Dozens of telephones ringing throughout the entire office. Countless voices seemingly speaking in unison with one another. All these are part of the norm in a typical sales department of a company. More often than not, salespeople will be talking with a lot of potential clients whom they are in conversation with for the very first time. As such, a mistake at this point in time can be quite costly. You will most likely not have a second chance from the get-go once you make a mistake.
 
Prospects or potential clients value whether or not you can help them and if what you are recommending to them are feasible and implementable in their own companies. Because of this, you as a salesperson must be prepared when calling these clients for the very first time.
 
14 Tips Before You Decide to Call a Client

1.) Know your prospect’s name
This might seem too obvious to make a mistake on but it can happen, especially when you have a high volume of prospects. It can be easy to mix up names when your calendar or notebook is cluttered with dozens of names to call on any particular day.    
             
2.) Know their job title
Along with their name, you must know their job title or what they do for their company. Instead of asking directly what they do, try to find out their company’s org structure to see how your client fits into the bigger picture.
 
3.) Be familiar with their company
You should know more than just your client’s company name. What type of business do they engage in? Who are the decision-makers in the company? How many customers and employees do they have? The thing to note here is that you won’t be able to find out everything but you must avoid asking clients about information that is easily accessible.
 
4.) Visit their social media pages
A client’s social media page can add vital information and put context in any conversation. At the minimum, try to find their LinkedIn profile as well as their Facebook and Twitter pages so that you can get a better grasp of how your client is as a person.
 
5.) Know your client’s career trajectory
It can be helpful to understand a client’s job history so you can find out if they have made similar purchases to your product or service in the past, their experience in the industry they are in, and how long they’ve been in the industry. All these can influence how readily your client can make the decision to purchase and how much you should educate the client on your products and services.
 
6.) Be updated with your client’s recent company announcements
Knowing their company’s historical financial performance as well as their plans at present and in the future will help you in convincing the client to purchase your product or service.
  
7.) See if you have common connections with the prospect
Going over your client’s network and finding common connections can help you in convincing that client to purchase. Whether it’s a former colleague, current customers, or even mutual friends, these people can help refer your product or service to the client. 
 
8.) Check a client’s previous interactions with your company
Make it a habit of checking your company’s system and records to see if a client has had a previous engagement with your company. Has the client looked at content about the company? Has he/she spoken with any salesperson from your company? Knowing all these can help put context to any conversation you might have with a client.
 
9.) Be aware of recent announcements by your client’s competitors
Your client would probably be thinking about their competition for the most part of their time. As such, familiarizing yourself with their competitors can help you build on an advantage that could put your client above the competition.
 
10.) Be familiar with conferences and forums your client has attended
Knowing which conferences and forums your client has been to can let you know how involved they are in the industry that they are in. Moreover, if you have been to the same conferences and forums, it will be easier for you to build a conversation based on these.
 
11.) Try and find out your client’s hobbies and interests
While these hobbies and interests shouldn’t take up the bulk of your conversation, having a shared hobby or interest can help put your client at ease and relax even if it’s your first time talking.
 
12.) Always remember what you talked about in a previous conversation
Once you have successfully engaged your client and are in constant contact, briefly refresh your memories of what you and the client have talked about in a previous conversation. That way, there will be continuity and it will be easier moving forward.
 
13.) Reiterate on how your call can help move the sales process forward
 Since you and your client are busy with work, each call is time spent for the both of you. As such, each moment is important and must not be wasted on idle chatter. There should be a clear objective for each call as well as a prepared next step to take.
 
14.) Set an agenda for the call
Setting an agenda for your calls is an important skill to have. Your clients know less than you do when it comes to your product or service so you need to be able to move the call forward without being overbearing or controlling. An agenda can help put a logical flow to the call which includes your client’s input.
 

​Jason is currently an Account Executive at Leadfunnel.ph. While he is new to blogging, he is well-versed in news writing and other forms of creative writing.

