Working from home is something I never liked doing. In the past I've worked from my office when there were snow days, bad weather or days leading up to and after a major holiday.  The reason I never liked working from home is because I can get distracting with other items when my mind roams.  Whether it's watching the news, tending to the yard or just fix something that I've been itching to fix for a long time. I guess it's my adult ADD.

A few weeks ago I decided to write my self a little note every other day. I wanted it to be a motivational quote that I would see every time I was at my desk.  Of course I found all that I need with the help of google.  The picture you see at the top of this blog is my mini white board. I procured it from Amazon about three weeks ago and have found many excellent uses for it.  Getting a message across on Zoom or Teams meetings works well, but it's best right where it is on my wall reminding me to keep the pedal to the metal.  Invest in yourself right?  That $6.00 investment is sure paying off right now.

Frak, I had all of these cools notes that I wrote down about what I did today.  Where they went is a good question because I can't see them anywhere on my desk.

I had that one order sitting in my email from the day before, however before I processed it I needed to finish that proposal for a two machine deal with an existing client.  That's the one where one of my larger A3 mfp's no longer supports a fiery.  I finished up that proposal within the hour.  It was then off to creating another proposal for a net new prospect.  I received this lead yesterday from my Jersey Plotters web site. This proposal also took the better part of 45 minutes.  I don't think I have a good shot at this one just because it's so far from my home office.  But, it's always good to put up a $14K opportunity because you never know.

One thing I've noticed is that it takes me much longer to process proposals and complete order documents from the home office.  I believe it's because I was used to working with three monitors at the office. It's much easier when you can keep three screens going at the same time.  At my home office all I have is my notebook and then my two screens for my personal PC.  Disconnected and reconnected is not an option since the two screens are wire tied with a harness.

By 11AM I was ready for our weekly sales TEAMS meeting. We ended shortly before noon and it was time for that awesome lunch break.  It was not pea soup today, funny thing about pea soup and New Jersey.  On any Thursday you can order pea soup in a dinner in New Jerset. Go in another day and there's no pea soup,  just Thursdays. I would love to know the story behind that.

After lunch I took call from another sales person in NJ, way out of my territory.  He stated he was struggling with net new business and only had a small based of installed MFP's.  He was interested in how I was doing it.  I told him that I have forty years in the business and even I struggle from time to time.  I was able to share some thoughts that I had and also told him to go about branding himself via social media.  I didn't have much time to spare but offered that he can call me anytime and feel free to use the message boards on this site to get input from others.  We're all rowing the same boat boat down the same stream, we all need to row together to make sure we can support  our selves a and our families.

I had a call from one of the deals I signed last week.  Seems one of the devices they wanted to change to something faster and with additional features.  After one meeting and a flurry of emails we agreed to another device.  It was then time to do the paper work!  End result was another $12k in the revenue kitty.  With more than 60% of the month left I'm sitting around $140K with a chance for another $16k for the rest of the week.

Now is not the time to let up, now is the time to push.  By the end of the day I was finally able to get in a couple of prospecting emails and phone calls.

Tomorrow is all about prospecting and setting additional appointments along with trying to move some opportunities forward.

-=Good Selling=-

During the month of April we posted 66 blog and videos. Special thanx to Ray and Larry for their contributions.  In my twenty years of hosting this site I've never seen this much inaction from the copier manufacturers.

Just today I heard from an unnamed source (frak I always wanted to write that), that XBS former Global has axed up to 50% of their Market Place Presidents.  A few days ago there was a another thread about lay-offs from Kyocera.  Really?  Does it really need to be this way?  When the going gets tough the tough get going!  The mentality of hunkering down and letting staff go is not the way to get through these tough times.  Leaders need to step up to the plate and present a vision for the future.  No vision from our leaders means no future!

TODAY

Another day with not a lot of prospecting. Sooner or later this lack of prospecting will catch up to me so I need to make the time.  Setting aside that time in the day where you don't answer the phone, and don't answer emails.  Yes I've been busy however if I don't set aside that time in the near future I'll be back to square one.

