September 20, 2023 • 20 mins
Are your sales stagnating, or worse, flatlining? What if you could revive your sales by attracting at least 10% new customers every month? Brace yourself for an enthralling episode of Surviving Outside Sales where we reveal game-changing strategies for prospecting and market canvassing. We're spilling the beans on how to be an exemplary prospector, reducing stress about individual deals, and keeping your growth on an upward trajectory.
But that's not all. This episode offers practical advice on how to make your presence felt in your market rather than just broadcasting your message. Learn how to fine-tune your prospecting techniques using powerful tools like Google and other search engines. Also, we introduce you to Rhythm AI's prospecting tool, available to you for a free 14-day trial. Lastly, as we relish breaking our July download records, we share insights on the importance of setting goals and celebrating achievements. Grab your headphones and gear up for a power-packed episode, promising practical insights and actionable strategies to transform your sales journey!
To connect with the show: Subscribe, Download & Share!
Would appreciate a 5-Star Rating if deserved on Spotify & Apple Podcasts!!!
Connect with Mike:
Website: Mike O'Kelly
Mike@survivingoutsidesales.com
LinkedIn: Mike O'Kelly | LinkedIn
IG: Mike O'Kelly - Sales Builder
______________________________________________________________________
If you are in outside sales and have had any of the following:
- New to Outside Sales
- New to an industry, new product, new territory - any type of change
- Experienced, but have lacked training and business development
- Seasoned but feel like you have hit your ceiling and need a reboot
If any of those descriptions sound like you or someone you know,
If you want to have a conversation about:
- Scheduling a strategy call for your next move
- Help building your business or territory
Reach out to me:
Schedule a FREE consultation
or https://www.linkedin.com/in/mike-o-kelly-44ba352b/
mike@survivingoutsidesales.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Surviving Outside Sales Podcast.
The Surviving Outside Salespodcast, hosted by Mike O'Kelly,
presented by Sales BuilderAcademy, the goal is to survive
and thrive all phases of outsidesales, whether you're getting
in, dominating or getting out.
Surviving Outside Sales.
Now on with the show.
Welcome to Surviving OutsideSales podcast.
(00:30):
I'm your host, mike O'Kelly.
I want to thank everybody whohas reached out to me in regards
to my father and the episodesfrom last week.
If you're new to the podcast,this is the first time you're
listening.
My father, who is in sales foralmost 40 years, 30 plus of that
in the medical sales worldpassed away over a week ago and
(00:55):
so last week was processing it,and if anybody has had any death
in the family, they completelyunderstand what I've gone
through and what my family isgoing through right now.
But my father was a perpetualprofessional and he believed the
best way for me to honor him isto get back to work, as he used
to say.
The show must go on.
So thank you to everybody andthe show will go on, and the
(01:17):
best way that I can honor myfather is to do the best shows
that I possibly can, and I canbe the best father, the best
husband, the best sales advocatethat I can be and teach the
next generation of salesprofessionals, and that is
exactly what I'm going to do.
So I did a lot of thinking and Idid a lot of I don't know,
(01:38):
retrospect is the right word butI thought about okay, what is
the podcast and what am I doing?
And so I looked at metrics andprevious episodes and it looks
like July is going to set an alltime record for downloads,
which is great.
But as far as doing five days aweek, I thought how do I want
(01:59):
to structure the show and howcan the audience get the most
out of it?
Because it's all about theaudience.
It's all about you listeningright now.
It's not about me.
This is not the glorificationof Michael Kelly.
Okay, this is about theaudience and people will listen
if it's entertaining and peoplewill listen if they're getting
information out of it and if I'mnot providing any value, it's
(02:20):
not just lip service from someguy who used to be in sales and
people may or may not know whothey are in a personal level.
So I really want this to besomething that stands out from
other podcasts and I think otherpodcasts right now.
The audiences.
They like salaciousness, theylike the mystery.
I mean, I think number oneoutside of Joe Rogan, I think
(02:42):
some of the number one podcastsare murder mysteries and who
done it and things like that,like disappearances, which I
think is actually prettyremarkable, that that is kind of
what's leading the podcastingworld.
But in our little corner of theworld, our little pocket of the
world in outside sales, there'snot a lot of outside sales
(03:03):
podcasts out there, but and it'sa very small niche, and that's
okay, because I'm not focused ontrying to have the number one
sales podcast.
