When your sales hit a dry spell, don’t panic slumps are inevitable, common and temporary. To help you get back on track fast, use this seven-step strategy for minimizing your downtime.

1. Acknowledge feelings of disappointment and frustration. It’s okay to feel bad about hitting a slump, just don’t dwell on those negative feelings. Talk your troubles over with a trusted friend or colleague, then decide to accentuate the positive and put your blues behind you.

2. Develop a process orientation. Resolve to perform your job one day at a time. Keep prospecting for new buyers, ask current customers for referrals and stay on top of changing market conditions. Remember that today’s actions determine tomorrow’s results. Map out a strategy specifically designed to get your sales back up where they belong.

3. Take advantage of extra time. If your phone isn’t ringing off the hook and you don’t have a full book of appointments, use the extra time to polish your organizational, goal-setting, objectionhandling and presentation skills. Try experimenting with new approaches to customers, then use your perfected technique with new buyers.

4. Finish projects you’ve been putting off. Once you get around to finishing those projects you’ve been meaning to complete for months, you’ll have a sense of accomplishment that should help keep your ego afloat and inspire you to give breaking out of your slump your best shot.

5. Jump-start your attitude. You’ll have an easier time getting your sales out of a rut if your attitude isn’t stuck there too. Get a boost from supportive friends and colleagues, and take advantage of all the motivational material available on the market. Familiarize yourself with stories of famous achievers who turned a situation that seemed hopeless into an incredible triumph.

6. Expand your network. Connections with people represent opportunities. The more people you know, the greater the odds that one of them will want to do business with you or will know someone who does. Take advantage of opportunities to attend company social functions, trade shows, seminars, training courses. Consider starting your own lead club in which you can exchange potential buyers with other salespeople.

7. Explore new markets. Maybe a new office park is under construction nearby or maybe your assumptions about one market segment’s needs have prevented you from calling on them. Expand your thinking about your product’s uses and its target market and you might find many of the limits on your sales were selfimposed.