Javelin Marketing says You Should Never Prospect for Clients
by bobrichards ~ May 21st, 2009. Filed under: prospecting.Every manager has told you that prospecting is the life blood of your business. We say don’t do it. Prospecting is the activity of a sales laborer and not a sales professional. As a sales professional, your time is far too valuable for this clerical, time intensive activity.
Understand that prospecting is the monotonous activity of separating the prospects (those people with an interest and with money) from suspects. So if you had a list of everyone in Beverly Hills zip code 90210, you can safely assume that most have money. But how do you find the 1% that have interest in your product or service? You let a sales laborer do it.
Here are some examples:
1. You delegate prospecting to an outside firm that will design and print and mail a postcard or letter for you. That firm and the post office mail carriers become your sales laborers to deliver your 10,000 mailers. The 1% of the recipients that reply (100 people) are “prospects” and these are the people you should talk to now that the prospecting has been done.
2. You hire a telemarketer or telemarketing firm to call those 10,000 people with your presentation (could be an invitation to a seminar, offer for a booklet, etc). You only talk to the people who express interest.
3. You place an advertisement in the Beverly Hills edition of the LA Times offering your booklet “The Six Best and Worst IRA Rollover Decisions.” You talk to the 50 people that request your booklet. The LA Times is your sales laborer.
4. You hire a company to run ads for you on the Internet and find prospects that meet your criteria. You pay them per Internet lead.
Yes, these all cost money. If you don’t want to invest in your business, then get a job as an employee because you’re not cut out to be a business owner. You can be a sales laborer for someone else.
Sure, prospecting is the lifeblood of any business but you, the sales professional, shouldn’t be doing it.
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June 22nd, 2009 at 7:26 pm
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head when it comes to outsourcing the labour. If you can close sales well, the last thing you should be doing is prospecting and qualifying leads.
The trick is to find competent labour that can handle the prospecting on your behalf. It’s such a meat-grinder of a job, anyone with skills moves on to real sales, and those who stick around are burnt to a crisp after a few weeks of being told No!
June 30th, 2009 at 2:16 pm
Hey thats true! This is a way of direct sales promotions. But how many people read these direct mailers? i agree if 1% people may have interest in your product but do all these 1%s read your mail is a big question mark.I think direct mailers are outdated way of sales promotion.Think something innovative,like a special feature in the newspaper that goes to most of the houses in the Beverly Hills or a big ad cam also do your work but with much more ease!
July 3rd, 2009 at 2:29 pm
This is so true. I recently hired a sales rep after years of doing this myself, and it has made all the difference - frees me up to focus on business development and he was not really that expensive.
July 8th, 2009 at 11:17 am
Charlie: Its true that the Direct mailers may be the oldest way of sales promotion but its certainly not outdated. Every big company is doing it. The chain stores are very much into it, but yes they also spend a lot on heavy advertising before. Once there product is known they send direct mailers to woo the customers.The way is certainly changed.:)
July 12th, 2009 at 12:15 am
Absolutely true, you can’t be salesman if you are businessman, i agree with you that businessman has more better things to do rather than selling prospectus, and i don’t think so that this is major work that will really effect business. nop, as charlie told, we agree if 1% people may have interest in your product but do all these 1%s read your mail is a big question mark.
Advertisement do really works, publicise your product not by prospectus but by mass advertisement in newspaper or somewhere, where people do really read your’s and show their interest in you.
July 13th, 2009 at 5:03 pm
The percentage of people who actually read mailers is very low.
July 13th, 2009 at 8:12 pm
I agree that we must have someone else to do the prospecting for us, there are lot of things that needs our attention when we want our business to be successful and that is not prospecting clients.
July 15th, 2009 at 10:29 am
I agree that it’s great to hire someone to do the prospecting for you, but in today’s economy with companies tightening the strings i’ve found myself doing more prospecting.
July 15th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
Should a business try and gain as many clients and as much money as they can? Or should they focus on ensuring the clients they have continue to trade with them, even if it means they don’t gain as many clients? In today’s global financial downfall, businesses should strive to keep hold of every customer, no matter how much money they spend.
July 16th, 2009 at 10:50 pm
You would be more efficient by using the geomarketing feature within Google. They allow you to laser focus to a specific geographic area, and it’s a lot more cost effective than direct mail or telemarketing.
July 19th, 2009 at 9:16 pm
Great information - if you are a sales professional - then stick with what you know best - closing the deal - don’t waste your time on the rest. great advice.
July 28th, 2009 at 1:40 am
This is true. I hired a sales representative after you do this alone for years. So I can concentrate on developing the company. Forgive me for my English.
Congratulations on the excellent site!
