For salespeople, time is money. They have to reach a certain number of sales every day in order to be effective, and most of them are so determined to achieve their goals that they won’t let anything and anyone stop them, except time. In this situation, we should ask ourselves what can be done to find a balance. The answer is not about working harder, it’s about working smarter.
When it’s the best hour of the day to sell?
You might be inclined to think that the best time to get in touch with a potential client would be in the morning, at 9 AM, as the day has only started and people’s minds aren’t yet filled with tormenting thoughts about work and household tasks. Following the same judgment, you may conclude that the worst time to talk to your clients would be in the afternoon, between 4 and 5 PM, when people only think about how annoying their job is and how much they would like to go home.
Things are a bit different in reality. Studies have shown that 9 AM is indeed a good hour for prospecting, but people are more prone to talk to you about your products in the afternoon, between 4 and 6. These figures are different from an industry to another, yet studies have demonstrated there are specific hours that make people want to buy.
Professional sales representatives are aware of the fact that identifying their Golden Hours is essential for achieving sales growth. However, finding the best moments to contact potential clients is more difficult than it seems. The easiest way of doing this is by creating what is known as a Time Optimization Plan (TOP).
Count every phone call you make and every person that you manage to speak with within an hour. Once you gather these details, calculating your contact rate for that specific hour will be as easy as pie. For instance, if between 9 and 10 AM you manage to make 40 phone calls but you speak only with 10 prospects, the contact rate will be 25%. Do this analysis every hour for a couple of weeks, and confront the figures in order to see which hours have the highest contact rate. The identified hours will be your Golden Hours.
Follow your Time Optimization Plan to the letter
The Time Optimization Plan is a schedule based on the analysis of your Golden Hours. Your schedule will not always allow you to count all phone calls and prospects, and you should know that you don’t have to put too much soul in this activity. However, the name “Golden Hours” was chosen for a reason, so you should try to value these hours as if they were gold. If you have something else to do one day between 10 and 11, try to make sure that your schedule for the next day won’t have anything planned between these hours.
Your TOP may look like a calendar, but you should never see it like that, because its features turn it into a way more important tool. In fact, it’s one of the best planning tools you can ever think of, and it guarantees that you will be able to plan your schedule so that the Golden Hours can catch you talking with potential clients.
Value your Golden Hours
You shouldn’t plan any interruptions, disruptions and meetings during your Golden Hours, since they’re as valuable as finite resources. You never know when they end, so you should take advantage of them as long as you can, while also protecting them. Salespeople who know how to use their time are usually those who make a difference in the sales field, in the sense that mediocrity never satisfies them. If you want to be successful in what you do, you will sometimes have to work harder than your competitors.
The Golden Hours will definitely help you promote your products to a larger number of people, and that’s exactly what you want after all. If people tend to buy more products between 3 and 4 PM, it’s your duty to call them in that time interval. You’re doing a favor to yourself, not only to them, so reschedule other tasks and do whatever needs to be done in order to please your customers.
The article is authored by William Taylor who has a great knowledge of sales and business. He shares his tips through the articles and moreover also provides seminars with the site phoenix-training.co.uk on genuine expertise in Leadership, Management, Sales, Commercial Skills and Communication.
