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I've written over the last couple of months that most printing salespeople should be saying "no" more often in the early qualifying stages of the selling process. A lot of time gets wasted chasing suspects who are not really prospects and who will never be good customers. Qualifying decisions should be made on the basis of probability, not just possibility.
I'll make an exception to that rule, though, as long as we're talking about companies that buy a lot of the kind of printing you're best equipped to sell. There are probably plenty of low-volume suspects within your area. With that sort of market density, you really can afford to disqualify these low-volume suspects pretty quickly when they don't show almost immediate interest in buying from you.
High-volume suspects are a different story, though, and the nature of the competition that surrounds them pretty much guarantees a longer selling cycle. In other words, people who buy a lot of printing get a lot of attention from printing companies. If you start calling on one of them tomorrow, you're likely to find a situation where they're already using one or more printers, and they probably have three or five or more other printing salespeople calling on them. You have to expect it to take a while to stand out in a crowd like that!
In a situation like this, I would expect to run into a series of "no's" before I got anywhere near any orders. But with patience and a plan, I'd be willing to hang in there with a few whale-sized suspects in the hope of generating enough interest to consider them fully qualified prospects at some point in the future. If I can make that happen, then I'll extend my patience and my plan in the expectation of turning some of those whale-sized prospects into major customers.
Patience and a Plan
If I started the selling process with a whale-sized suspect tomorrow, I would expect it to take at least six months to get my first order. I would expect it to take at least one month to secure a face-to-face appointment. Remember, we're talking about people who get a lot of attention from local and maybe even not-so-local printing companies. They don't need to talk to me, but they might very well agree to a meeting if I give them a compelling enough reason.
I've learned, though, that it isn't good strategy to fire off all of your big sales/marketing guns at once in a situation like this. It's better to tell them a little at a time, using multiple contacts in an effort to build recognition—and to demonstrate a "soft" persistence.
Next Month: More on "soft" persistence.
David M. Fellman is the president of David Fellman & Associates, Cary, NC, a sales and marketing consulting firm serving numerous segments of the graphic arts industry. Contact him at 919/363-4068 or visit his website at www.davefellman.com.
author: BY DAVID FELLLMAN