I’ve been running a sales sprint this week. On a few calls, I found myself asking a question:

Is this a time to sell, or not?

It’s a question that underlies most sales conversations, whether we ask it consciously or not.

On every call, we have to determine whether this is the right time for the prospect to make a decision.

When sales feels hard

Sales shouldn’t feel hard.

If you find yourself having to push, persuade, or “sell harder”, it’s usually a sign that something else isn’t in place.

When the conditions are right, sales tends to flow. When they’re not, everything feels harder.

And the instinct is to focus on the sales moment itself. But most of the time, the issue sits upstream.

Are the right prospects coming in?
Are they in a position to act?
Have they experienced enough of your thinking to trust it?
Do they see the problem as a priority now?

If those pieces aren’t in place, the sales conversation ends up carrying more of the load than it should.

The gap in sequencing

You understand the transformation your clients need far better than they do. You’ve spent years working inside it.

They’re often informed, but not experienced. Which means they don’t always see what needs to happen first and what can wait.

So they try to move forward with the wrong things in place, which, from their perspective, looks right and feels reasonable.

This is where sales can become difficult.

The role of sales

One of the most valuable things you can do in a sales conversation isn’t to persuade. It’s to help your prospect sequence their priorities.

To understand what needs to happen first, and where your work fits within that.

When those pieces line up, their decision becomes easier because the path has become clearer.

When to push

No one likes a pushy salesperson. But there are moments where pushing is appropriate.

As consultants, that usually comes up as a challenge.

We have to challenge the order in which our prospects are thinking.

If they’re trying to act without the right foundations in place, or delaying something that clearly needs to happen, it’s useful to question that.

It’s an effective way to illustrate our value, and challenging the sequencing means we are helping the prospect and ourselves. Because when the sequencing is right, the right decisions tend to follow.

A different way to think about sales

If sales feels harder than it should, it’s rarely about your ability to sell. It’s more often about timing, readiness, and sequencing - whether the conditions for a decision have actually been created.