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Is Your Sales Team Stuck in Hopa Hopa Land?

By April 12, 2011January 3rd, 20163 Comments
Anita Grantham

Anita Grantham

Today’s blog post is by one of our Phoenix Certified Partners, Anita Grantham. Anita is EVP of Business Development at Diversified Human Resources. Thanks for sharing your wisdom with us today, Anita!

How many of you have worked for leaders that implement culture based on the last book they have read? If you are lucky, you may get to experience six different cultures during any fiscal year!

Fortunately, The Whale Hunters Process™, when implemented by a leader and his or her team can alleviate this experience for your workforce! How? In my experience, implementing The Whale Hunters Process™ has helped our team build, be clear and save time.

Team Build:  When we created our target filter, we enhanced our communication and had great debate on what characteristics our clients must have to make them a “right” fit for our services. Still today, when implementing the target filter, our group discusses the 5 W’s around the specifics on the client and how to score them in our filter.

Be Clear:  During the harvest stage of our client interaction, our team is clear on what services and products we need to deliver, based on what was promised during the sales process. This is often the toughest part of the sale, making sure the team is clear on what the expectations are of the client and of our internal service team.

Save Time:  By knowing what “whales” we are hunting, our sales team can save time not hunting targets who are not a match for our products or services. We have been able to stream line our sales process to maximize the talents of our sales professionals, helping them focus on the deals they can actually close, not the ones stuck in “hopa-hopa” land! What is “hopa-hopa”? As our Denver President, Patrick Wieland shares, “Hopa-hopa is an emotional connection to a potential sale.” As a professional you believe you can close it, without objectively looking at the facts around what that client actually needs, so we end up hoping the deal will close when realistically it most likely will not.”

Have you had a deal stuck in Hopa Hopa land? What was the result? Create your culture around process, communicate clear expectations for your team and client, and save time by avoiding Hopa Hopa land in using the great tools outlined in Whale Hunting: How to Land Big Sales and Transform Your Company .

  • Thanks for guesting today Anita! I always love to hear how companies are implementing The Whale Hunters Process and what results they are achieving. Appreciate your taking time to write about it.

  • From one Anita to another, your words are akin to angels singing. It’s difficult to decide on strategy when there is so much out there and so many opportunities that are presented. Determining and then focusing on core competency is critical.

  • Thanks Anita! Yes it is hard to stay focused, a good process is the key for sure!

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