Focus on Qualified Prospects Only

Top Secrets of Marketing & Sales

Dealing with qualified prospects only is the best. Try to get rid of some people as early on in the process as you possibly can. If you found out that you invested some time with them and you later discover, okay, this person is no longer qualified. Cut the cord, move on.

David: Hi, and welcome back. In today’s episode, co host Jay McFarland and I will be discussing Qualified Prospects Only. Welcome back, Jay.

Jay: Thank you, David. Wow, this is the dream, right? This is the dream. If you could spend all your time only dealing with people who want your services, need your services, and then, wow, that’s what we’re searching for every day.

David: That’s it, man. We are living the dream. And I think for a lot of people, the reason they don’t live the dream is because they don’t make it a priority. They don’t build it in to their processes. They don’t say to themselves, when I am in touch with a prospect today, this needs to be one of the very first things that I do.

Is to get them qualified in or out as quickly as possible so I can move forward and not waste another nanosecond of my life energy on an unqualified prospect.

It’s doable, if you prioritize it as one of the first things that you want to have happen in a conversation with any new prospect.

Jay: Yeah, and I do want to point out there’s qualifying your leads and making sure that new leads fit in, but then there’s what we’re talking about.

Okay, you’ve got somebody new, you’re talking to them. In that process, you don’t want to spend more time with them than you have to if they’re just not going to fit what you have to offer. Now, I can usually do this in about five minutes, with somebody on the phone, and it’s because I’ve learned what to ask.

So, normally I’m like, I really don’t think we’re going to be able to serve your needs. And then I get to move on to the next call. And I think you’re sending a message to them and they may circle back to you eventually, because you were upfront with them.

David: Yeah, and we want to be upfront with people about that. Because we don’t want to waste their time any more than we want to waste our own time. One of the things that I’ve said to people so many times in so many conversations is, “Look, I respect your time as I respect my own, which is to say a lot.”

And it is so true. And the older I get, the more true it becomes. Although it’s been true for decades now, right? I’ve always looked at it as, I think I heard this from Brian Tracy originally, in one of his recordings, he said if you run out of money, you can always make more, but if you run out of time, all the money in the world won’t help you.

And I thought that is brilliant, because it is so true. When we invest time with unqualified prospects, when we spend too much time chasing down people who don’t have the need, the desire, the money, the budget, the willingness to spend. It means we are not in front of people who have all of those things.

And I did learn this lesson fairly early in my business, but I didn’t immediately implement it. It took me probably another several years before I finally got all the processes and all the procedures in place to try to strain those out, before I ended up in conversations with them.

And so often in my conversations with our clients, I’ll be talking to them about their procedure for bringing new clients through the door, like clockwork, because in my mind, everybody has to have that.

If you don’t have a procedure, in your business, for bringing new customers in like clockwork, then you’re going to be struggling. You’re going to be missing out. And during some of those conversations, I’ve had people say, “well, yeah, I’ve been trying to get an appointment with this person for months.”

And sometimes I’ll say, well, does this person even deserve an appointment? Have you qualified them? Have you asked a couple of qualifying questions to find out if they have any of the things, the need, the desire, the money, the budget, etc.?

And in a lot of cases, the answer is, well, no, that’s why I was trying to get to an appointment. And my point there is, why on earth would you spend any time at all trying to get an appointment with someone if you don’t already know they’re qualified?

Particularly if we’re talking about an in person appointment, which is what’s happening in a lot of these cases.

From a 21st century standpoint, where you’re trying to generate leads online, for example, it really is a two step process because you’re going to want whatever advertising you’re doing online to sort of weed out the worst quality prospects.

So you’re not taking calls with people who aren’t qualified to begin with. But even then it’s a net, you’ve got to sift out that first layer. And then sometimes you’ll end up on the phone with somebody who is still not completely qualified. And you’ve got to have a series of questions in place, a lead qualification procedure that will allow you to find out as you do, Within the first few minutes, whether or not it’s a good fit.

And if you don’t have that in place, if you don’t have a lead qualification procedure, a series of questions you can ask, relatively quickly, get answers to, and make that determination fast, you are going to spend not hours, not days, not weeks, you are going to spend months and years of your life talking to people who have absolutely no ability to buy from you.

