Monday, September 8, 2008

Cold Calls

Last week's travel threw me behind. It is amazing how much can accumulate in a few days time. However, the trip was productive. It resulted in one new customer and a number of others who I believe soon will be customers. It is rare in my business to get an immediate order for our services on a first visit. The key, I believe, is that we just seemed to click -- personality, timing and service fitting a need. It happens.

In my years of training salesmen (I may have posted on this before but can't remember), I have tried to teach them to look at each customer contact as one step closer to the sale. That is a difficult proposition for a young salesman trying to get started. "No's" can be hard on the confidence. However, if you count "no's" as being part of the process of getting to "yes," each "no" is considered a positive step forward.

Thinking back on the week, there really weren't any "no's." There was only one stop out of about 30 that was "cool" to the idea of our services. The rest were all positive -- and some were very positive. I expect significant results to develop.

Neal, I appreciate the help.

5 comments:

Plowing and Sowing said...

Some of our contacts will take up to a year to sign on the dotted line. It gets hard to be patient sometimes.

Anonymous said...

I could never be a saleman. I don't like people all that much, as a general rule.

Chris McClure aka Panhandle Poet said...

Hermit: Interestingly enough, I'm happiest in the middle-of-nowhere by myself. However, I've found that if I'm doing what I believe God has called me to do, I am happy and productive. Sometimes He definitely makes me stretch.

That Janie Girl said...

Congrats - sounds like a great trip!

Anonymous said...

I couldn't agree with you more!

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