186: Salespeople Should Start Preparing For V-J Day

<p>Salespeople Should Start Preparing For V-J Day</p> <p> </p> <p>At what point will things get back to some semblance of normality?  It is a bit like trying to pick the bottom of the current stock market drop.  We won’t know until after the event, but it will happen.  The Covid-19 numbers in Tokyo are gradually coming down, the lockdown in most prefectures has already been partially released.  We are not talking aeons here.  Actually, we are now talking days until the official lockdown will end.  Yes, there will be restrictions, but for all of us, it is that great feeling you get when you stop bashing your head against a wall.  Okay, none of us has ever bashed our head against a wall in our entire lives, but we all get the general idea.  The pain point has either reached peak or must be close now for a lot of companies.  That means that the sleeping giant that is the Japanese economy will gradually tear off the thethers that have enveloped it and we will be able to get the wheels of commerce driving forward again.</p> <p> </p> <p>As salespeople, are we going to wait for the all clear siren to sound or are we going to get going now, in anticipation of Victory Japan Day in our war with the virus?  Our clients are gradually emerging from their fetal positions and starting to look around them, wondering how to get things rolling again.  Guess what?  We are right here to help them do that.  There will be pent up demand, there will be fresh demand, there will be no demand.  We need to be talking to our buyers to determine which category they fall into.  I would guess that nothing will be done on our timetable based on what we desire, as far as rebooting revenues go, but that is definitely the light at the end of the tunnel which we can see. </p> <p> </p> <p>The broad commercial downturn will have either mortally wounded some of our competitors or at least given some of them seriously debilitating flesh wounds.  We may be carrying a few of those ourselves.  The survivors though, are self-selecting to serve clients and