Curious? Want to know more? You can reach Jason at 0917-569-3371. 
​
The difficulty of sales is what makes it challenging yet exciting all at the same time!

By: Abby Garcia

​Finding the best person for a sales job is very crucial, especially for startup companies. Since the firm’s still growing, a sales manager cannot risk hiring incompetent people to develop the business. If you have a hiring dilemma right now, these are a few tips on finding “The One” for your sales team:

1) Observe long enough before you judge.
A lot of people make the mistake of judging a person’s sales ability at the first interview. If you think you can assess a person right away, you’re wrong. Now you’re thinking, “How would I know if that person’s ‘The One’”? It’s very simple: Work with him long enough to judge him!

There are two criteria with which you can base your judgment: consistency and attitude. Initially, you may readily judge a new hire based on his performance at the first month. Coincidentally, this is also the time when he’s still enthusiastic about his job. After this phase, you’ll never know if he’ll still continue this enthusiasm for months. The point here is that if this person is consistent with his performance after three months, then he’s a keeper. Also, observe his attitude towards failure. If he cannot take rejections, sales is not for him.

2) Know that a perfect guide to hiring salespeople doesn’t exist.
Do you have a checklist of the things you search for in a salesperson? If you really want to find “The One”, throw that list away. Immediately. I’m not mocking you or your ability in sales hiring, but you should remember that these so-called indicators on whether a sales hire will be a great salesperson aren’t precisely correct.

Ask this simple question instead: “Do I want to buy from this person?” Even if the signs from above tell you that he’s a good salesperson but you don’t think of buying from him, don’t hire him.

3) Search from your own network first.
Look around you. Perhaps “The One” is just your college classmate, your next-door neighbor, or even your closest friend. Right now, he might be in a very different career path and probably doesn’t want a job in sales, but you have to realize his potential. Get a person who is both charismatic and can make things happen. You might have someone in your mind right now – then give him a shot! Train him. He might be a great asset to your sales team. You’ll never know, he may just be “The One”.

​By: Jason Dizon

The “Best” Among All the Rest
One of the questions often asked by recruiters to this day is that, “How do I know if I’ve hired the best person for the job?” After all, who wouldn’t want to hire the right person for the job to help the company reach its goals? This one question has gotten recruiters to rack up their brains to try and figure out just how to find ways of ensuring they get the best people out there.

Steli Efti from The Startup Chat has given his insights to shed some light on how to know if you’ve hired the best salespeople. “You don’t,” said Steli.  You’ll never know how good a person is from the get-go.  There may be some indicators that somebody might be good at sales but you’ll never truly know until you’ve worked with someone for a long time. You need to give the person the chance to show what he/she is capable of. In sales, consistency is important since salespeople need to be able to perform and deliver. Consistency is something that can only be measured through time which is why you can only truly know whether a person’s good enough after working with them.
 
Sales is a Performance-Based Activity 
“When I’m hiring a cook for one of my restaurants, and I want to see what they can do, I usually ask them to make me an omelette.” These are the words of Mr. Bobby Flay, a celebrity chef from America. What he said perfectly epitomizes how salespeople are meant to be assessed. You can try and ask a bunch of questions during the interview process but ultimately, you’ll have to see how people perform in their jobs to be able to give a proper assessment of their skills.
 
Sales is a performance-based activity not just because one requires the necessary skills for the job. A person also needs to possess the right mindset and attitude for sales. Salespeople need to be able to show up every day at work no matter how they feel, no matter how things are going on in their lives and perform to the best of their abilities. They need to be able to talk to people with much enthusiasm, energy and with enough clarity to properly negotiate with potential clients.
 
As my father used to say, “Salespeople take rejections for breakfast.” More often than not, salespeople will get their heart broken, get rejected, and watch helplessly as massive deals disappear like magic before their very own eyes. Amidst all this, salespeople need to be able to emotionally and psychologically deal with rejection and pick up the phone to call the next person.
 
