Does "no" mean "no"? Not in selling catering.
Time doesn’t stand still and neither do selling opportunities. Many a dollar are being flushed down your drain by squandering qualified leads.
You spend to get the prospect looking to feed five hundred guests to call you. That chunk of change would pay for a nice upgraded summer vacation. But you lose the deal. Now what?
Most people write the experience off as bad luck. How can you turn it into a dormant annuity?
Go back year after year and keep trying to get that piece of business. Eventually, a new decision maker, desire for a different menu, change in budget (higher or lower) or a mistake by your competition will leave the door open for you.
Offering To Help Goes a Long Way to Close the Deal
Years ago I was pursuing a $5500 event for over four years and finally closed it. Well worth the hour a year I'd invested to keep in touch and have another turn at bat. This prospect was shopping on price and we were in the ballpark, but the intangibles won the game.
In the past, they only had one serving line and it took forever. I changed the parameters from cost to service and on the phone made a big deal that I was willing to help their traffic flow - even if I didn’t get the job. There’s nothing more powerful than volunteering to help, even if you don’t get the job. That could mean giving out a recipe of a favorite dish the search committee loved or helping with logistics.
I’m not advocating a full-time job, but sincere interest in a successful event will get you goodwill and most of the time the catering job.
After we were awarded the event, she admitted the committee awarded the event because of our desire to help out - even if we weren’t chosen.
How Our CRM Features Help You Follow Up With Prospects
Thanks to the CRM in CaterZen's catering software, you can create reminders to go back after lost events. With the ability to save past proposals and keep notes, you have an upper hand in trying a different angle when following up.
There is power in persistence. If the event happens every year, never give up!
NOTE: If you are interested in a walk-through of our catering software, please schedule a time for a web-based meeting with Nell Herman, our Director of Enterprise Sales. Please click on the link below to schedule:
Book a Catering Software Demo with Nell
