The Selling Newsletter
The Selling Newsletter
from [email protected]
A free monthly newsletter of ideas to help make your selling easier.
Selling is the easiest job in the world…Just ask anyone who is NOT in sales! Best wishes for YOUR successful selling—Maura
This issue contains:
-The Selling Quote for the Month
-Upcoming Programs
-The Selling Ideas for the Month
-Action Items
-Selling Tips
-To Subscribe to the Selling Newsletter
-Need an article for your newsletter?
-About Maura Schreier-Fleming
-Contact Information
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The Selling Quote for the Month
“A few simple things done consistently in strategic places produce big results.” Anonymous
Why not look at something simple about your selling that you can begin to consistently do? Then see the results. Perhaps you can examine your selling materials that you use. Maybe you can look at your networking activities. Or is it how you ask for referrals? Often we try to make things more complicated than they need to be. Instead, simplifying our work and focusing on a small part to improve might give us the motivation to actually make a change.
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Does your trade association or company have a meeting planned?
Have Maura speak on selling and business skills and strategies at your conference so you can sell more this year.
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The Selling Ideas for this Month
Take the Rest of the Day Off
Selling has so many opportunities to make decisions. Who do you call on? How do you open the sales call? Which benefits are the best to present? Every decision you make either produces results that make it easier or harder to sell. After making good decisions that produced an especially successful sale, I always dreamed my manager would say, “Take the rest of the day off.” If you would like to earn a day off, here are some suggestions to apply to your selling.
What do I do? The first selling decision is who to call on. We can get our leads from many sources that range from the newspaper, a purchased list, referrals, library or Internet research. With existing business we prioritize whom to call on based on several variables. Factors range from volume, revenue, margin, location, industry, potential or business significance. Once we determine who to call on and begin our selling we review our success by checking our sales numbers. Sometimes we forget to check if we’re selling the best way we can. If we’re going to strive to get better sales results, we need to do more of the things that are working and less of the things that are not. Why not replace the less successful ideas with new ones and determine their effectiveness?
How do I improve? First look at the decisions you make for your business. Then measure the results. What I measure is always changing and I’m always measuring something. I was looking at my source of leads and determining which leads resulted in more sales calls. Now I’m looking at my sales material effectiveness. I’m determining how many presentations result in appointments. I’m going to use the information to see if I need to make changes in the presentation content. Next I want to look at the opening question I use for cold calls to see if that leads to a conversation resulting in an appointment. A future idea is to measure the length of my sales cycle to see how I can shorten it. You can look at any part of your sales process and measure what you’re doing and what the results are.
Why measure? Most salespeople monitor their sales numbers. If the sales numbers are good, the salesperson assumes that the sales process is working. Yet the sales process is composed of so many steps that checking sales numbers only tells us some parts are working. Checking numbers doesn’t tell you which steps can be improved. That’s what measurement can do.
By quantifying a step, a salesperson can make changes to the process and see if the changes produce better results. Without measurement one can only guess. Intuition plays a very important role in some parts of selling. Measurement plays a more important part when we’re trying to improve our selling. In order to improve your selling, examine your sales process and determine where you want better results. Consider the specific steps in the process and how you are doing them. Measure your results, make process changes and measure again.
By measuring your performance you get to see what works and what is less successful. You then have the opportunity to make changes based on data and resulting information rather than conjecture. Successful selling is about constant improvement and the improvement process is never ending. Maybe your reward is different than being offered the day off. Whatever your reward is, make the decision to share your dream with your manager. Then when you achieve your goals and earn your reward, I predict it will be an easy decision to take it.
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Action Items
1. Reexamine how you prioritize your accounts. Confirm or reconsider other variables.
2. What one aspect of your selling can you measure? Start to measure it.
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Selling Tip
From Maura’s ebook: 97 Ways to Sell More Now E-Book
https://www.bestatselling.com/selling_tools.htm#5
Tip 13. Plan the opening question for your next sales call based on the type of client you are meeting. (Listen to their voice to make the decision if they want to talk more or get right down to business.)
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Looking for new strategies to improve your persuasion skills? This easy to apply Audio CD will give you many new ideas to easily improve your persuasion skills so you can sell more and close business faster.
https://www.bestatselling.com/Audio_CD.htm
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I’m always looking for success stories and other tips from sales professionals. Please feel free to email me at info@bestatselling.com with ideas that have worked for you.
If you want to build customer relationships for long-term business, you can easily do it using Exacttarget (www.exacttarget.com) and their CANSPAM compliant broadcast services.
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To Subscribe to the Selling Newsletter
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Need an Article for Your Newsletter?
Articles from this newsletter may be used in your free publications or posted on your web when given the following credit:
Written by Maura Schreier-Fleming, [email protected] (www.BestatSelling.com). Maura works with business and sales professionals who want to sell more and be more productive at work. She is the author of Real-World Selling for Out-of-this-World Results.
For free articles, selling ideas and morale boosters
visit https://www.BestatSelling.com
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About Maura Schreier-Fleming
Invite Maura to speak at your next conference or sales meeting! Contact: info@bestatselling.com
Maura Schreier-Fleming works with business and sales professionals to make it easier to sell more and be more productive at work. Her [email protected] clients want to create long-term client relationships. They include Fujitsu, Fannie Mae and Dr Pepper/7UP. She has an M.S. in Textile Engineering from Georgia Tech and was Mobil Oil’s first female lubrication engineer in the U.S. With over 20 years of sales experience, she teaches the art and science of selling with a unique hands-on perspective and a great deal of real-life insight. She is the author of Real-World Selling for Out-of-this-World Results (a book filled with ideas to make selling easier and more productive. Her business column ‘Selling Strategies’ appears in the Insurance Record magazine and her column ‘Street Talk’ appears in Jobbers World. You can contact her for seminars at company or trade association meetings at 972 380 0200 or info@BestatSelling.com
Privacy: At [email protected] we take privacy issues very seriously. Your information remains with us and will never be sold, shared, or distributed in any manner, for any reason.
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Contact Information
1. Our Web site: https://www.BestatSelling.com
2. E-mail: info@bestatselling.com
3. Call: In Dallas 972 380 0200
4. Write us:
6757 Arapaho Rd., Suite 711-183
Dallas, TX 752448
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(c) Copyright 2006 Maura Schreier-Fleming. All rights reserved
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