The Ever-Famous “Sell Me This Pen” Interview Question
Some of you may remember this from the famous film, “The Wolf of Wall Street” starring Leonardo DiCaprio. He asked this question to his friends to see how they’d go about selling. This interview task is perhaps one of the most widely used ways of figuring out whether or not someone has the potential to be good in sales. In fact, Steli Efti always uses this whenever he would hire salespeople. The purpose of this task according to Steli is: to see how someone does the actual selling; to demonstrate one’s skillset; and to show their skill versus just talking about it.
 
However, it is important to note that even if someone does especially good in an interview, you must reserve your judgment on whether or not they’d be good at sales until you’ve worked together for at least three months, per Steli. This is because some people may only be good in the beginning since they are new and want to put their best foot forward. The most important thing to sales however is consistency. It is vital to let your people perform first and reserve judgment later. Only when you see that a person can do work every single day on a consistent basis, can you make the assessment that a person is a good salesperson.
 
How do I Find Potentially Great Salespeople?
Since you can’t possibly know if someone would be good at sales from the beginning, the question remains, “How do I find people who’d have the potential to be good at sales?” Before going into that, it is important to first classify salespeople based on how different they are. According to Steli, there are three classifications for salespeople:
     1. People that are great at selling  
​
     2. People that are great at selling themselves as salespeople
​To differentiate between the first two, you simply have to bear this question in mind. “How easy is it for you to convince these people to join your team?” If someone is truly great at sales, they are making a lot of money. They have a lot of offers and are very much in demand. If somebody seems to be too easy to hire, then they’re probably not that good at sales.
 
However, hiring those with highly decorated sales backgrounds, come with a very big price tag. This fact makes hiring experienced sales people difficult. Furthermore, they will be very difficult to convince since they have dozens of offers lined up. This may seem like a problem to most because they want the best, but at what price?
 
The problem lies in the fact that we are limiting ourselves too much. We think that we need to look for someone who has a sales career today or who at least has a bit of experience in selling. This is kind of thinking isn’t necessarily always right. A ton of salespeople today are those with no prior sales background to begin with. What you should be looking for are those whom you think have the potential to be good at sales but would never consider a sales job or are currently in a totally different career path. After all, sales techniques specific to a company can be imparted or taught.
 
     3. Everybody else who are in sales but shouldn’t
The last kind of sales people are those who are neither great at selling nor great at selling themselves as salespeople. These types of people are easy to spot and know because they will not be very convincing. They give you that vibe that you wouldn’t want to buy from this person. 
 
The One Question You’ll Need to Find “The One”
After everything I’ve said, you probably still have a lot of questions going on in your mind. That’s fine because you’re virtually taking a bit of a risk here. You’re getting a person whom you can’t be 100% sure of his/her capability to perform consistently. However, all your questions can be answered if you get around to asking yourself this one simple question. “Would I want to buy from this person I am currently hiring?” This single question may seem simple at first, but it can work you wonders. This question can help you gauge how much you will be able to trust this person should he/she be selling to others.
 
If I can leave you with one takeaway from all this, it’s this. Don’t think about whether or not a person is good in sales. Neither should you think about how this person similarly epitomizes your idea of how a salesperson should look and walk like. Simply ask yourself, “Would I want to buy from this person?” Do that and you’ll be saving yourself a bit of the trouble of trying to find the best person out there.
 
 

Jason is currently an Account Executive at Leadfunnel.ph. While he is new to blogging, he is well-versed in news writing and other forms of creative writing.

Curious? Want to know more? You can reach Jason at 0917-569-3371. 
​
The difficulty of sales is what makes it challenging yet exciting all at the same time!

Most sales people often think that closing a deal is a ‘one-time’ thing. When the client says ‘yes’ to the proposal, great. Once he says ‘no’, that’s it. Done. Goodbye.
 
If you’re one of these people, think again. If you want to be better in sales, I will let you in on a secret here – “closing is like courting.”
 
