Prospecting

Finding qualified prospects for your products or services is a necessary first step in the sales process. You need to have someone to sell to before you make a sale. But, making certain that there is a good possibility that they will buy is what makes them "qualified prospects."

An often used method in prospecting is finding out where your competitors are selling to. These are potentially your customers if you are able to convince them to switch to your brand.

Another method is desk research. Decades ago, flipping the yellow pages or phone book/trade directories is the norm. Now all you need is Google the information you want online. For example, if your products and services are used by ship or rig builders, type in “ship or rig builders” in Google search, and you will have a list of all prospective clients.

How about networking? Getting friends and business associates to refer you to a potential customer is common in many countries, like China and Indonesia.

Once you've identified prospects, you will want to learn all you can before you approach them. How is their company set up? Do they have a purchasing department? Or do every purchase goes through the technical department for evaluation before the purchasing department is involved? Is the boss or director personally involved in all purchasing matters?

Contacting each prospect takes a lot of time and energy so look at each potential prospect carefully to:

·         determine your sales approach and plan your sales calls

·         determine which products and services best suit particular prospects

·         uncover reasons why you should not pursue some prospects, saving you valuable time and resources

In my next post, I will elaborate on the Initial Sale Contact, the second step of the Sales Process.