The Sales Call Gone Bad

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:

1. Salesperson talked too much and didn’t guess right about what would interest the prospect
2. 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:

1. Salesperson did not differentiate himself from the competition
2. Salesperson did not ask any good, tough, timely questions
3. 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.

(c) Copyright 2006 Objective Management Group, Inc.