Plan to succeed...

Do you plan to succeed in 2009?

A bigger question for many of us may be whether we plan at all. During our recent National sales meeting this question was posed to approximately 115 of our top salespeople. I have to be honest... I did not see 115 sets of hands go up in the air!

It was exactly for that reason that we set up and ran workshops on designing a plan to be successful.

Unfortunately I think too many of us have been on "auto pilot" for a number of years. We get up in the morning and say " well let's see what today brings". For many years today brought a lot of things, a lot of good things like repeat orders, new projects and customer referrals.

Recently today has not brought us many good things. Has anyone picked up their phone recently to make sure that there is a dial tone. I know I am paying my phone bill but I swear it is broken as it only seems to be allowing outbound calls. No calls are coming in!

At Vernon we are done moping and whining about the economy. Much of our discussion is about getting in an attack mode, a proactive mode where we make things happen as opposed to sitting back and letting things happen to us, or not happen as the case may be.

Designing a plan, a custom plan for each rep is a labor intensive project however it can be done. Allowing the individual rep to play a key role in the design is essential because at the end of the day who is going to be expected to carry out the plan? it is the rep, not me or some other member of the management team.

This is why it is critical that a plan is designed that each person can buy into. Several of our top reps stood up in front of the group and told people that business is out there for those that go after it! They went on to say that each person needs to get off their butts and go after it!

When your existing customers are buying less there is only one way I know of to maintain your overall sales and income or post gains and that is to take it away from someone else. Our workshops concentrated on teaching salespeople how their plan can combine all the marketing and tech tools that we have to stay front and center with their customers and prospects. We need them to think of our company and our sales person when they are ready to buy!

Some of the tools we spent time educating our sales people on using included...

1. ESP On Line...all of our reps have their own ESP On Line Account
2. Technologo...proactively creating virtual spec samples is a great way to present ideas to your clients and prospects
3. Vernon Special Web offers...all of our customers receive regular web special offers from us. These offers are automatically generated and they are personalized with the reps information
4. Digital catalogs...We offer seven exclusive catalogs during the year and digital versions personalized for the reps are now available.
5. Direct Mail Catalog Program...most of our reps have all of their customers on our direct mail program where "specials' catalogs are mailed to their door steps...

These are just a few of the ways to stay visible with you customers!

I use the analogy that when you plan a trip you need to map out the directions and follow those directions. Failing to do so will result in you getting lost!

It is the same thing with your sales planning. You need to map out your goals and design a route to achieve your objectives. Once you do this you can check and update your route as needed, monthly, quarterly etc.

The bottom line is make sure you have a plan to succeed. It is your only chance!