The Selling Newsletter for Sales Professionals
SALES QUOTE
“Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.”
–-William Arthur Ward
For Salespeople…
It is that time of year when Thanksgiving is approaching. I hope you are thankful for your family, your friends, your customers and your life. Now would be a great time to tell those who have made a difference in your selling this year that you really appreciate what they have done for you. After all, it is almost impossible to succeed today without the help of others. I promise you that when you tell others what they have done for you, you will get back even more. Not only will they feel better, but you will, too.
To my newsletter readers: Thank you to all of you and those who send comments. I always enjoy hearing from you!
PS Happy Thanksgiving!
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THE BLOG S AND OTHER COLUMNS
I’m now writing The Real Deal, a column on women in business for Allbusiness.com Hope you’ll read more ideas so you can achieve your success in business.
You can get RSS feed for the blog.
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THE SELLING IDEAS FOR THE MONTH TO SELL MORE NOW
Losing Trust Will Cost You Sales
Sure you can sell without trust. It just takes a whole lot longer and is a whole lot harder. Here are a few problems that you might have with trust while you sell. All of these have happened to some unfortunate salespeople. Try to be sure they do not happen to you.
High level trust If you are like most sales professionals, price negotiations are part of your strategy. Profit and margins are an important part of sales. Talented sales professionals make their objective to charge as much as they can and sell their products and services in the shortest amount of time. You have work to do if you want to be the price leader. You would have to agree that being the price leader in the market just might make your sales cycle a little longer. Even Apple had to build its reputation first and that took time. The rewards in the marketplace are worth it.
If you want to be the price leader, your work starts with preparation for your meeting with your manager to discuss price. You include a competitive analysis of the competitors in your market. You know what they offer. You know what they charge. You have done a thorough analysis of your costs.
Knowing all the components, selecting each because of their contribution to the whole package, makes your offering a strong one. You decide that your offering is unique and you can charge for that uniqueness. You present this to your manager along with a recommended price. Your manager agrees to the price. You go to market with it and begin meeting with your first prospect. He is interested.
Now your manager changes his mind on the price. What now? Your manager has just damaged the trust you had in him.
Trust on the ground.You and your manager agree on a price at another pricing strategy meeting. You go to market with it. Instead, you decide that you want to lower the price without consulting your manager. You tell a customer your price. You have just damaged the trust relationship you have with your manager.
Think before you act. It almost does not matter whether a manager destroys trust or the salesman destroys trust. In both cases, you will damage the relationship you build with prospects and customers. How can a prospect trust you if you can not keep a stable price for a very short period of time?
What some salespeople and some managers forget is that there are too many customers who have had negative sales experiences. Anything you do to confirm their negative expectation hurts your ability to sell and shorten your sales cycle. Why? It takes that much longer to build trust. What is even more alarming is that in some cases when you break trust, it just might be impossible to reestablish it. That means no sale at any price for you.
So the next time you have a pricing discussion with your manager or customer, consider that price a promise that you are obligated to keep. Selling is helping a customer make a great buying decision. It is a great decision only when the decision is good for them and good for you.
When your price is a moving target, that is neither good for you or your customer. It is also an impossible promise to keep.
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ACTION ITEMS
1. What is your pricing strategy for getting a better price from your manager for a product?
2. How do you strategically build trust with your clients?
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DID YOU KNOW?
Here’s a tip this week for your sales success.
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Programs
You can check for current programs.
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: Here are some selling tools to help you sell more now. Click on the photo to find out more!
Monday Morning Sales Tips : A book that has quick ideas for you to be more successful in sales. Real-World Selling: A book with selling skills and strategies that work in the real world of sales. Secrets of Persuasion: Audio CD for the clues to use to speed-read people and close more business.