Turn No Shows Into Gold
Prefer to Watch: Here's the the Video
TL;DR
Sharpen your skills – Keep learning through books, podcasts, and roleplaying; trial and error only works if you analyze failures.
Track your numbers – Know your sit rate, close rate, contract size, and cancellations so you can pinpoint where to improve.
Generate your own sales – Ask for referrals after sales and no-sales, and prospect neighbors when you get a no-show.
Treat it like your business – Commission sales pay for results, not activity; discipline and initiative are what drive income.
In-Home Sales Consultant Tips: What to Do When No One’s Home
You do home improvement sales. You get your game face on, go through your pregame ritual drive hours to an in home appointment and knock on the door… and nobodys home!! What do you do? From being in this business for 35 years and literally managing thousands of sales people I’ve noticed that what you do when you are not in the home is just as crucial to making money as what you when you are in the home.
Final Thoughts on In-Home Sales Consultant Tips
Selling home improvements on commission requires self discipline and the mindset like you are running your own business. Nobody can actually see what you are doing once you are out and about. Nobody but you knows whether you just take a nap after you get no show or you actually go to work .
This not an activity job where you get paid by the hour whether you work or not. It is a productivity job where you only get paid for results. If you ran your own business and nobody came in would you just take a nap. It’s the same thing here. Here are three things you can and should be doing if you are not in a lead and will help you turn those no shows into gold including how I get referrals and self generate sales. Please listen to the end to hear all three so you don’t miss anything!
In-Home Sales Consultant Tip #1: Invest in Your Own Skills
The first thing you can do if have free time is that you should work on making yourself better. This is so simple but so many people won’t’ do it. Do you want to make more money? The only way for your to do that is to increase your skill set. The leads will never change, the customers will never get easier and everything else about your selling job can’t be controlled. The only controllable is your skill set.
There are only two ways to get better. The first way is trial and error and even that most sales people don’t get right. They run leads they they sell and they run leads they don’t and then go onto the next one. Either their ego or skill set won’t allow them to analyze the ones they missed to figure out where they lost it and what they could do differently the next time they had someone like that. That’ why learning by trial and error can be hit or miss.
The other way to learn is by studying from people who have already paid the dues and have figured out what works and doesn’t work . Kudos to you if you are watching this video because it shows you are trying to get better but hopefully you are learning something everyday by reading, listening to podcasts books, or role playing with your peers. It has to be a consistent process. Not only to constantly increase your skill set which will constantly increase your income but to replace the information you are losing. It’s like there is a hole in the back of your head where information is constantly leaking out.
How many times have you heard something and thought “wow I forgot all about that or I used to do that but stopped”. You have to keep refilling the knowledge. To stop wanting to learn is like saying you don’t want to make more money or that you can’t get any better than you are. Whether you have been doing this for 20 days or 20 years it blows me away why people don’t do this consistently.
In-Home Sales Consultant Tip #2: Know and Track Your Numbers
The second thing you need to do to make more money and be successful is to figure out a way to know and track your numbers. Hopefully if you have a good sales manager they are doing it for you but I find that’s it’s better not to leave your success in anyone’s hands but yourself.
After all do you think anyone cares about you and your income more than you? If you don’t know your numbers how can you adjust or know what to fix. Look at professional athletes. Do you think a professional football player doesn’t know his average yards per run or catch. A professional basketball player doesn’t know his free throw percentage or what percentage of the time he drives to the right vs the left?
Why do you think they know all of that? So they know where their weakness is and can adjust and get better on that statistic. The key word in all of that is professional. Remember the difference between a professional and an amateur is that the professional gets paid. If you sell in the home the numbers you should know and track are your sit rate, gross close rate, average contract price, cancellation and credit reject rate, net closing percentage and average dollar per sale.
All of these numbers are controllable by you. Ultimately the one number everyone knows is their paycheck but all of those numbers broken down are what makes your paycheck what it is. Something as simple as your average contract price. If you raise that by 10% you automatically get a 10% raise. But how do you do that if you don’t even know what it is? The numbers tell you where you can improve and what to work on.
In-Home Sales Consultant Tip #3: Generate Self-Sourced Sales
The third thing you need to do is figure out a way to generate at least one self generated sale a month if not more and do that when you get no showed. Most companies pay an extra 5 to 10 percent commission for self generated sales because of how expensive leads are. Most methods I use require an hour of extra work to generate one self generated sale. Even if they only paid you 3% more and your average contract price was only $10,000 that would be an additional $300.
