Many salesperson will tell you that sales is all about numbers. The more people you contact, the more leads you get, the more customers you will have. There is a lot of truth in that but what if you are an entrepreneur? You are a sales manager, marketing manager, operations manager, CEO, general manager, etc, all rolled into one. Will you still have the time and energy to contact the many prospects that you have to contact? The secret lies in qualifying the prospect.
What’s the difference between leads and prospect, you may ask. The answers is lots! Lots of time and energy saved, that is. A lead is any form of contact. They are both unqualified and qualified. A prospect on the other hand is a qualified lead. Which means that there is a high chance that the individual will purchase from you.
To maximize efficient use of time and effort, it is important to identify if that customer is just a lead or a prospect. There are a number of ways in which you can effectively qualify a prospect and sometimes it also takes a lot of honesty. There will be times when out of 50 leads that you receive, only 1 is a real prospect. The key here is quality and not quantity. If it is only 1 out of 50, then so be it. For the rest of the 49, you can simply send courtesy reminders or follow up with promotional materials. Do not bother spending too much time on them. Remember, as an entrepreneur with limited resources, you need to maximize use of your time and effort.
Here are some of the qualifying factors:
Compatibility
Determine if there is a synergy between your product or services and the needs and wants to the prospect. To do this effectively, you need to first make an informed judgment of what the prospect is looking for and does your product / service meet that need?
There is no point force feeding your product to a prospect who does not think that your product / service is suitable for him. Remember, limited resources so maximize use of time and effort.
Accessibility
Are you able to contact the prospect easily? There are prospects who are only contactable via a telephone number which nobody ever picks up or only via email. By giving you a contact which he/she is easily contactable clearly demonstrates his/her keen interest in our product. If you have a contact that proves otherwise, maybe you should just move on.
Eligibility
Is the prospect the right fit? Does the prospect work or stay close enough to your establishment? Does the prospect have a genuine need for your product / services?
Authority
Is the prospect the one which makes the purchasing decision?
There are 3 types of prospect so you need to determine which your prospect is. The first is the buyer. This refers to the person who does the physical purchase of the product / service. The second is the user. This refers to the person who is using the product / service. The final is the payer. This refers to the person who is the one who pays for the product / service.
It is relatively easy to identify the user. But to distinguish between the payer and the buyer, you need to really observe very carefully. One trick is to observe if your prospect keeps looking to a second person/the spouse for affirmation. If so, chances are your prospect is merely the buyer but the final paymaster, who should be your target, is the spouse/other person.
Profitability
Is the prospect able to afford your product / services? If he/she is able to afford, is he/she willing to pay for it? By carefully qualifying your prospect, it will greatly help you to maximize the efficient spend of your time and effort, which to an entrepreneur, is priceless.