That'd be great, but I'm notfocused on that.
What I'm trying to do is bringactionable topics to the outside
sales world.
And so I started thinking and Istarted breaking down some of
the challenges of an outsidesales rep, being an outside
(03:24):
sales professional, and I'mgoing to start tackling the
biggest things that I know.
And so the topic today is goingto be prospecting.
Okay, it is the topic that Iknow a lot of people dislike
prospecting.
But if you're not bringingpeople into your business, if
you're not recruiting morepeople, if you're not gaining,
(03:47):
you're losing.
There is no such thing asmaintenance.
Okay, your numbers might lookthe same month to month.
If you're not growing, if youflatlined or you plateaued, your
numbers look like they'restaying the same, but they're
not Because you're having achurn.
You're having some of yourcustomers, some of your users
are leaving and you're gettingnew people.
(04:07):
So what appears to beeverything looks great, you
actually have some decay.
So that's why, if you are notgrowing, if you're not
exponentially moving the needle,if you're not pushing the ball
down the field, then you aregoing to struggle in the long
term because there's thatinternal rot, internal decay of
your business that you can orcannot perfectly see.
(04:31):
So prospecting is vital.
So I always go back to this onestatistic that I remember from
the restaurant industry, theservice industry, and that is
every month you need to have atleast 10% new customers.
Every month you have to have10% new customers.
So you're basically gonna behaving 100% or almost all your
(04:51):
turnover in 10 months.
In theory.
I know that there's people thatwill never leave People like
brands, and they will stick withit through thick and thin.
But in theory, and a lot oftimes, what you have to do is
you have to practice theory whenit comes to building your
business.
So you create the theory first.
Then you go out and you make itactionable and you see if those
(05:15):
two things match up.
You can have a great theory.
You could theorize a lot ofthings about the sales world,
about your business, aboutgaining customers, but if you
are not going out in the fieldand testing your hypothesis,
your theory, what have you?
If you're not testing it andit's not accurate, it's not
(05:36):
gonna work.
So you have to theorize whatyou were doing.
Then you have to go out and youhave to do it.
So prospecting all right, I am aferocious prospector From the
standpoint is, I'm alwaysreaching out to new people, I'm
(05:57):
always willing to haveconversations, I'm always
looking for more people.
And what happens is, when youare an excellent prospector,
when you have got prospects andyou have got a lot of people in
the pipeline, what happens isyou don't necessarily stress out
a lot about those individualdeals.
(06:19):
So I'll give you an example.
Let's say you've only got twoprospects, okay, and those two
prospects they're kindainterested, they're on the fence
.
If that's all you got, you'regonna stress out about that and
you're gonna put pressure onthat natural buying journey
because there's only two of them.
(06:40):
However, let's say that youhave two, those same two
prospects, but you've got 25people in your pipeline.
You have so much going on todistract you, to keep you busy.
You're not focused on thosedeals, you're focused on your
process.
You're focused on allowing theprocess to take place.
(07:04):
You're not trying to muscle thedeals done.
You're not trying to squeezethe deals done.
So the first rule ofprospecting is bring as many
people in from your idealcustomer profile, your ICP, as
possible and continue toprospect.
No matter how many deals youhave, no matter how busy you get
(07:27):
, no matter how much businessyou have, there's always room to
prospect, okay, because you aregoing to have customers or
clients that are just going tofall off.
They're not gonna need youanymore, they're not gonna need
your service.
So you have to continue movingforward and you have to continue
aggressively going after it.
(07:49):
You have to be fanatical, youhave to be unrelenting.
As a prospector, I have to giveprops to my buddy, brandon
Millette.
Brandon was on the show back in, oh, between February and April
I can't remember the month, butBrandon was a good buddy of
(08:09):
mine that we've worked togetherin the past and he is now a top
realtor in the city of Charlotteand this guy is a fanatical
prospector.
It's unbelievable, in fact,it's so funny.
I was at a kid's birthday partyyesterday and we're at a public
park and Brandon's businesscard is up on the message board.
No other business cards arethere, but it's the public parks
(08:33):
message board and Brandon'sbusiness card is stuck in the
little corner and I thought itwas amazing.
