Prospecting activities arethings you can do to put opportunities in the pipeline today.Marketing activities are things that will put prospects in yourpipeline tomorrow. (Photo: Shutterstock)

One of the biggest struggles agencies and producers face ismaintaining a healthy pipeline. If you aren't getting infront of prospects, you'll never write the new business you need.Every agency and producer has a different definition of what thislooks like, depending on their conversion and close ratios, as wellas the average size of opportunity they pursue. In general, ahealthy pipeline is one that would ensure the producer or agencyhits their sales goal.

Prospecting versus marketing

There are two ways to put opportunities in yourpipeline—prospecting and marketing. Prospecting activities arethings you can do to put opportunities in the pipeline today.Marketing activities are things that will put prospects in yourpipeline tomorrow.

Related: 5 marketing tips to keep the client pipelinefull

Prospecting may include cold calling/emailing, requestingreferrals/introductions and networking. At its most basicdefinition, prospecting activities are when you are engaged inone-on-one, personal interaction during which you ask for anopportunity to have a sales conversation.

Marketing, on the other hand, may include your website, socialmedia presence, writing opportunities, speaking engagements, emailcampaigns, webinars/seminars, and some types of networking.

Where prospecting consists of a direct request for a salesconversation, marketing is about creating an interest in thepotential prospect to ask you to have that sales conversation. Atthe very least, marketing warms readers up for when they become atarget of your prospecting.

It's like a magic 8-ball

The key is to know how to allocate your time between prospectingand marketing. Often, this is a moving target.

Your current pipeline will tell you everything you need to know.It is the closest thing you have to a personal fortune-teller thatwill show you how much new business you are going to be writing, ornot, in the foreseeable future.

Indirectly, it will tell you exactly how to spend your time andhow to turn bleak predictions more positive; it will tell you whatto do to maintain a financially lucrative forecast.

You must find the discipline to block out the appropriate amountof time for your fill-the-pipeline activities. Start by askingyourself how many hours a week you need to commit:

• If you work a 50-hour week and you need to spend 75 percent ofyour time in overall sales activities, you have 37.5 hours ofavailable sales-related time.
• Deduct the number of hours your scheduled sales presentationsare going to require each week. Let's assume, on average, you need25 percent of your time for those presentations (includingpreparation) or 12.5 hours.
• You then have 25 hours to allocate between prospecting andmarketing.
• If your pipeline is dry, perhaps you spend 75 percent of thosehours on prospecting and 25 percent on marketing.
• If your pipeline is already healthy, flip those percentagesaround.

These are activities you have to do on a weekly, if not daily,basis. There is no higher priority for you than ensuring the healthof your pipeline. And, when something is a priority, you must planfor it, schedule it and execute with discipline.

Make this the year you up your new business game. But that hasto start by upping your pipeline game.

Read more: 

• Is your prospect pipeline in robust health orcardiac arrest?
• 2020 sales & marketing tips: Grow your book ofbusiness
• 3 questions to answer for successful marketingcampaigns – with Megan Chiarello