Imagine being hired to work on an assembly line. On your first day your manager gives you your work instructions. He says, "Put the parts together any way you want. It's fine with me." Sounds nuts? Well why is this being done in sales? Your manager should have an idea of how many quality sales calls you should be making a day. At least he should know a range. He should know … [Read more...]
Losing a sale. Now what?
At some point you’re going to lose a piece of business. That loss immobilizes some salespeople. They ruminate about the deal that went bad, what caused it and blame themselves. The reality is that all successful salespeople sometimes lose deals. They analyze what went wrong and resolve to avoid doing that again. They do this analysis once. Then they move on. If you find … [Read more...]
Make it easier for customers to buy
People make decisions by comparing one choice to another. The persuasion principle is known as contrast. Do you ever notice that off-white fabric looks dingy only when it’s next to bright white fabric? That’s contrast. Contrast is used in business to make decisions. When there are multiple choices, we compare one to the others. When in doubt, if there’s only one choice, it’s … [Read more...]
Stop playing telephone tag with prospects
It's time to stop playing telephone tag with prospects. How do you know when to stop? When you try once and your prospect tries to reach you once. Then you leave a voicemail, "It seems we're two moving targets. I'll be available (time 1, time 2, time 3). Please let me know which one of those times work for you. If none do, please give me a few times that do work for you and … [Read more...]
Don’t Make This Sales Mistake
There are salespeople (inexperienced ones I think) who early in the sales call will talk about price. In the first 10 minutes of the sales call they will say, “I think I can save you some money on your (product). Can I get you a quote? Quoting prices isn’t selling. In fact, you don’t even need a human being to quote prices today. The only way you can quote prices early in the … [Read more...]
Sales Prospecting with Social Media
I often look to other successful professionals for their input into the sales process. Kevin Kohleriter is an experienced and successful marketing strategist who worked with some of the largest companies to increase their sales. Here's what he has to say about using social media to get more sales. … [Read more...]
Expand the possibility of your sales
Sell the sizzle not the steak. Learn to state how your products and services impact your customers instead of saying what you do. You'll create interest and curiosity to hear more of your message. You start by knowing what benefits you bring to your customers. If you sell oil you help your customers reduce downtime. If you sell sales training the benefit you bring is … [Read more...]
Could you create copycat buyers?
Copycats are a good thing. Social copying is the phenomenon of looking to other people to show us what to do. That's what a TV track taps into. It shows us where to laugh and we feel better knowing that we’re part of the group. We also eat at crowded restaurants because it allows us to copy the other people who have chosen what we believe to be a good restaurant. Think of … [Read more...]
Are you afraid of sales?
There are too many salespeople who think they have to apologize for being in sales. How do you know if you’re one of them? Look at your business card and your title. Does it say sales? I’ll give you a pass if it says Business Development since so many people today now know that those words really do mean that you are in sales. I think that you are afraid of selling if your … [Read more...]