Brandon was not there at thatparty, by the way, so the fact
that his card was there was justhilarious, because he is
everywhere.
And that's what you need tothink about when you are in your
market.
You need to have the image, youneed to have the reality, and
(08:55):
other people need to think thatyou are everywhere.
You are canvassing your market.
Okay, so the first step isfinding out who you're going
after, but then the second stepis canvassing your area, not
with your message, but with yourpresence.
I'm not a big spout yourmessage off everywhere, but
(09:16):
people need to know who you areand they need to know what you
do.
Now I don't wanna be a hypocrite.
I need to do a better job ofcanvassing my market, and so
I've had a little chance torecalibrate and I've had a
little chance to get a spark anda little fire in my butt
(09:38):
because my father is passing.
I had a lot of time to be ableto break up the inertia of
everything that I was doing.
I worked less hours than Inormally do.
I was over at my parents housea lot and it gave me a lot of
chance to think about what I wasdoing and the direction that
I'm taking, the variousbusinesses that I'm building,
(09:59):
and that has allowed me to givea very honest look at what I've
done, and I'm more critical ofmyself than others are going to
be, or even the market is goingto be Okay, and so you can be
honest with yourself, and ifyou're listening right now, I
want you to be honest withyourself how good are you as a
(10:22):
prospector?
Are you actively looking tobring more people into your
world who may or may not knowyou at this time?
If the answer is no, you needto start doing that immediately
and you need to figure out howyou can do that as well.
You need to look at your day,examine your day, examine what
(10:42):
your messaging is, and thenexamine the processes that you
go out.
I mean, if you're out in thefield, you are meeting people
dozens of new people a day,maybe hundreds of people a day.
What are you doing during thoseinteractions?
I'm screaming from themountaintops what I do.
I don't have a lot offace-to-face interactions during
(11:04):
the day anymore.
A lot of it's done by Zoom.
A lot of it's done by socialmedia.
What I'm doing behind the scenesis I am ferociously creating
content that I can put out thereto the market.
Again, I'm trying to canvas themarket with me, michael Kelly
and what I have to offer and whoI can help.
Just with the podcast alone, Iprobably get about a dozen
(11:26):
people every couple weeks thatreach out to me and they want to
have conversations.
Well, to me that's not enough.
I want to have at least 50 to100 people that reach out to me.
That's what I need to do.
I need to up the anteProspecting.
The key thing to do withprospecting is, first of all, if
(11:48):
you're out there in the fieldand you're driving around, you
understand the keywords.
Think about keywords.
When I was in dermatology salesfor a really long time, I would
like to look at keywords skin,dermatology, medical, anything
that had to revolve, those wordsthat sounded like hey, I'm a
dermatologist, I'm a skin center, anything that was like med spa
(12:09):
, something like that, anythingthat dealt with the skin.
I tried to have my eyes open,because not everything is going
to appear on a Google search.
We think that Google is the endall be all.
Google will show you about 90to 95% of your opportunity.
There's 5% to 10% ofopportunity that may not be
(12:32):
exposed through Google.
A lot of times there might besome lag in Google as well,
because not every business doesa perfect job of advertising
online.
I know it's changed.
I know it's 2023.
I've been out in the field inthree years, but there was still
in 2020, there were dermatologymedical offices that did not
(12:56):
have web pages.
They did not have a website,which shocked me, absolutely
shocked me.
But there are still going to besome old school people who just
don't have a website.
If you're just simply relyingon A, a list your company gave
you, or B, just Googling things,you're going to miss out on a
small portion, but that smallportion could be your leg up on
(13:19):
the competition.
That could be the differencebetween you hitting quota and
not hitting quota.
So, number one keep your eyesopen when you're driving around.
Again, stop focusing onlistening to music and all the
other BS.
Listen to podcasts, preferablythe surviving outside sales
podcast in every episode.
Other than that, listen topodcasts that make you smarter,
(13:41):
that make you better and pushyou to strive for something
bigger than yourself.
Other than that, you should berole playing, or you should be
talking to team members or acoach or somebody that will help
you during the day with yourbusiness.
That's all you should be doingin the car period and but while
(14:02):
you're driving you're in astoplight.
Look around.
When you see medical offices,you see offices with law firms,
you see banking centers,whatever you sell, there's
always little clusters.