Jay: Yeah, but the problem is it’s so hard to think, Oh, I can sell to everybody or especially if you’re early on and you’re like, I can’t afford to filter these people out. Well, you can because you should be focusing on other methods.

It may be more valuable to be spending time reassessing your system than it is spending time on the phone with people who can’t use your system.

I mean, we have a system and we’ve talked about our system quite a bit, but at every step there is a qualification process, right? So our first qualification process is our insane focus on keywords. We’re doing it right now, again, we’ve just gone through a new list of keywords.

That’s the first thing. We only want people contacting us who meet those keywords. Then once they’ve set up a consultation right there in the form, where they fill out their consultation, we ask questions about what they’re looking for. Who are they? What they want.

If they don’t fit, then before I even get on the phone with them, they’re going to get an email from me saying, Hey, we’re probably not going to be able to answer this question for us. So that’s step two, right?

And then step three is actually in the conversation that I have with them. So by the time they get to me, I’m the third level of qualification, right? we’re just insane about this process.

David: Well, I would say you’re more structured than insane because what you described is beautiful.

When you talk about a three level process like that, that is specifically designed to reduce the amount of time that you spend with unqualified prospects, that is smart and beautiful.

And that’s what we encourage all of our clients to do. Not just take anyone who can fog a mirror, anyone with a pulse.

We’re not looking for that. We’re looking for the right people up front. Now, during a process like that, is it possible, or is it even likely that you’re going to disqualify somebody who could potentially buy from you?

And the answer is yes. We view that as a cost of doing business. Because for every one of those people that you miss out on selling, there are probably 9, 10, 50, or 100 that you will not waste your time on.

So from a simple math standpoint, from a simple, time investment standpoint, you’re going to be far better off doing exactly what you and I just described, than if you just talk to anybody who’s willing to have a conversation with you.

Jay: Yeah, so true. But we also have a sorting process, right?

Because there are other steps after that. I sort them into immediate, can I close them within the next seven days? Then I have another group of weeks, and then years, and then I have a long term drip, right? Depending on which way I sort them, there are other steps, right?

So I never look at somebody as gone. I’ve added them to my marketing list, right? And so they’re going to hear from me once a month. You’d be amazed. I get two or three calls a month from people who at the time I had sorted out of the system, but now they’re back and things have changed, right?

And I’ve been on their mind once a month. So the filter continues and you don’t have to feel like, oh, that was a waste. I don’t know that any contact is ever a waste if you can sort them and not spend time on them again. But your system allows you to keep in contact with them again.

David: Yes. And what you identified there lines up perfectly with exactly what we’re talking about.

Now, I believe that in the beginning, in those first few layers, especially that you described, that a goal there is to disqualify the unqualified as quickly as possible. Because you don’t want a lot of them in your followup procedure. Even if it’s a drip campaign, you don’t even want to be dripping to people who really have no ability to buy what you’re selling.

So I believe it starts with a disqualification procedure first, because in any situation, like what you described with the keywords, your keywords are going to eliminate probably 90 percent of the people who are ever even going to see your message. So that’s kind of unseen, but it’s absolutely happening.

For people who aren’t doing that type of thing, they’re going to have to have more conversations and they’re going to have to be more ruthless than you are when it comes to disqualifying people. Because they don’t have those automated levels happening first to make that happen for them.

But once you’ve done that, when you’ve been able to eliminate the 80 to 85 percent of people who are never going to buy from you, then everything you described as far as the nurture is concerned and determining are they going to buy now or they’re going to buy next week, next month, next year…

If they have the ability to buy from you, yes, we absolutely want to follow up. And of course, in our work with clients, we talk about the five levels of qualification.

Are they ready to buy now? Those are the ones we’re going to buy within the next week or so.

Do they have specific dates in mind when they want to buy? Well, I’m not ready to buy now, but first of the year, I’d like to do it, right? That’s the second group.

Third group are the ones who are generally receptive. They’re open to the idea. They have the money, the need, the desire, the money, the budget. They’re just not quite sure exactly when they want to do it. Definitely want to drip to those.