This morning I needed to process the $60K net new order from Friday. In addition I caught up on a few emails, by the time 11AM rolled around I was ready for Monday's with Ricoh.  Every Monday at 11:00AM Ricoh hosts a webinar with various themes for their dealers and direct channel.  Since COVID19 I've had the time to check in every Monday. Every Monday is well worth the time spent.  The learning never stops on our business. 

Cool thing today!  I took my notebook into the teal room (we call it teal because of the color) and hopped on the exercise bike for 30 minutes.  Right after this blog I'll be on for another thirty minutes again.

My afternoon had two appointments and then the struggle of the afternoon was how to develop a strategy to replace two existing MFP's with new ones.  My main problem is that one of existing MFP's has a fiery and my new device does not have a fiery.  Client wants to stay with the same features. I wasn't able to get the quote out because I needed time to think and research some of my options.  I found my option just not sure if the client will like it.

Around 4PM I received one of the other orders I was waiting on for a $7k deal.  In addition I was able to schedule two additional appointments for later this week and developed another wide format opportunity from my Jersey Plotter site.  This week I'll be signing a contract to move forward with a lead generation program. 

I'm hoping on an additional two orders this week for another $20K. Just maybe I can hit my goal of $200K (I set that goal over the weekend).  It's all about how bad you want it.

Greg and I are back on for a chat this Thursday it's FREE and we're not selling any books!  You can register here

How To Sell in the Age of Coronavirus: Part Vi, "Breakdown? Breakthrough."

-=Good Selling=-

Tomorrow is going to be awesome!  Finally some sun and some warmth with temps in the seventies, we might be a little cooler at the beach but I'll take it over the cold and damp days of late.

Tonight's going to be a really short blog, it's late and I'm beat plus I'm looking to get a head start on tomorrow.

Two meetings were on tap for today. One of the meetings was to move a BDR opportunity closer to the finish line which we did. My other meeting was with a Municipal IT DM to ask some questions about what they are using for document management.  No opportunity with her but it was a good meeting because we spoke in length about some of the existing issues they are having with document management.

Okay, we did it!  I received the documents back for the net new $60K deal!  Please let me toot my own horn a bit, thus for the month of May I'm sitting at or around $123k with three weeks to go (my VP states that my numbers are always moving if you get my drift).  I was thinking about setting a personal goal of $250K, but that may be a bit of a stretch since I almost emptied my hot pipeline.  Whatever the numbers are at the end of the month I'm happy that I I'm seeing so light in tunnel from having a horrid first four months of the year.  I also finished at nine appointments for week up from the six I had last week.

Next week is all about prospecting and working a couple of accounts with some ideas I have for upgrades. I still have a net new prospect out there for about $30K, however we haven't spoken in a couple of weeks. I'm also pulling the trigger for a lead service next week. It's going to cost me about $400 a month but you've got to spend it to make. 

While other dealers have pulled in the reins Stratix has continued to move the ball forward.  I thinks it's impressive that we've booked almost a quarter of million in orders this week.  What's more impressive is the team in my eyes, no one is giving up, no one is saying woe is me and there is no one digging their head in the sand.  Hoping we can equal this weeks number or go higher for next week.

Like I stated this is a short blog tonight, let's enjoy the weekend and on Monday it's back to the grind. BTW, print is not dead yet!

-=Good Selling=-

Yippee!  Tomorrow is Friday woohoo! 

Seems like Sunday will be the best day of the week and finally a day in the seventies.  Can you guess what I'll be doing?  Nope, not the beach since Sandy Hook National Recreation Area is still closed.  Give up yet?  My day will be spent pulling weeds and not the weed you smoke.

From about 5PM till about 9PM tonight I was thinking about what the frak am I going to write about tonight?  It's not an easy task to write every day let alone find that one thing you did today that could help others.

