Andy Neary says most salespeople waste money on huge lead lists and mass emails, then panic at year-end. Instead, narrow your focus to a few dozen prospects who actually align with what you stand for and let them come to you.
Chapters
All right, I want you to picture this. It's January. You sit down with your sales manager, or maybe you are your own boss, and you set your annual sales goals, and you write down the number that you're going to hit this year. And it's a big number, but you're excited because you are confident you're going to blow through this number. You're confident this is the year you break through. So now it's time to go prospect. Here's what you do. You go to a platform like ZoomInfo or some other lead platform, and you buy or pull a huge list of thousands of prospects. And you look at this list and you say, with a list this big, there is no way I am not going to hit my sales goals this year. And then you start attacking the list. Cold call after cold call, email after email. For the first quarter, you just hit up these unassuming prospects with some good old direct marketing. But by about June, you're a little frustrated because you haven't made any progress. So you sit down and say, maybe it's my sales message. Maybe I just need to tweak up my message. So now enter July. You're excited. You got a new message, but you still have six months to hit your goals. So you're confident. So you get back at attacking this list with some direct marketing. But now, by late August and early September, you're starting to get nervous. You're looking at this list, and you really haven't created the activity you thought you would back in January when you set that lofty goal. So now you start pressing, the stress starts accelerating, and you're looking up, and the end of the year is coming quick, and you're not quite near your lofty goal that you thought you would be by this time of the year. So what do you do? You change up your message again. Try a completely different prospecting tactic. No, you need a bigger list. So you go buy yet another list and you start attacking this list just like you did the previous part of the year, which didn't work. And before you know it, December's here and that end of the year is staring at you in the face. And now you're no longer selling. You're actually begging for business. You're hoping somebody will just say yes to you. You ever been there? Yeah. Good news. You're not alone. Most advisors are. This is how most advisors and agencies still prospect. They apply good old direct marketing to a huge list of people who have no clue who they are. If you want to fix it you have to start leaning into brand marketing. And by the way, ask yourself this question. How many wins would it take for you to completely change your business? I bet you it's not as many as you think. Is it 5? 10, maybe 20? So why are you trying to talk to thousands? You just need a few dozen who believe what you believe. And this is the key of brand marketing. What do you believe? What do you stand for? How do you feel about the product you sell? You see, you're afraid to stand for something with your product because you're afraid you might offend somebody. That's exactly what you're supposed to do. Stand for something, believe in something, and then go find a few dozen who believe it too, and they'll raise their hand to the heavens. This is how you change the trajectory of your business. Stop trying to talk to thousands of people when you don't need to. You see, if you applied a little more brand marketing to your prospecting strategy at the beginning of the year, the results at the end would be completely different. So my advice for you, as you enter Q4 and leading into 2023, figure out what it is you stand for, what do you believe, what you sell. And then go share that message with a few people, not thousands. Because when you align with the right people, the right people will raise their hand and your sales will change forever. This is what changed my career. It's what changed my business. What's it's helped us grow Complete game consulting as fast as we have. We aren't a fit for everybody, and that's okay. We know what we stand for and we go find the people that believe the same thing. You can do this too. Brand marketing over direct marketing. And your results will be better. Go out and get after it.
