If you’re talking you’re not selling. That is an old axiom I learned early in my sales career and it is always true. Talking does not equal selling. Unfortunately, people not experienced in sales hiring often have the opposite view. Their stereotypical belief is that the best salespeople are the ones who are perceived to be the best talkers. This misguided view often leads to bad hires. Here is where the mistake occurs – hiring managers assume that social skills are equivalent to sales skills. Ok, maybe that is too strong, but the assumption is that the social skills are the key to successful selling. Social skills are a component… Read More
Continue ReadingSeparation Clarity
Good article here from Salesopedia.com titled Reject Me, Please. Handling rejection just may be the most important trait of any strong salesperson. Rejection is the key differentiation between sales and all other positions. Salespeople have to be able to handle this topic well. Excellent sales people realize it’s about the products and service, and not them. They may have represented the product poorly and answered questions about the services ineptly, but nonetheless, the opposition is about what’s being sold, not the seller. This ability to distinguish between the purveyor and the purveyed I call Separation Clarity. Well stated and I am now a fan of the phrase “separation clarity.” I… Read More
Continue Reading“Technology has destroyed time and space boundaries.”
The Wall Street Journal offers up an interesting read about work/life balance from Dr. Henry Cloud. Every time I receive a call from one of our customers at 8:30pm I think of this topic. Here is the full text of the quote referenced in the title: I think the first thing is to be aware that you basically have two things available to you to create your vision — in work and in life. First, you’ve got your time. Second, your energy. The second thing, energy, you might not be aware of because of people and activities getting the best of your energy, or the wrong people and wrong activities… Read More
Continue ReadingWhen Selling To Executives…
Executives are a tough sell and it takes the right sales skills to match them. One of the toughest skills for me has always been the money topic. I personally like to buy not negotiate and it shows in my sales role. But there are ways to handle the negotiation as you will learn in this ManageSmarter.com article – Back to Basics: Think Before You Offer Discounts. The pull quote (emphasis mine): However, professional buyers and key decision-makers know that many sellers will drop their price at the first sign of resistance, so they ask everyone for a discount and can be aggressive in their approach. Plus, experienced negotiators lose… Read More
Continue Reading12 Strategies For Asking Questions
This article from Selling Power offers suggestions for salespeople when questioning prospects. The author makes some excellent points with one that stands out – number 9. I have edited the content for length. 1. Qualify prospects You can quickly establish if this “suspect” is a qualified prospect with a few questions. Many salespeople waste valuable sales time chasing the wrong company or talking to someone without decision-making power. Develop a profile of your ideal prospect. What criteria must a “suspect” meet to qualify as a bona fide prospect for your product or service? 2. Uncover needs By asking questions and understanding the client’s needs you can determine which benefits the… Read More
Continue ReadingSelling To The C Level
We here that phrase often – must have experience selling to the (insert executive/C level/CEO here). But how many positions actually sell to this level? What do CEO’s actually purchase for their company? Financial planners sell to the C level. High-end insurance salespeople sell to the C level. However, most positions do not sell at that level. One value for a salesperson is the ability to enter at that level and then be sent down to the correct mid-level manager with a referral from the C level contact. Yet even that “kicked down” ability is overstated. The real value is being able to discover the decision process within the company. … Read More
Continue ReadingShortening The Sales Cycle
Salesopedia.com offers a good article this week on a timely topic – How to Shorten Your Sales Cycle. The author cuts to the quick on an issue we encounter frequently: To begin with, many sales people just don’t know how long their sales cycle is, we ask and we hear things like “depends” (sometime it fits), “it changes” (it always seems longer during Daylight Savings Time), and the all time favorite, “well you know it’s different in our business”. Well it’s not really. Underlying this is the fact that many reps and organizations do not know what their sale looks like, they have not deconstructing their sale, identified the basic… Read More
Continue ReadingWomen Sell Better
That isn’t my commentary, it is from the author of the Inc.com blog Sold!. His reasoning: And there are some very good reasons why I believe woman are better suited for selling. Among them: o In their personal lives and in business they tend to create relationships better. o They tend to sell based on personal input and business input rather than just business. o They listen. o They don’t have a sales history that they are tied to, so “new” works for them. o In many areas, women who are good in sales are still enough of a rarity to create a buzz. Ok, it pays to be provocative… Read More
Continue ReadingSales Reminder-Be Valuable
This reminder is from the daily JustSell.com email: Harvard Business School Professor Emeritus Theodore Levitt once said, “People don’t want a quarter-inch drill, they want a quarter-inch hole.” The sales point: your prospect doesn’t want a product; she wants a solution. You need to listen to uncover your prospect’s hidden needs, and then sell your product as a solution. It’s not about what you’re selling – it’s about how what you’re selling can help the customer. Be valuable. And remember – a good salesperson walks away if he cannot truly help his prospect. That last sentence is difficult for many salespeople.
Continue ReadingOpen-Ended Questions
Asking the right questions is the backbone of successful selling. The reason they are so important is that the right questions qualify the right information. This information allows the salesperson to determine how good of a fit exists between the prospect’s needs and the salesperson’s solution. Simple, right? But what questions should the salesperson ask? JustSell.com has an excellent starting point where they list 30 open-ended questions. An example: qualifying What do you see as the next action steps? What is your timeline for implementing/ purchasing this type of service/ product? What other data points should we know before moving forward? What budget has been established for this? What are… Read More
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