5 Time-Saving Tips For Salespeople

As far as I know, time is still a limited resource. This means professionals need to optimize their workdays to achieve their goals and objectives.

Salespeople in particular should take heed of this advice. Spending an extra hour or two on a deal or slacking off for an afternoon could spell the difference between breezing past quota or missing it by a mile. For salespeople, the maxim “time is money” is especially relevant.

How can you make the most of your minutes? Work the following practices into your day-to-day to avoid wasting time and speed up your process.

1) Use customizable templates.

Note the word “customizable.” You shouldn’t send out the exact same email to every single prospect you want to engage. That’s called spamming, and it’s unacceptable in sales.

However, it’s smart to store a few templates in your email or CRM system for time’s sake. Instead of reinventing the wheel every time you want to reach out, simply grab the appropriate template when a buyer hits a certain stage and personalize it. For nine sales email templates on a variety of scenarios, check out this ebook.

2) Qualify correctly.

You know what wastes time? Selling to someone who can’t buy your product or service. And yet, salespeople do this every day.

This is a qualification problem. The best salespeople aren’t afraid to disqualify aggressively and quickly because they know the sooner they hear a “no,” they faster they can move on to a prospect who will say “yes.”

A lot of activity doesn’t automatically generate good results. In sales, it pays to be choosy. Don’t spend time on bad fit prospects — cut them loose and seek out good fit buyers instead.

3) Get LinkedIn to deliver prospects directly to your inbox.

But doesn’t it take a lot of time to find prospects perfectly suited for your product? Well, not necessarily.

With LinkedIn saved searches, you can actually set up a search in LinkedIn for the type of prospects you’re looking for, and choose how frequently you’d like results emailed to you.

Here’s how:

Want more hidden LinkedIn hacks? This SlideShare is chock full of them.

4) Schedule your day on your buyer’s time.

Let’s say your goal is to make 10 connect calls this week. You block out time to make calls every day from 9 a.m. – 9:30 a.m.

But…no one answers. You fail to have even one live conversation. What happened?

Well, that depends on your buyer. 9 a.m. could be a great time to call, or it could be the worst time. If you’re trying to reach a B2B businessperson, they probably haven’t even sat down at their desk yet!

HubSpot director of training and development Andrew Quinn advocates that salespeople schedule their days around their buyer. Instead of making prospecting calls when it’s most convenient for you, think about when your prospects would be most likely to answer the phone or respond to an email. Then rearrange your calendar to increase your odds of connecting.

Instead of wasting time chasing down prospects and making attempt after attempt after attempt, this simple scheduling hack will help you maximize your prospecting time and minimize the call backs and follow ups.

5) Set up Google alerts.

No one has time for a completely cold call with an irrelevant pitch or a product pushing email anymore. Sales reps must research their buyers and customize their outreach to add value from the very first touch. Otherwise, you can forget about grabbing a busy buyer’s attention.

But who has time to research when your day is already jam-packed with calls, meetings, and coaching sessions?

Enter Google alerts.

If you’re trying to break into a specific company, set up an alert for the organization’s name, industry, and appropriate keywords, and watch the news flood in. The next time you want to reach out, simply scan your alerts for relevant announcements and customize your message accordingly.

Although there’s no such thing as a 25-hour day, these tips might make your day feel an hour or two longer. And more time means more deal-closing conversations. Get out there and sell!

What other time-saving tips for salespeople would you add?

5 Time-Saving Tips For Salespeople