The Selling Newsletter
The Selling Newsletter
from Best@Selling
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 to have Maura speak at your next program/conference
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The Selling Quote for the Month
“Always borrow money from a pessimist; he doesn’t expect to be paid back.”
-Unknown
That’s what I call doing a good job of targeting a prospect. Why? Because it’s one thing to sell your products to just any customer. It’s another to sell to a customer where you have the greater chance of meeting that customer’s expectations. First, start by making it easy to serve your customers. These are the customers who have an explicit need for your products, or they want your products or services, or you can show them why your products or services will best meet a need they hadn’t thought about. When you find these better prospects, it’s your job to uncover their expectations or show them what they can expect from working with you. When you meet customer expectations, you set yourself up for a more satisfying and successful customer relationship. When you know what your customers expect, you’ll also find it’s far easier to please them, too.
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Sales Tips to Share
What’s sales tip has helped you be even more successful in sales?
Send your helpful tip to https://us.f823.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?To=tip@bestatselling.com
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Upcoming Programs
Where: Small Business Development Center
4800 West Park Blvd.
Plano, TX
When : September 15, 22, 29
11.30 AM- 1:30 PM
What: Master Selling Series for Sales and Business Professionals
For more information: 972-985-3749 or
972-985-3758
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When : October 13
11.30 AM- 1:30 PM
Where: Small Business Development Center
4800 West Park Blvd.
Plano, TX
What: Serious Creativity: New Ideas that Work for Business
For more information: 972-985-3749 or
972-985-3758
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When : November 10
11.30 AM- 1:30 PM
Where: Small Business Development Center
4800 West Park Blvd.
Plano, TX
What: Negotiating for Business
For more information: 972-985-3749 or
972-985-3758
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The Selling Ideas for this Month
Wrong Customers and the Salespeople Who Have to Sell to Them
The customer is always right. Wrong! The customer is not always right. When customers are wrong that is when salespeople face selling challenges. What do you do? Do you point out that they’re wrong? Your only option is to deal with it and understand that your job is to make the customer right when the customer is wrong. Do you know how?
The customer doesn’t know what the customer doesn’t know. Customers buy from new suppliers when they have a need for improvement or a need to solve a problem. Sometimes the customer thinks all is going well. The customer doesn’t even know there’s a need. That false sense of security makes the customer wrong. The world renowned quality guru, Dr. Edward Deming, used to say no customers ever asked for an automobile. They said, “We have horses, what could be better?” You may even remember the time that customer research indicated that a majority of customers did not want to pay for seat belts, air bags or antilock brakes. Now many customers make buying decisions based on safety features. Think about the minivan. Was it customer demand that drove the development of the minivan? No. Customers were quite happy in the early 70s driving in their station wagons.
What does this mean for your selling? You may ask a customer if all is going well. Don’t get sucked into the trap if the answer is yes. Customers may be wrong because they just don’t know that it’s not going well. Think about all the information that customers today need to make a buying decision. It’s an incredible amount and many customers just don’t have what they need to be right. Remember that telling customers the information is less effective than asking questions. When you ask questions you guide customers to consider other options by the answers they give.
They’re thinking the wrong way. If you ask customers how the buying decision is going to be made, many times the answer will be price. They say price because they think that’s what they mean. They forget that price has a big impact on total cost. If you ask if they’re concerned about total cost many customers will say of course. When they say price, they’re wrong. It’s not what they mean. When you hear price, make sure you know that selling needs to immediately shift to a discussion of total cost. Your job is to show customers that paying more should get them more value and that is what they need. If you miss this opportunity to make the customer right, you’ll end up selling on price. That’s wrong for both of you.
They ask for things they don’t need. Some salespeople make unsuccessful sales calls. With poor questions they miss uncovering customer needs or areas to improve. Yet customers ask them for a proposal. The customer is wrong to ask for a proposal when he has little reason to make a change. The salesperson is fooled into thinking the customer is going to buy. How would you even be able to write a customized proposal that demonstrates to that customer why he should make a change and buy from you, when you haven’t done your job? If you present a generic proposal, be prepared for delay, customer difficulty to make a decision and a low probability sale. Instead, when there’s a premature request for a proposal, be prepared to educate your customer about your sales process. Respond that you need to gather information to develop a customized proposal. Find out who will be on the decision making committee. Speak with all of them to uncover information about areas to improve or problems that exist. Generic proposals get specific responses. These specific responses are difficulty in getting phone calls returned and customers ultimately doing nothing to change suppliers.
When customers are wrong they impact our selling. The only option is to make them right. If we don’t, we’ll be wrong. When both customers and salespeople are wrong, the salesperson sells less. And that’s not right.
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Action Items
1. What information do you have for an upcoming proposal?
2. Have you identified the decision maker, the process of selection and a clear need for your products/services?
3. What questions do you ask to uncover customer needs that they didn’t know they had?
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Selling Tips
From Maura’s ebook: 97 Ways to Sell More Now E-Book
https://www.bestatselling.com/selling_tools.htm#5
Tip 14. Write a customer a letter of appreciation. You’ll make someone else feel better and you’ll feel better, too.
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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, Best@Selling (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 Best@Selling 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 Best@Selling 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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