Opportunity qualification and its role in the sales process

A salesperson who is consistently successful is a valuable asset to any company, but the big question is what they are doing that the other members of your sales team are not. Whilst it might be fair to say that natural ability and talent can go a long way towards helping to explain some of that makes one sales person’s figures significantly better than others, there are other factors that come in to play. 

No salesperson, no matter how good their patter is or how great their sales training was can close the deal if the prospect the opportunities for qualification are just not there.

There is a good chance that your sales staff who find themselves less successful at the end of the year may well have fallen into the same trap and that is that they are spending far too much time on potential deals that have simply gone nowhere. 

With the right type of training, these are the types of pitfalls that your sales team could be avoiding in the future. If you haven’t already done so then you might find the SCOTSMAN Commitment manager is a very effective tool that your salesforce could benefit from.

So just what is opportunity qualification?

In a nutshell opportunity qualification refers to the decision that you make to identify whether the product or service that you offer can fill the need or challenges of your prospect and if it does whether they are in fact looking to fulfil that need or simply just looking at what Is available. 

In other word’s it’s the steps that you as a salesperson should be taking before you spend too much time, an energy on following up on a sales lead that will not ultimately lead to a sale.

What is the role of opportunity qualification?

If you want to get the sales, then you need to be able to understand when you are chasing a lead that will ultimately go nowhere. As the saying goes “Time is money” and this is certainly true in the world of sales. You can’t afford to expend time and energy chasing a prospect, especially one who sets any alarm bells ringing, in case they might eventually get that sale.

If they don’t have the money to invest in your product or service right now, if they are tied into a contract they can’t get out of, if the service or product your company offers does not fit the criteria of what they are looking for then there is a point where you need to make the decision that you might be wasting your time. The time that you could instead be spending chasing up a far more likely prospect that will result in a sale.

Remembering to pay careful consideration to your opportunity qualifications early on it your dealings with a prospect has the potential to elevate you from a good salesperson to a great member of a sales team; the one who gets the sales.

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