I have a friend, Iggy, who had proposed to six different girls all throughout college. Like some guys, he was the type which strongly believed in ‘destiny’. He was the “if it is willed, then it will be. If not, better luck next time”-type of guy. In short, he’s the ultimate ‘hopeless romantic’. He used to ask me for advice on how to get the girl he wanted. I am not a ‘love expert’ though, I am a sales person. Although this was the case, his stories, as I observed, were very similar as to how deals are closed successfully. So, here are some of the tips I had given him which you can also apply in sales, or better yet, in love as well:
 
1) Closing, like courting, is a long and continuous process.
“It does not stop at ‘no’.” Iggy found this idea hard to believe when I first told it to him. As a romantic like him, he thought it would be more painful for him to continue pursuing the girl after being rejected. He thought it was the end, no use hoping for whatsoever. Even when the girl asked to keep being friends, he stayed away from her thinking that it was the best for both of them. I nearly slapped him in the face. What could have been if they still kept in touch? If they stayed as friends, there could have been a higher chance of going more than that!
           
Now, what does this have to do with sales? Being rejected once does not mean that the deal has ended. It is just the start of a long process. To close the deal, you have to ask the buyer what went wrong, and improve on it. Simple as that. Perhaps he just wasn’t convinced by the time you popped the question. Remember, a buyer carefully analyzes all aspects of the deal before deciding. So, by knowing what was wrong and asking for his suggestions, you can change your strategy and ask again next time. Maybe he changes his answer, too.
 
2) Attitude matters.
Confidence is the key. After every rejection, Iggy was always devastated. Like any other hopeless romantic, he thought, thinking like a loser, that he would never be able to love again. He had thoughts such as, “I can never find a girl as good as her” or “I think I would not get over it.” Simply put, he was afraid to ask another girl again, fearing rejection.
 
Unlike Iggy, you as a salesperson needs to be confident to make the deal happen. There are two things which may hinder you from getting the sale; either you’re not confident with yourself, or your product. If you’re not confident with yourself, then maybe sales is not for you. If you’re not confident with your product, know what’s keeping you from being one. When you believe in your product, your customer will believe it also. In both courting and closing, confidence is “irresistible.”
 
3) Everything is a learning experience.
Going through Iggy’s lovelife, the one thing common to every courtship he had done is that he was very impatient and seemed desperate. The time difference between him meeting and “loving” (or so he says) a girl is too short that he skipped the getting-to-know stage and went straight to courting. Similar to a meal, he jumped straight to the main dish without eating the appetizer. I used to advise him often on that, but he always shrugged it off by saying, “that’s how love goes. I cannot do anything about it.” If he had waited for the right time to propose, wouldn’t he have scored one of those six girls?

In sales, or even life in general, what makes us better is not our successes, but our failures. For every lost deal, we should take this as an opportunity to develop our skills and to strengthen our will. Afterall, closing, like courting, is also part of life.

By: Jason Dizon

Indecisiveness, the Roadblock to Decision-Making.
“Indecision and delays are the parents of failure.” Such are the words of Mr. George Canning, an English Statesman back in the 1800’s. If you think about it, perhaps he was onto something. At least in my 22 years of existence, I’d like to think about it that way. Almost every failure in my life in my opinion was due to the fact that I waited too long to act and make a decision.
           
I lost my scholarship back in third year college because it took me too long to decide to study harder and take things more seriously. I did not get to apply for the exchange program I wanted to undergo because I kept delaying until the deadline breezed past before my very eyes. I couldn’t even confess my feelings for a girl because I was too shy and indecision overcame me.
           
If I were to write about all my notable failures because of indecisiveness, I could write a 10-page blog at the minimum. However, I’d like to focus on a necessary skill for business. Something that indecisive people find difficult confronting. That skill is none other than “Closing.”
 
