Andy Neary (speaker) presents a short coaching talk (YouTube video, Nov 6, 2020) advising sales professionals how to capture prospect attention in a crowded 2020+ landscape. He contrasts old-school one-to-one prospecting (cold calls, door-knocking) with scale strategies and recommends concrete tactics: leverage centers of influence, write higher-quality emails, maintain a professional LinkedIn presence (social media), host value-driven webinars with strong CTAs, pursue public speaking to build authority, and update your website to align messaging with prospect needs. The talk emphasizes providing value, clarity about target prospects, and taking action.
Chapters
What are you doing to grab the attention of your prospects today? If 2020 has taught us anything, it's two things. Number one, it has never been harder to get the attention of your prospects because everybody's trying to get that attention. And number two, if you are not online right now, if you do not have an online presence and you are in sales, you are completely irrelevant. So today, I want to help you fix that. I want to help you gain more attention than your competition. I want you to gain the attention of the right prospects. And I just want to help you set up a plan of action to win so you can fill the pipeline, so you can do what you do best. And that's close business. Now, why are you struggling to get opportunities right now? Here's why. Because if you are in sales, you most likely have been taught a pretty old school way to grab attention. Let's think about this. I come from the health insurance industry. Here's how we were taught to grab attention. You're going to pick up the phone and you're going to call one prospect who doesn't know who the hell you are. And you're gonna try to trust them and grab their attention to take a meeting with you. But if you make 25, 50, 100 calls a day, just work the numbers and eventually you'll get meetings and go get them, kid. Go win some business. Now, I'm not saying cold calling is dead, but I am saying you can't just be cold calling today. Remember, you're calling one prospect at a time. Now, others say, hey, back in 1985, 1995, I pounded the pavement. I just went out and met the people where they were. Okay, great. Again, you're knocking on one door at a time, trying to get the attention of one prospect who doesn't know who the hell you are today. The beautiful thing is we've got the tools and technology to grab and gain attention at scale. So I want to help you do it right. So today I want to teach you five things you need to be doing right now to grab more attention than your competition. Let's dive in. Number one, centers of influence. We all have them, right? You've got the banker, the accountant, the attorney buddy of yours that's sending you business. But here's my question. Does he or she actually know what you do? Does he know who you're going after? Does she know the process by which you help your prospects solve their problems? Does she know what the destination is you create for your clients? Or do they just know you as the health insurance salesman, the payroll salesman, the phone book salesman. Remember those you see when your centers of influence know exactly who you're trying to go after and what it is you do for them, they become a powerful sales force for you. Because they know exactly who to bring. They know exactly to bring the prospects that will let you do your best work instead of bringing you all these prospects you've got to weed through. So take the time to work with your centers of influence to get them to truly understand who you work with and who you're trying to go after. Number two, email. Yes, you still need to use email even though open rates are way down right now. I know it's 2020, everybody's using email and open rates right now are like 8 to 10% insanely low. But doesn't mean you should stop using it. Here's what you need to do though. You need to create better emails. You need to take the time to write better emails. There's a good chance you're sending out some generic blasts, some regulation Updates from Washington D.C. some industry specific updates. Boring. Nobody reads that stuff. Take the time to type a good email to your prospects, talk about what you do for them, talk about the challenges they have, and make the email sound like it's coming from you. If you took the time, every single week, a half hour to write out a good email, an impactful email that brings value, I promise you, your prospects will start listening and action will start happening again. We're not only living in a time where he or she who grabs the most attention wins. He or she who brings the most value will win every time too. Third thing is social media. Yeah, you need to be on social media, my friend. I know we'd all love to go back to the days before social media ruined our lives, but here's the deal, it's never going away. Here's why you're not using it though. You think your market specifically is not on LinkedIn. Why? Because you're used to looking in the past and remembering who you used to go after. Your prospect used to be Bob, the 63 year old CFO who's not on LinkedIn. But guess what? Becky, the 37 year old CFO, the CFO of the future, she's going to be on LinkedIn. So you need to be there too. Now, if you're in B2B sales, LinkedIn is the number one platform you need to be on. Maybe Instagram, but definitely LinkedIn. So if you haven't taken the time right now to show up to post on LinkedIn. At least get a pro profile. You need to do it today so you can start connecting with your Target prospects on LinkedIn. Number four, webinars. Love webinars. Why you're bringing the prospects to you. Now, the webinar has to be good. But here's the beautiful thing. If you know who you go after, you know what their challenges are, what the goals they have are, you know the process by which you help them solve their problem, and you know what their life looks like after you help them solve it. You're just gonna have a webinar, talk about it, bring value. And now you're bringing 10, 20, 50 prospects to you. So you can teach, you can bring value, but most importantly, you get to sell on a webinar. It's yours. So have a strong call to action at the back of the webinar. Too many finish a webinar saying, well, so if you're interested, reach out, give us a call. And that's like even a. That's less than a slight tap saying, hey, you want to do business, you need to punch them in the face with a call to action. Be like, listen, if you think this is what you need, call us right now. Set up a discovery call, take this survey, whatever it is, you have to have a powerful call to action at the end of your webinars. And last, but certainly not least, public speaking. It is the most powerful prospecting tool you have to gain attention today. Why? Number one, when you are on stage, you are the authority. You want to create an authority ship in your. Is that even a word? You want to be authority in your market. You want to create better engagement and relationships with your prospects. Get on stage, get their undivided attention for 30, 45, 60 minutes. Now, we're doing it virtually. We're not doing it so much live. So it's never been easier. The other reason it's powerful is because 98% of your competition is too afraid to do it. So get uncomfortable, get on stage, create that authority in your market, and I promise you, the engagement relationships with your prospects will never be better. Now you're seeing a sixth one here. I thought there was only five. Andy, this is the magic number six website. You want to gain attention today. Please change your website. Number one, if you know who it is you're going after, you know the problem you solve for them or the problems you solve for them, you know your process to help them win. Your website has to match up what your mouth is saying. It has to back up what Your mouth is saying, I look at far too many websites. I audit them every single day. And I see what the sales professionals are saying out there. They then I go to the website and I'm like, that says nothing about what's coming out of your mouth. The second that happens because your prospects are doing the same, you've lost credibility. Make sure your website matches what your mouth and your producers are saying, and make sure your website is all about the prospect. It used to be our websites were a place to talk about ourselves and how great we are. Not anymore. The website is all about the prospect. So there you have it, guys. This is how you grab attention at scale. Yes, maybe you pick the phone up every so often, every week. Maybe you go knock on doors and we can do that again. But if you want to grab attention at scale, the most attention a, you got to bring the most value. And the easiest way to do that is through your centers of influence. Have damn good emails that reach the emotions of your prospects. Use social media consistently to bring value at scale. Host webinars, get your butt on stage, because that's how you create that authority figure. You, you want your market because you're bringing prospects to them. So my last question for you is this. Do you want to continue prospecting one prospect at a time by picking up the phone and knocking on doors? Or do you want to be able to reach 10, 25, 50, hundreds of prospects at one time? The beautiful thing is tools and technology. Let us do it today. It only comes down to you taking action, because you know what happens when clarity and confidence collide. You take action. Go make it happen today.
