Great Clients Are Created From a Great Sales Process

Good clients are born from a good sales process that includes clear communication.

When I ask salespeople about a characteristic of a bad client, one of the top issues is clients that pay late.

However, a minority of salespeople discuss payment terms during the sales call. Instead, they include it in a proposal or contract.

Merely putting your terms in an email or referring to them in your proposal or quotation does not establish an agreed set of mutually acceptable ground rules.

The result is that we may put ourselves under financial pressure and find ourselves chasing customers for payment. This invariably means we'll incur avoidable fees and the overhead of credit controllers.

Far better to look your prospect in the eye and say, "One of the conditions attached to my offer is that I get paid on time, in full, every time. I never want to have to chase you for payment. If you can't commit to me now, we can shake hands and part on friendly terms, but let's not do business. Are you comfortable with that?"

You may, of course, fear that having such a frank money conversation may cause your prospective customer to back off.

Not if you have sold them on doing business with you.

Let's face it, if a prospect isn't willing to commit to paying you on time, every time, when do you want to find that out?

So, if you want to avoid price pressure, discounting, and tighter margins and you want to get paid on time, address it in the sales process every time rather than hiding it in documents.