By Dave Fellman
We live in a world of acronyms. Some of them are used to identify people, places or things. Others are used as mnemonics; combinations of letters strung together to help us remember important things. That’s what I have for you today. IQDD — pronounced IQ Double D — stands for Identification, Qualification, Discussion & Decision. These are the steps a printing salesperson should follow in determining who is worthy of a concerted selling effort.
Identification
The first challenge any salesperson faces is to identify companies that look like good prospects; in other words, they look like they buy the products or services you sell, and they look like they might buy enough of those products or services to make it worth a salesperson’s time and effort to go after their business.
Once that’s accomplished, the next part if the “I” stage is to identify the decision-maker. Remember, you don’t sell to companies, you sell to people! Having said that, you probably won’t succeed with any company if you’re not talking to the right person/people.
Qualification & Discussion
Please look back at my definition of prospects -- they look like they buy what you sell and they look like they might buy enough to make pursuing them worthwhile. In the earliest stages of prospecting, look like is enough to justify a salesperson’s effort. But experience has shown that the look like doesn’t always reflect the reality. If, for whatever reason, they don’t buy enough of what you sell to make pursuing them worthwhile, they’re simply not qualified prospects.
I don’t know how much that is, by the way, in terms of volume potential. It’s certainly different depending on your circumstance. For example, an owner who wears multiple hats in addition to the selling hat should have a higher cutoff than a sales employee. The less time you have to sell, the bigger your targets need to be!
So how do you actually know if they’re qualified? Through discussion! And that means more than a presentation of your capabilities. It means a conversation about their needs and their wants.
The wants part is critical. There are actually three qualifying criteria: (!) They buy what you sell. (2) They buy enough to make pursuing them worthwhile. (3) They show some real interest in buying from you – as opposed to whoever they’ve been buying from. Remember, your prospect is almost certainly someone else’s customer right now. So why would they change? Possibly because they want better service, or better quality, or a printing partner who can provide something else that they want or need. You learn what that might be through discussion.
Decision
The final stage of the prospecting process is the decision on what to do next. Based on what you’ve learned so far, is this person really a qualified prospect? If not, the decision is pretty straightforward. Take them off your hot prospect list!
If the answer is yes, though, you still probably have challenges in front of you.
The prospecting stage moves into the convincing stage.
I think it’s a fair—and unfortunate—observation that most print salespeople work without much of a plan. They make a few phone calls or send a few emails. They get to talk to a few people. They turn up a few jobs, or at least a few opportunities to quote on jobs. Then they chase those jobs, calling a small list of often questionable prospects each week to ask: “Are you ready to go yet with that job we talked about?”
A better strategy is to engage the prospect in the decision stage. “If you were me, what would you do next in terms of following up on today’s discussion?” I’m hoping IQDD can take you to that place, and help you to move forward with Fully Qualified Prospects.
Dave Fellman is the president of David Fellman & Associates, Cary, NC, a sales and marketing consulting firm serving numerous segments of the graphic arts industry. Contact Dave by phone at 919-363-4068 or by e-mail at dmf@davefellman.com. Visit his website at www.davefellman.com.