I found that in my first on-line meeting today.  It was not a demo, nor was it a meeting to talk about new services or copiers.  It was a meeting to help a client with their existing service invoice. About this time last year I upgradied an existing client from an A3 color mfp to an A4 color mfp.  Can we call than an upgrade?  The client had an older A3 mfp, services costs had been escalating over time and the system was not capable of communicating for scanning with their server.  The client was also very thrifty and that's a nice way of telling you about the client. After discovery last year we found out 11x17 was never used (just another case of an over sold A3 device).  The opportunity was there to lower ma/supply cost and save money on the lease.  Done deal

Yesterday an email comes in from the client asking questions about the renewal on the maintenance agreement. I answered and stated I would forward to are contracts person so I could use my time to finding prospects and closing orders.  I emailed the client back that and told them I had forwarded the email to that person in our office.  Late yesterday the client emails me again and wants to have a meeting over the invoice. In fact has to be first thing this morning.  I took the meeting for two reasons, one I had the time and two that little birdie in the back of my head reminded me that there could be an opportunity that might come out of this.  I was taught long ago that you don't run away from issues but rather confront them.  Seems I forgot about this when he first emailed me.

The call went better than expected about the maintenance agreement issue because I had prepped with having a copy of the maintenance agreement from the old A3 mfp and a copy of the one we sold with the A4 mfp. After a few minutes the client understood that they actually saved money with the new agreement.  But I wasn't stopping there and asked "why are you printing so much paper when you could be paperless?".  Which lead to a conversation about why they print, how the file, why they lose or misplace files.  After another 5 minutes I was able to finagle another meeting to show them a short demonstration for DocuWare.   Taking someone from nothing and turning it into an opportunity was the highlight of the day!

Three or four meetings in total today.  Two or three with clients and one was our internal meeting for IT training.  One new opportunity developed and one opportunity moved closer to closing.

I was able to get my order docs out for the $60K deal today and finally sent them at or around 3:30PM.  Hoping I can get the docs back for tomorrow, I did ask to have them back tomorrow also. Like I stated yesterday if you don't ask you don't get.

Not much prospecting again today because of the order docs, the meetings and there was quite the flurry of email activity today. By the end of the day I was planning my CRM for tomorrow and updating my list of things to do.

On a personal note today I was finally got my exercise bike to 25 minutes. That might not be a big deal to some but with changing my eating habits and exercising I've gone from a 40 inch waster (was probably 42 but I would never admit it) to a 36 inch waist!  It's been a slow process over the last year.  I got twenty pounds to go and I know those are going to be the hardest to lose.  The step after that is maintaining.  Just another goal on my list for 2020!

Hoping to have a great day tomorrow!

Right one other note I posted the recording of the MPSA webinar on our site today.  Here's the link below..

How are MPS Dealers Surviving the Impact of COVID19

-=Good Selling=-

Yay!  Our Governor is opening State and County Parks on May 2nd....with conditions with social distancing.  Getting to hate that "social" crap.  Many people are furious in New Jersey about the handling of the shut down along with not having the ability to get outside.  After pressure the Gov caved to the pressure. However, here's what I think, we'll have such an influx to the parks and beaches from knuckle heads (govs favorite word) and out of state peeps that he will close the parks on Monday. 

On one hand he is stating it's okay to go back to the parks, however if you don't behave we'll close them down again.  Actually a pretty savvy move on his part. He gave us what we wanted and will then blame the people when he issues the close on Monday. Now,  I may be wrong and I hope I'm not,  but I just got this funky feeling about this.

Before I start with what happened today. I want to share some notes I took from the MPSA COVID19 taskforce webinar today.  It was a one hour session and featured some prominent peeps from the MSP channel.

