I moved house the beginning of this month…. (picture is of my remaining boxes!) What a palaver! People were telling me it was the most stressful thing after divorce… So I thought I would look it up.
Indeed, it was in the top 3 most stressful life events… and it was totally a difficult experience, both emotionally and physically – especially as it landed when we had the 40°C heatwave!! 🥵
Then I started to think what the most stressful thing was that my clients were going through at the moment to put my house move into perspective. I came up with the thing that stresses them out the most: Prospecting. Building a healthy pipeline and hitting sales targets in this upcoming recession is and will be a demanding task. Buyers in this economic climate are being a bit more pensive and reluctant to invest. They are still buying though… an important thing to remember!
I thought I could use this moving house analogy to see if I could find ways we can de-stress and refocus on the task at hand. Hitting sales targets can be daunting and cause anxiety, we can end up doing nothing and becoming inefficient.
So… I found an article on ways to make your move easier – if your moving soon, read it here.
Let’s see if their tips will also help us with hitting our sales targets!
Get organised
Getting rid of all the clutter and researching the new area is always useful to prepare for a house move, it stops all the last-minute jobs that could easily have been done weeks, or months prior.
Same goes for prospecting, make sure all your marketing activities are effectively bringing in quality leads. Clean up your pipeline and target the right people to ensure you get good quality conversations to progress opportunities and not waste your time when you are prospecting for new clients.
Give yourself time
When moving house, it’s important to allocate enough time to get all the jobs done – and that includes time to plan. Good tips were to take time off work to pack and also for relaxing & resting as moving can be quite draining of all energies!
When growing your pipeline, make time for it. We are all busy with business & client needs. Make sure you still have time to follow up leads & engage with new ones… and… Taking time out to relax is a great idea. It helps us reflect & refocus on what is important. Make sure you make time for that as well J
A box of comfort
They recommended when you move to create a “box of comfort”. A great idea… pack a box of things that make you feel better, a special mug, a nice bubble bath favourite toys for the kids… whatever will help you settle in and relax in the new home.. even surrounded by unopened boxes!
Never thought of this one before, but it does make sense. When doing follow up or reaching up to new prospects, try using your favourite mug with a nice coffee/tea (and favourite cookie!) or sit somewhere you are feeling relaxed. Maybe not in a crowded office or rushing in between meetings. This should alter your mindset to a more positive one and relax you.
Prepare the essentials
During a house move, always have essential items at hand like medication, documents or even tools! This will make the move less stressful when you can’t remember which box they are in J
When you are prospecting, have you got everything at hand? Your last meeting notes? Your product information? Their website open? “Winging” prospecting is very common in sales, we have all done it. Having all the important information at hand will speed things along and make the experience a lot easier, relaxed and successful.
Be kind to yourself
When moving house, people feel more tired and anxious which is normal. It’s important to look after yourself during this period. Eat well, sleep and get some exercise. I can vouch for this one! I could have done better on all fronts!
I get asked a lot to help salespeople, and those people in non-sales jobs that have sales based activities, to help them remove the fear and anxiety of making “sales calls”. Sales confidence is real and can stop people from making the next steps to converting a sale, usually following up quotes or second tries at calling enquiries.
📚Read out blog here on how to improve sales confidence if you want to learn more…
Get help
They recommend when moving house to find as much help as you can, from friends and family lugging boxes and making meals to getting specialists in to box and move everything. This was definitely the part of the move where I could have greatly improved!
Same goes in sales, many people think they can do it without training or systems/processes. Yes they can, but it can be very daunting and time consuming, and many times inefficient reducing possible sales conversions and directly hitting the bottom line of the P&L.
Get in touch if you feel this is you 🙂
Use a checklist
Lastly, a fab end to these tips.. make a checklist of all the things you need to remember that if you forget could jeopardise the move. Things like Quotes from removal men, booking pets into kennels, home insurance just to name a few!
I can’t live without my to do list… it always has a bit about the 3 things I need to do today to be more productive… I also includes secondary tasks & follow ups for the day. I don’t always get them done but I am much more focused and clearer about what to do, and what to do first.
I hope you liked this analogy; it certainly made me think! If you can think of any other tips for moving or analogies of prospecting & moving, please add in comments below!
