Check Your Business Priorities: Appointments

Check your business priorities to determine your overall business strenghts and weaknesses. The previous post focused on leads. Let's talk about appointments.

Leads

Appts
Social appointments
Networking appointments
Prospective client appointments

I believe there are 3 types of business appointments that aren't sales appointments. Social appointments can be meeting someone simply to say hi over coffee, play golf, etc. No business is expected. But these can also lead to networking for prospective clients and customers.

Networking appointments may be chamber of commerce luncheons, your business networking group or any group where you're seeking to network for the purpose of a lead.

I knew a mortgage broker named Roy who reversed the networking process. He would make it a point to sit down with a business owner and learn about their business, then he would make a deliberate effort to network the owner with a customer. He was a match-maker. And he often never asked for networking contacts himself. This was a "soft" marketing approach for him.

I asked him why he did this and his reply was simple. He didn't make home loans every day so rather than sit around and try to continually pass out his cards he truly wanted to learn about others and help them. But he knew this also kept his name and business in front of others.

Prospective client appointments, that meeting right before the proposal or sales appointment, is what we strive to put on our calendars. However, if you're coming in cold then you almost have to go through the "get to know you" stage. The more effectively you can network and the wider your social network then prospective client appointments are more warm.

Don't use this as the time to sell yourself. Just like Roy the mortgage broker asked about others and their needs, this is your chance to learn about the needs of your prospective client. Ask them questions, lots of relevant questions since people generally like to talk about themselves. This is also the first step in the sales process.

Sales Appts and Final Proposals

Proposals Accepted

Projects underway

Projects Completed

Invoices Sent (Billings)

Invoices Collected