• One major MPS company reported 29% decline in pages or revenue
• Another major MPS company reported a 71% decline
• Healthcare for one of those clients saw a 40% increase
• More inquires from clients in respect to file sharing and content 
• Expecting continuing decline for another 30 days in revenue and prints
• First week of April they hit bottom and has stayed that way with no increases
• Only 6% of those who applied for unemployment has received funds in Florida has received them

Opportunities

• Good uptick in cloud based solutions for documents
• One attendee wanted a robust cloud data collecting, stated there are no good ones out there
• New sectors of business will flourish with post-covid19, other businesses will not return, we need to identify those that will flourish
• Disposable menu's could be the next big thing for restaurants post COVID19
• Major opportunity to grab market share from players who have shrunk their business or may not make it

Stuff I heard from the last two weeks

• Much of the unpublished "cocaine" funds are exhausted from the manufacturers ( I use the term cocaine because the back end money is habit forming)
• Pull back from published "take down" or "knock out" programs from some manufacturers
• Marco laid off or furloughed 200
• Visual Edge laid off or furloughed 500
• Local dealers by me laid off an average of 80% of staff

Day Thirty-Two

Another good day in the books! Opened up my email about 8:15AM and I had a set of order docs waiting for me for three devices.  One 60ppm A3 color, one 30ppm A3 mono and a wide format.  Good day in deed! 

Since there were three devices and I'm working from my notebook PC with no extra monitors it took a lot of time to develop the docs, make the notes, do the config pages and get the order in.  I had an email back later in the day that I messed up some the accessories and did not sent the network connectivity doc.  It was my fault,  it's tough going when you don't have three monitors for the work, and a little tougher since I can't print anything. I have two monitors on my home PC, but connecting and disconnecting is a real pain since they are neatly corded together.

Another day of not much prospecting, I don't mind because of the order writing. I was able to pull off two meetings, one with an existing client (nothing happening there) and one for my Noon Virtual Demo I had planned on the 29th. In the next few days I'll be emailing that content to invitees that could not attend.

Everyday my VP asks me what I had for lunch.  Yesterday was a little jab when I told him about the sandwich. Thus today's menu was pea soup, a couple of crackers and some shredded chicken. There you go Tim!

I received the credit app for the net new $60k deal today. I held it until I had a chance to speak with my VP. Just wanted to review a couple of items.  We sent it off about 4PM, by 6PM we had our approval.  I wasn't suppose to have this back until Friday of this week. Tomorrow is now all about building the order docs, crossing the t's & c's and getting the documents to our prospect.  I'm hoping we can get them back by Friday of this week. In fact I will ask to get them back by Friday.  If you don't ask you don't get!

I didn't get the docs back for the smaller $7K deal today, thinking I'll have those by the end of the week also.  Just keeping my fingers crossed that all of this pans out for this week.

I need to get back to prospecting again, even though I have four appointments in for the the week I need to be at six or more.  Nothing else to report it's late and this old man needs his sleep.

One more item the Greg & Art show is on again for May 7th at noon EST. I posted the link in our calendar.

-=Good Selling=-

Every now and then we have one of those days. When I'm waiting for a deal to develop I'll calling it "waiting for the ball to travel". Let the ball get deeper before you hit that homer.  Today was one of those days that I waited for the ball to travel. What I mean by that is that I took a much needed mental day from prospecting.

Today was a perfect day for that since I had four meetings on tap. One was our weekly sales TEAMS meeting and the other three were with prospects.  In addition I had to develop another quote for an opportunity that I developed last week.  That opportunity is going to be for the third quarter however they need to get the quote now because one of the DM's will be out for sometime in the near future. 

All of the meetings went well, so well in fact that I received another verbal to move forward with the order.  Developing those docs and getting them out today took a little bit of time also.  Just a small deal for about $6.5K.  Thus this week or starting tomorrow I'm hoping to have docs for $6.5k, $26k & 60k.  Would be a good week right?

I mentioned this in a previous blog that even though you have a verbal they really don't mean you have the order, especially with not being able to visit the clients location.  It's that tortoise mentality that will win the day in these times. Slow and steady with constant points of contact every other day to guide the process to the finish line. I like where I'm at but I also know that anything could go wrong at anytime.

Tomorrow will be a day of prospecting and putting a couple of plans in place to get a few additional opportunities going. The plans are simple, what's the one thing that every company has in common right now?  Give up?  It's all about saving money, all companies what to save money when there is risk or uncertainty in the future.  ROI (return on investment) makes for a great selling strategy and that pitch of reducing costs will get you some attention.