July 31st, 2009 at 8:46 pm
@Alex : I think businessman is a wider term,but every businessman is a salesperson for sure,infact they are into business for the sales, don’t you think so? The primary objective of a businessman is to earn profit and he does so by selling his products and services, so he/she is a salesperson.And how do we make a sell? by prospecting a customer obviously,an intelligent salesperson will go to that person who may want his product but not to them who do not want his product at all.And how do we know that who want our product, by prospecting only i guess!
August 4th, 2009 at 2:16 pm
Thanks for the info- it turns out Microsoft’s bing really is making an impact, it seems to me your blog is getting a lot of search engine traffic from bing- have you found this to be the case?
August 5th, 2009 at 2:51 pm
I found that when I brought on an assistant last year it really made a big difference. It freed me up to do the things that were important to my business. Writing good articles, updating the website, only doing consultations with pre screened and qualified clients. Now I don’t know how I used to do things without her.
August 7th, 2009 at 10:49 am
I also am in agreement with the idea of running your business and not working in your business. However, when you are under-capitalized, how can you take advantage of all the examples bob richards decribes? When you don’t have money to invest, then you must invest time until you can invest money. That means licking stamps, putting out flyers, doing some of your own telemarketing and then as you profit, out-source. All of that to say, do not underestimate or minimize the value of licking your own stamp!
August 11th, 2009 at 11:17 pm
For me the internet lead is the best way. Low cost and high return At least in my country, Brazil.
August 12th, 2009 at 6:14 am
I agree with the advice above. You cant do all of the work yourself and prospecting full time takes some of the joy out of work.
August 17th, 2009 at 9:01 pm
Prospecting is the building block on which many succesful financial advisory firms have been built. Prospecting often gives the adviser the opportunity to contact, speak to and build initial relationships with potential clients. Yes, its time consuming but its also a very good opportunity to foster long term working relationships with clients that can often lead to repeat and referral business. There is much to be said for outsourcing labour intensive jobs such as this in some cases but in the long term it pays off if you have built that relationship from the start. Check out our blog on http://www.xl-recruitment.blogspot.com for similar articles
August 19th, 2009 at 2:02 am
I always discounted using PPC and other methods to find leads - until I helped somebody out with a Google AdWords campaign. Once they hit the “sweet spot”, the leads just started rolling in. The key is to keep track of a “acquisition cost” per customer, and make sure that it continues to make sense.
August 21st, 2009 at 1:21 pm
I agree that it’s great to hire someone to do the prospecting for you, but in today’s economy with companies tightening the strings i’ve found myself doing more prospecting.
Nice stuff.
August 21st, 2009 at 2:06 pm
The other thing i see regularly are that some of the top field based sales people are poor when it comes to telemarketing. Better to use a good telemarketeer and keep the sales person in the field where he performs best.
August 24th, 2009 at 1:25 pm
As well as waiting for leads to come in to a business I think one should also chase business whenever they can. Business networking is a great way to find that 1% that you are chasing because remember people buy off people.
Would you recommend business networking as a sales strategy?
August 25th, 2009 at 2:10 am
I agree, as a sales professional you need to be talking to solid prospects. As a marketing professional, you’d be utilizing the prospecting tools that you mention. As a business owner, you could be _developing_ the marketing and prospecting tools, to be outsourced later. That is what I do.
August 26th, 2009 at 5:56 pm
In one point I agree absolutely. You have to invest in your business. Without the readiness to spend some money, you won´t be successful over a longer period of time.
August 28th, 2009 at 9:51 am
I agree with you when it comes to outsourcing the labour. The key is to be able to utilize all the different resources around you.
August 29th, 2009 at 4:46 am
I’m with Giuliano on the best leads coming from the Internet. The users are searching and then hopefully finding the content they are looking for on your website. Cultivating strong upper level relationships with other business owners is a good use of your time, in my opinion if the potential is there…
September 2nd, 2009 at 8:22 pm
You make excellent points. Especially with “If you don’t want to invest in your business, then get a job as an employee because you’re not cut out to be a business owner. You can be a sales laborer for someone else.” It is very important to outsource time-intense tasks to others (internal or external), because you as the business owner, needs to focus on the bigger picture of your business.
September 3rd, 2009 at 3:54 am
Every job demands various set of skills. Sales associates’ jobs titles can also be sales representative, account executive and account representative among others. This description may also be used with many other industries including pharmaceutical sales, insurance sales, retail sales and automotive sales etc. Managerial jobs require high quality organization and human relation talents and abilities.
September 4th, 2009 at 11:00 pm
Outsourcing is the key to a successful business. You are a fool if you think you can do it all yourself and you will fail if you try to. Find the best way to utilise funds and maximise profits.
September 7th, 2009 at 3:38 am
This posts makes some EXCELLENT points. Growing a financial advisory practice is a full time business where the advisor should be delegating prospecting and dedicating all his time to meeting with prospects and clients.