If you've noticed this I was inthe medical field for a really
long time there's always medicaloffices usually stick together,
and so when you're in one ofthese offices, go to the board
(14:28):
at the front and see what otherclinics are in there.
Don't just go to your clinic.
Ask the person there hey, whatelse is in this building?
Do you know of anydermatologists?
Do you refer out?
Have you heard of anybody?
They're asking questions, butalways just realize there are
businesses and there isopportunity moving into your
(14:48):
market daily.
So you gotta try to open up youreyes.
You also wanna continually dosearches.
I would do a search at leastonce a week.
So Google is still a greatresource and, by the way, we
have a fantastic prospectingtool on Rhythm AI.
If you wanna try it out forfree, you can Go to RhythmAIcom.
(15:11):
Try it for free 14 days.
There's a prospecting tool.
It does tie through Google but,like I said, 90 to 95% of
businesses are on Google, soit's gonna give you a great
opportunity of businesses thathave opened, have websites that
you may not have searched, butcheck weekly.
I used to always check weekly,usually on a Thursday or Friday
(15:33):
when I was preparing for myfollowing week.
Check Google and see if any newclinics have opened up.
Search social media and seewhat pops up.
Check some of your competitorssocial media, yes, stalk your
competitors.
See what they're posting.
See if there's any link toother clients or businesses you
(15:58):
may not have known of.
Start searching organizations.
Seek out the organizations thatyour prospect could be a part
of.
See if they have anynotifications.
You're out there in the fieldevery single day.
Utilize technology to ramp upyour ability to find new people.
(16:22):
Start asking questions.
If you don't ask questions andyou're not actively searching,
you're not going to be able toprospect.
You're only going to think ofthat limited subset of people
that you currently know about.
But I'm here to tell you and I'mscreaming from the mountain
tops there are more people outthere than you realize.
If you're in territory sales,you are limited by the territory
(16:46):
you live in.
But there are still businessesthat are opening left and right.
That's the one thing we do nothave a shortage of in this
country, which is great.
We don't have a shortage ofbusinesses.
They're opening left and right.
I'm opening another one in RockHill in the next several months
for store hyper wellness.
I know I'm going to getbombarded with people trying to
(17:07):
come in and sell me stuff.
I might buy some stuff, whoknows.
Point being, prospecting is thelifeblood of the future success
of your business.
Prospecting is not the presentsuccess, it's the future success
.
So everybody wants to have agreat future in sales, everybody
(17:30):
wants to crush it and everybodywants to live the life that
they want through sales.
You've got to become a greatprospector and you have to build
it into your daily process.
You have to prospect everysingle day period and if you are
not, eventually you're gonnafall behind.
(17:51):
Thank you so much.
I really do appreciate it.
I had mentioned that I was gonnabe building out Sales Escape
Plan by August 1st.
That is gonna be delayed.
I apologize.
I'm not using my dad's passingas an excuse, but I did lose
about three weeks in July, soI'm gonna try to have that out.
(18:12):
I've had several people reachout to me on LinkedIn to request
information about it.
If you're interested in SalesEscape Plan, as a reminder, it's
for those individuals who needhelp navigating their career.
Perhaps you're stuck in whatyou're doing, you are looking
for something different orbetter and you wanna know what
some options are, or you justwanna have somebody guide you
(18:33):
and coach you through navigatingsome type of change in your
career or setting your goals forthe future.
If that sounds like you, thenjust DM me on LinkedIn and ask
about Sales Escape Plan and Iwill shoot over information that
I have and then that's gonna bereleased.
But I am gonna be putting out apreview on my website, hopefully
(18:54):
by the end of this week.
It's gonna be Sales Escape Planpreview.
It's gonna have a video.
It's gonna run throughEverything that you're gonna get
in the course.
There's gonna be threedifferent levels of.
There's an online course.
There's going to be a done withyou where I sit down and I help
you do your plans and thenthere's gonna be a done for you.
Or as if you want me to takeall the information you have and
(19:16):
then come up with a plan foryou, I can do that as well.
So people have been inquiringabout all different types.
So reach out to me on LinkedInand if we're not connected and
you're listening to the show,please just reach out to me and
say, hey, I listened to the show.
I'd love to connect.
