States are starting to open back up again (maybe a second or third attempt for your state). Airlines are bringing back pilots. Marriott Bonvoy is offering promotions that require you to actually stay at a hotel.
That can only mean one thing for a field sales rep, it’s time to get back out there!
As the world continues to open back up, nearly everyone is feeling a sense of urgency to make up for lost revenue in 2020. You can’t waste precious time executing on a hunch that doesn’t pan out – your time is more valuable than ever.
But how can you ensure that you are shifting your attention to the more profitable markets and areas?
By following the data.
This is where Geopointe comes in. You need to ensure you are going after the right prospects and leads in order to avoid wasting precious time and energy. Luckily, Geopointe has multiple features that will help you build call lists, surface insights, and take focused action.
Prioritize your accounts with heat maps
You probably haven’t seen anyone in awhile, so you need to make up for lost time with your accounts & prospects. Unfortunately you’re only one person, so you can’t visit them all right away.
You’ll have to prioritize the accounts you need to visit first, whether that’s the accounts with the highest ARR, or the accounts that haven’t been visited for the longest period of time. Visualizing those accounts on a map makes this so much easier than if you had to rely on spreadsheets and reports to compare zip codes or cities.
In order to narrow down your potential targets, you can use Shape Search to look for accounts only within your territory. Alternatively, use the Everywhere Search to look for accounts and prospects anywhere in the world – this is especially helpful for companies that do business globally.
Use Geopointe’s heat mapping to figure out where the most important accounts to target are, and see if any others that are nearby can fit into your schedule.
Plan out travel ahead of time with Calendar-Based Scheduling
It’s stressful to start traveling again – you’re out of practice and there are so many little things you’ve forgotten that can throw a wrench in your plans. Plan out your days ahead of time so that you have one less thing to worry about.
With Calendar-Based Scheduling, you can select the accounts you want to visit on your upcoming trip and see a geographic perspective of your schedule. You’ll be able to see where each stop is in relation to one another, and keep track of where you have to be and when.
Setting up your schedule is easier and faster when you’re able to add appointments directly from the map into the calendar staging area, and then figure out the best times to visit each account. Once you have your day – or week – set up, you can reference the calendar throughout your trip to make sure you stay on track.
Find the fastest and most efficient route with route optimization
Being able to build routes is one thing, being able to optimize that route so you can hit as many stops as possible in as little time as possible is a whole other thing.
Geopointe’s built-in route optimization capabilities are incredibly helpful for finding the best route. Make sure you are hitting different accounts in the most efficient order based on location, and free up enough time to squeeze one extra visit in.
It’s probably been a long time since you were last out in your territory, so you’ll be grateful for the turn-by-turn directions. There are also the little things that are so easy to forget – think construction season and unexpected detours. The ability to save these routes and access them on your mobile phone means you can even use your navigation app of choice (Waze, Google Maps, or Apple Maps).
Also, with Geopointe routes, you can plan for a buffer between appointments in addition to calculating drive time, so that you can avoid running late if anything comes up along the way.
Find a place to meet with Nearby Search
Some people are still working from home, and don’t want to meet near the office anymore. Use Nearby Search, which taps into Google Places, to find a local coffee shop in the city they live in, and plan to meet up there.
With Geopointe’s Nearby Search option, you can select an address anywhere on the map and search for things within a certain distance of that location. For example, if you plan on taking a customer out for dinner and want to make it easy for them to get to, input their address and set the search distance for restaurants within a 15 minute drive.
If early on in the travel planning you don’t know specifically where your visit will be, but know the city it’s in, you can use Geopointe’s Map View Search to look at locations for meetups in the general area. You can zoom in and out to include larger or smaller portions of the map in the search, and it won’t expand beyond what’s visible on your screen.
Another thing you may not have thought of – many places require reservations now and hours have changed, so you’ll want to check out Google Places to double check all the necessary information about a place before suggesting it.
Keep track of visits with Check-in
When you’re making up for lost time, your days get jam-packed with visits and meetings, leaving little room for anything in between. This means you can quickly fall behind on notes and follow-up tasks from your visits if you aren’t logging notes at each stop.
Luckily, Geopointe’s Check-in functionality makes it easy to take notes and create tasks in Salesforce on-the-go. No more waiting until the end of the day or even the next day to log all your meetings, adding extra time to your days. Geopointe makes it easier to keep your data accurate without requiring extra effort on your part.
Be a step ahead of the competition
You may not be back out in the field yet, but you will be – soon. If you don’t prepare yourself now, you’ll find yourself behind your competitors who have been proactive.
Even without the setbacks of 2020, sales teams are always looking to increase the sales pipeline more efficiently and effectively. The goal will always be to “do more, better,” it’s just a little more urgent now.
But you don’t have to do it alone – you can use the tools that Geopointe makes accessible to dramatically reduce the amount of time you spend planning. With Geopointe, you’ll quickly see tangible results as our solution helps you speed up your outreach and ensure you’re targeting the right people.
If you have a data-driven plan of attack for which accounts to target first, Calendar-Based Scheduling and routing to plan out your visits, and a host of other tools in your Geopointe toolkit, you’ll be unstoppable.
