Hot Prospects: The Proven
Prospecting System to Ramp Up Your Sales Career
by Bill Good
Bill Good's bio: Mr. Good
suggests that you ask any good financial planner or broker, “Do you
know Bill Good?” He's confident they will say yes. That's because
he has spent his professional career in financial services, and he
created that industry's best prospecting system. With all the
mergers that were occurring, Good knew he had to make his prospecting
system more general. This would insure he could market it to all sales
professionals. Mr. Good is the founder of Bill Good Marketing based
in Draper, Utah. This book is actually an updated version of his
1997 book Prospecting Your Way to Sales Success.
The '97 book is much more thorough which, in this case, means more
difficult. I have implemented both books so, if you have any
questions please let me know.
Key
point: Good prospects are
located, not created.
Bill Good confidently claims, “The
major problem in sales is not really a problem with sales. It's a
prospecting problem.” Good
acknowledges, “Sales skills – the ability to create desire to
have the benefits of your product – and closing skills – the
ability to get people to make a decision about buying your product –
are vital to success as a sales professional.” The benefit of
Good's system is to, “Double your income or work half as much.”
And Bill says, “You won't get a two-to-three-year double just
because you have merely improved your selling skills.”
The main innovation
that Mr. Good created was to divide the sales process into two steps.
The first is prospecting and the second is selling. He says that
the goal of the two steps are not the same, indeed they are opposite.
While prospecting Good advises you to take a “No” quickly and
easily and move on but in the selling phase you don't take “No”
for an answer. While this might seem obvious it's not the
predominate method being taught in sales.
The sales landscape
has long been dominated by what Bill calls, “The Old Way.” This
is the school that can be traced back to people like J. Douglas
Edwards. In the old way you are counseled that, “All buyers are
liars,” and, “Don't believe the prospect until he or she has
said no three, six, twelve, or twenty-seven times,” and “Every no
gets that you much closer to a yes.” The old way focuses on
closing and overcoming objections, suggesting that there is a war
between buyers and seller.
Good mentions that
the old way, “Did serve its purpose at an earlier time in this
nation's history. Undoubtedly it came of age in an era in which the
old-time peddlers could not make more than one call a day or even in
a week. And in the old days, if you didn't sell on that one call,
you didn't eat.” But today we live in a country of 300 million
people, any of whom could be contacted fairly easily. Overcoming
objections and closing the prospect can be useful during the selling
step, that is to say once you have found a prospect who truly needs
what you're offering. However, such heavy-handed techniques are
liking to backfire during the initial prospecting phase.
To fix
this situation Bill offers what he calls The Good Way and its three
basic assumptions. The first assumption is that your product or
service is sold, not bought. Meaning, we're not talking about
Frosted Flakes and things of that nature. The second assumption is
that there are enough prospects in your market area who are
interested and qualified today to make it worthwhile to look for them
and ignore the rest. Meaning, if you sell movie scripts, Bill's
system wouldn't work because you're only dealing with a handful of
motion picture companies. The third assumption relies on the basic
principle that not all buyers are liars. Meaning, it's best to
operate by the Golden Rule and treat others how you want to be
treated. If the person says they're not interested, believe them,
say,”Thankyouverymuch,” and move on.
A minute ago I said
that Good divided the sales process into two steps and, while that's
true, it's only part of the story. Bill actually considers there to
be three phases that all sales must go through before closing, they
are: Lead Generation, Lead Development, and Sales. If you're paying
attention you can tell that I didn't lie. Good has simply divided
the prospecting step in two; generation and development. Bill
understands that you can market to the people you know but that's not
the focus of his book. His is a system of cold prospecting which can
be done in-person or over the phone.
The first step is
to contact someone and ask them a question to see if they're
interested in what you're selling. When someone says yes you have
generated a lead and they go in your pipeline. The lead developer is
responsible for managing the pipeline and setting up appointments for
the salesperson. If you're like most people you do all three task
yourself. However, Good advises that you delegate the first two task
and focus only on selling. To do this takes money. But, if you
follow his system you should be able to generate enough income to
hire help.
Good did time
management studies and found that a salesperson is worth $1,000 an
hour, in gross revenue, when they're selling. So, anything they do
that distracts them for selling eats into that tremendous income.
Eventually, if you want to make the big bucks, you will want hire a
support team. Getting someone to generate and develop leads isn't
that hard and it will allow you to stay in selling mode. However,
that might not be possible right now so we'll assume you have to do
it all yourself.
