The skills that are necessary in the pipeline phase of selling are not the same as those required in appointment setting. (Part 1 of 4.)
Many sales managers we talk to operate under the assumption that because their sales team, once in front of a target, can move that target through the pipeline effectively, they are properly equipped and capable of getting a target into the pipeline. After all, selling is selling, isn’t it? The sale, or objective, is just different, right?
Unfortunately, the answer is no. And this misunderstanding of the differences has created what we like to call the ‘elephant in the sales bullpen’. It is apparent to everyone that enough Initial Appointments are not being set, but the root cause is not pursued. Instead, us sales managers all ignore the elephant and utter the old mantra, “Make more dials”!
This four part blog explores the four major differences: the Beginning Repartee, the Pace of the Exchange, the Types of Responses heard from the target, and Preparation to Succeed.
- The Beginning Repartee. If our target has agreed to an appointment with us, the opening moments of the call, although perhaps not yet openly friendly, are at least collegial or warm. That happens because our target has already decided to invest time with us so they are open to the conversation and to us.
On a cold appointment making call, the opposite is true. They have not yet agreed that there is value in even talking, let alone meeting with us. The reasons for that are twofold. The first is that they don’t think they need what we’re selling yet, so why would they need to have this conversation. Couple that with reason number two, we’re interrupting them from doing something and they don’t even want to talk with us. Hence, they’ll do anything, including lie to us, to get us off the phone. Hence, the term ‘cold’ call as the target’s behavior towards us is cold. What that means is that the call begins as being adversarial.
In the Initial Appointment, the normal conversational skills we all have developed throughout our life are at play. Not so in a cold call. The skills necessary to Counter that initial negative response and get the target to open their mind for a moment to a conversation about our value proposition are not needed nor practiced in the pipeline half of the selling process.
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