Replace A Cancelled Sales Activity With Another Sales Activity

What do you do if a sales appointment is cancelled? Or even if you don’t have the number of ideal sales appointments on your schedule for this week? If you’re like most people in the financial services industry the answer is probably something similar to, “Well, I always have work to do, so I just pick up the next file.” The problem is that the work that’s waiting on you is probably service work, so your business ends up getting the wrong balance of needed activity.

And of course, service work needs to be done, yet if it could wait when you have a sales appointment, it can just as easily wait when a sales appointment gets cancelled. Your business needs consistent sales activity and when you use time allocated for sales to service clients, your business isn’t getting the right balance of activity to hit your goals. Because there is never a lack of service work, it’s too easy to shift focus away from dedicated time for sales to catch up on service work.

We’re challenging you to make one small change which can have a huge impact in your business… simply replace the activity that didn’t happen with the same type of activity, especially with sales activities.

For instance, if a sales meeting is cancelled or you don’t have your ideal sales meetings scheduled, fill that time with activities such as:

• Calling prospects from your hot list to set up meetings.
• Try selling your low-hanging fruit. For example, call those who don’t have life insurance, but have P&C policies with you.
• Identify 5 businesses in your area and then go visit those businesses.
• Send out emails relating to sales:
  • Campaign to get life insurance.
  • Ask for reviews/referrals.
  • Contact past clients or X dates.
• Call centers of influences and check in with them.

The goal is to simply dedicate the time with like-minded activities. This helps ensure that your business has what it needs, which is a balance of sales and service. It ensures that your focus is on the right activities. And it makes it a lot easier to decide what to do in the moment. Because the truth is service work is pushy. It's always begging to get done and it never ends. And it’s easy to allow that work to get in the way of reaching your goals. 

To make this change, first make sure you have allocated a specific number of hours each week for sales activity. Second, we suggest taking the list above and tailoring it to your sales activities. Keep it in a file or even a printout on your wall. And when an appointment cancels or you look and see that your ideal schedule indicates that you should have a sales meeting at 1 PM today, use that list to prioritize the work that you are doing. The service work can, and will, wait.