Then you have the disqualified that we talked about before. No need, no desire, no money, no budget, no willingness to spend, rude, obnoxious, belligerent. I want those people out. If they happen to make it through the first couple of nets, I want to make sure I nail them on the third.

And then there are the unresponsive, the people who just stop replying to you. And for those, you can either continue with your drip campaign, or you can say, you know what, that’s enough. No soup for you. No more soup for you. I’m done.

And when you recognize that there are only five levels of qualification, it tells you exactly how to follow up with each one.

It gives you a system you can follow, and it makes your life a whole lot better.

Jay: Yeah, and I want to point out to anybody who’s watching or listening, I’m in a very niche industry. I mean, as niche as you can get. That makes my keywords, that makes my steps very simple and then I can continue to fine tune that.

I don’t want to imply that everybody can just rush out and figure that out. It’s not the case, especially if you have a broad base. Customers that you’re looking for, right? I hate it when people are like, “just do what I do,” right? is, certainly not that simple.

David: But the message is exactly right. Because however you do it, whether it’s through the technology or whether it’s individually, whether it’s at a sales level, however it is it’s happening, an automated level, it doesn’t matter.

The point is the same. You still have to do this. It might take you longer. It might take you a different process. But that’s why, it’s not about one solution. It’s about identifying your specific situation, which is why we find it so important to have conversations with people ahead of time.

We don’t want to take on a client if we’re not absolutely convinced that we’re going to be able to help them. And so for us, that’s criteria number one.

And it really should be for everybody listening to this as well. If you don’t feel like you are the best solution to the person that you’re communicating with, you want to determine that upfront. You want to be the one to say no, right?

And some people, salespeople in particular, feel like, no, everybody is my prospect. I should be able to sell to everybody. And, I don’t know. Is it possible that’s true? It’s possible, I guess. I think it’s unlikely, but it is possible. But if you recognize that there are people who need what you sell right now, and you realize that you’re not in front of one, you want to be able to expedite the amount of time between now and the time you can make that happen.

Jay: Yeah. I’ll give you one last example of something we’ve learned over time. And that is when we first started out, I wanted to sell everybody. So I would offer discounts, right? I’d rather have the money than not. And we have realized, over time, in our industry, that people who want discounts are the most demanding people.

And guess what? We don’t offer any discounts, anymore. Not because we don’t want the money. We would love to have the money and provide the service. But we know we’re probably not going to be able to satisfy that person. And it’s going to be a lot more work for us. So when they ask for a discount, I’m even more firm.

You know what I mean? I’m like, we are the experts. We are going to save you money. We’re going to avoid any issues for you. So yeah, take it or leave it.

David: It’s a disqualifier for you. I mean, it goes exactly back to our primary topic here, which is that there are some people you want to try to get rid of them as early on in the process as you possibly can. If you found out that you invested some time with them and you later discover, okay, this person is no longer qualified. Cut the cord, move on.

Jay: Yeah, exactly.

David: Qualified prospects only!

Jay: There you go. All right, David, how do people find out more?

David: Go to TopSecrets.com/call, schedule a call with myself or my team. If you’d like to be able to interact with more and better quality prospects, we’d love to have a conversation with you.

We’ll start by looking at where you are now and where you need to be in terms of visibility, sales and profits. Visibility meaning, are you visible to the type of people who actually want your services and are ready to buy from you now?

Because if you’re not visible to them, they don’t know you’re alive. You can’t possibly sell to them. So let’s have a conversation.

TopSecrets.com/call. If you’re not interested in buying from us, we don’t care because that means you’re not qualified to buy, but you could still be qualified to learn something. And our determination on these calls is to say, “okay, even if you’re not qualified to buy from us, is there something we can help you with?”

Can we give you an idea that may help you to become qualified to buy from us? And we do a lot of that. And then we hear back from people later who said, “Hey, you know what? I implemented that one thing you suggested on our strategy session, and I was able to generate the revenue I need now. Yeah, I’d love to work with you.”

And we’d love to have them back. So TopSecrets.com/call. Let’s have some fun!

Jay: All right, David. Thank you. It’s always a pleasure.

David: Thank you, Jay.

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