Dave Kurlan is a top-rated speaker, best-selling author, sales thought leader and highly regarded sales development expert.
When most salespeople talk about calls gone bad they're often talking about sales horror stories, a trend developed by Dan Seidman at Monster Sales News. I believe that any sales call that fails to move forward (next step, base or stage) is a bad call. When a prospect 'didn't hear anything that interested him', one of two things happened:- Salesperson talked too much and didn't guess right about what would interest the prospect
- Salesperson didn't talk enough and didn't have time to impress the prospect
When a prospect 'wasn't impressed' the following scenario could have taken place:
- Salesperson did not differentiate himself from the competition
- Salesperson did not ask any good, tough, timely questions
- Salesperson did not take the time to develop a relationship
What should you do if your salespeople have bad calls? First, it's important to develop criteria that everyone agrees with as to what constitutes a bad call or your people will never have any. Then, when your salespeople have a bad call, you can ask them what they should have done differently, what they learned and how they'll prevent that from happening again. If there is a way to salvage the situation, then you can use your energy to help with the rescue plan.
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