It’s okay to say no to a time that won’t work for you!
We teach to ask for a specific time and date for the appointment you want. Unfortunately, our targets also live by a calendar and sometimes our specific request can’t be met, so they propose something different. When that happens, why do some of us sales professionals seem so reluctant to say no to that request when the target’s suggestion is inconvenient to us?
When coaching sales professionals in our Prospector’s Academies™, I hear this come up all the time. Here is why I believe this happens to inexperienced sales professionals. Think back to the days of kings—or perhaps to the movie, The Godfather. When an audience with the King or the Godfather is arranged, the term generally used is that the audience is ‘granted’. The connotation is that the person doing the ‘granting’ is doing the requester a favor. Therefore, the requestor takes whatever they can get in terms of when. Why is that? Because the requestor feels they are on a level below the one granting the audience.
Sales professionals who have not yet made the transition to believing they are providing a valuable service to those they sell to, do exactly the same thing. Additionally, those sales professionals that have a hard time setting enough Initial Appointments exhibit the same tendencies. They think the target is doing them a favor by granting them the audience. Or, they are so desperate and have so little self-confidence they don’t want to take the chance on putting up a barrier to the meeting.
If you are still thinking that the target’s calendar is more important than yours, try this next time you get ready to make appointment setting calls. Think about one of your best customers and how much they appreciate what you’ve done for them. Think about the benefits you provided. Do they trust you? Do they believe you know more about what you provide than they do? Do they look at you as a business professional? Of course they do. So why are you thinking their time is more valuable than yours?
If you’d like more information on the topic of why no team of sales professionals has ever failed to at least double the number of Initial Appointments they were setting after going through one of our programs, give us a call or drop us a line. We love talking appointment making!
Caponi Performance Group and Contact Science jointly market the telephone prospecting and cold calling solution called Coldcalling101™. It is the only comprehensive solution to solving the biggest barrier to success in most selling organizations—the inability to secure enough Initial Appointments to begin the selling process. We accomplish that through simultaneously addressing both the efficiency and effectiveness of the process. We can be reached at 817 224-9900 or at barry@coldcalling101.com. You can also find answers to many of your challenges in our books: Contrary to Popular Belief, Cold Calling DOES Work! Volume I: Effectiveness, The Art of Appointment Making and Volume II: Efficiency, the Science of Appointment Making.
Share and Enjoy