Tomorrow it's back to my list of things to do.  That never ending tasking of adding and deleted from the list.  Prospecting by email, prospecting by Linkedin will rule the day.  It's late and I need a good jump for tomorrow.

-=Good Selling=-

Mondays, whether you hate or love them Mondays can sometimes define your week.  Do you have a favorite Monday song?  Mine is "I don't like Mondays " by the Boomtown Rats.  Yes the eighties, yes I'm a boomer and yes the eighties was an incredible time to cut your teeth in the copier industry. 

I could write some stories that would rock your world because they surely did rock mine. Some of you reading this blog may have heard me tell you about the eighties and it's something I just may put in print once I'm retired or maybe I get around to writing that first book.

We heard from our Governor today and he offered no time frame for when we'll even try to open up the state.  He double talked and backtracked on a number of issues.

While I'm working,  I'll tune into his daily comedy fest and today's was a really good one.  Our Governor starts off with and I'm paraphrasing "The State of New Jersey is unified and stands with me", of course he was referring to his policies and decision making efforts.  While I'm watching the show on my iphone I can see the comments pouring in from everyone else who is watching also.  The amount of angry emojis was frightening!  If I were asked to guess about the percentage of haters to likes, I would say 85% were in the hating mode. I thought that was funny because he was the one who stated "NJ stands with me".

One other interesting item I picked up on was the need for safe places for those COVID19 patients that are quarantined. What I comprehended out of that is that the State of New Jersey would set up safe places.  WTF does that mean?  Did he mean quarantine camps for the sick?  I didn't stick around for the entire show however I did read that reporters were allowed to asked him questions this time around and he offered no reasonable explanations for most of the questions.  Just a real joke here in New Jersey.

This morning I worked on trying to finish up the documents for the verbal order I had a Friday. There was a lot to it since there were three devices and each one needed a configuration page. In addition I had to triple check that my pricing was right.  Even after forty years this old dog can still make mistakes.  Of course I had some interruptions and before I looked up with was time for lunch.

Tim, I had one sandwich that had three slices of chicken breast, one slice of cheese (smoked guoda) with mustard on rye bread. I also downed a couple of dill pickles.  Hope you are happy with the menu!

Forgot something, in the AM I also had to follow up and send those financing rates for the $60K net new deal. That's a deal that could go either way, but as they say you need to be in it to win it.

After lunch while still downstairs (my office is upstairs) I check my email and I had an email from the $60K net new.  The email read, "we'll go with the 60 month term, please tell us how to get this started".  Okay, Monday is getting somewhat better in fact I just may change my Monday song to "Manic Monday" by the Bangles.  Yes, another 80's song for the boomer.

Of course I'm not counting any of these, counting them now is something you never ever do.  The plan now is to keep moving them forward in small steps and to keep working some of the other opportunities.  Am I excited?  Somewhat excited but reserved also, anything can happen when you can't be on-site to get the documents.  I guess it's more about being the tortoise than the hare right now.

Tomorrow?  Couple of meetings, try and move the two deals forward and some prospecting. 

-=Good Selling=-

Another day another dollar, you never know what tomorrow will bring you, the harder you work the luckier you get. 

If you're a consistent follower of my blogs you'll see that I use those statements quite often when blogging.  I've never shied away from hard work in fact I quit high school in mid-way through the 11th grade because I wanted to make money.  Yes,  I had the desire and the determination to make money but I was missing one key factor.  At sixteen I didn't know how to work hard or maybe better yet I had no idea of what hard work was.

It was luck that one night David came over to me and asked me if I wanted to help unload a produce truck one night.  For the next 5 years I put in 12 hours days 7 days a week except for Sundays. Sundays were half days working from 6AM until Noon.  That first real job was were I learned what it's like to work hard and how to work hard.  I took many bruises and bumps in that journey while working for that family.  They were hard workers, they knew how to make a profit and never lost sight of their goals.  It was the work ethic that they taught me that carried me for the rest of my life.  I know I'm not the smartest person out there but given the chance I will outwork everyone else.

