When B2B Selling is Slow - 5 People You Can Call

It’s the biggest travel week of the year—and it feels like everyone except you has already clocked out for Thanksgiving. But your goals don’t take a holiday. So what do you do when it seems like no one else is working?

In this mini-pod, I’m sharing practical and tactical advice for owners and business leaders to stay productive during a slow week, without burning out. You’ll learn:

• Who’s still picking up the phone (hint: it might not be who you think!)
• How to give yourself a little grace while still making progress

If you’re feeling frustrated by the pace this week, this episode will inspire you to shift your focus, take action, and set yourself up for success—not just for this week but for the months ahead.

Companion content:

• Podcast episode: How to move your deals along when everyone's in holiday mode.
• Podcast episode: Strategies for finishing your year strong
• Podcast episode: AI-powered strategies to close deals and ill up your 2025 pipeline

Show notes:

• Episode recorded and edited using Descript
• Repurposed content, such as this description created using CastMagic
• Visit Rise of Us for more information about Summer's services
• Connect with Summer on LinkedIn

Transcript

0:00

Hello. And welcome back to C-suite sidekick. Here's another mini pod for you. And this one is made, especially for the biggest travel week of the year. You know, when no one's working, it seems. We're revisiting a topic that was pertinent back during the summertime, which is who can you call when it seems like no one else is working. We're going to do a slight Thanksgiving twist to that. Because if you're like me, you're starting to hear that things are going to have to bump out until after Thanksgiving. You might be having people ask if you're working maybe you're starting to realize that not a lot of folks are working this week. Maybe you're anticipating it. Either way. You're likely to feel some frustrations. So I get it. Now, this is a little peak into the type of coaching that I do when I work with revenue teams. Sales folks. Uh, customer service folks, customer experience folks. But no matter who you are. Thanksgiving week if you're working. You are going to have some folks that you're trying to reach. Uh, in order to get some business done or move our project along. And you're going to hit a couple of roadblocks because people are either out of the office or they're distracted. And I get your frustration. It's not like your goals. Take a vacation. So let's focus on. When it seems like you're the only one working or no one else is answering. Who can you call? I've got five people, plus a funny Thanksgiving themed little bonus at the end. Number one, you know, who's always willing to take your call. Other than your mom, of course, is a salesperson. This is the perfect week to lean into your partnerships. Now first, some reminders on why partnerships are important. The stats vary, but in general partner leads are two to five times more likely to close. They tend to close faster and they're often larger or more valuable than your average deal. So call your partners. But not to commiserate about the fact. Fact that no one else is working this week. Although I'll give you a little bit of grace there. They're going to understand. Because they're feeling it too. Schedule some time to meet with your referral partners in person. If you're close. Or a video call if you're not and make sure you set a little bit of structure. So there's some intentionality here. Otherwise, you're likely to spend half a day having lunch with your business friend and you feel like you worked, but you kind of didn't you just had a burger. Burgers or great. Don't get me wrong, but that's not our focus here. One hour meetings, 90 minutes. If you're having lunch. Set the expectation in advance so that they can prepare that you're going to go through your prospects and your clients. You're going to see who you can refer to each other. If you're a leader or a business owner, you're going to want to look at how you can fold this partner into your marketing efforts next year, start making some plans to do a blog together, do a webinar together or whatever it is that you do. Look for ways to tag team each other to win together or to help elevate each other's businesses. Number two. Check in on your clients. Remember that your best clients can also be your best partners. We don't have time to get into details here, but just know that this play is one part partnership. And one part customer success. Check in to see how they're doing. Listen for any service issues, follow customer success protocols. If you hear anything. The client's happy. Ask for referrals and also get stories that you can send over to marketing. If you need help on how to ask for referrals without sounding goofy. Let me know. I've got an entire session around that. Something to remember is that this is exactly the time of year when your competitors are calling on your clients. Be sure to show them some love so that they're less likely to take that call. Right. And also, this is a time if you're a senior leader or a business owner. To connect with the person who is at your same level within the organization. Studies will also show that if your relationship is basically based on the sales person, calling into the client or the service person, working with their main contact. But your relationship with that client is very vulnerable. You're going to strengthen that relationship by connecting everyone in your org chart to every one. With a corresponding title on there or chart. If that makes sense, we can go into this in a little bit greater detail later. But even if you're not in sales, it's