Every three months or so I receive a call from the same sales rep. He immediately launches in to a sales pitch without any regard to what my needs are, in this case I don’t need what he sells. Yet he hasn’t bothered to ask me any questions that would properly qualify me as a prospect or not. I’m morbidly fascinated by how long he will keep calling and completely wasting his time. Our conversations are less than three minutes and consist of him talking for 2 minutes and 50 odd seconds and my replying that I’m not interested. He then replies that he will send me his contact information in case my needs change.
This is not someone who is relatively new to sales that simply doesn’t know any better. Rather, this is a really bad sales rep who keeps blindly attempting the same approach and getting the same results. Is anyone thinking about the definition of “insanity” at this point? He’s not crazy, he’s just insanely bad at sales!
Sales can be a numbers game, but the best sales people make it a “smart” numbers game. It’s not just about activity such as cold calling or emailing, it’s emailing and calling with a well thought out purpose. Do some research on the industry, company and person that you are calling or emailing prior to reaching out to them. What challenges are they facing? What are their strategic priorities? If you can’t logically build a bridge from your solution to their needs, you shouldn’t waste your time or theirs.
I’ve always coached my sales teams over the years that they should be weighing where they invest their time and resources to maximize their return in the form of sales success and commissions. If you don’t value your own time, why should any prospect?
Bad sales is offensive and rampant. Particularly during touch economic times, it pays to do your homework and separate yourself from the desperate sales masses.