3 Tips to Making Sure your Meeting Takes Place

My Coach shared that he used to get ticked off when prospects were a no show. The reason, he would plan out his day, arrange for childcare, buy gas and then drive across town, only to sit and wait for someone who would not show up.

Well, if you knew my Coach, you would know he was ALWAYS confirming his appointments, so he sat and figured out why his prospects were not showing up. He had to confirm his appointments - but differently than he had been doing.

I share these proven steps he taught me and I applied with success in my Hot Prospecting Tips Series, and I will list some of them here.

First, you should remember the reasons you confirm an appointment are:

1. To ensure your prospect gets what they need/want.
2. To ensure that the event didn't slip the prospect's mind.
3. So you are certain they know all the details about where to be and at what time. This could include dress code, specific meeting location, fees that might be associated, etc.
4. So that you can plan and have a correct estimation of educational leave behind materials with you.

With these reasons in mind, My Coach came up with steps for confirming his appointments as well as a “script.”

Here are 3 of Coach’s tips he taught me about how to confirm appointments correctly and a short script:

1. Confirm your appointment the night before. It gives your prospect enough time to plan or reschedule accordingly;
2. The best time to call them to confirm is the time you know you can reach them. If you know they work all day, try to get them right before or right after work. If they put the baby down for a nap at 1:00, try calling then.
3. When you reach the person, DON’T say, “Are you going to be there?” Instead, give some small details about the meeting like the dress code and location.
4. Also, when you reach the person, DON’T insult their intelligence by saying “I just wanted to remind you in case you forgot.”

When you call, using a script such as the following one will let you confirm your appointment effectively:

“Hi Wendell, this is Rylona. I’m just calling to let you know I’ll meet you at the door by the front desk tomorrow at 4:30. By the way, I’m coming from a meeting, so I’m going to be in dressy/casual clothes. See you there!”

For more of my Ambit secrets on confirming appointments and other prospecting tips, check out my “Hot Prospecting Tips Series.”

HAVE A WONDERFUL WEEK!

[Video] In Business and Sales, Practice Still Makes Perfect by Coach 100K

Practice makes perfect, is a familiar one. Creative types seem to know this intuitively and are driven to practice their art during each free moment. Professional athletes seem to have the same understanding. Next time you watch a 30-second Olympic event, think about the countless hours of practice that led to that moment. These methods are proven to work, but in many cases, business professionals don't seem to follow them. Companies typically invest a lot of time and money into new employees to make sure that they are trained on company policies and practices, but after that, most employees get nothing more than an annual training program rather than the daily practice that gets proven results.

Last month, the You're the Boss blog in The New York Times tackled this topic in a post called "If Practice Makes Perfect, Why Don't Companies Practice More?" The author of the post discusses Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers, which states that in order to become proficient in his or her field, a person needs at least 10,000 hours of practice. Given that, why do so many business owners meet clients or put employees in front of them without providing the opportunity for practice?

In sales, practice is essential.

    Study your products.
    Understand your services.
    Take turns describing them in your own words with colleagues.
    Write cold-calling scripts and carry on practice phone conversations with office mates.
    Ask your partner to come up with objections until you become adept at getting around them.

Make this a weekly, if not daily, habit, and you'll see your confidence improve as you become more and more successful in your field. If you have any questions about best practices in sales, contact Closing Time.

Listen to my interview on Top Ambit Incomer Executive Consultant, Nir Golan's, conference call with host Executive Consultant, Debra Hicks:

Facts Tell But Stories Sell (Wisdom Point) Coach100k

How often do you talk prospects into buying things they don't want? Probably not very often. How often do you talk prospects out of buying things they do want? Probably more often than you realize!

Salespeople have a great deal to talk about: the features and associated benefits of the product or service, as well as the advantages of buying from their company. All of which is fully documented in advertising literature and marketing materials.

Who cares?

The salesperson cares. The marketing department cares. The advertising agency cares. But, does the prospect care? The salesperson doesn't know. He's been too busy delivering his sales monologue. Overloaded with information to consider—some of which may have nothing to do with the reasons the prospect would buy the product or service—the prospect has little alternative than to "think-it-over" or perhaps seek out another salesperson who will at least listen to what she has to say.

The salesperson's objective should be to find out why, and under what circumstances, the prospect would buy the product or service from him. That requires a dialogue, not a monologue. The salesperson must ask question to elicit the prospect's interests, concerns, and expectations.

During your next initial interaction with a prospect, withhold your product knowledge and unique selling points. Instead, start with a question to uncover the prospect's mindset regarding the acquisition of your product or service. Here is an example for a company that provides overseas shipping services.

"I suspect you have some specific concerns about your overseas shipments. Why don't you tell me what they are and then I'll do my best to address them?"

Once the prospect reveals his concerns or interests, you can ask additional questions about their significance. The more questions you ask, the more the prospect talks, and the more you will learn about potential opportunities and how to favorably position your product or service.

Achieving Your Dreams by Jim Rohn

While most people spend most of their lives struggling to earn a living, a much smaller number seem to have everything going their way. Instead of just earning a living, the smaller group is busily working at building and enjoying a fortune. Everything just seems to work out for them. And here sits the much larger group, wondering how life can be so unfair, so complicated and unjust. What’s the major difference between the little group with so much and the larger group with so little?

