Spend your time wisely

- There's not enough hours in the day, there never is. And if you ever find yourself bored and with nothing to do, then you're doing sales wrong. There's always something else you could be doing. And usually there's more things to do than there is time to do them. Sales seems to be a black hole of time. Time absolutely flies past when you always have your next target in mind, you're always thinking ahead and rushing to get everything in order before that deadline arrives. Meaning that time slips between your fingers. Now, I've made plenty of content about not becoming a busy fool and rushing to do tasks that don't help. But I wanted to reiterate that here. Spending your time wisely is the most important sales tip. If you waste time, you waste opportunity to sell and therefore cost yourself money and put yourself behind on your targets. It's as simple as that. And usually it's just a case of being conscious of what you're doing. So firstly, don't cold call companies that aren't the right fit for your product or service. Don't follow up with leads that you know are going to be no good. Don't procrastinate when you have jobs to do and do understand where your time is most valuable. Obey the 80/20 rule and focus on the 20% of stuff that gets you the 80% return. Don't waste your time doing small admin tasks or researching a prospect way too deeply or going to networking events that never bring good contacts. Really think about what you do that brings the most return and then focus on that. Don't drop the other stuff. You need to do that, but find a way to either do it quicker or get rid of it, through delegation and outsourcing. Then stop multitasking. People think they're being more productive when they're doing two or more tasks at once. They think they're doing two tasks at once as well as they would be doing them individually, but they're not. They're not even doing two tasks half as well making it a net even. They're actually doing tasks less than half as well because they're losing momentum and having to refocus every time they switch over. It's a proven fact that you're better off completing a task in full before you pick up the next. So that leads to the next tip, batch tasks. That applies to all jobs you need to do like replying to emails, writing proposals, cleaning your desk, whatever. But to a sales person it applies even more to prospecting such as cold calling. That's the work with the highest return that you can do. If you batch time to cold call then you improve your focus and get into a good rhythm. You get into the energized mood to make the calls and engage with prospects. You start to build the language, the jargon and ask the right questions. So trust me, warming up and being on good form is a major factor to consider when you're making cold calls. Plus it helps to batch the prospects you're cold calling that applies to any other groups. Be it sector, business size, prospect job role, geographical location, whatever. Again, you'll start using that language and terminology as habits helping you to build rapport with them much more quickly. And then my final tip is one you're like, take regular breaks, cut yourself some slack and reward yourself for hard work. Taking breaks will help level your mind and keep your energy levels high. Your mood will be more positive. And if you give yourself an incentive of saying make 20 calls and take a 15 minute break, then you'll work harder with that goal in mind. So, this week I want you to plan every day around those tips. I want you to be conscious of what you're doing, stop multitasking, batch tasks and book them in for the entire week and finally, take breaks and book those in too and then enjoy a heightened productivity and a clearer head.