One of the biggest concerns our consultants have is how they are going to expand their network beyond their friends and family.
Luckily, there is an endless list of possibilities regarding how you can build and expand your sales network – from putting yourself out there “in-person” at events such as networking, clubs, societies, curating your own events, going to the pub or gym and starting new hobbies, or connecting with each other “virtually” such as through social media, PR, content marketing and email.
Steve Witt, Co-Founder of Not Just Travel, offers a simple yet highly effective sales process that takes just an hour or two for anyone in the consumer sales world who wants to expand their sales network. The process creates exponential growth in leads and potential customers.
The process is called FROGS. Many of you will have heard of it in training, but even so, just before Peaks is a great time to revisit it and increase that sales network.
FROGS stands for; FRIENDS – RELATIVES – ORGANISATIONS – GEOGRAPHY – SAME NAME
And
here’s step-by-step, how to do it:
FRIENDS
Go through all the contacts on your phone, your phone book, your Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter profiles. Go through old address books (retro!) and scour your life for people you know. Then think about who those people know – their friends and family members. Map them all out and take time thinking thoroughly about their social and family circles. You might be surprised and rekindle some cherished friendships along the way!
RELATIVES
Ideally your family network is a supportive one and once family members see what a success you’ve made of your business, they will buy from you. As well as relatives, think about all their friends and associates too. Map out each individual on a page and build up concentric circles of who those people know – and their friends. Then plan about how you might be able to draw them into your circle through the offer of great service and value.
ORGANISATIONS
Again, this is where a mind map (writing organisations down on a piece of paper) can come in handy. Write down in circles all the organisations you know – charities, Facebook groups, work, religious, social groups. Then map out all the individuals in each group – and all the people they know too. You’ll find the list is almost endless.
GEOGRAPHY
Think of your life as an onion with many layers. Start small such as mapping out the people on your street, then community, then local area, then county, wider with everyone you know dotted around the country county by county. And then all the people you know who live abroad – people you’ve met on holiday, through work and your social life.
SAME NAME
This is a powerful trigger which gets you thinking differently. Start with everyone you know with the same name as you. Then go through a hunt for people you know called Jo, David, Sarah etc. Then think about who each of those people know and so on – and before you know it, a list of 50 people will become 500.
What next?
The most important step is to log them all in a sales list – whatever you use be it Excel or a paid-for CRM database. Then go through that list and make contact. There’s no point doing any of the above if you don’t then act on it, approach them and follow up with them. It’s simple – our most successful franchisees are the ones that follow the FROGS technique and follow it up with a solid sales process. It’s not magic – it’s down to following the process and acting on it. They then offer a level of service that is memorable. That has the wow factor. In turn they become the go-to Travel Consultant.
When you find customers, the next step is how to keep them. Read this inspiring story of one of our Travel Consultants and how he goes the extra mile to look after his customers. Read article here.
