A few days ago I was watching a television show about golf, and I was intrigued when I heard the host of the show suggest that golfers analyze their divots. He said they could learn a lot about the way they swing the club if they took the time to study their divots. (For you non-golfers, a divot is the chunk of grass that a golfer often tears up when taking a shot.) I immediately thought about how the comment relates to sales and selling.
When was the last time you analyzed a face-to-face or telephone sales call? Taking the time to analyze your performance should be part of your daily routine. After all, how we can expect to improve if we don't regularly critique ourselves?
To improve your performance, ask yourself these three questions after each sales call, meeting or appointment:
What went well? I like to focus on the positive and believe it's important to review what we did well on a particular call because it reinforces our strengths.
What did I miss or forget to do? I can't think of a single sales call where I didn't forget something. It may have been asking an important question, making a suggestion, asking for the next step or something else. Sometimes it was a minor item; other times it was important. The key is to review your sales calls and identify what could have been improved.
