How top reps get twice the hours in front of buyers and close more deals in the same working week

Your week fills up before Monday starts, with forecast prep, CRM updates and the internal call about the internal call. By Friday, the buyers who could move your number got about a fifth of it.

You already work long days, and the reps who close more work the same ones. They decide where the best hours go before anyone else gets the chance to.

How much time do sales reps spend with customers?

About a fifth of the day.Ebsta’s 2025 benchmarks found the typical seller spends 21% of the day with customers, and Salesforce’s 2026 State of Sales puts it at 22% of the week. Ebsta’s top performers at AI-enabled companies spend 43%, about twice as much, a figure from Ebsta’s data alone.

Ebsta also found the typical seller spends under 2 hours a day actively selling, against 4 hours for its A-players (one dataset). That is the same working day, with twice the selling in it.

How do top reps protect their selling time?

They book buyer hours first and fit everything else around them.Four moves do it: block your best hours for buyers before the week starts, book the next meeting before the current one ends, batch the admin into one block, and spend each hour you win on the next person on the deal.

1. On Friday afternoon, block next week’s buyer hours. Put 2 hours of each day in your calendar as buyer-only time, in your buyers’ working morning, before internal meetings claim them. Move them only for a buyer.
2. Book the next meeting before this one ends. “Before we hang up, can we get 30 minutes on Thursday with you and your operations lead?” A meeting booked on the call takes one minute, while one booked by email can take a week of back and forth.
3. Batch the admin. CRM updates, forecast notes and internal email go into one block at the end of the day, so the gaps between calls stay free for buyers.
4. Spend the hours you win on the second contact. Each protected hour is a chance to meet the next person on a big deal, and Gong Labs found won deals have twice the buyer contacts of lost ones.

What eats the rest of the day?

For most reps, a good part of the other four fifths goes on writing up the last call and hunting for what a buyer said before the next one. Every minute of that comes out of the 21%, and it is the part of the week top reps have found a way to shrink.

Not sure where your week stands? See how you compare on the three numbers in the report, in 90 seconds.