Evaluate Activity; Don't Waste Time "Casting" to Fish That Aren't There!

Okay, so I have been hammering the phones for the past four weeks. Dialing and getting dumped into voicemail. Not leaving messages. Dialing and leaving messages with gatekeepers. Dialing and getting dumped into voicemail again. Leaving messages this time. Dialing. No message. Message. Dialing… and on and on.

Question: Does anybody with buying authority answer the friggin’ phone anymore? Don’t answer that, I already know they don’t.

In today’s hyper speed, information overload era prospects are getting bombarded with marketing messages and sales pitches. And with the advent of caller ID nobody in their right mind answers one of those calls. I don’t do it at home (and when I do it’s a machine… that’s for another day!), so why do I expect my prospects to answer my call? Don’t they know how important I am, and how much time and money (blah blah blah) I can save them?

Here’s the kicker- I actually had considered those calls “casts!” Metaphorically I had envisioned myself as the Bass Pro “casting” to dozens (if not hundreds) of prospects a day. Here’s the problem- my “bait” never got in front of any real prospects. It’s as though the bass are ten feet below the surface and my jig is only going three feet down. So why did I think I was actually being productive when I was never really getting in front of the prospect? Did I honestly think that my “value statements” on their voicemail where going to entice them to swim up and take a look at me?

Ultimately the question is how can I actually get in front of enough prospects? I don’t have the answer here, but I know what’s not working! What would the bass pro do? He’d probably add weight to his jig, switch baits, switch locations and change tactics. I need to do all of the above.

This is back to the basics. The fundamentals of this metaphor are… find fish, get in front of fish, entice fish, hook fish, keep line taught, reel fish in, keep fish alive in livewell… repeat.

My problem is I was telling myself that I was in front of the fish when I really wasn’t. We need to constantly evaluate our activity and be honest with ourselves. As sales professionals and fishermen we have enough technology and information to evaluate this hourly, daily, weekly, etc. I know who my prospects are, now I just need to find better ways to get in front of them.