From a new hire to top sales rep in a Fortune 500 company in 3 weeks? Sounds like one of those stories that is made up or a “got lucky and landed a huge client” type situation right?
But what if I told you that wasn’t the case for Terry who is a door to door sales person in Florida. His early success was repeated week after week and month after month by strategically and consistently repeating specific behaviors that had had him earning new and loyal customers every day of every week.
New to The Industry
We all know the saying that goes something like, “if you keep doing what you have always done then you will keep getting what you have always gotten.” To make a big impact you have to change the norm and disrupt the usual.
When Terry started his new job he received a little bit of OTJ (on the job training) from a senior sales rep that had been with the company a while. Terry rode around with this co-worker on sales calls and prospecting. They did what most sales people do and cherry pick what houses they thought would be the best potential customers.
They would look for signs that the house may be able to use their service then go and knock the door. Nobody home? Leave a flyer and walk away. They talk to somebody but they aren’t interested? Thanks for your time and walk away.
Have somebody that wants some more info or check back in a month? Write the name down on a piece of paper and leave it in the notebook to follow up on.
The seasoned rep explained to Terry that this is how it was done here, wasn’t too hard and that you can make a decent living in this industry by following his advices.
Doing it His Way
Not one for inefficiency Terry thought it could be done better and set out to do things his own way. After all, how much time is wasted driving from house to house and cherry picking who we “thought” would make a good customer. If you don’t talk to everybody in between how would you know?
And the dismissing of those that were Not Interested. More like, Not Interested AT THIS TIME. You shouldn’t write them off forever. And writing leads down on a piece of paper to follow up with later? What is the likelihood of that happening? Slim to absolute none.
How He Did It
So I asked Terry to summarize what exactly he did that propelled him so fast on the company leaderboard. Going from a nobody to the top in a few weeks is one hell of an achievement if you ask me, in ANY company, much less a nationwide company with thousands of employees.
To break it down into the simplest of terms, here is what Terry did:
- Knock every door in a neighborhood,
- Record details at every door,
- Set reminders in his phone calendar of “next steps,”
- Follow up, follow up, follow up,
- Have a “Rainy Day Plan.”
Think about it for a minute.
There is really no magic in those 5 things. It is all Sales 101. These are the first chapters in ANY sales book.
But… His rise to the top proved that the majority of any sales organization still aren’t doing the basics. Laziness and complacency are the #1 causes of underperforming sales reps both on the rep side and management side.
Very few individual sales reps have the self motivation to attack their daily activities like Terry does which is why he was able to be so successful so quick.
A Deep Dive into the Details
Let’s break it down a little further about how a combination of these events can lead to a domino fall of activity that skyrocketed his sales. Every point mentioned above is one step in driving a prospect through the sales funnel and out the other end.
Knock Every Door in Your Neighborhood
You don’t know who your potential customers are or who your potential customers may refer you to. By knocking on every door you are maximizing your reach and opportunity. Terry knows the status of every house in every neighborhood that he works because he has knocked on every door.
If you are going to work a neighborhood then really WORK the neighborhood. Don’t leave any stone unturned.
Record the Details at Every Door
Not only are they Not Interested but why? Do they use a competitor? Yes, then which one? Do they not have the money at this time? Did they have a bad experience with another company or YOUR COMPANY before?
You need to know these things because the next time you are in the neighborhood you are going to reference that and you know what objection you need to be prepared to overcome.
Where this really comes in handy is on Leads. Terry said if he talks to the wife and she wants him to come back in a week when her husband gets back from the golf trip in Hawaii he puts that in SPOTIO. When he follows up in a week the first thing he asks is, “How was that golf trip to Hawaii? Must have been spectacular…”
Talk about instant rapport building and now the husband now has his guard down and trusts that Terry is on top of his game. After all, how many people does he talk to a day and he remembered about my Hawaii trip? Little does husband know that Terry takes short notes of important things his leads tell him to bring up later like names of dogs, children, vacations, favorite college football teams, etc.
This alone will create more loyalty and generate more referrals than almost anything (other than just asking for them of course).
Set Reminders in Your Phone
Even if you have a steel trap for a memory you will forget in a month to call back that family over on 1123 Main Street that was interested in your product or service. Terry sets reminders for everything that are in his phone so when he wakes up in the morning he knows EXACTLY what to do for that day to make sales.
He calls back the customers who were interested but needed time, stops back by others that told him to come back in a week and has a game plan for every house in his territory. Terry doesn’t have to worry about losing leads or letting them fall through the cracks because he knows that when the time comes for a follow up he will be notified.
Follow Up, Follow Up, Follow Up.
Every top sales rep that I have ever known was amazing at follow up. Even in door to door sales where the whole goal is a one call close if you don’t have a system for follow up you are leaving a TON of potential business on the table. For door to door sales reps that are only given one chance to close the sale I would be willing to bet that your company has a solid follow up protocol in action.
Here are the facts, I didn’t make these up:
- 48% of sales people DO NOT follow up on a prospect
- 25% of sales people STOP after the second contact
- But 80% of sales are made after the 5th contact
If you don’t have a good follow up plan in place then you need to start NOW. Don’t do anything else until you figure this one out because it is THE GAME CHANGER out of all the things that Terry does and you can do.
Terry uses point 2 and point 3 as his follow up plan. He has reminders set and knows what to say when he calls them every time so his follow up is meaningful.
Have a Rainy Day Plan
If you make your living as a full commission door to door sales person there is nothing worse than a rain out. Most reps have nothing to do in these cases. Sure you can go to the office and “catch up on the paperwork” but what about if you want to generate more sales and more income?
Here is what Terry advocates. First, he goes into SPOTIO and filters his pins to show only his “Hot Leads.” These are leads that Terry expects can close at any time. He will either go down the list and call each one or go and stop by their house. Yes, its raining but nothing an umbrella can’t fix. If you want to be the sales leader then these are the things that you have to do.
You have to be willing to do more in order to get more.
Terry also does this if it is coming to the end of the month or they have a new promotion or he needs to get a good sales pop to close out the month strong.
Wrapping It All Up
There are many reasons I LOVE this story and yes one of them is that Terry uses door to door sales app like SPOTIO on a daily basis to track everything he does but more than that it proves that if you manage the daily activities of your sales process properly you will be successful.
I have seen this similar story play out many times in my past experience with top performing sales reps. Most of them weren’t what I would call “expert closers” or master level sales people rather what they were great at was doing a combination of things on a very consistent basis very similar to the activities Terry mentioned brought him his success.
One thing to keep in mind is that all of the tactics Terry employs can be done using a lead management software. Its so important to log all your sales activities to know where you’ve been, what you’ve done and what you need to do.
Here is a final quote from Terry,
“SPOTIO took me from somebody that never did door to door sales to the top salesperson in a fortune 500 company in 3 weeks.”
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SPOTIO is the #1 field sales engagement and performance management software that will increase revenue, maximize profitability, and boost sales productivity.
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