Despite all of the factors that affect our lives—like the kind of parents we have, the schools we attended, the part of the country we grew up in—none has as much potential power for affecting our futures as our ability to dream.

Dreams are a projection of the kind of life you want to lead. Dreams can drive you. Dreams can make you skip over obstacles. When you allow your dreams to pull you, they unleash a creative force that can overpower any obstacle in your path. To unleash this power, though, your dreams must be well defined. A fuzzy future has little pulling power. Well-defined dreams are not fuzzy. Wishes are fuzzy. To really achieve your dreams, to really have your future plans pull you forward, your dreams must be vivid.

If you've ever hiked a 14,000-foot peak in the Rocky Mountains, one thought has surely come to mind: “How did the settlers of this country do it?” How did they get from the East Coast to the West Coast? Carrying one day’s supply of food and water is hard enough. Can you imagine hauling all of your worldly goods with you... mile after mile, day after day, month after month? These people had big dreams. They had AMBITION. They didn't focus on the hardship of getting up the mountain.

In their minds, they were already on the other side–their bodies just hadn't gotten them there yet! Despite all of their pains and struggles, all of the births and deaths along the way, those who made it to the other side had a single vision: to reach the land of continuous sunshine and extraordinary wealth. To start over where anything and everything was possible. Their dreams were stronger than the obstacles in their way.

You've got to be a dreamer. You've got to envision the future. You've got to see California while you’re climbing 14,000-foot peaks. You've got to see the finish line while you’re running the race. You've got to hear the cheers when you’re in the middle of building your Ambit Business. And you've got to be willing to put yourself through the paces of doing the uncomfortable until it becomes comfortable. Because that’s how you realize your dreams.

“If there is no struggle, there is no progress." - Coach 100K

Success is not measured by what you accomplish, but by the opposition you have encountered, and the courage with which you have maintained the struggle against overwhelming odds.

The Four Emotions That Can Lead to Life Change by Jim Rohn

Emotions are the most powerful forces inside us. Under the power of emotions, human beings can perform
the most heroic (as well as barbaric) acts. To a great degree, civilization itself can be defined as the intelligent channeling of human emotion. Emotions are fuel and the mind is the pilot, which together propel the ship of civilized progress. Which emotions cause people to act? There are four basic ones; each, or a combination of several, can trigger the most incredible activity. The day that you allow these emotions to fuel your desire is the day you'll turn your life around.

1) DISGUST

One does not usually equate the word "disgust" with positive action. And yet properly channeled, disgust can change a person's life. The person who feels disgusted has reached a point of no return. He or she is ready to throw down the gauntlet at life and say, "I've had it!" That's what I said after many humiliating experiences at age 25, I said. "I don't want to live like this anymore. I've had it with being broke. I've had it with being embarrassed, and I've had it with lying." Yes, productive feelings of disgust come when a person says, "Enough is enough." There is nothing so life-changing as gut-wrenching disgust!

2) DECISION

Most of us need to be pushed to the wall to make decisions. And once we reach this point, we have to deal with the conflicting emotions that come with making them. We have reached a fork in the road. Now this fork can be a two-prong, three-prong, or even a four-prong fork. No wonder that decision-making can create knots in stomachs, keep us awake in the middle of the night, or make us break out in a cold sweat. Making life-changing decisions can be likened to internal civil war. Conflicting armies of emotions, each with its own arsenal of reasons, battle each other for supremacy of our minds. And our resulting decisions, whether bold or timid, well thought out or impulsive, can either set the course of action or blind it. I don't have much advice to give you about decision-making except this: Whatever you do, don't camp at the fork in the road. Decide. It's far better to make a wrong decision than to not make one at all. Each of us must confront our emotional turmoil and sort out our feelings.

3) DESIRE

How does one gain desire? I don't think I can answer this directly because there are many ways. But I do know two things about desire:

a. It comes from the inside not the outside.
b. It can be triggered by outside forces.

Therefore, while searching for your "hot button" of pure, raw desire, welcome into your life each positive experience. Don't erect a wall to protect you from experiencing life. The same wall that keeps out your disappointment also keeps out the sunlight of enriching experiences. So let life touch you. The next touch could be the one that turns your life around.

4) RESOLVE

Resolve says, "I will." These two words are among the most potent in the English language. I WILL. Benjamin Disraeli, the great British statesman, once said, "Nothing can resist a human will that will stake even its existence on the extent of its purpose." In other words, when someone resolves to "do or die," nothing can stop him. When confronted with such iron-will determination, I can see Time, Fate and Circumstance calling a hasty conference and deciding, "We might as well let him have his dream. He's said he's going to get there or die trying."

The best definition for "resolve" I've ever heard came from a schoolgirl in Foster City, California. As is my custom, I was lecturing about success to a group of bright kids at a junior high school. I asked, "Who can tell me what "resolve" means?" Several hands went up, and I did get some pretty good definitions. But the last was the best. A shy girl from the back of the room got up and said with quiet intensity, "I think resolve means promising yourself you will never give up." That's it! That's the best definition I've ever heard: PROMISE YOURSELF YOU'LL NEVER GIVE UP.