All of this leads me to this morning.  Remember the $36k deal that was still in the weeds?  That deal produced a verbal in the AM to move forward and 5 minutes before 5PM I had the order docs in hand.  Even before I had the verbal on the $36K deal I had an email a little after 9AM for a verbal on the $26K deal.  The $26K was the one I thought would move next week.  There was still a few odds and ends I needed to work on for that deal and there will be one more meeting on Monday. It's not done yet but looking good.

Not a bad day right?  Too bad it was a day late to count for the month.  On the bright side it's a nice jump start for April.  Just maybe by Monday night I'll be at $62K and I still have another $60K to try and wrap up for next week.

If some one were to ask me how I got to this point (which no one has), I would tell them that it's about the effort you put forth on daily basis.  In addition I could not have gotten to this point without the support of the people I work with and the dealer principal.  While other companies in our industry have laid-off and furloughed sales people, our dealer principal put his faith in the team and we have responded.  In uncharted territory and unparalleled times our sales staff nearly notched $200K for the week! 

We will continue to work, continue to make the effort, and garner new accounts while our competitors shrink. Bad news travels quicker than good news and those companies that did not place their faith in their team will soon be distant memories in the eyes of their clients. 

Yeah,  I kinda went off there for a bit. I'm no soothsayer but I've been around the block enough to know what the future can hold.  Right now I think we've turned a corner and we're not looking back. There's no reason why we can't turn this event of a lifetime into a positive business initiative.

Everyone have a great weekend.  Bring on Monday!

-=Good Selling=-

Yay it's Thursday and that means it's time for the Greg & Art lunch chat hour!

Today was a great chat session and there were some chats about post recovery and how we can add our experiences to our value proposition. Another awesome question was posed as to how dealers are getting their PPE gear.  I never even thought about the PPE thing.  Drivers, techs, installers and maybe even sales people could be required to don PPE gear when entering an office now and in the future.

In addition we also spoke about post recovery ideas and the value proposition that will come out this for those companies that kept staff on hand. I think there's a very positive and powerful message that many dealers can tell in post COVID19.  That message can be about how we helped, how we cared and how we didn't cut staff and or services for our clients.

On another note the post COVID19 can be a culling of the herd of dealers.  Those that can't weather the financial storm will need to make a move to ether close up shop or sell the client base to another dealer.

I don't want to see anyone lose their job and I think it would be a terrible shame for those to lose their business at this time.  But sooner or later we do have to come to grips that in certain geographical areas there is saturation. 

Greg and I will be on again next week. You can pretty much count on Noon EST next Thursday. I'll try and have that up on the P4P calendar tomorrow.

Today was another day like yesterday with press releases and news related to copiers and IT services.  Maybe three press releases in total compared to the usual 10-15 every day.  I'm enjoying it because it is giving me a little bit of break and more time to dedicate to this blog series.

My 35K deal is still in the weeds, it's not dead yet and I had an email today that "it looks promising" and has to run past one more principal tomorrow.  We'll see what happens tomorrow but it would a nice day to close out the week.

I also had two appointments today with one being net new for $60K and the other was an existing client for about $25K.  The net new may be close but it's going to come down to the financing and how bad the prospect wants it.  The 25K deal may get some legs next week.

As far as calls and emails I may have done a handful of each.  Just wasn't enough time in the day. My thoughts of sending 200 emails this week is starting to fade with only one day left in the week. However if Saturday is another cold and dreary day in Jersey I just may continue the email push.

I read today that 13% of the population (that's assumption) from the Governor New York may have already had COVID19 due to recent antibody testing. Three thousand people were tested and 13% showed the antibody.  Thus the assumption can be made 2.7 million people in New York may have already had COVID19.  I also heard but have not read this from any source yet that COVID19 may have been here in December 2019.  It will be interesting to see how this plays out. I'm not calling anybody names yet but just watching and waiting.  We're hoping that New Jersey opens up antibody testing soon and the sooner the better to get us open.

