‘Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably the reason, so few engage in it’. One of Henry Fords greatest quotes.
Thomas Edison was another great thinker, one of the most famous and prolific inventors of all time. Thomas Edison exerted a tremendous influence on modern life, contributing inventions such as the incandescent light bulb, the phonograph, and the motion picture camera, as well as improving the telegraph and telephone. One of his most famous quotes was: “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work’.
Thinking about our sales activity
I recently had a coffee with a client that I have known for over 15 years. He has a very successful career, both as a Sales Leader within a large enterprise and more recently in establishing his own business. Let’s call him John.
Our conversation turned to recent new business opportunities, and John began to tell me about a recent opportunity that he had lost. John was open and honest and explained why he believed he had not successfully closed the new business account.
In sales, often the hardest lessons come from our biggest losses. That may be, for example, losing a new business sales opportunity to a competitor or losing an existing customer due to poor account management.
It is often these experiences that we learn most about ourselves through re-examining our failings, thinking and re-evaluating our professional skill set. These are only wasted opportunities if we don’t think, analyse what went wrong and learn.
I believe that sales is one of the most challenging professions, as it requires us to analyse our behaviour and address any limiting behaviour in order to succeed and move forward.
Sales qualification and thinking!
As part of our selling journey, we need to constantly be thinking about our sales activity. This is particularly apparent when we are qualifying sales. Are we spending our time wisely focused on sales opportunities that we are likely to be successful with? Just as important are we servicing our existing client fully or under servicing them. This leaves your existing customers open to approaches from competitors. Remember, your competitors’ best prospect are your best customers,
Thinking and how a CRM can help
A CRM system benefits an organisation through the visibility of its sales activities. This visibility is fundamental to managing sales performance and control of the sales process. The business insights that the CRM provides should be a valuable tool in helping you track trends and patterns. These trends and patterns may be indicators of how the sales person is not ‘thinking’ about their sales activity.
This visibility also enables management to understand why, when, who and how opportunities are being won, stalled, or being lost. If it cannot be monitored, it cannot be managed. The visibility offered within the CRM system also allows management to make educated business decisions based on hard data. A CRM system will enable structured data to be used to access performance. This assessment should indicate which sales person is out performing others.
How Proaptivity can help!
ProAptivity are an independent CRM solutions provider. We focus on the implementation, training, and support of highly customised CRM software solutions. Our CRM software supported by our sales training provide customers with the tools needed to deliver successful sales process management.
Fundamentally, we help organisations embed CRM best practice throughout their organisation. This helps organisations become more competitive, customer focused and ultimately more profitable.
If you need help in understanding why my business needs CRM, maybe some of our eBooks could help! Alternatively visit Maximizer CRM for more information. Contact us today on 028 9099 6388 or via info@proaptivity.com. Contact us today for a free CRM consultation that will assess if your business is CRM ready.