September 12th, 2009 at 8:32 pm
smart post…always out-source the labour so you can always be closing…I learned this when I was selling air duct cleaning.
September 15th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
Correct. The modern day saying is concentrate on your core business and outsource the rest.
Thanks,
Leo
October 31st, 2009 at 10:41 am
yes..i do agree with the points you said about prospecting.It is needed but only to some extent i think as it becomes clerical as the frequency gets higher.
bespoke furniture
November 5th, 2009 at 4:36 am
While I do agree in principle - and as most would agree I don’t like prospecting very much - I tend to ACT MORE, i.e. follow up, make appointments, etc, with prospects I found myself.
Also, I think referrals are the key and if I sometimes have to put in elbow grease to find prospects, I feel I’m more likely to get referrals.
In essence, I agree 100% in theory, but in reality I still think prospecting makes a part of my time.
November 6th, 2009 at 11:06 am
This posts makes some excellent points. Growing a financial advisory practice is a full time business where the adviser should be delegating prospecting and dedicating all his time to meeting with prospects and clients. transfer smart
November 9th, 2009 at 11:19 pm
Reading this I was wondering how I could apply this to my business. I already outsource a lot of the lead generation and internet marketing stuff to another company. This all costs money, and at the beginning of a business you need to watch the costs. But, yes, agree with what you are saying.
November 15th, 2009 at 8:53 am
This is right. I rent a sales envoy after you do this unaided for years. So I can focus on increasing the company. Pardon me for my English.
By the way well done on the outstanding site!
January 17th, 2010 at 12:54 am
Prospecting is definitely better to outsource. It frees my time which in turn allows me to concentrate on more beneficial business strategies. Thanks for the info.
January 18th, 2010 at 4:14 am
I usually do my own prospecting for reasons of cost, but I found much of your info to valuable and will look into telemarketing as an additional resource. Thanks for the info.
January 18th, 2010 at 4:29 am
I do see the point of outsourcing prospecting. Unless you are set up as a marketing company, personal prospecting takes more time than anything else and brings very poor results.
For real estate agent, for example, prospecting could become an absolute nightmare. You have to have a knowledge in a particular marketing niche. You also have to automate your tasks to get any benefit from self-prospecting. Otherwise its a waste of time.
January 19th, 2010 at 7:31 pm
Prospecting is indeed the key. I have an assistant and honestly could not survive without him, it comes down to in my opinion great delegating skills, which of course any manager or self employed person must have naturally or learn in my opinion.
Enjoyed the post, thanks very much for the tips.
January 20th, 2010 at 3:15 am
Although expensive hiring a telemarketer will really help you get more client faster. I think thats the best marketing strategy that I’ve applied in my business.
January 25th, 2010 at 12:48 am
Very good ideas. Focus on everyday business- use outsourcing!
January 25th, 2010 at 10:04 am
It is hard to be able to afford outsourcing prospecting like this, but if you can do it…it sure is a great way to free-up precious time!
February 3rd, 2010 at 4:08 am
Great post and appreciate all the comments. Lead generation should come both actively and passively. While you should always get referrals from satisfied clients having a turn key marketing system is key to having an ongoing source of leads in your pipeline. This should include both online and offline marketing.
February 7th, 2010 at 4:03 am
It is the best way to hire someone for prospecting but in this day everybody feels that this should be made inside because of costs. As someone said the outsource is the key but it is difficult to keep the costs down.
February 8th, 2010 at 1:51 am
We made the decision to have the sales team sale and add a full time marketing person. It has paid off in spades our agents want to show properties not market themselves and or spend the money and the time trying to brand themselves.
February 9th, 2010 at 10:24 am
I agree with the points that you’ve presented in your post. In business, clients are everything. Clients = sales. This is why prospecting clients is one of the most crucial part in making a business grow.
February 11th, 2010 at 8:16 pm
I completely agree with you. There isn’t enough time in the day to waste with fliers, phone calls, and internet ads, but those things must be done. Especially internet advertising in my opinion.
February 12th, 2010 at 2:27 pm
I agree. Prospecting is a pretty repetitive task and if you have the right support staff or lead gen, you can spend your time closing deals.
February 12th, 2010 at 9:56 pm
I have been considering hiring a commission-based salesperson for some time. Very interesting article.
February 13th, 2010 at 2:54 pm
we should have someone else doing prospecting for us, there are lot of things that need to ne considered. i agree with you.
February 14th, 2010 at 3:33 am
Great advice on the employee vs employer issue. I helped out a friend with her business once and she just didn’t want to spend anything– wanted everything for free.
Needless to say, she’s not in business.
February 14th, 2010 at 6:25 am
Outsourcing is so valuable! That’s why so many companies either use other nations to outsource to or other third-party businesses.