I'd love to get more ideas andtips.
I have daily sales tips.
I'll be posting every singleday of the week, seven days a
(19:38):
week.
I have reinstituted my processand putting content out so you
can use LinkedIn as a greatsource.
But thank you so much,everybody who's been listening,
I really do appreciate.
July was a incredible,incredible, incredible month.
It broke the record for mostdownloads on the Surviving
Outsides Sales podcast.
So I like breaking records andyou know that's what we try to
(20:02):
strive every day.
Every day, I try to strive toget better and so thank you so
much.
I really do appreciate that.
Please share this download andshare with the like mind
individual and talk about yourprospecting, talk about your
process and get a little bitbetter with each and every
single day.
Thank you so much.
I do appreciate it.
I hope everybody has afantastic rest of your day.
This has been SurvivingOutsides Sales.
(20:23):
We'll see you tomorrow, bye,bye.
Welcome to Surviving Outside Sales Podcast.
The Surviving Outside Salespodcast, hosted by Mike O'Kelly,
presented by Sales BuilderAcademy, the goal is to survive
and thrive all phases of outsidesales, whether you're getting
in, dominating or getting out.
Surviving Outside Sales.
Now on with the show.
Welcome to Surviving OutsideSales podcast.
(00:30):
I'm your host, mike O'Kelly.
I want to thank everybody whohas reached out to me in regards
to my father and the episodesfrom last week.
If you're new to the podcast,this is the first time you're
listening.
My father, who is in sales foralmost 40 years, 30 plus of that
in the medical sales worldpassed away over a week ago and
(00:55):
so last week was processing it,and if anybody has had any death
in the family, they completelyunderstand what I've gone
through and what my family isgoing through right now.
But my father was a perpetualprofessional and he believed the
best way for me to honor him isto get back to work, as he used
to say.
The show must go on.
So thank you to everybody andthe show will go on, and the
(01:17):
best way that I can honor myfather is to do the best shows
that I possibly can, and I canbe the best father, the best
husband, the best sales advocatethat I can be and teach the
next generation of salesprofessionals, and that is
exactly what I'm going to do.
So I did a lot of thinking and Idid a lot of I don't know,
(01:38):
retrospect is the right word butI thought about okay, what is
the podcast and what am I doing?
And so I looked at metrics andprevious episodes and it looks
like July is going to set an alltime record for downloads,
which is great.
But as far as doing five days aweek, I thought how do I want
(01:59):
to structure the show and howcan the audience get the most
out of it?
Because it's all about theaudience.
It's all about you listeningright now.
It's not about me.
This is not the glorificationof Michael Kelly.
Okay, this is about theaudience and people will listen
if it's entertaining and peoplewill listen if they're getting
information out of it and if I'mnot providing any value, it's
(02:20):
not just lip service from someguy who used to be in sales and
people may or may not know whothey are in a personal level.
So I really want this to besomething that stands out from
other podcasts and I think otherpodcasts right now.
The audiences.
They like salaciousness, theylike the mystery.
I mean, I think number oneoutside of Joe Rogan, I think
(02:42):
some of the number one podcastsare murder mysteries and who
done it and things like that,like disappearances, which I
think is actually prettyremarkable, that that is kind of
what's leading the podcastingworld.
But in our little corner of theworld, our little pocket of the
world in outside sales, there'snot a lot of outside sales
(03:03):
podcasts out there, but and it'sa very small niche, and that's
okay, because I'm not focused ontrying to have the number one
sales podcast.
That'd be great, but I'm notfocused on that.
What I'm trying to do is bringactionable topics to the outside
sales world.
And so I started thinking and Istarted breaking down some of
the challenges of an outsidesales rep, being an outside
(03:24):
sales professional, and I'mgoing to start tackling the
biggest things that I know.
And so the topic today is goingto be prospecting.
Okay, it is the topic that Iknow a lot of people dislike
prospecting.
But if you're not bringingpeople into your business, if
you're not recruiting morepeople, if you're not gaining,
(03:47):
you're losing.
There is no such thing asmaintenance.
Okay, your numbers might lookthe same month to month.
If you're not growing, if youflatlined or you plateaued, your
numbers look like they'restaying the same, but they're
not Because you're having achurn.
