Sales Appointment Setting With Your Ideal Prospects

Michael Glaubitz

A major challenge for a salesperson today is simply a lack of appointments. One of the most important things for success is sales appointment setting. But how do you get prospects to agree to meet with you?

It can be intimidating to reach out to ideal prospects and try to set a sales appointment, but taking the right approach is key. Here are some tips for setting up an appointment in the sales funnel.

Set appointments only with your ideal prospects

The best salespeople focus on the sales process, not just on setting random sales appointments. When you’re trying to set an appointment with a prospect, it’s important to think about who your ideal customer is and make sure the person you’re dealing with fits that description.


Research your prospects and focus only on setting up an appointment with them. Invest your energy in a sales appointment that you know has the potential to be successful, instead of wasting it on prospects who are unqualified or unlikely to convert.

Understand the upside

When you reach out to a prospect, it’s important to understand the potential upside of meeting with them. Make sure they understand how they can benefit from your product or service and what value they will get from the sales appointment. You need to make sure that prospects are motivated to meet with you—so emphasize the potential upside before setting sales appointments.

Create an outreach machine

We have the fortunate opportunity to live at times when automation of sales outreach is an amazing option. However, using the best software, we could systemize and automate everything else to help you as long as you maintain the human part of the process. Don’t rely totally on automation but this one is perfect for LinkedIn and Email Outreach.


Setting sales appointments and sales prospecting needs a human touch. Make sure your sales outreach machine includes personal emails, and direct messages when appropriate, as well as automated processes like email automation and social media marketing.

Engage your lead in a conversation

Your first interaction will be to begin a conversation. Make sure you’re knowledgeable about the topic, provide useful information, and don’t overwhelm them with sales pitches. Listen carefully to what they have to say and make sure that you follow up on their questions.


Focus on building a relationship. Be friendly and professional, but don’t be too salesy or pushy. As the conversation progresses you can naturally flow to the next steps.

How do I schedule appointments with a customer?

The best way to schedule sales appointments is to use a sales appointment scheduling tool. This will allow you to quickly and efficiently book sales cycle calls. Most sales appointment scheduling tools come with powerful features such as automated reminders, easy calendar integration, and the ability to customize your sales process.


These tools make it easier to manage your sales appointments. They also can make it easier for your prospects to make appointments. Nothing feels better than seeing a new appointment pop up on your calendar when you did no outreach.

Have contingencies

Finally, make sure you have contingencies in place when sales appointment setting. This means having a backup plan in case the sales appointment doesn’t go as planned. Have an alternative sales strategy that you can use if the sales meeting doesn’t work out—this could include scheduling a follow-up call or sending additional sales collateral.

Be a doctor to address whatever ails your prospects

Start sales conversations with a diagnosis instead of a sales pitch. A sales call should begin with an understanding of your prospect’s needs and objectives. And this usually requires some research and preparation before you pick up the phone.


Once you understand their problems, be bold and open the conversation by asking if they’re having trouble solving the issue. This makes salespeople come off as knowledgeable, helpful, and trustworthy — three key components of successful sales appointment setting.


If prospects don’t want to talk or seem uninterested in sales appointments, try reframing the sales call as a “consultation” instead.

Know your IPP

IPP – Ideal Prospect Profiles. If you are going to set up a sales meeting or send e-mails you must have the ability to know the person you want to talk to. It is very important. How many times does someone want to ask for a conversation, and then they just have to ask for a response?


Let’s say after all the work we’ve done, the person is the wrong person. It may have happened due to the wrong IPP. Having an off-base IPP means that you waste your time talking to people who never bought anything from you.

What Should An Appointment Setter Do?

Demonstrate very quick insight

Making sales appointments requires demonstrating authority and expertise. You’ll need quick insights because you’re dealing with busy clients. Set yourself apart from a salesperson if you offer honest and thorough insight into a customer.


For salespeople, it’s essential to understand their prospects’ pain points before jumping into a sales pitch. A salesperson needs to be prepared with data and research that can back up their insights and lead the conversation in the right direction.

Disqualify the rabble during discovery

The sales discovery process is the best chance salespeople have to identify qualified leads. Salespeople need to ask critical questions, such as how they measure success and what they are looking for in a solution.


These conversations should focus on customers’ needs — not on sales features — so salespeople can effectively disqualify prospects who do not fit their sales criteria.


Ultimately, salespeople should remember that sales appointment setting is not about selling; it’s about building relationships. If a salesperson can quickly demonstrate authority and expertise, build trust, and start meaningful conversations with prospects, sales success will follow.

Make time for client research

It’s also important salespeople do their research to find out more about their prospects. Learning the customer’s organization and challenges takes time but make sales conversations much easier.


Salespeople should use a combination of data points such as company size, industry, and challenges to create sales stories that speak directly to customers. By understanding each sales prospect’s situation, salespeople can tailor their solutions to increase the odds of setting a sales appointment.


Also, salespeople should consider sales intelligence software such as a sales engagement platform to help them capture and analyze customer data quickly. With the right sales tools in hand, salespeople can save time on sales research and close sales appointments faster.

Know your ideal customer

Finally, salespeople need to develop a clear idea of who their ideal customer is. Understand what their needs and objectives are so sales calls can be tailored specifically for them. This will make sales conversations more meaningful and increase the odds of sales appointment setting success.

