Last week my wife and I enjoyed a trip to a resort in Mexico. One afternoon, we were sitting near the pool people watching. Dozens of people walked past us, and we couldn't help but notice the vast majority dragged their feet or shuffled as they walked. This got me thinking about situations in which salespeople drag their feet and how this affects their sales.
- Prospecting. As my friend Mike Weinberg says, "No one ever defaults to prospecting." Many salespeople drag their feet and procrastinate when it comes to engaging in this activity. However, it is the one sales activity that can influence your final results more than anything else.
- Lead follow-up. It never ceases to amaze me how many people drag their feet when new prospects contact them. I can think of several situations where I contacted a company to inquire about a particular product or service only to have my email or voice mail ignored, forgotten or misplaced.
- Sales follow-through. Very few sales happen in the first conversation, which means salespeople need to follow through if they want a sale to move forward. However, many salespeople drop the ball and fail to follow up after that initial sales call.
- Information. In today's lightening-paced world, people have a very low "wait" tolerance when they request information about your products, services or offerings. I recently read that companies (and salespeople) who get information to a prospect faster than their competition significantly increase their likelihood of capturing that sale.
- Self-development. Many salespeople and their managers believe that their existing skill set is sufficient and that they don't need to update or improve their selling skills. Sales training expert Colleen Francis reports that three-plus hours of sales coaching a month will ensure a salesperson hits 107 percent of his or her quota, while less than two hours of coaching per month sees that rep hitting 90 percent of quota. Yet many salespeople resist coaching and even more sales managers drag their feet and fail to provide effective sales coaching.
- Adapt and change. If there is one thing I have learned in business and in sales, it's that change is inevitable, which means we need to constantly adapt and modify our approach if we want to generate better results. Salespeople, however, are notoriously reluctant to change their approach, particularly seasoned veterans.
In today's competitive sales world, dragging your feet can cost you money in lost sales opportunities—especially if your competitors are light and quick on their feet.
