Isn’t forecasting just a tool for management to poke their nose in our business? How many of us feel this way? Of course, the primary reason for forecasting is to report up through the ranks so they can tell the board, Wall Street, Moose and Rocco, or whoever. However, I’ve never met a sales person that had an accurate forecast that wasn’t an excellent sales person.
Below are two reasons you should take your forecasting more seriously, and why it will lead to greater sales success.
- Knowing your market ensures that you’re on top of it. If you know what is happening within your major programs and near-term transactions, you likely know your customers and the limitless amount of dynamics happening – personalities, politics, budget battles, etc. If you know these things, you’ll have success … grand success. BTW, that statement never fails.
- Knowing your forecast helps you optimize your activity. As I write this, I know the ISC West fed me a ton of opportunity, PSA TEC is about to feed me even more, and proposals from late last year are coming to closure. I know where all of my opportunities sit - the probability of each closing, and the timing of closure. Does that mean I slack in my prospecting? No, but I will shift a bit to make sure that my content is 100% ready for a busy Q3 and Q4 full of exciting new projects. I’ll take more time this week to ensure that the IPVM sales program is over-the-top excellent, that my RMR Program is still improving since I’ll have six clients engaged in it soon, and that my blogging and social media is up to par. I don’t need to knock on too many doors this week (but I will knock on a few because I have a rule to do so every week!).
I have a friend that runs a 5K twice per year. He doesn’t really like running, but he conducts these races because he knows that the rest of his health is ok as long as he is training and maintaining for these two events. This is the same as forecasting. Don’t do it just for forecasting’s sake. DO so because it keeps your sales healthy.
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