No matter what sporting event you enjoy, a scoreboard is often used to determine if the contestants are making progress towards their goal and to eventually identify the winner of the contest.
In sales the winning results that we desire are sometimes far in the future. With this in mind, my suggestion is to create an “Action Scoreboard” to demonstrate and measure progress toward your goal. Here is how it works in my business coaching company:
Keeping Score with The “Action Scoreboard”
My goals include securing individual and group coaching assignments, team workshops, speaking engagements, and executive retreats. Since the achievement of these goals is often a multiple-step process, I have broken the objectives down into a listing of some of the fundamental behaviors that I often take to produce these results. Each action item is given a point value and I track the totals on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis.
My experience is that there is a high correlation between the level of action being taken and the outcomes that are achieved.
The Point System
One point actions include warm prospect calls, Linked in connections, writing a focused email message to a prospect or center of influence, researching an individual or company, or getting a business card from a prospect for follow up.
Two point actions include attending networking events, hot prospect calls, attending a business seminar, and giving or getting a qualified business referral.
Five point actions include setting a one on one new client discovery session, scheduling a presentation or speech, attending a business trade show, participating on a board of directors, and meeting with a center of influence.
Ten Point actions Actual face to face meetings including meetings over a meal or a cup of coffee with a qualified prospect.
Twenty point actions include securing an engagement. Feel free to add extra points based on the size of engagement.
What a Typical Day May Look Like
- 6 phone calls to warm prospects= 6 points
- 4 linked in connections= 4 points
- 1 discovery meeting with a viable prospect= 10 points
- Giving 2 referrals and getting one referral= 6 points
- Scheduling a speech on networking for a local business group= 5 points
- 8 follow-up e-mail messages and 6 follow up phone calls= 14 points
- Securing a business coaching assignment with an attorney who wants to make partner and increase their business development success = 20 points
Total= 65 points
My challenge to you is for you to create your own game and point system that will allow you to act your way to better results.
