The 4th quarter is the accountability quarter.
Some of you are thinking, “Hey, it’s been a great year,” because you’ve done well in Q1-3. Others are saying, “Ugh,” because you simply didn’t accomplish everything you hoped.
Giving up is not an option! If you want to make the fourth quarter the best one, follow these eight tips:
- Discipline and focus
People ask me all the time, “Mark, what’s the number one thing I need to do to be successful in sales?” And I say, “You need to be disciplined and have focus.”
Disciplined with your objectives and how you manage your time. Focused on the customers you’re dealing with to understand them at a level nobody else understands them.
- Review your pipeline
I just did this over the weekend, and I saw several things in my pipeline that I can zero in on.
Spend some time looking at things in the lower half of your pipeline. In other words, if what’s coming in at the top are prospects, and those moving out the bottom are customers, what are the things in the lower half? Those are the ones where you’ve got to focus on.
Take each one of those, start breaking them apart, and ask yourself: What do I need to do? Is it possible to make it close? Keep things simple.
As people get desperate, they start doing stupid things. Focus instead on your next step with those prospects.
- Assess your current customers.
You undoubtedly have got a lot of customers that are probably capable of doing a lot more business with you. Ask yourself this question: Why am I not getting more business? What is it that I need to be doing to get more business from them?
It’s a very easy step up, because assessing your current customers includes such things as:
- What are additional items you can sell them?
- Are there additional divisions?
- Are there other people you should be talking to within that company?
- There’s a wealth of business ready to be made if you put in the effort.
- Referrals
Referrals are always one of the fastest, easiest ways to get business. Currently, what are you doing to get referrals? And what are you doing to give referrals?
Remember, referrals are a two way street. If you want to get referrals, you better start by giving referrals.
It’s an excellent tool. Ask yourself, who are my referral partners? Who are the best people that I can be working with that are going to help me get more referrals?
- Leverage the calendar
Right now, sit down and look at the calendar. Look at all the holidays, the year end for your own company, as well as year end for your current customers. If you deal with other countries, look at the holidays in those countries? Why? Because this is going to affect how you manage your time.
Do you have vacation time you’re taking as you get down towards the end of the year? Because all of these things begin to come into play, and I’d rather be planning for it right up front.
One of the biggest things to know is when is the last day that you can get an order in for this calendar year to get it shipped, or for a customer to receive it? In other words, are there credit terms you need to work out? Are there various pieces of paperwork you need to get done to be able to ensure that end of the year orders get shipped and taken care of?
- Keep it simple
Don’t overcomplicate things for your customer. If you give them too many things to think about, or you give them too many options, you’re going to lose deals.
You’ll begin to hear a lot of, “Oh man, we need to think about it. We’re just going to push this off to the first of the year.” We will hear that a lot starting in November.
Instead, make it very easy for your customer to do business with you today, right now.
- Focus on the task at hand
It’s so easy to get sidetracked right now. “Well, I don’t think I’m going to make my number, so I’m going to kind of venture off and do this.” No, stay focused and hold yourself accountable for each two hour block of time.
It’s called time blocking. It’s something I advocate a lot, and means I block my time for every two hour segment, and I’m going to hold myself accountable for that two hour segment.
It’s one of the reasons I love the 10:00 AM rule. The 10:00 AM rule is very simply this: You want to have accomplished something significant before 10:00 AM each day. Why? Because that is going to give you more momentum. It’s amazing how much more productive your day will be, because you feel good.
Even if your day should fall apart, it will still have been a good day, because you accomplished something significant.
- Your attitude matters
Make sure that you’re hanging with positive people.
That includes who you spend time with physically, but also what you read, and what you listen to.
That’s why I put these videos out, and why I have my podcast, The Sales Hunter Podcast. Not to mention, The Sales Hunter University, and all the coaching I do, because I hope I can be a positive influence on your life and on your sales.
I know these ideas are going to help you as we enter into the accountability quarter. But don’t forget, your mindset is even more important than your skillset.