In the
Good Way of prospecting Bill says we're just like the old gold
prospectors that came to California in the middle of the 19th
century. Bill gives his definition of the term “prospecting”
as: “the act of searching for something of value.” If the
prospector wishes to find more gold, he has to sift through more and
more dirt. Bill says, “Gold prospecting was and still is primarily
the act of discarding what is not gold.”
In much the same way, “In the Good Way of prospecting, the first
thing you do is: disqualify nonbuyers.” Nonbuyers are the dirt and
they are always more plentiful than buyers. As I'm sure you know,
that's just the way it is.
To be a legitimate
prospect a person must qualify for at least two of the following four
attributes: interest, decision-making power, time, money. If they
don't qualify they're out, just like the dirt. For this reason Bill
says, “Good prospects are located, not created.”
Bill poses the
following question, “What effect do you think you would have on
people if, instead of attempting to keep talking to everyone you talk
to, you tried to get rid of them?” As many a trainer will tell
you, the prospect can smell neediness on your breath, and it makes
them run for the hills. When you are the one looking to disqualify
them, all of a sudden they feel less threatened and more comfortable
with you.
When you initially
contact someone and they say they're not interested, Good says you
should believe them, thank them and move on to the next person. Bill
writes, “Yes, I know it's possible to sell people who are initially
not interested. But your time is much better spent letting those
disinterested people go while you look for someone else who is
interested.” If you don't rough people up, you can call back your
list every couple months. This repetition will build familiarity and
trust with your prospects and make initially resistant people more
receptive.
As
with many thing, when prospecting you want to know your objective.
This means you want to know what kind of prospect you're looking for.
In order to do that we must first define our prospects. Good talk
of five types of prospects and he labels them A,B,C,D,E,
in order of decreasing hotness..
First
off you have A or the hot prospect. Hot prospects are defined as
those willing to set an appointment with a salesperson. No
appointment, no hot prospect. Bill counsels us that it is virtually
impossible to create interest on the first call. Similarly hot
prospects are few and far between, so it's better to shoot for
someone a little further down on the temperature scale.
Next we have the B
or the red cherry. “A red cherry is a prospect who is currently
interested enough to receive literature from your firm, who has the
funds now to purchase your product or service, and who is able to
make a decision or is in the decision-making team. A red cherry is
not currently interested enough to set an appointment. Many red
cherries will, however, become hot prospects as long as you don't try
to barge into their home or office before they are interested enough
to start the sales process.” So we contact people, send
information to those interested and follow-up. Hopefully you can see
the need for lead develop.
A green cherry is
classified, by Mr. Good, as C. A “greenie” has interest,
decision-making power, and time but just not the money. According to
Good the prospect needs to give you a date for when the funds will
become available in order to be a true green cherry. But remember,
Bill's coming from financial services so you might want to tweak that
definition just a little bit. In my business, LegalShield, the
invest is negligible, so I don't need to qualify people for the
money. I'm looking for people that are interested in supplementing
their income. So a greenie for me is someone who would like to have
their own home-based business but is not sure when they'll have the
time to pull the trigger. Hopefully that helps you define what a
green cherry means in your business.
Then we have the D,
what Bill calls the info lead. Good says, “An info lead is a
prospect who requests information, but we know little else about this
person.” Info leads are responding to ad or have dropped their
card at your trade show booth or have registered at your website.
Perhaps they have been referred to you or simply asked you to send
them information during a cold call and wouldn’t allow you to
further qualify them.
E is the pitch 'n
miss. Good writes, “By pitch-and-miss I mostly mean a prospect
likely spoken to several times and with whom you wanted to do
business with.” This could be someone you have had multiply phone
conversations with or someone who you did an in-person presentation
for but who you weren't able to close. If you would like to do
business with this person, get their permission to keep them on your
mailing list and drip on them over time.
If the person
doesn't fit a prospect category Good calls them a pit. “What do we
do with pits? We return them to the list from which they came. I
would not waste any time documenting their pitness. Just toss them
back in the pond.” Bill says that salespeople spend the bulk of
their prospecting time doing what he calls pit polishing. Good
states, “It is virtually impossible to create interest on a single
phone call or appointment. Pit polishing is the single biggest
destroyer of salespeople that exists.” Strong words. Bill says to
pick the cherries and toss out the pits. However, he does remind us
that pits are seeds and sometimes they grow into cherry tress. So we
leave them on the list and recycle the list as long as it's
profitable.
If
you've followed up to this point you understand these words from Mr.
Good, “You are the
rejector, not the rejectee.” We hear a lot about the importance of
a PMA or positive mental attitude. Bill says, “Frankly, a positive
attitude isn't really necessary to be a cherry picker. What you need
is a 'don't care' attitude.” It's like you're on an assembly line
and your job is to simply identify what each thing (prospect) is and
put it in the proper box (category.)
