About five years ago a sales trainer, Ken, started calling on me to introduce their program to me. His company helped sales people work the phones during their prospecting time, and he wanted to chat with me about using their content with our clients. For about a year, we never connected. I didn’t answer his calls because I usually had turned off my ringer and never felt compelled to return his voicemails. Not that Ken wasn’t doing a great job, but I’m an extreme personality when it comes to returning calls – I don’t do it unless I have a need. I’ll return an email, but not a call – not a policy, just a natural behavior of mine (and not one I’m proud of).
Then, on Wednesday before Thanksgiving, Ken called again. This time, I took the call. By that point I recognized his number and I thought: “What the heck, I’m just catching up on stuff today, take the call.” He had a great pitch (which is expected considering what they do for a living), and I scheduled a meeting with him.
That got me thinking. Maybe we should be prospecting during the holidays? Not during the actual day, but those adjacent days when most sales people stay in the office. After a few years of successfully using this strategy, I’ve developed four best practices to prospecting during holiday weeks.
