Sales Training Tips with 19 Things Every Salesperson Should Know

Sales Training Article: 19 Things Every Salesperson Should Know

By Geoffrey James, INC - Sales Source

The essence of sales success distilled into a single, short list.
   
Over the years, I've listened to dozens of pundits and trainers explain what it takes to be successful in sales. Here's what they've told me, distilled to its essence:

1. How to research prospects and their industries.  
Use the web to discover how your potential customers view their business and how they serve their own customers.

2. How to differentiate between hot and cold sales leads.  
Apply a set of criteria for who's likely to buy, based upon your past experience of who has bought in the past.

3. How to start a conversation with a prospect.  
Whether you're cold calling or following up a referral or web access, you must be able to capture a stranger's interest.

4. How to ask questions that move the sale forward.  
You'll need to gradually uncover information, not through interrogation, but through the natural give-and-take of conversation.

5. How to listen more than you talk.  
Even if you've got a lot to say, you must always remember that selling is mostly about the customer and not you or your firm.

6. How to cultivate a budding opportunity.  
In every sales situation there is a season: a time to plant, a time to reap, a time to keep silent, and a time to speak.

7. How to recognize that a prospect is NOT interested.  
Don't let your daydreams of glory keep you from seeing the harsh reality of a prospect who's simply not going to buy.

8. How to clarify a customer's problems and opportunities.  
Customers usually have an idea of what they need; it's your job to diagnose and address the roots of that need.

9. How to neutralize a competitive threat.  
From the start, you must communicate what's unique about your firm's solution, so that it becomes the only real option.

10. How to transcend objections to buying.  
Prospects who want to buy will surface objections to make certain it's the right decision. Your job is to help them see clearly.

11. How to build trust through working with people.  
Trust must be earned through consistency and integrity, both of which only reveal themselves over time.

12. How to enthrall an audience.  
When you're asked to present to a group of people, you can't just run down the bullet points. You want them "eating out of your hand"!

13. How to perceive when a customer is ready to buy.  
Prospects who want to become your customers give off signals (green lights) that they're ready for you to close the deal.

14. How to ask for the business (aka close the deal.)  
Even if you're getting all the "green lights," you still must summon the courage to ask, even at the risk of losing the sale.

15. How to create a long-term customer relationship.  
It costs time and money to drum up new business. It's cheaper and easier to sell to people who already know your worth.

16. How to get your firm's support staff on your side.  
No salesman (or woman) is an island. Your ability to serve the customer depends upon the other people in your firm.

17. How to get a referral after you've closed the deal.  
If your customers are truly delighted, they'll send their friends and colleagues your way. Especially if you ask.

18. How to stay positive even when your numbers aren't.  
Even if you possess every skill on this list, there will be times when selling is tough. It will take inner strength to keep you going.

19. How to feel and express true gratitude.  
Success in sales (and indeed in every job) is totally failure unless you're feeling and expressing thanks to those who've helped you.

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Need some help with your sales performance? Take a look at the sales training workshops available to you and improve sales performance.

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Sales Training Article with the 5 Basic Principles of Selling

Sales Training Article: The 5 Basic Principles of Selling

By Geoffrey James, INC - Sales Source

The essence of what I've learned in over a decade of writing about sales.

What is selling, really? Ask ten salespeople you'll get ten different answers. Ask ten executive, you'll get ten more. But what is selling, really? IMHO, selling can be boiled down to the following basic principles:

1. Selling is 60 percent listening and 40 percent talking.  
When you're having a conversation with a customer, your main goal is always to figure out how (and whether) you can help that customer. This is impossible when your mouth is open.

2. A sales message consists of two sentences.  
Like so: 1) why your customers hire you, and 2) why you do what you do better than anyone else. If you can't get your sales message down to these two short sentences, you're not selling, you're blathering.

3. Customers care about their business, not about you.  
Every sales conversation should take place from the customer's perspective rather than from your perspective. It's never "my product is great." It's always "here's how I can help."

