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I would prefer closing both, but if I had to prioritize I would put the second account ahead of the first. My reasoning is simple, 30 percent of $50,000 is more than 2.5 times the sales volume of 80 percent of $5,000. Big accounts with big order potential are sometimes complicated and can break your heart. But when they come through, you’ve done it. The secret is to keep the potential order funnel so full that, when you lose an order, you simply replace that prospect with another.

Learning When To Walk Away Is Key
When working with new salespeople, we often find that it is not their skill or knowledge holding them back from being a top-seller. They are simply spending time on the wrong opportunities.

I have found it is not very hard to get salespeople to sell new printing products and services. I find it much harder to get salespeople to stop selling solutions they are comfortable with, but yield poor returns for their effort. From a sales person’s point of view, how I should spend the next hour of my time can be determined by answering three questions:

• When do I go forward?
• When do I say no?
• When do I quit?

Knowing the opportunity cost of every prospect you work with will ensure your choice of how you spend your time will yield the most sales and commissions. A fact often lost on owners and production teams is that the critical final measure of a salesperson is how much money they earn. This is why it is important for print companies to have compensation plans perfectly aligned to their financial and business objectives.

It is not a secret that spending time on a new market or new customer is a risk. It may cost a lot of valuable time. On the other hand what is the cost, measured in time spent or lost commissions, on not spending the time? Does this mean salespeople should spend all their efforts on very time consuming opportunities? No. All is means is that they should carefully and logically consider each opportunity and understand the cost of not spending the time on it.

Five Questions To Ask
The key to managing opportunity costs in sales is the ability to master a few simple techniques. A key resource for professional sales people is their prospect list or the sales pipeline. To effectively manage opportunity costs, experienced salespeople and managers critically review their documented prospect and targeted account list daily. Reviewing the opportunity and payback for each potential opportunity is crucial.

The following questions should be asked when comparing two opportunities:

1. Is the payback worth it for me to be spending my time on each of these sales opportunities?
2. Should I try to do both?
3. Should I walk away from one of them?
4. Can I delay or extend the time necessary to close the deal on one or both of these opportunities?
5. Do I have the information and knowledge to make a decision?

Some of the key criteria to think about before you determine whether to pursue an opportunity includes: project management, time and effort required, sales cycle time, relationship with the customers, commission implications, opportunity for repeat sales, overall size of the order, geography, competition, ongoing support and technology required, production capability, product differentiation, relative cost, etc.

Sharing and discussing opportunities with an involved owner, your sales manager or other salespeople is a great way to get a third party perspective and new ideas. Talking to and getting advice from other professionals can also help you learn how to prioritize opportunities.