Closing, a Hit or Miss
Closing according to Steli Efti is “the art of creating a decision.” A process that is supposed to lead to going for or against a particular decision. However, even before you get to closing on a particular deal, you’ve got to sell first. In selling, you’ve got to establish a connection with who you’re dealing with. There has to be a fit or an alignment between what your client wants and what you’ve got to offer. Only then can you go about closing and getting your client to make a decision on whether or not he/she will take your offer.

Some people may think that closing is something easy. Something as natural as breathing. However, closing may prove difficult especially for those who are weak at heart. Now why is that so? Simply put, it’s because of a particular misconception that a lot of salespeople have. Closing for some is a “one-time thing” in which they are given one chance to make or break. Thinking that they only have one chance, salespeople at times are hesitant to close because they are afraid of rejection. That moment of hesitation leads to indecision and by the time that they decide to go for the close, they are one step too late.
 
Closing is Scary?
By now, closing may seem like something to dread and avoid if you don’t want to feel dejected. I mean, who in their right mind would rejoice when someone rejects them? Am I right? However, like most things in life, it’s all a matter of perspective.

Steli Efti from The Startup Chat presents another way to look at closing. When a potential client says no straight to your face, you need to feel great because that rejection can be something to learn from. For Steli, a no means that there must be a crucial piece of information that you don’t have yet that can help a client make a better decision or make you realize that your product or service is not right for them. 
 
Confidence is the Key!
“If you are not confident and comfortable, you cannot decide to do something.” Steli makes a solid point here. If you don’t think you can do something, chances are, you will give up even before trying. Closing can also be thought of as the same. If you’re not confident in yourself, you won’t be able to strike a deal with your client since you’re probably going to keep on postponing on closing.
 
Final Notes on Closing
1.       Some people fail to close simply because they aren’t asking for it
Since a lot of people are afraid of rejection, they are hesitant to ask for the close from their client. There is no next step or a call to action on the part of the salesperson.  

2.       Some people try and wait for the perfect moment to close until it’s too late
Related to the first point, since salespeople are hesitant to ask for the close, they try to wait it out until the perfect opportunity arises. This way of thinking is wrong since opportunities don’t do anything by themselves. They’re meant to be taken!

​3.       “Learn to expect the yes and embrace the no”
Steli here makes an important piece of advice. In closing, you must be prepared to hear either a yes or a no. If it’s a yes, well then good for you. If it’s a no, then it’s also good for you. At least, it gives you an opportunity to learn and find out why someone said no. 

If I can leave you all with one thing to always remember, it’s this. “Don’t be afraid to close before you even try.” You will never know what your potential client is thinking if you don’t do anything to help them make a decision. Always remember, you can’t close if you’re not confident! 
​

By: Jason Dizon

Sales is undoubtedly one of the hardest jobs anyone could be doing. More often than not, customers will not readily give their “Yes” simply because a salesperson has made a good pitch or has thoroughly explained the product or service features of what they have to offer. In fact, people working in sales can expect to be rejected a majority of the time. I’ve personally had experiences wherein I was able to explain everything our company could offer, but in the end, got rejected.
 
Now you’re probably asking yourselves, “Is there a way to help lessen or avoid getting rejected by our customers?” We all want our businesses to succeed, and in order to do so, we need to be constantly closing deals and gaining new business for our companies. What is therefore the best way for us to “outsmart” getting rejected? This seems too hard to think about. I mean, getting rejected is something we can expect as salespeople? Right? While making mistakes is normal, there is a way to avoid them or lessen their chances of happening. As Bram Stoker, the author of Dracula puts it, “We learn from failure, not from success!” 
 
Luckily for us, The Harvard Business Review has presented to us the top reasons on why salespeople lose deals. I’ll go over each briefly and hopefully by the end, we can all learn from other people’s experiences.

     1.) No Decision
Customers are very eager to solve their problems. However, this does not necessarily mean that they will readily accept something that could possibly help them. Customers these days are very cautious and will do everything they can to eliminate their fears and reduce any uncertainty there can be. At the end of the day, customers are not 100% sure that they’ll make the purchase even with all these. As salespeople, the best we can do is to help them make the decision by explaining our product/service and answering any queries they may have.
 