More appointment-setting steps

These are just a few sales appointment setting tips to get you started. There are other sales steps that salespeople need to take during sales appointment setting, such as creating a sales script and following up with prospects after the call.


Salespeople need to be persistent in their efforts and not give up at the first sign of resistance.

Personalize your message

Personalizing your marketing will make your outreach better. If salespeople know who their customer is, they can create sales messages that are tailored to the person.


For example, salespeople should use first names and avoid generic language. Also, salespeople should be aware of industry news or events that could affect prospects’ buying decisions. Being in the know helps salespeople build trust and credibility with customers.

Make scheduling easy for your clients

If salespeople can make sales appointment scheduling easier for customers, they’re more likely to agree to a sales call. Salespeople should consider sales appointment tools that allow customers to book sales appointments directly from their computers or smartphones.


Also, salespeople should use an online calendar scheduler that syncs with their calendar so they can avoid scheduling conflicts.


Having an effective sales process in place is key to sales appointment setting success. With the right sales techniques, salespeople can start closing more sales appointments and hit their sales goals faster.

Sales appointment setting tips

Many sales appointments are created without putting the necessary effort into the right type of leads. Sales appointment settings provide a key barrier to closing deals. To save time on cold calls that don’t go anywhere, the sales leader should set an organizational strategy to position the team for success.

Know your leads inside and out

When your representatives begin to visit customers, you must know who they are talking to and what the products and services that your product offers will help them solve problems.


Even though it’s intrusive and uncomfortable, one must be present without a real motive to be there. It’s important to spend a good amount of time building a good client profile that can inform the entire marketing campaign, including how you promote and market the solution, how it can affect pain points, and finally how it’s done.


If you can ask prospective customers the questions they are asking you then you have a better chance of getting an interview.

Pre-close with the value proposition

At that point, the prospect needs to consider their problems and you should adjust slightly to give you some details about your product. Your best chance is to use a constructive, supportive tone instead of trying to force buyers into signing up with no details.


Take advantage of information gathered during research to link your offer to the realities of their daily life. Can you provide the opportunity for your business to gain an edge over the competition or to be noticed by other business owners and customers?

Prepare for objections

Be ready for sales objections, and always have the plan to handle them. If salespeople are prepared with answers to common sales objections, they can address customer issues more quickly and convincingly.


They should also be equipped with story sales techniques so that customers can better understand the product or service being offered. If salespeople make sure their sales process is concise and straightforward, customers can easily understand how the product or service will help them.

Share problems to agitate a problem

Agitating a problem is all about salespeople uncovering the root of customer problems and finding out how they can be solved. Salespeople need to ask questions that reveal details about their customers’ issues so that sales conversations are more productive.


The goal is to have customers identify the pain points that need to be solved and to understand how salespeople’s products or services can help.

Set a clear goal

As with every sales strategy appointments will be successful by focusing clearly on achieving the right goal. It’s aimed at getting people willing to commit to continuing the conversation. It may sound easy, however, you must understand the fact that selling appointments are usually set up around two goals: it is the ultimate goal of closing the deal, but the short-term goal is in acquiring the first serious “yes”.

Give an elevator pitch

Once you’re confident that the prospective customer has a few minutes to hear you speak, you’re ready to give a brief elevator pitch. The elevator pitch is simple sentences describing how the product will help customers.


Sales representatives should think of sales appointment setting as a way to figure out how they can help the customer solve their problem. This is not the time for salespeople to be pushing sales but rather listening and understanding what it is that customers need to make sure that sales conversations are more productive.

Confirm the prospect is available

When you’re visiting an office, you need to make sure the prospect has enough time to talk before you start. You appear unexpectedly and you may enter their office at inconvenient times. In doing this, you’ll show prospective purchasers that it respects your time–a very easy way to give you a few minutes to prove your solution and put you on your way to scheduling an appointment.

Ask for the appointment

Some people forget to ask for appointments. Again, this will help you make an appointment. When salespeople ask for an appointment, they don’t have to be pushy or salesy. A simple “I think it would be a great idea if we could get together and discuss this further” should do the trick.

Set appointments from the field

If your staff set up appointments at your location, you should ensure canvassing agents can view sales calendars for rep availability immediately to make it easier to get the prospect in person.


If you set sales appointments from the field, it is important to let sales reps know which customer visits are booked and what times they should expect sales prospects.

Conclusion

Sales appointment setting can be a challenge, but it’s worth taking the time to learn how to do it effectively. By preparing for sales objections and agitating problems, sales reps can increase their chances of booking an appointment with a prospect. It’s also important to set clear goals for each sales meeting and to give a brief elevator pitch describing how the product will help the customer.


Finally, always confirm that the prospect has enough time to talk before starting the sales conversation. With these tips in mind, sales reps can feel more confident when setting appointments from the field or over the phone.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michael Glaubitz

Michael has over 22 years in Public Safety but has always had side jobs. From Logistics to Real Estate, Finance, and Staffing there have been many experiences. These all lead to Social Selling and Marketing as both a Salesperson, Small Business Marketer and Recruiter. By combining all of this experience with an innate desire to serve others he plans to deliver more value than you can handle.

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