4 Critical Notes to Take After a Sales Call

When I first started out in sales, I recall that my coworkers and I used to spend up to ten minutes taking notes after a sales call. At the time I thought I was being thorough, but I’ve since learned that each second I spent taking notes was a second I wasn’t spending on the phone with another prospect.

As  Jeff Ernst asserted in his book, New Rules of Sales Enablement, post-call notes are but one factor that leads to 65% of  a sales rep’s time doing things other than selling.

The first rule of post-call notes is stripping documentation down to only what can really help you or another rep close the deal down the line. The second rule is having a sales tool that automates at least some of the manual input for you.

1. Time and Date of Call

It ‘s important to be able to record the time and date a call takes place. That way you can remind your prospect or customer of the call during follow-up communications. You’ll also be able to report the activity to your sales manager. This is the type of note you definitely want to automate if at all possible with an app or phone that automatically syncs your call activity, such as Revenue.io.

2. Record any Actionable Follow-up Tasks

Did your lead ask you for a slide deck? Did they ask you to call them back the day after tomorrow? Actionable follow-up activities are important to record. If you’re contacting prospects on a mobile device, this is one area where Revenue.io can help, as you can enter followup tasks directly on the same device you used to make the call. The task will automatically sync with Salesforce.com.

3. Record Changes to your Lead or Contact’s Record

Imagine you’re in B2B Sales (we know this is the reality for many of you), and the last time you spoke with a contact, she was the marketing manager at an enterprise company. But upon calling her 6 months later, she informs you that she’s been promoted to Director of Marketing. Now more likely to be a decision-maker, you’re going to want to make sure to make the necessary change to her Salesforce.com record.

4. Record Key Bits of Sales Information

Sales (especially B2B sales) is all about building strong relationships. For decades—and probably centuries—the best sales professionals have stored personal information about clients that will help strengthen those relationships. Did a prospect mention that he loves dogs? Did she talk about her husband being injured in a bicycle injury? These are the sorts of details that can help you close future deals. With a good CRM, you won’t need an elephant’s memory to store key sales details. However, we advise that you don’t take too many of these notes. Focus on which details are key to bettering your relationship with each customer and take notes accordingly.