Day twenty-nine tomorrow..... the harder we work the luckier we get.

-=Good Selling=-

I thought this would be appropriate to start off today's blog

Another closing day and I ain't got no orders
I got some opportunities 'cause i just made some calls
How I wish I had someone to sell to
I'm in an awful way

Right, so juiced up the lyrics a bit from the Sam Cookes rendition of "Another Saturday Night".  My personal favorite is Cat Stevens version.  If any one else would like to fill in the rest of the lyrics, then have at it.  Could be a fun exercise for everyone!

It was another day of very few press releases for the copier channel and the IT channel.  Never have I seen it this slow for press releases.  Guess it's a good thing that I'm writing a daily blog.

While I'm writing this blog the song that came on after "Another Saturday Night" is "Somewhere over the Rainbow" with "IZ" Kamakawiwo'ole on his ukulele.  Kinda hits home with my feelings right now and the thought that sometime soon the storm will pass, the rainbow will appear and we'll be out of this mess.

Today was a record.....for emails sent.  I pumped in 91 of them!  I need to check my eventbright to see if I snagged any registrations. I did receive two emails back with a confirmation.  But I'll check in the AM to see where I landed. 

I also had one appointment for later in the day, however that cancelled.  My $35K is still in the weeds at this time.  I did hear back from the CFO late yesterday and the finance meeting did not come off. I was told that she would reach out today to the DM's.  Thus I let the ball travel today.  Letting the ball travel is a baseball term which reminds hitters to wait a little longer before they swing so they can make better contact or even yet hot a home run!

Tomorrow marks the end of the month for me. I be be assured of two things, one I bust my quota for the month or I don't.  Kinda dis-heartening but what hasn't been lately, if the deal doesn't go tomorrow the next best thing is a stall and it moves to May. I don't have any more moves to make, it's down to getting a the decision.  Whatever way it goes I'll look at the brighter side to the month and it was the ability to put myself into the position to win against overwhelming odds.  Another day another dollar.....

II was able to pull off one appointment today with a wide format account, and developed another opportunity that may have a chance for May.

Here's a little tip that I've learned about emailing clients or prospects.  Never ever ask more than one question and make sure you put that question at the end of the email.  I can't tell you how many times I ask multiple questions in an email and they go unanswered. In addition if I put the question towards the start of the email they usually get unanswered also.  Thus I have learned to only as that one question, even if I have more questions I will save them for the next email. Just something I've found that works.

Tomorrow, tomorrow, the sun will come out tomorrow, just thinking about tomorrow clears away the cobwebs and sorrows.  Let's GO TOMORROW!

-=Good Selling=-

Tell me how this happens?  My wife starting ordering food from a local company in New Jersey.  I like it, she likes it and we're pleased with the service and the food.  We started using them at the end of last year so it's not a COVID19  thing.  One of the things I like is that in every book there is a recipe, instructions and a gloss brochure.  Yup you guessed it..., the documents are printed in color and it means potential prospect! Maybe production also.

Inspection of the box provided no phone number to call, inspection of the documents that were shipped provided no phone number.  No worries I'll hit up their web site right?  Nope no phone number there either! Okay do a google search for the phone number and nothing. I searched and searched and it seems they do not publish a phone number.  WTF

There's no way I can drive there and pay them a visit, and some quick searches on Linkedin got me two 3rd level contacts.  Problem is I don't have the Premium Linkedin and Linkedin wants $60 for one month. Mind you I spend money when I have to, but I still can't get past the company not having a published phone number.  Thus I will be contacting them through their "contact us" page.  I just need to think of a crafty email to get a response. One of my jobs for tomorrow.  My little rant of the day.

Today was a busy meeting day for me.  Three on tap but only one for an existing client.  All three of the meetings took up the entire morning.  However the one client meeting did produce another opportunity!  Nothing right away but something for the 3rd quarter of this year.

