GTD in Sales

[wussery]

I think that your question about using GTD in a sales job is important and hasn't been addressed fully here. It's complex because sales involves phone calls, visits, proposals, emails, timely follow-up, filing, -- sort of a GTD decathalon.

I also didn't like ACT or Maximizer because they have extra features that slow me down.

My solution is to create a task in Outlook (GTD would call it a Next Action) for each sales lead. And as that sales lead moves through different phases of emailing to set up a phone call, to having a phone call, to sending a proposal, to waiting for a response, I keep [b]updating its category. There is only one task item for each sales lead.

For example, a current client might say "contact my friend Joe at Acme Inc. because he might need your products." In Outlook, I create a new task called "Call Joe at Acme regarding potential sale." I file it under @Call-Sales. In the notes section, I might even list out all the steps I need to go through for this sale (like call a friend who knows Acme, or look up articles about Acme before contacting Joe). After Joe and I talk, and agree on a general proposal, I change that same item to "Send proposal to Joe at Acme" and I make sure that as part of the Task's Notes, I keep my notes from the conversation with Joe. That task is now refiled under the category for @Proposals. After I send the proposal, I change its name to "Follow-up with Joe about Acme proposal" and file it under the category for @Follow-up.

This lets you monitor your sales funnel. By counting up the tasks, you can see how many prospects are in the stages of @Call-Sales, @Proposal and @Follow-up. (or any other categories you set up)

The key for me has been creating just one task for each potential customer, and then changing the title and category of it as I move it through the sales process. I also keep complete notes in one centralized place as I go through the sales process.

Sometimes I'll also put a tickler on my calendar that I need to call the sales prospect for follow-up, for instance 1 week after the sales proposal has been submitted. But it doesn't substitute for that one Task that is always associated with that customer.

If you don't like Outlook, I suppose you can do this with Index cards -- 1 for each customer. Just ensure that the same card follows the same customer through the whole process.

Does this help?

Scott, the methodology you describe above can easily be setup in Ecco Pro using the Phonebook as your Home Folder. I would create a contact for each Sales Lead and then below each contact enter data as follow:

Contact Name
Discuss Proposal with Mike

Things I need to cover before calling Mike
A
B
C
Outcome of Call
A
B
C
Send Sales Proposal

Follow-Up with Mike regarding Proposal

To the right of the Sales Contacts Name are Folders such as Date Of Entry, Type, IMP Dates, Clients, Keyword, Delegated.

I have prototyped this methodology and can send it your way, if you'd like to review it. You can monitor everything in the Phonebook view or the Calendar View using the Tickler Section. Also the Phonebook has a more powerful Search engine than what is available for the other Notepads in Ecco Pro. Under the Type Column, which is a Pop-up folder I have entered @Call-Sales, @Proposals and @Follow-UP. You can then Search on this field using the Value in the Type Folder that you want to Filter on. Makes it very easy to get a snapshot or focused view based on your template.

This is just the beginning of what can be done with Ecco Pro and just scratches the surface of what a Final Sales related Template would look like using GTD as the model and Ecco Pro as the engine.

wussery@gmail.com