ask of ourselves if we've worked as hard as we could today.

-=Good Selling=-

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It's amazing what happens when you make that "last" call for the day/holiday.

I share this story with my sales reps quite often:

i remember about 7 years ago on a Friday around 3:00 I was working a more rural area of my territory and saw a sign for a church. I rode by the sign and said to myself I would go back later. Something told me to go back and I did. I went back to the church that is a small backwoods rural church with probably 30-50 members max. Stopped in and spoke to the pastor and he asked to sit down right then and there. He said "you're lucky you caught me because I'm rarely here during the week." Once we talked, he said it had been discussed the previous Sunday that the church needed a copier and they should start looking. The pastor asked me for some pricing right then so I pulled out my price book and wrote him a proposal on notebook paper. We discussed features, speeds and feeds, our service etc etc and he liked what we talked about and said call me on my cell Monday morning around 10 or 11 so he could go over it with the person who handled the finances over the weekend. I walk in the office Monday morning and about 9am he calls telling me to bring him the paperwork before I could call him. I got there late that afternoon and he said it was a relief to him I stopped by and he didn't have to look through the yellow pages or the Internet to find people to call. We are on our second 5 year lease now and it pretty much is a walk in, show him the new machine, and do the paperwork....in and out in about 5 minutes. 

Any time I get the feeling to go home early, or get to the other side of town before traffic etc. I try to make one or two more calls to see what things I can drum up.

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