“OK,
Mr. Courtney,” you may ask, “who do we contact?” There's no
single right answer to that question, only you can make that
decision. There are, however, guidelines that can help. For
in-person prospecting you obviously go to wherever people are, from a
networking event to a mall and everywhere in between. In his system,
Bill Good recommends contacting people with the phone. Of course, we
live in the age of the Do Not Call registry so this isn't always so
easy. It will be up to you to figure out how to navigate this
terrain. One option is to canvas an area, perhaps door-to-door in a
neighborhood, and generate leads that way. People that have
responded to your initial offer give you permission to call them back
and you should be in the clear to do so. Note: I am in no way giving
legal advice, to check the current status of the Do Not Call list
it's best to contact your attorney.
Because it's Good's
way I will stick with explaining a methodology using the phone. To
get a list of people to call you have many options. The most
rudimentary way is to simply call people in the yellow pages.
Another option is a database called Reference USA. This is a
database of millions of homes and businesses and it's available for
free at many libraries.
Good says that you
want to be campaign driven. He defines a campaign as, “A series of
steps or actions, taken in a given market, that produces predictable
results.” Within a campaign we have different variables, all of
which you have control over. They are: the list, the campaign
objective, the style, the primary benefit, the offer, the message,
the sound, and the numbers.
The list, as
mentioned, is the people you plan to call, the neighborhoods you plan
to walk, etc. Good says this is the most important variable and
should be given proper time and attention.
The campaign
objective is the degree of hotness you require of your prospects.
This can be anything from a hot prospect to someone who is just
willing to talk with you.
The style is, “The
medium or combination of media used to produce the response.” To
start Good says it's smart to do a phone/mail/phone campaign. This
is where you call someone, make them an offer, mail desired
information, and then callback to follow-up.
The primary benefit
is, “The main advantage someone will enjoy if they buy your
product.” As mentioned before the primary benefit of the Bill Good
Marketing System is to double your income or work half as much. To
create your primary benefit you must first know the difference
between a benefit and a feature. People buy benefits not features.
Very
simply, a feature is what the product is
and a benefit is what the product does.
In the case of BGMS the feature is some tricked out computer program
that helps you manage your contacts. The benefit is to double your
income or work half as much. I'll give you another example. One
feature of a turbo charger is that it's something that you can put on
your car that utilizes forced induction to inject extra air into the
combustion chamber of your engine. The benefit is that it provides
your car with extra power and acceleration when you need it but gives
great gas mileage when power is not necessary. How about a third
example? You could buy a Brembo brake kit for your car and it might
have four-piston calipers and cross-drilled rotors, and those
features would probably mean squat to you. What you're really
interested in is the benefit of being able to safely stop your car
whenever you want.
The offer is,
“Something you propose to give the client in exchange for some
time.” Free samples, free reports and other sales collateral are
very common.
The message is,
“What you actually say in your calls, ads, and written messages.”
Ad copywriting is beyond the scope of this report. For instruction
on how to create great copy you'll need to read this and other books.
However, I can tell you this, what you say in your calls and message
should be scripted. One thing all the big money makers in sales know
is the importance of a script. “It's the new kid on the block who
feels compelled to be unique and creative with each presentation,”
says Bill. Unfortunately for them, that uniqueness and creativity is
costing them a lot of money.
The sound is just
that, the way the words come out of your mouth. Bill ranks your
sound as second only to the list in importance. Mastering a script
is one way to sound good.
The numbers are the
easiest thing to control. This is simply the number of dials you
make or the number of doors you knock on. You've probably heard it
said that sales is a numbers game and it is. You can't know if a
campaign works if you're making just a few calls. Bill always starts
his diagnosis of a running campaign by asking how many dials per hour
are being made. If the answer if something ridiculously low like
five, he knows the campaign might indeed work, the numbers just need
improvement. Good counsels us to keep the numbers above forty dials
an hour for first time cold calls. If this leads to an average of a
cherry and a half an hour you'll want to hold onto that list and keep
using it. Another great benefit of focusing on 40+ dials an hour is
that you'll sound better. By focusing on achieving your numbers
goal, each hour, you won't sound so needy and desperate which will
improve the results you get.
So, you may ask,
how long does it take to find out if a person is a prospect? Good
says, this is the most important question and the answer is, “Less
than a minute.” He says the second most important question is,
“How long does it take to find out if a particular campaign itself
is a cherry or a pit?” And, to that, he says, “A lot less time
than you think.” Bill informs us, “Over its life, there is only
one way to evaluate a campaign: profitability.” So be sure and track your numbers.
