“You put way too much pressure on that deal and if you don’t recognize that only about a quarter of your deals are going to close, then you don’t have enough deals in the pipeline.” – Jeff Bajorek in today’s Tip 285
Do you have a pipeline problem?
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Jeff Bajorek on LinkedIn
Jeff Bajorek: Rethink the Way You Sell
208: You Don’t Have a Closing Problem
264: You Have a Planning Problem
278: You Have a Decision Maker Problem
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Transcript
Scott Ingram: You’re listening to the Daily Sales Tips podcast and I’m your host, Scott Ingram. It’s Thursday, and that means that today’s tip comes from Jeff Bajorek. This is part 11 of Jeff’s 16 part series that he kicked off back in tip #208 called “You Don’t Have a Closing Problem,” and if you’re paying really close attention that means that I’ve had the numbering wrong for about the last 8 tips, because that opening was #1 in the series. Anyway, with that out of the way. Here’s Jeff with today’s installment:
Jeff Bajorek: You don’t have a closing problem. You have a pipeline problem. One of the things I love about salespeople is how optimistic we are. Everything’s an opportunity. The glass is half full, not half empty. Yeah, that deals coming in. You’re going to close it. No problem. You got this one in the bag. Your quarters made up. Your year is made up. Way to go pack yourself on the back. But don’t pack yourself too hard cause you know what gets in salespeople’s way more than anything is how optimistic they can be. Yeah, that deal’s going to close 25% of the time and that’s if you’re pretty good. So the problem becomes then that you have to close that deal. You put way too much pressure on that deal and if you don’t recognize that only about a quarter of your deals are going to close, then you don’t have enough deals in the pipeline. So then when that deal doesn’t close as it’s going to 2/3 to 3/4 of the time. You’re hosed because you forgot to fill the rest of your pipeline. When you have enough deals in the pipeline, no single one of them become so important that it’s going to make or break your year. That means that no single one of those deals has so much pressure on it that you need to worry about closing it. If you have enough deals in the pipeline; Hey, you’re probably going to hit that number. You may even close more than one of those deals. And what’s wrong with exceeding expectations? Do you have three to four times your number in your pipeline? If you only close 25 to 30% and that’s on the high end of your pipe, would you still meet the expectations that have been set for you? Most of you listening to this right now cannot answer that in the affirmative. That’s your real problem. You don’t have a closing problem, you’re not working enough deals to close.
Scott Ingram: For more about Jeff and for links to the previous tips in this series just click over to DailySales.Tips/285 that’s also where you’ll find the video version of Jeff’s tip and links to help you connect with Jeff, and you should ask him about his Rethink the Way You Sell community. There’s some really great stuff happening in there.
Thanks for listening and be sure come back tomorrow for another great sales tip!