Today is rant day for me and here's another one.  We're allowed to go to convenience stores, allowed to shop for food, allowed to go other essential stores, but the caveat is that everyone needs to wear a mask. I have no problem with that. Yes,  we all look a little lame with those masks on but that's the price we pay to be safe.  So what is the problem with not opening up the economy with those caveats in place. What's wrong with going to the park, the beach, or the gyms as long as you have a mask on and are being socially responsible? 

The problem lies with the elected officials and the fact that they don't trust us to be socially responsible (key word here is social).  I tell you when this ends we're all going to find out that COVID19 was here in mid December. I get it enough with the rant. I want my freedom back.

My afternoon was all about trying to move some deals forward. I was able to secure another appointment late in the say with a pre-COVID19 opportunity. I was not able to turn the tide for the order because the clients owns the existing mfp and he's right in waiting it out a bit more because the mfp is working.  It's just old.

Phone call after phone call, email after email a check mark went next to every opportunity. I keep check marks next to every opportunity so that I can see the seven touches. Those seven touches are suppose to help you get closer to winning the order and establishing a deeper relationship.  The only thing I got was an appointment to an assessment for BDR, however that kinda floundered when I was told my contact did not have admin rights to the servers (that's another story for another day).

My $35K deal is out there still, however one of the principals is out sick. I found that out today, not sure if it's COVID related or not. I'm hoping it is not.  There's a follow up in place for tomorrow.

Tomorrow has me down for one meeting late, other than researching one of my new opportunities it's going to be a day of calling and emailing.  My CRM has never looked so good!

Another day another dollar, looking forward to tomorrow!

-=Good Selling=-

The end of the day was pretty cool for me.  After 5pm I had the chance to speak with a dealer principal out on the West Coast.  Yes, things are just as bad out there as here in New Jersey.  But we really didn't speak about COVID19 that much, instead our talk was about how the industry has changed in ten years and where are industry is going in the next ten years.  It's always great to hear from dealer principals that still have the desire to go after it in this business!  Yes, there are still good years ahead for us.

Today was more about prepping for meetings.  A 10:30AM meeting with a client tomorrow and I wanted to make sure I knew the last four months of volume along with the last month. Those drops were awful, in fact the volume dropped 98% for both black and color, thus I'm thinking that office is staffed by one of two people.  There's a trigger for this account since the end of the lease is six month outs, thus I wanted to make sure understood their pre-covid print volumes.

My second task of the day was to prep some data so I could call later in the day and get an appointment for a possible meeting this week.  I took the time to put together a short spreadsheet with what the client is spending now and what the costs would be to upgrade.  In this case the lease came out 15% higher, of course maintenance was down, but the kicker was on the wide format device that has 240K on the meter.  After emailing the file I was able to schedule another meeting for this week.  I believe I ended the day with not even a handful of calls or emails but snaked out three appointments.

Right now I'm going through all of my crumpled papers to see my notes from today.  Every day it's been about making a list of "to do's" accomplishing those tasks and adding more "to do's) to the list.  The list never ends.....

My third task was to nail down an appointment for a 60K opportunity.  I was able to schedule that with about a half a dozen back and forth emails.

The last item on my list was to co-ordinate with other peeps in my office for an event that's set to go off on the 29th of this month.  It's by personal invitation only. It's my plan to send out 100 invitations by the end of this week via email.

Tomorrow will start with a 9AM appointment with Jerry, then it's the 10:30AM with my client and then an 11AM sales teams meeting. It's going to be a busy day tomorrow!

I had someone ask me why I'm writing this blog series, the question was "what inspired you to do this?".  There's two reasons and I guess the most important reason is to give my self motivation for every day. Hey, I can't be writing about how I watched movies and napped all day can I?  The second reason is that I hope that some of you that are reading this can take something from each day.  Whether it's the motivation to keep on pounding or maybe something I wrote sparked an idea that could you help with a sale or prospecting.

The end result is that we all need to pay our bills and feed our family. I truly believe that our members our family, and family helps family through tough times.

-=Good Selling=-