Respect The Beeps Like F1 World Champ

Formula One motor racing. Many people’s idea of legitimised paint dry watching. Yet on the rare occasion there’s an incident-packed grand prix it can be riveting.

The broadcast snippets of radio chatter between pit and driver can be entertaining.

This year my ears pricked at the apparent stubbornness of outgoing world champ Sebastian Vettel. His race engineer politely scolded him for not adhering to the braking zone computer sounds prompting him to change gear. The rebuke used by Guillaume “Rocky” Rocquelin in response to Vettel over-revving when beeps in his ear tell him to shift gear goes something like this;

“Sebastian you need to respect the beeps. Fuel mileage is marginal. Respect all the beeps.”

Though it must be said that he has also been told to “ignore the beeps” when chasing down a rival.

Many a lengthy sales cycle also has ‘beeps’ of its own.

Racetrack corners are a bit like deal gateways.

(…and remember a true gateway is not one governed by your crm or sales reporting system’s arbitrary self-focused funnel-type station, it’s rather progression that your buyer values)

If you head into them too quick, you can lock your brakes and go straight off the asphalt. If you try to speed out of it too fast, then you can spark a spin causing a race-ending, face-the-wrong-way stall. Attempt an overtake without a gap and you scrape the target car, and your wheels can, literally, come off in the shunt.

Yes any solution seller must push their prospect along. But creating false urgency never works. To be out of tune with your prospect’s buying cycle is to disappear down a crevasse of frustration, out from which you cannot climb.

So where are your beeps?

What can alert you that you might be moving out of synch?

The classic revolve around specific actions you ask your buyers to undertake.

Compliance is good. Procrastination bad.

Match these up to the most important of your gateway bends and your process gets sped towards podium striding refinement.

You hearing your beeps?