You're having some of yourcustomers, some of your users
are leaving and you're gettingnew people.
(04:07):
So what appears to beeverything looks great, you
actually have some decay.
So that's why, if you are notgrowing, if you're not
exponentially moving the needle,if you're not pushing the ball
down the field, then you aregoing to struggle in the long
term because there's thatinternal rot, internal decay of
your business that you can orcannot perfectly see.
(04:31):
So prospecting is vital.
So I always go back to this onestatistic that I remember from
the restaurant industry, theservice industry, and that is
every month you need to have atleast 10% new customers.
Every month you have to have10% new customers.
So you're basically gonna behaving 100% or almost all your
(04:51):
turnover in 10 months.
In theory.
I know that there's people thatwill never leave People like
brands, and they will stick withit through thick and thin.
But in theory, and a lot oftimes, what you have to do is
you have to practice theory whenit comes to building your
business.
So you create the theory first.
Then you go out and you make itactionable and you see if those
(05:15):
two things match up.
You can have a great theory.
You could theorize a lot ofthings about the sales world,
about your business, aboutgaining customers, but if you
are not going out in the fieldand testing your hypothesis,
your theory, what have you?
If you're not testing it andit's not accurate, it's not
(05:36):
gonna work.
So you have to theorize whatyou were doing.
Then you have to go out and youhave to do it.
So prospecting all right, I am aferocious prospector From the
standpoint is, I'm alwaysreaching out to new people, I'm
(05:57):
always willing to haveconversations, I'm always
looking for more people.
And what happens is, when youare an excellent prospector,
when you have got prospects andyou have got a lot of people in
the pipeline, what happens isyou don't necessarily stress out
a lot about those individualdeals.
(06:19):
So I'll give you an example.
Let's say you've only got twoprospects, okay, and those two
prospects they're kindainterested, they're on the fence
.
If that's all you got, you'regonna stress out about that and
you're gonna put pressure onthat natural buying journey
because there's only two of them.
(06:40):
However, let's say that youhave two, those same two
prospects, but you've got 25people in your pipeline.
You have so much going on todistract you, to keep you busy.
You're not focused on thosedeals, you're focused on your
process.
You're focused on allowing theprocess to take place.
(07:04):
You're not trying to muscle thedeals done.
You're not trying to squeezethe deals done.
So the first rule ofprospecting is bring as many
people in from your idealcustomer profile, your ICP, as
possible and continue toprospect.
No matter how many deals youhave, no matter how busy you get
(07:27):
, no matter how much businessyou have, there's always room to
prospect, okay, because you aregoing to have customers or
clients that are just going tofall off.
They're not gonna need youanymore, they're not gonna need
your service.
So you have to continue movingforward and you have to continue
aggressively going after it.
(07:49):
You have to be fanatical, youhave to be unrelenting.
As a prospector, I have to giveprops to my buddy, brandon
Millette.
Brandon was on the show back in, oh, between February and April
I can't remember the month, butBrandon was a good buddy of
(08:09):
mine that we've worked togetherin the past and he is now a top
realtor in the city of Charlotteand this guy is a fanatical
prospector.
It's unbelievable, in fact,it's so funny.
I was at a kid's birthday partyyesterday and we're at a public
park and Brandon's businesscard is up on the message board.
No other business cards arethere, but it's the public parks
(08:33):
message board and Brandon'sbusiness card is stuck in the
little corner and I thought itwas amazing.
Brandon was not there at thatparty, by the way, so the fact
that his card was there was justhilarious, because he is
everywhere.
And that's what you need tothink about when you are in your
market.
You need to have the image, youneed to have the reality, and
(08:55):
other people need to think thatyou are everywhere.
You are canvassing your market.
Okay, so the first step isfinding out who you're going
after, but then the second stepis canvassing your area, not
with your message, but with yourpresence.
I'm not a big spout yourmessage off everywhere, but
(09:16):
people need to know who you areand they need to know what you
do.
Now I don't wanna be a hypocrite.
I need to do a better job ofcanvassing my market, and so
I've had a little chance torecalibrate and I've had a
little chance to get a spark anda little fire in my butt
(09:38):
because my father is passing.
I had a lot of time to be ableto break up the inertia of
everything that I was doing.
I worked less hours than Inormally do.
