Every year, thousands of salespeople spend the end of the year in a frantic effort to meet their quota or satisfy management’s demands to hit a specific number. I’m not suggesting that this is necessarily a bad approach to increasing sales, but there may be a less stressful and more successful way to approach this challenge that I’d recommend you consider in the next few years, if it’s too late for this year.

Granted, many prospects and customers wait until the end of the year to see if they have budget available to buy or commit to buying your products or services. I understand this philosophy. Many others simply procrastinate, waiting for lightning to strike before they can make a decision to proceed with an order. There are hundreds of reasons to wait and only one reason to do something now. It makes sense because there is a need, desire or sense of urgency to solve a problem or the ability to take advantage of a business opportunity that may go unnoticed if no action is taken. Either way, it’s up to the salesperson to discover or create this sense of urgency: the real problem or need.

Too many salespeople deal with superficial reasons, wants, and needs that prospects bring to them and therefore never really get to the heart of the prospect or customer’s ultimate pain or real need. I know, I’ve been there many times. It takes skill, confidence, courage, and often the willingness to walk away from some deals to be willing to peel back the layers of excuses, lies, and deadlocks that can set potential deals weeks, even months, and sometimes even years, back. years.

There is only one way I know how to do this and that is with difficult but relevant questions.

Sure, there will always be a certain percentage of business that will wait until the last day of December. My question is though, do you trust this business as a large percentage of your annual fee? If so, you are setting yourself up for frustration, disappointment, increased stress, and even possible failure if this is your approach.

A better way is to consider each month of your year as one twelfth of your year. In other words, when April ends, all the lost sales that were needed to hit your number for the year will be gone forever. You don’t get a chance to make up a shortfall in April in December. Every month is a mini year. With this attitude, you will tend to maintain the urgency of keeping your sales volume and results spread evenly over a 12-month period. Your year is like a rotating year. At the end of each month, a new 12-month cycle begins. In essence, each month is the last month of your year.

This attitude and strategy won’t guarantee that some businesses just need more gestation time before a customer buys, but it will tend to reduce the pressure and stress of what I call the “fourth quarter blues.” It’s better to spread this anxiety over a twelve-month time frame than to push it all into the last 30 or 60 years of the year. Most people can handle stress, anxiety, and disappointment in small doses. But, few people can effectively handle large amounts of these things condensed into a small chunk of time. The holidays are stressful enough for many people, why add more business stress to personal stress?

The end of the year holidays should be enjoyed and not feared by the pressure you feel at work.