Ex-Significant Other Pitch

Handling the following situation is one of the things that separate great salespeople from average salespeople:

You meet with a prospect, there is some definite interest, the sale advances to the proposal stage and then it doesn’t close. Average salespeople give up and move onto the next opportunity, while great salespeople find a way to rekindle the opportunity. A great way to do this is by using the ex-significant other pitch, which is patterned on how you would rekindle things with an old flame (I used this technique to successfully schedule a meeting this morning):

Hi Bill, Eric Young calling from Vorsight, how are you today? Good, I’m sure you don’t remember but I believe you met with a colleague of mine about 18 months ago to discuss our lead generation and inside sales training offerings? Oh, I’m glad you vaguely remember the conversation but allow me to add some more details. We specialize in helping our clients maximize their success in the first half of the sales cycle. Does that ring any bells? Great, the reason I was reaching back out is I’m sure a lot has changed for you over the past 18 months and we have also developed some new initiatives that we thought might be of interest to you. Would it be possible for us to reconnect when we are in town?

This is a simple, yet effective way to get back on your prospect’s radar screen. Feel free to share other success stories of rekindling opportunities that black-holed in the comments section.

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