Did you give them a chance? (Five ways to get results for your efforts - The Power of Five)

Something that happened to me personally inspired this thought. I was headed off to a phone conference, met with my client who scheduled the call only to find out I was an hour early. I rushed out for nothing because I did not spend the time to read the email through. The email said 9:00 AM Central time, not 9:00 AM Eastern time. In my rush to get to the next thing I glazed over the email, scheduled the call in my planner and moved on. The client was shocked to see me an hour before the meeting and thought I was there for another reason.

If you are having an issue getting prospects to meet with you chances are you or they are doing the same thing. Rushing to get onto the next thing, whatever it is and not properly sharing or receiving the message. Help your prospect make an informed decision.

Here are a 5 ways to help you avoid rushing people to a decision:

• Approach with excitement, not with details.
• Invite them to a meeting, one-on-one, phone, web-conference. Invite without losing control: "If I set up a time for us to meet are you serious enough to attend? This is serious and I can't waste time."
• Confirm your appointment - Confirm with conviction: (Just like your doctor): "I am following up on our meeting tomorrow. Are you still planning to attend ? My schedule is filling up (conference call is filling up) and if you cancel I am not sure when I can get you back in, it will probably be a couple of weeks."
• Never answer questions before your meeting. Regardless what the question is, let them know that all of their questions will be answered when you meet. You can give them many reasons for this but the best ones are: You have a partner and they can better answer the questions or They have to see it for themselves, you don't want to ruin it for them, etc.
• Work with your upline, sideline, downline. Having a second person who is also involved with the business available, even if it is over the phone or internet, helps the person see that this is more than they thought.

Michael Zimmer is the author of the Power of Five System, 5 lessons every Entrepreneur should know about building a Multi-Million Dollar Network.