When it comes to selling – what are we NOT doing that we need to be doing?

Are you a Business owner, who has worked with 100+ companies?

– Are you a Sales Professional, who claims to have a list of 1000+ business cards?

– Are you are Social Networker, whose claim to fame is 10000+ contacts?

If you are any of the above and are in the market looking for more business opportunities, either for yourself or for your employer, you need to go back to your contacts, revisit companies and people who you have already worked for in the past and of course have not crossed swords with.

In today’s commercial environment, it is becoming more and more challenging to find new business or acquire new business opportunities. Sales cycles are becoming longer, competition is strong and the client is confused.

A sure shot way to getting revenues through the door with new sales opportunities is to seriously start looking within your contact base and to reconnect with people and businesses with whom you have worked with in the past. The success rate is far higher with the same effort put in as compared to working on a new OR potential client.

If you decide to go back to your Rolodex, make sure the details for your contacts are up to date – remember, just like you they may have moved jobs too.

Understandably, most people we know as contacts are somehow connected with us on commercial social media networks like LinkedIn, Glassdoor etc., however it has been noticed that 60% of the people who move jobs, do not update their profiles immediately or at all, until they have landed themselves another job – by which time it could be too late for you.

if you would like an external agency to assist with validating details of your contact, Akiko Business Consultants (Philippines) Inc. specialises in validating business card details and they can send this data back to you in a format that can be imported into any email system.