Asking the right questions is not enough
A good conversation, an enthusiastic customer, and then nothing happens. Why good intentions stall and how to turn them into action.
"We'll send you a proposal this week." It was promised out loud, and everyone was enthusiastic. Three weeks later, no proposal has been sent. By now the customer has chosen someone else.
The problem
Many conversations go well right up to the moment they end. The right questions have been asked and a follow-up has been agreed. But the next step stalls. That is a shame, because that is exactly where the result is made. And time is tight: according to Salesforce, salespeople spend only 28 percent of their time actually selling.
The cause
Psychologists call it the gap between intention and behaviour. You plan to do something, but it never happens. Not because you do not want to, but because the intention is too vague.
Peter Gollwitzer and Paschal Sheeran set out to discover how to close that gap. They brought together 94 studies with more than 8,400 participants in total. The outcome is clear. People who made their plan concrete, with when, where and how, reached their goal considerably more often than people who only had a good intention.
"We'll send something over" is an intention. "Sanne will send the quote tomorrow before noon" is a plan.
the editorial team (Sanne is an example)
The solution
At the end of the conversation, turn every agreement into a plan straight away.
- Who does what? One name per action, not "we".
- When? A day and preferably a time.
- How? Is the email already drafted, is the follow-up meeting already in the calendar?
After every conversation, Stiqqs sets out the agreements, with who does what. The follow-up email is ready to send, and you add the follow-up meeting to your calendar with one click. So you do not just ask the right questions, you act on them too.