That means I’m getting paid $300 an hour to do this. Most of you would be paid $500-$1000 an hour in extra commissions by learning how to do this effectively. Unfortunately the majority of sales people don’t even ask for referrals let alone have a dedicated system.
Asking for Referrals After a Sale
The easiest way to do that is to get referrals from the people I sell. The way I do that is after I make the sale(Caption: After Sale) and I'm in the post close where I am rapporting them again after the sale. The conversation usually sounds something like this. “Well, again, I appreciate your business and I know you bought because I promised you that the job would be excellent and that you'd be very happy, right?” yes “ Good, because after the job is done I want to come back and take some after pictures and make sure you're happy with everything. Would that be OK?”Yeah, that would be great, Ron. “I have a favor to ask you. If I make sure that I keep my promise to you, can you make a promise to me?” Well, what's that, Ron? “Well, if I keep my promise and you love everything and you're happy with the job, can you promise to help me get at least three people that you know are referrals that I could contact and see if they'd be interested what we do? This makes me look good with my company because referrals means happy customers”Most people say, yeah, I'll see what I can do.
Then when I go visit them after the job is done and double check that they are happy with everything I say ..”So did I keep my promise to you that you'd be happy with everything?” Yes. “Well do you remember your promise to me?” Ohh, what's that? Remember that you said you'd give me at least three people that I could contact and see if they'd be interested.” Now I get the referrals. Now, whether I'm asking for referrals here or some other times if people don't give you a referral usually what they say is “well I don't really know anyone right now.”
The easiest way to deal with that is for you to say “ohh, you think I'm asking you for the names of people that you know are interested in getting a new roof, right?” Ohh, yeah. “No, it's not something people normally talk about. I mean, did you tell all of your when friends you were looking at or getting a new roof?” No…not really “What I just needed are the names of three people that you know, that are homeowners that I could contact and see if they're interested in getting their roof done. Ohh, OK. And then get the three names. In the old days, they'd have to get their address book.
They have 100 names sitting in front of them, right on their phone. Sometimes if they're being a little stubborn and say well I don’t really know anyone I might literally have to point next door or across the street and say who lives there etc. Then get the name and number and contact them.
Asking for Referrals After a No-Sale
The other place I ask for referrals is from people who don't buy. Usually after I'm done, if they don't buy, I'll say well is there any constructive criticism you can give me in how explained everything today? And at that point most people feel guilty because they're not buying and they say ohh, everything was perfect. So if anyone asks you about getting a new roof, do you think you'd feel comfortable recommending us to find out about?
Ohh, yeah, that'd be no problem. And then I ask them for any referrals like I did earlier and use the same rebuttal for people who say they don’t know anyone. If nothing else get in the habit of asking . I also use the rapport I have by adding “and if you like me, this would really help because right now we're having a contest just to see who can get the most referrals and I’m winning. Then ask!!
Prospecting Neighbors After a No-Show
Another way to get self generated leads requires you to be aggressive and a hunter. Which if you are in sales I know you are. This is when I get a not home or no show. I usually go to the house to the left and the right and the three houses across the street, 5 houses and I knock on the door and I say ohh I'm sorry to bother you.
I show my ID and I say just really quick I wanted to check does John Smith live right here and I point to the house where I got no showed. Yes he does. Why? Well, because I'm from ABC hvac and we do free HVAC consultations to see whether people could save money with an HVAC system. And we had an appointment at 10:00 and he wasn't there. And since there is no cost or obligation and it’s free generally people wait a week or two to get an appointment and it’s rare they are not home so I wanted to make sure I had the right address.
You'd be surprised how many people at that point say, yeah, he lives there, but what do you mean by a free HVAC consultation or roofing consultation or whatever you do? And I'm able to get an appointment from them. Remember most homes in the neighborhood are the same age and if one person needs a home improvement done there’s a good chance their neighbors do as well.
And a lot of times if there's an interest instead of setting an appointment I might say, well, they're not home and you're home right now. Do you just want to go ahead and get the free consultation now. Sure, and then you go.
Final Thoughts on In-Home Sales Consultant Tips
Remember this is your business and you can’t be afraid to work it like one. Stop acting like the little lamb waiting to be fed everyday.
If you found this video helpful please see the post on “Failure Is Good” or the posts about Home Improvement Sales Closing”.
Happy Selling!
