In his first TelE-Sales Tip for the New Year, Art Sobczak, the president of Business By Phone Inc., Omaha, Neb., gives his take on "How to Make 2010 Your Best Sales Year Ever." These are the similar tips to those he has given at the beginning of years past and they are worth the time for sales professionals to revisit them.
He declares "If you're serious about having your best year ever in 2010, today is the best time to start. I do suggest you take some time to sit down with these questions. Think about your answers. Challenge yourself. Write them down. Them go to work!
"It's quite simple: If you want to be better in 2010, you need to do more than simply want it. You need to make some changes. Start now."
Here are the questions Mr. Sobczak believes sales people need to examine at the beginning of the year to be successful in this (and any) year:
What are you going to do to improve your industry and product knowledge in 2010?
How many inactive customers will you revive and turn into regular customers again? What do you need to do to make that happen?
What will you do to ensure you're protecting your best customers, and adding more value to the relationships? How will you sell even more to them?
How many new customers will you bring on this year? How do you plan to do that, specifically?
What will you do to improve your physical health in 2010?
What, specifically, are your sales and production goals for 2010? How does that break down into quarterly and monthly goals?
How much more money will you make in 2010? How will that happen? What will you need to do, today, to take the first steps in that direction?
What will you need to do to increase that number by an additional 10%?
What are you going to do every day to keep your attitude at a high level?
How much time are you going to spend, daily, to improve your own sales skills? What will you do?
How many referrals did you get in 2009? How will you get them? From whom? What will you do to turn them into sales?
In which areas will you improve your personal, family and spiritual life?
How are you going to maximize the use of your time? Where will you cut out the time-wasters in each day?
What have you been putting off that you will take care of within the next two weeks?
Who can you help to feel special every day?
What challenge, wish or desire--that you've never attempted before--will you finally achieve in 2010? How will you do that? Why?
Where are you going to write all of this down so you can review and revise your plans regularly?
What will it look like when you accomplish everything you've just been thinking about?
How good will it feel?
What will it sound like when you achieve these things?
Why couldn't you do all of this?
"Any answer to that last one is not a reason, but rather a self-imposed limitation, excuse, or lack of desire or effort. The biggest deterrent to success looks us in the mirror every day," Mr. Sobczak said.
For more info about Mr. Sobczak, go to
