The following is an excerpt from my new book, “Knowing Isn’t Doing — Build a Business and Life You Desire,” which will be released in March.
The major obstacle to building your sales for the average, non-wealthy, independent worker is that they simply “wing it” when it comes to sales and sales planning. Unfortunately, you can’t wing it to win it. You need structure, you need a schedule and you need a playbook. At the Massimo Group we developed a playbook which consistently generates prospects and, ultimately, clients. This playbook consists of eight steps:
Defining Your Avatar
This is your ideal client. You want to be as specific as possible here. If you are an office broker, don’t tell yourself that your ideal client is any tenant. Be specific.
Maybe you are a commercial real estate agent who has had great success with representing law firms because they stay in the same offices for as long as possible, they stay in business for decades, and you have a lot of large properties in inventory. So your new ideal client is the managing director of a law firm of at least 20,000 rentable square feet.
Define your avatar as best you can. Have some fun with it and name your avatar. Using our prior examples, perhaps your avatar is Larry Lawyer, Mike Multifamily or Sally Small. Get to know everything about this target audience.
Define Key Issues
Continuing the law firm example, think about the key issues the managing director is dealing with. Don’t focus on real estate/lease issues (the issues you have), but business issues (the issues he or she has). What opportunities or challenges are they facing, who is influencing them, and how does this all impact them? It’s not about you or your services, it’s about your prospect and their needs.
Define Your Value Proposition
How will you and your firm service the ideal client and help solve the issues he or she is facing? How will you differentiate yourself? What is your value proposition? Terri Sjodin, author of the bestselling “Small Message, Big Impact” once shared with me that a solid value proposition answers the questions “Why me, why my company and why now?” If you can answer these in the context of your prospect’s needs, you are on the right path.
Draft a Prospect Letter
Address the key issues, demonstrate your value proposition and include a call to action that will resonate with your ideal prospect. Send that letter as the opening round in your campaign. Don’t think prospect letters are old hat. You should not be asking for business via email, which is way too impersonal. Well-written letters stand out.
Opening Statement
You’ve identified your ideal client, articulated their issues, positioned yourself to solve them and opened the door with a letter. The next step is to talk to them in person by making a prospect call. Craft an opening statement that will be a clear representation of the purpose of your call and that explains the advantage to your prospects of taking the call.
Prospect Call
Be prepared for obstacles, challenges and rejection. Are you armed with tools necessary to turn an obstacle into an opportunity? What if they say “yes” and meet with you? What if they say “no?” Do you know what to say and how to direct the call? This is critical to your ability to secure meetings that will grow your business.
Questioning
The person who asks the right questions will control the flow of the conversation. You should have a question methodology and library designed to convert calls into meetings. We don’t believe in scripting per se, but we do know there is no single solution. Be prepared for directing the conversation and moving your prospect to yes.
Supporting Content
Prospecting without a personal presence is an uphill battle. Leverage value-oriented content that will resonate with your prospects and assist in your prospecting efforts. Once you define steps one through three, you can easily determine the appropriate content to share with your prospects.
For more information on “Knowing Isn’t Doing,” please visit knowingisntdoing.com
Rod Santomassimo
The Massimo Group
rod@massimogroup.com
800-517-5542
