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Prospecting
One of the first steps is identifying potential customers, and building a list of those prospects. The goal is to build a long list of qualified prospects. There are two very important concepts in that sentence:- build a long list
- qualify your prospects
Professionals don't just grab a phone book and call it their prospect list. Instead, they get involved in all kinds of organizations where they can meet people and network. Go to the local Rotary Club, Kiwanis Club, or other civic organization and you'll meet a half dozen people who tell you what they do, give you a business card, and start asking you questions. What are they doing? They are working on their prospect list.
If you're ever fortunate enough to see a company's prospect list (and it will be a closely guarded secret), you'll notice that their prospects are divided into categories: people we know (either we have sold to them or we have tried to sell to them) and people we want to know. Next to each name is contact information, relationship information, hobbies/interests, the last time someone spoke to him and the number of times we've spoken to him. The pros know that relationship building can take years, so they never take a good name off their prospect list.
A salesperson's job is to add names to the prospect list, help to qualify leads, build relationships, and close business. What does it mean to qualify the lead? That means evaluate whether or not the prospect is a potential customer. If the name on the list is not someone your company wants to do business with, they take the name off the list. It can take years to close a piece of business. The pros don't want to waste their time building relationships with the wrong people.
Well how does this knowledge of prospecting help a TKE chapter? First of all think about your prospect list? Do you have one? How big is it? What kinds of names are on it? Those are the questions to ask your recruitment committee and chairman.
All too often, the chapter starts off by getting the names of incoming freshmen and thinking they have a prospect list. Wrong. You have started the process by collecting names, but now you need to qualify those names. And trying to qualify 10,000 incoming male students might take you a year. Instead, start building a list of men who share the same values that we share. That's what values-based recruitment is all about. Think about love, charity, and esteem and build your list accordingly. You might find it helpful to think like this:
- Scholarship - Collect names of men who have good grades. They are graduating high school with honors, or tops in their class, or are enrolling in honors classes at college. Who has been inducted into freshman honor societies? Who do our professors think are good students?
- Character - Collect names of men who have been involved in other values-based organizations like Scouting. Another great source of referrals is sororities. Ask the girls for names of gentlemen who should be in a fraternity, but aren't.
- Leadership - Research student government, residence hall associations, and other clubs and organizations to find out who their leaders are and then recruit those men.
- Teamwork - Who is playing intramural sports other than Greeks? Find the names of the winners of the residence hall leagues and add them to your prospect list.
- Service - Read your campus newspaper and figure out who is participating in community service.
- Brotherhood - Ask the members of your chapter for referrals; find out who they study with, who they attend class with, who they know from back home. All are great sources of names for your prospect list.