a good idea to go call your counterpart, especially if it is a key client. Now we touched on competitors. Speaking of competitors, that's number three. Remember those clients that you lost to competitors over the last year or so? Well guess what now in the spirit of giving you get to return that favor. I have an entire session around selling into competitive accounts. Another. Another thing we don't have time for today. The basic concept is that salespeople tend to abandon a client after they win the deal. And also research shows that B2B buyers, your customers expect the relationship to continue. After the sale is done. I like to think about some of these things as relating to a marriage. You don't want to court somebody and fallen all over them and be, be just great. And then when you get business married, you know, when they signed the contract, you just sort of set them off to the side and start concentrating on somebody else. Yeah. Clients don't like. That. And guess what. Your competitors are guilty of that. We're probably a little guilty as well. That's why I told you to call your clients before calling your former clients. So go in there, show your former clients some love, show them some new and innovative ideas. This is a great time to talk about. New features you put in this year and why they were impactful share and anonymized client success, things like that. And you might look for a little crack in the armor. Maybe you've got a shot at winning back that client. In the near future. Number four. Your internal partners. We've talked quite a bit about aligning with marketing, and let's also not forget service implementation teams at it. What cool stuff is it working on? They don't always remember to tell the sales and marketing folks. Customer service teams also tend to. Have insights into. Neat things that clients are doing with the system. Little compliments that clients have given small wins on the client, size that from a marketing or a sales perspective, they don't always know just how valuable those little nuggets are. So this is a good time to meet with them, to catch up with them, to see how things are going and to glean some of those, you know, new features that you can tease client success stories. If you. You are. A business owner or you're in the C-suite. This might be the time to meet with your department heads and just talk to them about how things are going. And maybe since we're on this topic, we can. Fold in a little bit of an alignment there, you know, are you guys working together on anything? It's a good week to be alignment focused. Because you might have trouble catching clients and prospects. Now someone. Someone else. That you can call on this week. Business owners, higher up folks. If you work with small businesses, guess what? Sometimes the owner sticks around to take care of lingering business during a slow week and they let their folks have the time off. If you work with larger organizations, this is the time when executive assistance or some of those gatekeepers go on vacation and you might find a senior leader. Who's got some free time on their hands because. A lot of people are on vacation, right. They might be willing to pick up the phone and talk to you directly. Now, disclaimer, it's not going to be all of them because a lot of senior leaders have a lot of PTO because they've been with the company a lot of years and they tend to just take the whole week off. But you never know, it is definitely worth a shot calling. Hi this week, the owner of a small business and that senior leader that you've been hoping to catch. What do you have to lose? And then also give yourself some grace. It doesn't have to be all work all the time. You don't have to be operating at 110% productivity every single day of your life. This can be a slower week. And here's your little Thanksgiving tip. Your bonus person, you can call. Your mom. Are your grandma. If you're any thing like me, your mom probably thinks you should call much more frequently and now might be a week that you actually do have some free time. You know, for an hour long conversation about the weather. And if it's not fun to call your mom, paul a colleague or a friend you haven't talked to for a while, you know, just have a fun conversation. Maybe you talk about what you do for work or what you've been up to lately and maybe you don't, um, In any event, it will do your soul some good. And when your soul feels right, you show up to work as your best self. And you're giving your best self to your employees and to your customers. So it's all, it's all part of the same thing, right? So let's wrap it up. During times when clients and prospects are taking vacation. Right around this holiday. There's another holiday next month, where not a lot of folks are going to be working. Don't beat yourself up and get down about it. Call people that you know, will answer or at least call you back. Use this time to build relationships and always look for ways to gain referrals. I'm a fractional revenue leader who definitely thinks that coaching should be part of every revenue leaders, playbook. I don't use any particular system or methodology as much as I look at the way people work. I look at buyer behaviors and I craft personalized approaches that are designed to resonate with not only the buyer, but also the person who is delivering it. If you want to explore a little bit more about how a highly customized revenues strategy plus coaching might look in your organization. You know where to find me. On LinkedIn. I am summer Polenti rhymes with spaghetti. You can find me on my website@theriseofus.com. I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving week. And thank you so much for listening.