One of the hardest parts of being in sales is creating a list of people to sell to. Finding prospects and creating that list may seem tedious and hard, but in reality it doesn’t have to be! Here's a simple 5-step process that will walk you through the steps to creating an amazing prospect list in no time.
1. Pick a company to focus on.
The first step is simply choosing a place to start. You can’t do anything without a starting point! Pick a company that you feel would be a beneficial prospect for your company. (Make sure it meets your ideal customer profile.) You are now ready to begin creating your list. Boom—step 1 is already complete, and you haven’t even had to really do anything yet!
2. Go to the company's website.
Now that you have this company’s name in your mind, you'll then go to their main website and check it out. You should look for a tab that says something along the lines of, “Contact Us” or “About Us,” usually the jackpot for finding the names and emails you are on the hunt for. You are wanting to specifically find people with titles such as “manager” or "director" or have titles that contain these words. Once you have this, you will want to begin actually creating your amazing masterpiece of a list.
3. Create your list.
Now that you are at your target company's website and have found your target prospect(s), the next step is to create a simple spreadsheet to cover the essentials (and only the essentials—keep it clean and simple) of what you'll need in order to contact each person. The column titles should be “company”, “city”, “first name”, “last name”, “email”, and “phone number” (mailing address optional, if you need it). This should be enough to cover all of the necessary information without seeming over-crowded.
4. Sort your list and simplify.
Now if you’re anything like me, you will have created yourself a list that has overlapping information such as manager names, numbers, etc. This is your chance to delete these in order to make sure that your list is concise and not repetitive in any way. After all, this list is a work of art….
5. Repeat.
Now that you have gone through all of the steps with this first company, it’s time to tackle the next company. Pick a new focus company, go to their website, find the contact page, and repeat!
This process is simple, but effective, especially if you don't have access to prospecting software. You’ve got this, go get em’ champ!
