Up and down and up and down goes the pipeline. You call like mad and network like crazy and guess what? You get business! Yeah! But be careful what you ask for because then you have to serve what you sell. Suddenly you get wrapped up in client work and about the time you can breathe you look up and ‘Oh Crumb!’ my pipeline is empty.
Then you start all over again.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
Let’s talk about some simple (not easy) concepts to execute to stabilize your cash flow and client service (oh and your paycheck too).
I’m going to keep it pretty simple to give you something to begin performing consistent activity leading to consistent results. You will have to refine this as you begin your own prospecting effort, but let’s get going…
First, you need to recognize that your prospecting activity consists of face to face or scheduled meetings with prospects, clients or someone who can lead you to a prospect or client. That means:
- Bumping into someone does not constitute a meeting.
- Networking and catching someone for a 2 minute conversation does not count as a scheduled meeting.
- Cold calling and never talking to anyone does not result in paytime activity.
- Hanging out on Facebook with 335 of your college buds is not considered pay time activity.
- Drinking coffee with co-workers who will not buy anything from you is not considered prospecting activity.
With that clear, let’s talk about what a scheduled contact collaboration meeting needs to sound like…
- What does their typical prospect look like – industry, revenue, #of employees, decision maker, problem experiencing, etc.
- Who is their ideal prospect – top list of who they most want to do business with in the next 12 months.
- How can you collaborate? Your research on their Linked In profile of ideas to collaborate on – how can you help them find new business, improve their service offering, cross serve their clients more effectively, etc.
- How can you set complementary goals? What are the goals for the next 12 months of their prospecting activity?
Now comes the simple part – each and every day you schedule 2 meetings. Monday through Friday. No matter what. No exceptions. No excuses. If you take a day off, you book your meetings the day prior. You get sick, guess what? You book your meetings x 2 to make up. If less than 10% of your job responsibility is business development, you can get by with 1 meeting per day. With a client, a prospect or someone who can refer you to your next client or prospect.
This will get you started on building a consistent pipeline of business. If you aren’t making enough based on the 2 meetings per day, examine your client profile and work on improving your average clients size. It’s up to you to make it a great year. This will get you down the road to your business development goal.
For more information on reaching your prospecting goals, be sure to get your FREE e-book “Developing Your Prospecting Plan”. It will guide you further through the tactics to reaching your sales goals utilizing all your prospecting activity.