In sports, do winning coaches send players onto the field on game day with no plan? Just a "Do your best!" shout and then he sits back and watches from the sidelines, hoping for the best. No plans. No reviews of old games with that team. Nothing.

When someone asks me ask me if they should prepare a Call Plan for every customer meeting, I sometimes tell them that they should only be used for important interactions. A question I like to follow up with is: "Are there any interactions you have with your customers and prospects that are not important?"
 
One of the main reasons for using the Call Plan tool is to accomplish more with fewer calls. Consistently applying the Call Plan tool is to all customer conversations helps you to accelerate opportunities in the pipeline and win deals faster.
 
If you have already used Call Plans with customers, you have probably seen how valuable they can be, especially if you prepared in advance and reviewed your plan with a colleague.  
 
When you start to create Call Plans for all of your meetings, you get better at quickly formulating an End in Mind (EIM), the decision you want the customer to make at the end of the meeting.  Asking the following questions can help to create greater focus for each meeting:

• Is there one and only one End in Mind?
• Does the EIM enable the attendees to say, do or decide something?
• Is "No" an OK response?

Knowing the EIM is only the first step. Making the EIM transparent increases the likelihood that a decision will be reached at the end of the meeting.
 
As the application of the Call Plan tool becomes a habit, you begin to get really good at:

• Preconditioning the meeting so that customers are more likely to share the same EIM appropriate for the stage in the sales cycle
• Identifying the Key Beliefs which support the EIM
• Creating and delivering a clear, effective opening statement that gets the meeting off to a good start

Call Plans can also be very helpful in making internal meetings an effective and efficient use of company resources, particularly the most important resource of all: Time.
 
What benefits have you found by using the Ninety Five 5 Call Plan Tool?

By NF5 sales guide Bill Rust