How to use time management to become a more successful sales professional!
Time is life
Each day comes with a 24-hour package, distributed equally to all. It is up to us to make the most of the 24 hours of each day that is given to all of us. There is so much to do and so little time is the common complaint these days. Within these 24 hours we have to work, sleep, take care of our body and mind, take care of our families, pursue our hobbies, and keep our mother-in-laws in a good mood. We have to use these hours to grow, produce and progress through proper time management. Managing the fixed quota 24 hours effectively leads to fulfilling all our responsibilities and improves our personal and professional quality of life. When properly managed, time produces the greatest returns on the energy invested.
For sales professionals, time is money. They are not paid in terms of the number of hours worked, to “strike a clock”. They are paid to produce results: sales results through sales numbers. Therefore, it is imperative that sales professionals manage their time properly and make the most of it. Time management is a critical skill for career happiness. Your income, your home, all your dreams and aspirations depend on it. Remember, you can’t manage time; all you can do is manage yourself with respect to time.
Time management
The art of time management is based on some simple and proven techniques. Only with practice can it become an ingrained habit that can produce amazing sales results.
o Get Organized: Getting organized is the first step to effective time management. Highly successful salespeople have their calendars marked a year in advance. Create an organizer and schedule your tasks according to your top sales priorities. Make a list of things to do. Minutes make an hour, so enter your plans to get things done to the smallest minute. Three minutes to scan the headlines should mean three minutes and not one more minute. Also prepare a record book of time spent on daily activities. Keep the log book religiously and record each day’s activities before bed. Do a weekly review of this to find out where you are spending/wasting your time and spending that extra time on something worthwhile. Eliminate unproductive activities.
o Visualize your action plan for the whole day. Do it after your morning exercise or the night before.
o Delegate tasks to others to save time. Things that can be done by your assistant, subordinates, relatives or others should be handed over to them. Compensate and praise them well, and they’ll feel good about entrusting them with the responsibilities of completing a task and earning something extra.
o Don’t procrastinate. He is the biggest thief of time. Finish things as and when scheduled. If possible, “beat deadlines, don’t just try to meet them.”
o Some sales executives take the easy jobs first and keep the hardest jobs last. Tackle the difficult tasks first. You may need to do one or two easy tasks to warm up. That’s perfect. But then you have to focus on the hard jobs. You’ll be surprised how quickly they cook when taken head-on. Then you will have plenty of time for easier tasks.
o Staying away from negative thoughts and negative people is a huge time saver. Both can drain energy, reduce productivity, and consume a lot of time. Once you plunge into the whirlwind of negative thoughts, it will take you a considerable amount of time to get out of it. It is absolutely necessary to entertain only positive and good thoughts. It is also advisable to avoid the company of negative people and mix with positive and optimistic people. Stay away from negative thoughts and stay positive.
Use your idle or wait times creatively. As a sales professional, you probably spend a lot of time in your car in traffic to get to your next appointment. Why not use this time to make phone calls to your prospects? We all wait at traffic lights, wait to meet the managers, wait for our food to be served, wait for our secretary to finish preparing the report, wait in lines to pay the bills, etc. Use these times creatively to help improve your sales productivity
o The above time saving tips are based more on common sense. There are other tips to save time and improve productivity that are also backed by solid research.
o Analysis of the income growth curves of successful sales professionals reveals that it is not important how much total time they spend on sales activities rather how they allocate their time. Super salespeople at financially high-performing companies working with high incentives and stock options spend 40% more time with their best prospects and spend an additional 3-4 hours on high-value sales activities than their peers at high-performance companies. poor financial performance. A survey by Watson Wyatt of 841 salespeople from 500 companies with large sales forces has established this. Sales reps at successful companies focus more on identifying customer needs and spend more time with potential customers they meet.
o The survey also finds that high-performing salespeople spend 30% less time on administrative work than low-performing ones. Administrative work should be delegated to administrative staff, the secretary, or should be reduced to a minimum. The best salespeople do all unrelated sales activities between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m. and 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. is defined as the best selling time to be “tummy to tummy” with a money taker. decisions.
timing is everything
In sales, timing is everything: what time to make a sales call, what time to give a presentation, when to talk, when to listen, and when to close a sale. It may not require the precision of a scientist, but it nevertheless requires a proper sense of time. A super salesperson knows that there is a right time to meet with the CEO of a company when he or she would be relaxed and receptive. There is also a right time to close a sale without allowing it to be delayed.
There is a time for everything. There is a time to work and a time to rest just as there is a time to speak and a time to be silent. This is the essence of time management. Wise salespeople know this and they know it well.