The 5 O’clock Track Team
Sales is a job with inherent flexibility. Some salespeople exercise their flexibility by working hard all week and cutting out a little early on Fridays—and their sales leaders let such behavior slide. They feel that if a salesperson is above plan they can do whatever they want. But is a short Friday a well-deserved break or a missed sales opportunity?
Consider Mike and Marie. Mike is a top performer. He’s well respected and consistently hits his sales quota. Marie is a top performer too, and also well respected. Unlike Mike, though, she consistently beats her sales quota. What’s the difference between the two? Call either of them on any given Friday at 4:30 p.m. and you’ll figure it out.
Mike cuts out early on Fridays. Marie does not. She looks forward to Friday afternoons, but for a different reason than he does.
Marie knows that her most senior buyers, the ones who make the decisions on her largest deals, work a full Friday. They like the latter part of the week. It’s productive time for them. As the office clears out they can hunker down and get some work done. Their spirits are high as they wrap up the current week and plan for the upcoming one.
Marie sees this as a great time to make connections with these hard-to-reach folks. She has a good chance of reaching and influencing them, as no other salespeople are calling them. She knows they are in a positive frame of mind and more open to considering good ideas. Her ideas. This coupled with a “let’s wrap up this week and plan for the next one” mindset is a good scenario for a sales conversation.
Marie has a distinct selling advantage on Fridays. The sales-signal-to-noise ratio is high. All she needs to do is make a connection with her buyer after her competition has packed it in for the week.
On Friday afternoons Marie also has easy access to the admin and operational folks within her own company. She has them all to herself. She uses this time to deepen relationships with them. They are vital to her sales success. They find focusing on her needs much easier during this time, when there are no line-ups at their doors.
Marie enjoys the relative quiet in the sales office too. She wraps up her week and prepares for the upcoming one. She crafts strategies to close her deals and gets ready to show them to her sales manager on Monday. Thus, she starts her next week one step ahead, rather than behind the eight ball.
Marie’s sales success is the result of good sales habits. She reaches out to her contacts when others do not. She works hard while others take slack time.
Shaping the behaviour of the sales team is a core duty of any sales leader. One way to do this is to give team members role models to emulate. Healthy sales behaviors exist within your team already. Make it an obsession to catch your people doing something right. Point out their great sales habits. Celebrate them. Explain to your team why those behaviors are great and how they connect to success. Encourage others to follow suit.
Taking advantage of the relative quiet at the end of any work day can help lead to sales success, but there seems to be some magic to the Friday element. . Being a member of the Friday afternoon track team generally precludes one from being a member of the company’s President’s Club sales team. Make this common knowledge within your team.