I was over at my parents housea lot and it gave me a lot of
chance to think about what I wasdoing and the direction that
I'm taking, the variousbusinesses that I'm building,
(09:59):
and that has allowed me to givea very honest look at what I've
done, and I'm more critical ofmyself than others are going to
be, or even the market is goingto be Okay, and so you can be
honest with yourself, and ifyou're listening right now, I
want you to be honest withyourself how good are you as a
(10:22):
prospector?
Are you actively looking tobring more people into your
world who may or may not knowyou at this time?
If the answer is no, you needto start doing that immediately
and you need to figure out howyou can do that as well.
You need to look at your day,examine your day, examine what
(10:42):
your messaging is, and thenexamine the processes that you
go out.
I mean, if you're out in thefield, you are meeting people
dozens of new people a day,maybe hundreds of people a day.
What are you doing during thoseinteractions?
I'm screaming from themountaintops what I do.
I don't have a lot offace-to-face interactions during
(11:04):
the day anymore.
A lot of it's done by Zoom.
A lot of it's done by socialmedia.
What I'm doing behind the scenesis I am ferociously creating
content that I can put out thereto the market.
Again, I'm trying to canvas themarket with me, michael Kelly
and what I have to offer and whoI can help.
Just with the podcast alone, Iprobably get about a dozen
(11:26):
people every couple weeks thatreach out to me and they want to
have conversations.
Well, to me that's not enough.
I want to have at least 50 to100 people that reach out to me.
That's what I need to do.
I need to up the anteProspecting.
The key thing to do withprospecting is, first of all, if
(11:48):
you're out there in the fieldand you're driving around, you
understand the keywords.
Think about keywords.
When I was in dermatology salesfor a really long time, I would
like to look at keywords skin,dermatology, medical, anything
that had to revolve, those wordsthat sounded like hey, I'm a
dermatologist, I'm a skin center, anything that was like med spa
(12:09):
, something like that, anythingthat dealt with the skin.
I tried to have my eyes open,because not everything is going
to appear on a Google search.
We think that Google is the endall be all.
Google will show you about 90to 95% of your opportunity.
There's 5% to 10% ofopportunity that may not be
(12:32):
exposed through Google.
A lot of times there might besome lag in Google as well,
because not every business doesa perfect job of advertising
online.
I know it's changed.
I know it's 2023.
I've been out in the field inthree years, but there was still
in 2020, there were dermatologymedical offices that did not
(12:56):
have web pages.
They did not have a website,which shocked me, absolutely
shocked me.
But there are still going to besome old school people who just
don't have a website.
If you're just simply relyingon A, a list your company gave
you, or B, just Googling things,you're going to miss out on a
small portion, but that smallportion could be your leg up on
(13:19):
the competition.
That could be the differencebetween you hitting quota and
not hitting quota.
So, number one keep your eyesopen when you're driving around.
Again, stop focusing onlistening to music and all the
other BS.
Listen to podcasts, preferablythe surviving outside sales
podcast in every episode.
Other than that, listen topodcasts that make you smarter,
(13:41):
that make you better and pushyou to strive for something
bigger than yourself.
Other than that, you should berole playing, or you should be
talking to team members or acoach or somebody that will help
you during the day with yourbusiness.
That's all you should be doingin the car period and but while
(14:02):
you're driving you're in astoplight.
Look around.
When you see medical offices,you see offices with law firms,
you see banking centers,whatever you sell, there's
always little clusters.
If you've noticed this I was inthe medical field for a really
long time there's always medicaloffices usually stick together,
and so when you're in one ofthese offices, go to the board
(14:28):
at the front and see what otherclinics are in there.
Don't just go to your clinic.
Ask the person there hey, whatelse is in this building?
Do you know of anydermatologists?
Do you refer out?
Have you heard of anybody?
They're asking questions, butalways just realize there are
businesses and there isopportunity moving into your
(14:48):
market daily.
So you gotta try to open up youreyes.
You also wanna continually dosearches.
I would do a search at leastonce a week.
So Google is still a greatresource and, by the way, we
have a fantastic prospectingtool on Rhythm AI.
If you wanna try it out forfree, you can Go to RhythmAIcom.
(15:11):
Try it for free 14 days.
There's a prospecting tool.
