It’s
impossible, right? In order to get more done, you need to invest more time or
hire more people. Working ten hour days will make you more accomplished than a
colleague that only works seven. Hiring a person will double your output but
will cost you at a time when budgets are shrinking.
Working smart
beats working hard. In some cases working more can actually damage the amount
you get accomplished. Also, getting someone up to speed in understanding your
business and acquiring the right skills can cause you to work even more. In both cases, the degree effort matches
outcomes has been overstated.
Working less
and accomplishing more isn’t easy. It requires thinking creatively to find more
effective ways of doing things. But first you have to be open to the
possibility that your methods aren’t as efficient as they could be. Once you do
that you can look for ways to get more accomplished without just increasing
your to-do list. Here are a few guidelines to start looking:
1) The 80/20 Sales
Rule
The 80/20 rule basically suggests that a small amount of inputs contributes to
a much larger amount of outputs. Using this rule means to minimize time spent
in the unproductive 80%.
In application,
you can’t simply cut everything that doesn’t directly contribute to your bottom
line. Some things, however trivial, still need to get done. The purpose of the 80/20
Sale Rule is to force you to be more ruthless in cutting time in areas that
contribute little. Here are a few suggestions:
·
Cut prospecting time (see below, sharpening the saw) time to
invest more in growing your key accounts.
·
Say no to people who want commitments that don’t contribute
enough value.
·
Spend more time developing an inbound marketing strategy and get
prospects engaged and interested in you.
2) Interactive
Selling - Critical Path
Instead of performing a needs assessment and jumping to the proposal, work the
Critical Path interactively with the prospect before you deliver a
proposal. The Critical Path is a list of
actions that is key in developing a no-surprise proposal. You will find your prospect will be a
valuable contributor, you’ll spend less time producing the proposal yourself
and you’ll increase your probability of getting the sale. Give yourself and your prospect action items
and deadlines which will cultivate a desire to collaborate. A proposal that concludes with a Critical
Path is far stronger than one that ends with a price.
Here are some
applications:
·
Document the history and projection portion of your interactions
with the prospect from the time the initial meeting up until the proposal is
completed.
·
Chunk the project into smaller tasks and action items. Again, strive
to complete those pieces, rather than just working on the project aimlessly.
·
Include the history portion on the last page of your proposal.
3) Sharpening
the Saw
There’s an old story of two lumberjacks in a tree-cutting contest. The first
picked up a rusty axe and ran into the woods immediately to start chopping
trees. The second spent almost until the end of the contest sharpening his axe.
After which he walked up and quickly felled the biggest tree.
The moral?
Don’t use rusty tools.
Don’t waste
your time doing things you don’t intend to be excellent at. Delegate them to
someone who does have a sharp tool. Based on the above, if you want to invest
more of your time in growing key accounts, building no-surprise, interactive
proposals, why not contract with the AppointmentLab who is focused and skilled at getting you appointments. Perfect the things you want to master and
make it a priority to sharpen your tool beyond what is necessary to cut. The
right partner can save you time and money.
4) Rule with
Numbers
Assumptions are the biggest waste of your time. When your intuitions about the
world don’t match the way it works, you can never be efficient. The only way to
combat false assumptions is to test them and follow them up with numbers. The
results of a test can save you hundreds of hours if it shows a current process
has no impact or suggests a faster alternative.
Key Process Indicators (KPIs) - Don’t just measure the result
of the sale. Measure for example, how
much research it takes to qualify a prospect, how many prospect interactions
(emails and calls) it takes to get the appointment, how many prospect visits it
takes to get the sale. See how they go
up, down, or change over time and how they impact your sales results.
5) The Marginal
Rule of Sales Process Management
Is it better to
be a perfectionist or sloppy? A perfectionist develops a process that he/she
follows, measures the results and continuously improves. One can never be efficient in getting an
appointment, negotiating and contracting without following a process. For example, randomly calling prospects or
not preparing for a sales visit is a waste of valuable time. I think the answer
is simpler: If the input invested gives less output doing a comparable task, it
becomes haphazard, unproductive and more importantly, you could be losing
potential clients.
Here are some
applications to try:
·
Develop a systematic process by communicating a valued business
reason (VBR) for prospects to meet with you.
Try following our Don’t Give Up process.
·
Measure the difference between different amounts of time spent
within your process. Analyze at what point in the process you are getting the
appointment and compare the effectiveness changes when you change the amount of
time it takes. Can you really justify spending 20 hours per week conducting research, developing VBRs, Success Stories,
e-mailing and calling on prospects instead of spending more time with your
existing clients?
·
Are you getting a “yes” with a slower proposal process? Analyze the success rate percentage using
time spent on the Critical Path (above) with the client. You don’t merely want a decision, you want a
yes! Interactive selling raises your
closing percentage and boost the number of times you get a yes.
6) Energy
Management
Energy management, as opposed to time management, forces you to think of
results as a function of energy, not time invested. Working intensely for a
short period of time can accomplish more than working for days, tired and
distracted.
Working
yourself into low energy can actually make you accomplish less than if you
rested. Here are some ideas:
·
Work in bursts. Divide yourself between complete rest and complete
focus. Don’t constantly switch in-between which leaves you neither rested nor
productive.
·
Keep your prospect engaged. Maintaining the prospect’s interest and optimism
while the proposal is under development lessons the burden on you to develop
the “perfect solution” all by yourself.
·
Rest, health and fun matter. Enslaving yourself to your work can actually
accomplish less. Master the ability to recharge yourself when you need it.