     2.) Stalled Sales Cycles
There are a variety of reasons on why a company’s sales cycle could be put on hold. As salespeople, we could have already convinced the person we were talking to. However, these people could not convince others within their company. This can be the case whether we were able to talk to someone in the lower levels or even with their top executives.

This is something we have experienced in our company. Typically, we get to talk with managers of companies and explain how our service works and how we can help them. However, there are cases wherein we were able to convince these managers, but they weren’t able to convince others. In other cases, it took too long for these managers to convince their superiors. As someone external to our customers’ companies, the best we can do as salespeople is to convince customers in such a way that they can champion our products for their companies.
 
     3.) Inability to Penetrate New Accounts
One of the greatest challenges for any company is acquiring new businesses to grow. It is difficult to pique a person’s interest at first and to set a meeting and discuss. Even for our company which specializes in lead generation, getting new business is no easy feat. The best we can do is to provide the best service and experience for our customers and hope to get that “Yes.”
 
     4.) Product Commoditization
Competition in practically every industry is inevitable. Even for startups with new business ideas, competitors are bound to emerge to the point that there is very little that differentiates one company from the other. In order to avoid products/services to be commoditized, we as salespeople should try and differentiate ourselves as much as possible whether on product/service features or even with the service we provide for our clients.
 
     5.) Price vs. Value
Oftentimes, these two are what get in the way of each other. We price our products/services in such a way that justifies their value. However, our clients might not share the same sentiments. Even if we’ve explained everything our product/service can do for them, clients may still think that the offer is still too expensive.

​This is not a new experience even for me. After explaining everything and setting the price, some clients still think that our service is too expensive. In order to lessen the chances of that happening, we put ourselves in our customers’ shoes. Our business is results-oriented. This way, our customers have less hesitation when it comes to pricing. Whatever the approach may be for a company, the best thing to do in this situation is to try and understand where the other is coming from.
 
     6.) 800 Pound Gorilla
A difficult obstacle to overcome, especially for smaller businesses, is to contend with “800 Pound Gorillas” or the so-called top companies of any particular industry. Some of these companies are so big and reputable that they seem to win any business by default.

The best thing to do in this situation is to try and differentiate your company from theirs. After all, you don’t need to contend in the exact same turf as these gorillas.
 
     7.) “Nice-to-Have” Product
Many companies these days try their best to cut down on costs. They will not purchase anything that is not necessary for their company. Therefore, your product/service could merely be considered as something that is “Nice-to-Have” rather than a “Must-Have.” As salespeople, our greatest challenge is to help our customers make that transition from “Nice-to-Have” into “Must-Have.”

For our company, we help customers make this transition by making them realize their problems and how these might negatively affect their company in the future. We make them realize the implications of these problems by constantly asking questions. This way, our customers do most of the talking and naturally make that transition.
 
     8.) Internal Sale
As I mentioned previously, the hard part in selling is to get other people in your client’s company onboard. After all, you as an external sales person will not be involved when your client is pitching to their superiors.

The best you can do is explain everything to clients and help them so that they can champion your product/service to their superiors.
 
     9.) Administrivia
In some companies, there seem to be too much admin work that it gets in the way of salespeople going out to the field. However, these admin tasks (e.g. forms, reports, etc.) are necessary to finalize any sale. Since these are necessary, the best we can do as salespeople is to properly schedule and allot time for all necessary tasks.

In our company, what we do is put all necessary tasks and the person responsible for them in Pipedrive, an online CRM software. The important thing here is to write these tasks down so that we can be reminded of everything that needs to be done.
 
     10.) Pre-Sales Resources
For some companies, there comes a time when there is a lack of resources (i.e. staffing and material resources) necessary to finalize any sale.