It does tie through Google but,like I said, 90 to 95% of
businesses are on Google, soit's gonna give you a great
opportunity of businesses thathave opened, have websites that
you may not have searched, butcheck weekly.
I used to always check weekly,usually on a Thursday or Friday
(15:33):
when I was preparing for myfollowing week.
Check Google and see if any newclinics have opened up.
Search social media and seewhat pops up.
Check some of your competitorssocial media, yes, stalk your
competitors.
See what they're posting.
See if there's any link toother clients or businesses you
(15:58):
may not have known of.
Start searching organizations.
Seek out the organizations thatyour prospect could be a part
of.
See if they have anynotifications.
You're out there in the fieldevery single day.
Utilize technology to ramp upyour ability to find new people.
(16:22):
Start asking questions.
If you don't ask questions andyou're not actively searching,
you're not going to be able toprospect.
You're only going to think ofthat limited subset of people
that you currently know about.
But I'm here to tell you and I'mscreaming from the mountain
tops there are more people outthere than you realize.
If you're in territory sales,you are limited by the territory
(16:46):
you live in.
But there are still businessesthat are opening left and right.
That's the one thing we do nothave a shortage of in this
country, which is great.
We don't have a shortage ofbusinesses.
They're opening left and right.
I'm opening another one in RockHill in the next several months
for store hyper wellness.
I know I'm going to getbombarded with people trying to
(17:07):
come in and sell me stuff.
I might buy some stuff, whoknows.
Point being, prospecting is thelifeblood of the future success
of your business.
Prospecting is not the presentsuccess, it's the future success
.
So everybody wants to have agreat future in sales, everybody
(17:30):
wants to crush it and everybodywants to live the life that
they want through sales.
You've got to become a greatprospector and you have to build
it into your daily process.
You have to prospect everysingle day period and if you are
not, eventually you're gonnafall behind.
(17:51):
Thank you so much.
I really do appreciate it.
I had mentioned that I was gonnabe building out Sales Escape
Plan by August 1st.
That is gonna be delayed.
I apologize.
I'm not using my dad's passingas an excuse, but I did lose
about three weeks in July, soI'm gonna try to have that out.
(18:12):
I've had several people reachout to me on LinkedIn to request
information about it.
If you're interested in SalesEscape Plan, as a reminder, it's
for those individuals who needhelp navigating their career.
Perhaps you're stuck in whatyou're doing, you are looking
for something different orbetter and you wanna know what
some options are, or you justwanna have somebody guide you
(18:33):
and coach you through navigatingsome type of change in your
career or setting your goals forthe future.
If that sounds like you, thenjust DM me on LinkedIn and ask
about Sales Escape Plan and Iwill shoot over information that
I have and then that's gonna bereleased.
But I am gonna be putting out apreview on my website, hopefully
(18:54):
by the end of this week.
It's gonna be Sales Escape Planpreview.
It's gonna have a video.
It's gonna run throughEverything that you're gonna get
in the course.
There's gonna be threedifferent levels of.
There's an online course.
There's going to be a done withyou where I sit down and I help
you do your plans and thenthere's gonna be a done for you.
Or as if you want me to takeall the information you have and
(19:16):
then come up with a plan foryou, I can do that as well.
So people have been inquiringabout all different types.
So reach out to me on LinkedInand if we're not connected and
you're listening to the show,please just reach out to me and
say, hey, I listened to the show.
I'd love to connect.
I'd love to get more ideas andtips.
I have daily sales tips.
I'll be posting every singleday of the week, seven days a
(19:38):
week.
I have reinstituted my processand putting content out so you
can use LinkedIn as a greatsource.
But thank you so much,everybody who's been listening,
I really do appreciate.
July was a incredible,incredible, incredible month.
It broke the record for mostdownloads on the Surviving
Outsides Sales podcast.
So I like breaking records andyou know that's what we try to
(20:02):
strive every day.
Every day, I try to strive toget better and so thank you so
much.
I really do appreciate that.
Please share this download andshare with the like mind
individual and talk about yourprospecting, talk about your
process and get a little bitbetter with each and every
single day.
Thank you so much.
I do appreciate it.
I hope everybody has afantastic rest of your day.
This has been SurvivingOutsides Sales.
(20:23):
We'll see you tomorrow, bye,bye.
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