There’s an exercise I did recently that I recommend all salespeople do. There are several benefits to doing it and almost all relate to sales but some relate to life too. Before I get into what I’m recommending, I’m going to give you some background about what led up to it.
For years I’ve called all my former clients at least once a year. Every single time I’ve done this, I’ve gotten business…100% of the time. This year I was looking for something extra. Lately I’ve been trying to get into Fortune 500 companies. The people I’m trying to get to, Regional VPs of Sales and up, have been a challenge to reach to say the least. They are very insulated. Standard channels for reaching others: the phone, email, LinkedIn, and others, are many times monitored for them so they can stay on their most important tasks. As a result, I had to find a different approach and the answer came fairly quickly: get referred in by people who know them. Great, no problem, just call a bunch of people and find out who knows someone at a Fortune 500 company. Simple, right? Not exactly. First I made a list of all friends, family, acquaintances, former co-workers, all the people I could pretty much just pick up the phone, tell them what I was up to and ask for help. And I did that. The problem was, even though I had a few people who knew someone in one of those companies, the numbers were small plus, they weren’t the actual titles I was looking for, I was going to have to expand beyond first-level contacts. So, a thought occurred to me which led to this article and the thought was: Why not call everyone in my cell phone?
I looked in my phone and realized I had 612 contacts. They say the average person knows roughly 250 people and I had more than double that number in my phone. Originally I was going to either delete or call everyone but that almost instantly evolved into ‘call everyone’ regardless.
I’ll admit I didn’t go from number one straight through to number 612. I started with some easy ones, the warm contacts, many of whom were on my original ‘warm-contacts’ list. But either way, eventually, I called everyone and I ran into several interesting situations. Some people, who I had no idea who they were, I was actually afraid to call. What if I was supposed to remember them but I didn’t. Were they going to think I was losing it or worse, would they be insulted? Were they going to hang up on me or give me a piece of their mind? That’s the exact same fear that keeps salespeople from following up with a lead, asking for the referral, or picking up the phone when they’d rather send an email. And the good news is: the more calls I made, the less the fear there was. By the end I was reaching out to people I’d have talked myself out of calling a month earlier, and almost every one of those was worth it.
Now, one important exception. When I started, the plan was delete OR call. It turned into call because the vast majority of that discomfort: “who is this person,” “we drifted, is it weird now”, is exactly the discomfort you should push through. That’s the good kind. But every so often you’ll scroll past a name and feel something different: not awkwardness, but a real gut-level no. Someone who drained you, someone who did you wrong, someone you decided a long time ago you were better off without. That’s not fear talking, that’s judgment, and you should listen to it. Don’t call that person. Delete them and keep going. Uncomfortable is a green light. Harmful is a red light and delete.
My call script was pretty simple, it was just the truth. “Hey Bob, John Chapin. Reason for the call, I’m actually going through my cell phone and calling everyone and I’m up to the…” whatever the first letter of their last name was. Only one person basically hung up on me once I mentioned I was a sales guy, “probably spoke at your association event”, and he said, “Yeah, thanks for calling” and hung up. I had a few more that we truly couldn’t figure out how we knew each other but the exchange was still cordial. I also got to talk to the executive director from an association I had spoken for five times over ten years. She had just been diagnosed with a rare blood cancer and had less than a year to live. She told me what a great guy I was and how I was her favorite speaker, that’s why they continued to bring me back. That one was a gut punch, but I hadn’t spoken to her since I shifted industries and probably wouldn’t have talked to her again. I’m SO HAPPY I made that call. I also got more than the occasional, “Wow, that’s a great idea, I should be calling everyone in my phone too.”
A lot happened during those 612 calls from the very special and heart-felt, talking to the executive director, to the mundane. I rekindled some relationships, strengthened others, said farewell to a few people, deleted others and removed bad or disconnected numbers. I experienced lots of emotions from joy to pain to indifference and a few others in between.
I’ve often said in my sales speeches that your long-term success in selling will come down to the size and loyalty of your network. We know that life on planet Earth will ultimately come down to people and relationships. Who were you with during your journey on planet Earth and whose lives did you positively impact and who positively impacted yours.
Calling everyone in my phone was a very enriching experience and one I highly recommend to all salespeople and in fact, all people. I think at this point I’ll do it at least once every two years. Also, it gave me another idea which I’ll follow up on next: to reach out to all my connections on LinkedIn and Facebook, plus anyone else I can think of that I’ve somehow crossed paths with over the years. Who knows, maybe I’ll write an article on that too.
John Chapin is a motivational sales speaker, coach, and trainer. If you have questions, or to have him speak at your next event, go to www.completeselling.com John has over 39 years of sales and sales management experience as a number one sales rep and is the author of the 2010 sales book of the year: Sales Encyclopedia (Axiom Book Awards). You can reprint provided you keep contact information in place. E-mail: johnchapin@completeselling.com.