Want to be a sales superstar?
Having clear and definitive goals is great, but that alone won’t get you there! Creating an action plan is the next step in the process. Carrying out that action plan is where success is built.
You can choose to do the minimum required to meet your goals and be an average sales person or you can excel by surpassing those goals rather than settling for them. But you must take action to win month in and month out, year in and year out.
Reverse engineer goals
Setting goals may be easy but the reality is that most people who set goals will fail to reach them. According to this study by the University of Scranton, 92 percent of people will set goals and never achieve them.
In fact, most people never even take action on the goals they set simply because they don’t know where to start. The goal seems so huge and overwhelming that they become stuck in procrastination and eventually just give up altogether.
This doesn’t have to happen to you, though. You can accomplish any goal you set your mind to simply by reverse engineering it. Reverse engineering a goal involves breaking your goal down into smaller, more manageable pieces and figuring out the steps that will be required to achieve it. Instead of trying to do everything at once, you tackle a little bit one day at a time.
Sounds simple enough but how do you actually put this into practice? Here are five steps you can take to begin reverse engineering your goals:
Begin with the end in mind
This may sound counterintuitive, but the best way to begin is by setting the desired end result and working backward from there. No matter what the desired end result is you need to start with the specific goal first and then work out the steps in reverse.
When you have an overarching goal that is driving you, it will guide all of your daily decisions and actions along the way. It will also allow you to change strategies along the way if you realize what you are doing won’t achieve your desired results.
So, if you want to meet a big sales goal at the end of the year, begin with that in mind. Be specific, whether that is a dollar amount, number of clients or other metric, be specific. That will then help you figure out how many new clients you need, how many new prospects you need to contact, how many proposals you send out, how many tours you will need to conduct, and how many people you should follow up with every day, etc.
Do your homework
Now that you know what your goal is you need to research what it will actually take to reach that goal. It is a great idea to talk to somebody who has already achieved that goal so they can give you insight into what worked and what didn’t.
Here are some helpful questions to ask yourself:
What will it take to accomplish my goal?
How long will this process take?
What action steps do I need to take?
Are there any new skills I need to learn?
Identify all the actions that need to happen
Once you have identified your main goal and done some research, you need to work out what it will take to reach that goal. For instance, if you are working toward a sales goal in your community, you need to identify what milestones you will need to hit along the way to make that happen; quarterly, monthly, etc.
The key to successfully reverse engineering goals is to identify all the daily actions that need to take place along the way in order to achieve the desired results. Focus on taking daily actions and let go of the results in the meantime. Setbacks are inevitable but your daily actions are what will continue to drive you forward. There will be interruptions in your day, both planned and unplanned.
Plan for those interruptions you know about, such as sales meets, conference calls, and days off. But keep in mind, these actions are not set in stone. They may change over the course of the year as you begin receiving feedback but it is better to go into it with a plan.
Take action
Now that you know what your goal is and the action steps you will have to take to get there, it is time to start taking action. This may sound obvious but it is the hardest part for most people.
The best way to begin is by picking two to three actionable items to focus on each day. The irony is, most people who learn to master reverse engineering their goals don’t end up just meeting those goals — they usually far exceed them.
Plan for failure along the way
Most people cringe at the thought of failure but it is an inevitable part of the process. Part of reverse engineering your goals is being able to respond and adjust your actions if you don’t meet a milestone along the way.
If you feel like you aren’t making any progress, that doesn’t mean you need to scrap
the entire plan. It means you simply need to tweak your plan so you can meet and even exceed your big goal. Rather than adjusting your goals, simply adjust your actions.
Its important live by the phrase, “plan your work and work your plan.” With a little planning and calculation, you now know the daily, weekly, and monthly activities you should be performing to meet your goals. But remember, these are generally minimum excepted milestones. To be a superstar you will want to increase your activities by 2x or 3x. This will ensure you meet your goals and also comfortably exceed them. Being the superstar you were meant to be is not easy and will take a lot of hard work, dedication and an unflappable spirit to achieve. But it can be done!