4 important ideas for controlling multitasking during phone calls
Posted by Geoff Alexander on Mon, Aug 22, 2011 @ 10:02 AM
I recently read a compelling article by tech guru Larry Magid on the complexities of multitasking in a world with media options that seem to be increasing exponentially. I’m faced with this reality weekly as I work side-by-side with reps taking our inside sales courses. In addition to the telephone, there’s Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, email, prospects’ websites, the CRM, and the internal resource website. That’s a lot to juggle.
When you’re on a phone call with a prospect, there’s good multitasking, and multitasking that can really hurt productivity. I like to break this down into two categories, the good and the not so good:
The good
1) It’s a great idea to have the prospect’s website up and open when you’re making your call. You can more easily link your solution’s benefits to the prospect when you can make direct reference to something you see on the website, so you can discuss them from the perspective of your prospect. In addition, you’ll need to have your CRM screen up, and your own internal website in case you need that information during the call. That’s three screens, and you should be able to toggle easily among them, or even have a separate screen, like many of my clients do, right on the desktop for easy use.
The not so good
1) Sending prospects to your website during the conversation. I’m always concerned when reps aren’t focused on the conversation with the prospect. Walking the prospect through your own website while you're involved in a conversation invites feature-dumping. When you do that, you’ll miss clues, and may fail to ask intelligent questions to get the prospect talking about his or her business. Many times, when you’re walking the prospect through your website, you’re removing your relevance to the sales situation. After the call, the prospect may not need to talk to you at all --- after all, he or she can just go to your website instead in the future. Why does he or she need you?
2) Typing notes into the CRM while conversing with a prospect has always been a concern of mine, because reps seem to be more focused on taking immediate notes than on addressing clues that come up the conversation. Prospects know when you’re tying, too, and many times, they feel they’re being interrogated rather than having a meaningful business conversation. Take good notes on paper, address clues in real time, and provide great conversations. This is showbiz, and the prospect has to be actively engaged with you. You’re a sales or sales dev rep, not a stenographer.
3) Looking at Twitter, Facebook, and your email when talking with a prospect. These things are irrelevant to your call and prevent you from being focused on the prospect. You can do all this stuff when the call’s over. And please, never terminate a call prematurely just because you see an inbound call coming in that you’d rather take. Give your full attention to the eprson to whom you're talking.
One of the things I teach is that the call you’re on may be the only time you’ll ever talk to that prospect. I encourage reps to fully qualify of disqualify in 8 minutes or fewer, because often prospects jump off the phone quickly. If you qualify fast, listen for clues, address business needs, and are exciting and relevant on the phone, the prospect will welcome your next call. If you’re more focused on multitasking than you are in conversing, it’s not going to be a very exciting call for the prospect.
In today’s Sales 2.0 world, you’ve got a lot to focus on. But never lose track of the fact that your one-on-one conversation is more important than anything else going on at the time. So add keeping multitasking in control to your Best Practices playbook, and you’ll have far more successful calls, and prospects who will welcome a call from you any time.