STRATEGIC PLANNING

Good sales people don't just turn up and "wing it". All of the greatest battles had masterfull planning and its the same on the sales battlefield.

Think about what you are going to do and communicate the plan to the prospective clients. Always provide a proposed Agenda for meetings including what you going to cover, and ask them what particular things they would like covered.

"Stop, look where we are with respect to objective, refocus, implement more planning, and then start again"

Check out where you are now, and think about how you can get to the next step in the sales cycle.

ANALYSE YOUR STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES WITH RESPECT TO YOUR SALES OBJECTIVE

The classical method of analyzing Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) helps you to understand where you are in the sales process, and how best to proceed. Use a grid like the following to list out the attributes which are helping or endangering the sale.

Strengths: These are where our company and product appear to be stronger than the competition.

Weaknesses: These are where the competition may be stronger, or this could be a lack of information, or anything where we feel our position is weak.

Opportunities: These are things which we can do to improve our strengths and increase our chance of winning the business.

Threats: These are things that might happen to increase our weaknesses and contribute towards losing the deal.

BRAINSTORM POSSIBLE ALTERNATE TACTICS

Think about possible ways to improve your current situation and progress to the close.

PRIORITISE THE TACTICS AND IMPLEMENT AN ACTION PLAN TO ACHIEVE THEM

Identify which of the possible way to progress towards closing are most important.

IMPLEMENT YOUR ACTION PLAN

Give yourself actions to accomplish the tactics with the highest priority items to be accomplished first.

Make sure the objectives are reachable. If you are agreeing the objectives with somebody else, both parties negotiating the objective must agree that the objective is achievable. Objectives which are not achievable mislead management and investors of the company, as well as, cause undue stress, and de-motivate the salespeople. Don't give yourself or others objectives which cannot be achieved, and never agree with your manager that you will achieve an objective you know you will not.

REMEMBER THE P'S!!

    -Planning

    Prevents

    -Poor

    -Performances

Think ahead and make sure you are ready for what's coming. Remember the boy scout's motto:

Semper Paratus - Always Be Prepared