/meeting metrics matter_
Nothing happens in high-ticket sales until you book a meeting. The higher the ticket the more time you need to spend to build a relationship of trust necessary to qualify for getting someone to depart with precious resources.
You have to respect that money is a precious resource. Nearly everyone would prefer to figure something out on their own before they pay someone to figure it out for them.
The reason people make a purchase of services is because they can’t do something on their own. Whether they are unable or just don’t want to.
Getting a person to that point is rarely a matter of persuasion. Either they want someone to help them with the problem or they don’t. The persuasion comes in when a person who has already made the decision that they are going to purchase and they are deciding between vendors.
When an SDR/BDR doesn’t understand this, they try to persuade a person to buy too fast and it’s a total turn off. This is why cold email is such a grind. Cold LinkedIn messages are a grind. Cold calls are just painful.
On every smart phone there is a setting to silence unknown callers. You’re call isn’t even showing up. Cold emails and linked in messages feel the same and unless they are coming from someone that the person already knows the chance of getting ignored is 100% unless you can nail an intro with stakes low enough to let you in.
When you lead with a pitch, the stakes are way too high because you’re immediately asking someone to depart with precious recourses with no context.
But right now, as a direct result of the pandemic, an innovation has happened that will make everything better for everyone. That’s the thing about crisis. As unfortunate as it is, crises force people to change the way they do things and on the other end of it you often end up with something better than the way things were before.
I’ll give you an example. At restaurants now, a lot of them are doing QR code menus to reduce the spread of germs transmitted through touch. But when you go, it’s actually a really great experience. You sit down, pop out your phone, thumb through the menu. There are more options for design and flexible menu items, ordering directly from the site, in site recommendations. It’s a better way.
For outbound sales and marketing, where in person conference aren’t happening. Trade shows aren’t happening. You don’t know what offices are closed or open. Hospitals are on tight lock down. Universities are practically all online. There isn’t a pop in and introduce yourself happening and the inbox infiltration is useless. My inbox goes to 80 at minimum every day and I delete everything I don’t know and unsubscribe from the most offensive affronts. That’s about 60 emails everyday.
Thank goodness for the proliferation of zoom. Not only are one to one meetings happening on Zoom with great comfort and ease but group meetings (or many to many meetings) are happening with more and more regularity.
Many of these meetings have less than 15 attendees. They feel a little like a less formal BNI or Chamber of Commerce meeting but before you role your eyes, many of them go right to conversations where people ask for help solving the problems they are facing. It ends up being a group think tank where people get real help and perspectives from other people in business and it’s easy to go from these calls to a connection on linked in and a booked meeting with anyone on the call. I’ve never left a zoom group meeting without a one to one.
These meetings are worth it. They are low stakes. They build trust. When you contribute to the conversation they establish you as an authority. On the one to ones you set up, it’s classic networking at its best. You gain a friend. A referral partner. At best, an opportunity and a booked demo.
When you get on this one to one call you want to come to a conclusion of what this person is to you. You won’t know until you ask enough questions to figure out if they have a pain that you can solve. If they don’t have a pain you can solve, they aren’t a prospect. They may be a good referral partner. They may be a good option for extending your network but if they have no pain, they are not your prospect.
About a quarter of the way through the call you will know whether they have a pain or not. If they have a pain, offer relief. Position your company as the remedy by explicitly explaining how your company solves the problem. Describe the result through stories about how other customers are using the service. Then book a next meeting to look at it.
If they are not anywhere in the ballpark of being a prospect, I just start asking them what problem they solve so I can be a good referral partner to them. Sometimes, I might want to be the customer. Who knows?
If I feel like they could be a customer but their pain is latent, I will usually take steps to deepen the relationship. This includes, phone calls to catch up. Lunch dates. Asking for mentorship. Offering mentorship. Inviting to other networking calls. Inviting to a one to many meeting like a podcast or live streaming broadcast. Sending a gift.
One to many meetings are an interesting prospect but they are difficult to gain traction. They may be slow to start. Starting a podcast or video series feels like a pipe dream and often is. But with a clever concept, one that either entertains or enlightens, you can capture a one to many audience.
Let’s say you decided you want to host regular zoom calls that are broadcast to Facebook. Easy. It’s all set up in zoom ready for you to go. When you have these one to one meetings, or even to get a one to one meeting, mention in your introduction that you host a show. Then as you have a conversation think about it as if they were on the show. Is what they are saying substantial? Do they present well on the fly? They might be a good candidate.
At the end of the call invite them to do a thing with you. Set the date and set it up. The more regularly you do this the more traction you’ll get with your audience as well as the audience of your guests. You’ll benefit together just from hosting them on your show.
That deep conversation you have will billed rapport and reciprocity so that the next time you talk, they will be ready for your offer. And if not, they will want to champion you and help you connect with people who might be ready.
Classic networking 101, but a good reminder that a meeting is the only metric that matters. Your closing ratio is what it is. You know how many meetings you need to have to turn into a sale.
If you don’t know much about me yet on the professional side. I work with companies who are trying to automate their marketing funnels and drive more business. My design and tech team and I do this through helping companies design and build a booking site that puts appointments right on their calendar using WP and the Periodic platform. I’m very happy to make new business friends and have whiteboard sessions. Let’s collaborate! Hop on my calendar anytime.
Torlando Hakes | Author | Speaker | Podcaster
Director of Business Development at Periodic
