Have you ever wondered how you’ll get everything done? That’s how I feel all too often. I get to my desk at 7:30 to tackle the emails. I work through my lunch hour. And, at the end of the day it seems like I’ve barely made a dent.

Here's the truth. I like telling people I'm crazy-busy. It makes me sound important. And, even worse, I’m a closet slug. All day long I make bad choices that contribute to this predicament.

But on the upside, I’ve learned how compensate for my slothful behavior. Here are 2 strategies to increase sales effectiveness that have worked for me:

1. Pinpoint Prospecting: Instead of dialing for dollars, I learned how to target companies where I had a higher likelihood of success. And, I looked for specific trigger events – like stagnant sales or new strategic initiatives – that created a greater need for my services. The result? Fewer calls, but more hot prospects.

2. High Quality Meetings: I spent tons of time prepping for very single call, meeting, presentation or proposal. I researched, I planned, I wrote out questions and agendas. The result? It took fewer prospects to get more and bigger sales.

Being a closet slug taught me to focus on efficiency and effectiveness. But I still think it would be nice to have more time to spare for fun things in life. How about you?