Most salespeople underestimate the amount of prospecting they need to do. That’s because they don’t align their prospecting activity levels to their ultimate sales goals.
Let me show you what I mean with a simple example. Let’s assume that:
- You have a sales goal of $600,000 this year.
- Your average deal size is $20,000
- You have no existing book of business, so all your business must have to come through prospecting
So, let’s start by thinking about the number of deals you’re going to need to close to achieve your sales goal.
Since your sales goal is $600,000, and your average sale is $20,000, you’ll need to close 30 deals to achieve your goal.
Next, let’s think about the number of meetings you’ll need to close 30 deals based on the next set of assumptions:
- 1 out of 4 opportunities results in a closed deal (25% opportunity to close ratio). So, you’re going to need 120 opportunities to close 30 deals
- 1 out of 2 meetings results in an opportunity. That means you’re going to need 240 meetings to secure 120 opportunities
Finally, we need to think about the amount of prospecting activity it takes to generate 240 meetings
- Let’s assume 1 in 5 people you contact (20%) agree to a meeting. That means you’ll need to reach 1200 prospects to achieve your goal of 240 meetings
- Finally, let’s assume that it takes an average of 5 calls to reach prospect, that means you’ll need to make 6000 prospecting calls over the course of the year
While at first, this may seem like an insurmountable number, it really isn’t that hard if you make prospecting a daily activity.
- In fact, it works out to about 25 calls per day or 125 calls per week.
While the number of prospecting calls you need to make will vary depending on your industry, the important thing to remember is to figure out how much prospecting is required to meet or achieve your goal.
Finally, commit to prospecting daily to stay on track.