For instance, we had this experience with a client wherein we couldn’t finalize the deal because they lacked the manpower to work on the leads we gave them. In other cases, our customers lacked the budget to push through.

In such cases where our customers lack the means necessary to avail our product/service, the best we can do is wait and try to get back to them at a later time.     
 

With all these reasons on why a lot of salespeople fail to close deals, hopefully we can do our best and lessen any objections our customers may have. 

We generate leads for several companies that sell to overseas Filipinos. These are the best sales techniques we have seen from among them. If you are a sales professional, you would probably find these useful, whether or not you sell to overseas Filipinos.

1. Get to the core of their desires
It is common wisdom among sales professionals who focus on overseas Filipinos that the following are the main goals of Filipinos working abroad:

• Provide good education for their children
• Get a good house or a new and better house
• Invest in a business to run in their eventual return
• Buy a nice car

Bottomline, they are making the sacrifice of working abroad to create a better future for their families.

As a sales professional, empathizing with this allows you to better serve their needs and communicate the value of what you are selling.

2. Understand their financial situation and urgency of buying
This highlights the importance of talking to them over the phone (see #3 below). Financial situation is a sensitive topic. The ability to establish rapport and gain trust is key. Experienced sales pros invest in calling prospects abroad since this is the fastest way to move an overseas lead forward. To qualify the lead, some of their go to questions include:

• Years abroad
• Type of job
• Other recent investments / purchases

Sales leads we produce for some of our clients include indicators of financial capacity and urgency of buying. This allows initial qualification even before the first call. 

As any sales pro would know, time is gold. You need to focus your time on prospects that fit your target market and have the possibility of buying soon.

On the other hand, if a qualified lead is not immediately closable, you don't want to waste the lead. It is just a simple matter of order and a bit of technology to maximize long-term leads (see #5 below).

3. Call them. Immediately.
Some sales professionals I have talked to have spent more than PhP60 per min (!) on calls abroad. They see this is as a worthwhile investment.

Statistical studies back their instinct:

• 35-50% of sales go to the vendor that responds first. [Source: InsideSales.com]
• If you follow up with web leads within 5 minutes, you’re 9 times more likely to convert them. [Source: InsideSales.com]
• Firms that tried to contact potential customers within an hour of receiving a query were nearly 7 times as likely to qualify the lead as those that tried to contact the customer even 1 hour later—and more than 60 times as likely as companies that waited 24 hours or longer. [Source: Harvard Business Review]

Filipinos abroad normally use messenger apps like Viber, Whatsapp or Facebook Messenger. These are also ways to connect and have a call. However, there is nothing like calling their phones to quickly establish rapport and qualify.

This is why we have started providing our customers with calling solutions with much better rates than using long-distance.

4. Visit them
Some of the sales teams we work with that have the best quota performance are those which do roadshows abroad. Their companies invest a lot for this trips because they clearly see the ROI from the sales.

Leadfunnel helps these teams by providing them leads in their roadshow locations months before their trip. This ensures that they spend their precious time overseas closing, rather then looking for leads.

5. Play the long game. Important: plan for their visit to the Philippines.
Filipinos abroad visit the Philippines every few years. Many of them delay their purchase decision until their next visit. By using a CRM or a calendar, sales professionals could maximize their results and commissions by playing the long game. Sales managers could hit their team goals with the patience and perseverance of nurturing leads until the right time comes to close them.

March 2016

• March 18. Sales Advantage. Dale Carnegie Training.

April 2016

• April 12 - 13. Sales Territory Management. Mansmith and Fielders.
• April 12 - 14. High Impact Selling.  Guthrie-Jensen
• April 15 - April 23 (Fridays - Saturdays). Sales Management. Ateneo de Manila Graduate School of Business Center for Continuing Education.

May 2016

• May 12. Strategies for New Sales Managers and Supervisors. Harry Pound Consultants.

This list is based on publicly available data on sales seminars, programs and courses from various training providers in the Philippines. To sign-up, please click on the link to their websites.