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You might think you’re being nice or even driving incremental business when you allow your BDC to set soft appointments, but you’re not. In fact, you’re costing them and yourself money. Here’s how:

Why Set Rules For What Counts As A Valid Appointment?

When you have soft appointment rules, like paying a BDC agent for an appointment that shows a day early (yes, I’ve seen this more often than the alternative) or giving the BDC credit for a sold unit because they had “meaningful contact” with that prospect in the last 72 hours, you’re actually hurting your sales and the paychecks of the BDC agents.

Unless you have strict rules in place for what constitutes a valid appointment, your BDC will NEVER have the discipline to pin a prospect down on a specific time. Why should they? Setting a hard appointment takes work, is sometimes uncomfortable, and they’re going to get paid either way, right?

Yes it takes work. Yes it’s sometimes uncomfortable. But no, they’re not getting paid, because the prospect won’t be showing up.

When your team allows a customer to say something like, “I’ll be there before 9,” there is almost no chance this “appointment” will show because it’s not actually an appointment.

Once you force your team to start setting stronger appointments (by paying them only for those that arrive within 45 minutes) their show rates will multiply along with your sold units. Read more in this article, The Secret to Setting Appointments That Show.

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