4. Your reputation always precedes you.  
In today's hyperconnected world, you can assume that anyone who might possibly buy anything from you knows exactly who you are. Even if you're calling out of the blue, your life history is just a Google search away.

5. Selling is all about relationship-building.  
Contrary to much of the foolishness that gets passed around as "sales wisdom," customers will only buy from you if they trust you, respect you, and like you. Everything else pales by comparison.

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Sales Training Insight into A Differentiator That Can Be Sustained

Sales Training Article: A Differentiator That Can Be Sustained

By John Holland, Chief Content Officer, CustomerCentric Selling® - The Sales Training Company

For many organizations the Holy Grail for product development is to have sustainable competitive advantages that sellers can use to win business. Given the pace of change and the shrinking product life cycles, it is becoming an unrealistic to enjoy product/feature advantages for any significant amount of time.

It is interesting to note that when calling at high levels, offerings can look very similar to senior executives that often aren’t users. For example, if you look at hosted CRM offerings and had sellers from 3 different vendors call on a CFO whose goal is a more accurate forecast, I’m not sure the buyers view of offerings would be significantly different.

The seller most likely to emerge as “Column A” would be the one that was able to uncover the buyer’s goal, do a thorough diagnosis of how the forecast was being created today, and then offered only the relevant capabilities that would enable the CFO to improve forecast accuracy. Coincidentally, the seller that took this approach would be the one that exhibited the most patience in deferring any discussion of product and price.

A small percentage of sellers are A Players capable of making effective calls on senior executives. Instead of having Product Development trying to always have a competitive advantage, perhaps some of their funding and effort should be geared to creating sales ready messaging® to enable B Players to use best practices in emulating executive sales calls made by A Players.

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Sales Training Advice with How to Revive a Cold Opportunity

Sales Training Article: How to Revive a Cold Opportunity

By Geoffrey James, INC - Sales Source

Even if you've dropped the ball, you can still win the game. Here's how to reheat a cold lead.

Anybody whose job involves selling knows how to handle a hot opportunity: stay in contact, work the issues, and drive towards a decision.

But what do you do when an opportunity has grown cold?

Perhaps the prospect was supposed to get back to you and didn't. Or maybe a decision was about to be made, but it's been sitting around for a long time. Or, even worse, suppose that you dropped the ball because you were too busy.

In cases like this, it's wishful thinking to believe that you can simply pick up where you left off. The situation has changed and whatever progress you made on the opportunity may no longer be valid.

Your best approach in this case is to think of the opportunity as being back in the "initial contact" phase. Send an e-mail reintroducing yourself. Mention the prior situation, but in terms of an "opportunity missed" for both you and the prospect.

Ask whether it makes sense to reopen the discussion and, if appropriate, mention anything that's changed in your situation or your firm's offerings that might be of additional value to the prospect.

When I say "anything that's changed," I do NOT mean launch into a sales pitch or list out a bunch of features. I mean something like "Since our last conversation, we've started offering discounts to first-time buyers."

As with any sales e-mail, make it easy for the recipient to respond. Rather than "please contact me if you have any questions," simply ask a question that the prospect can easily answered by clicking on "reply."

Ideally you'll be able to open a dialog again, find out more specifics about the prospect's needs and restart your sales effort. Here are three examples:

1. WRONG (Too aggressive.)

Jim,
What is the status of the gizmo order that we discussed three months ago? We put a lot of time into that proposal and, if you remember, we were going to save $1m in your gizmo return needs. I'm ready to move your account into the inactive file. If you still need gizmos, please contact me.
Joe

2. WRONG (Too salesy.)

Jim,
I hope that all is well.
As you know, our new product line already featured the best potrezebies and veeblefetzers in the gizmo industry. If you are still in the market for the highest-quality gizmos, Acme is the still right supplier for you! I've attached a new spec sheet and a PDF of our latest brochure. Please feel free to contact me if you require more information.
Take care.
Joe

3. RIGHT (Simple and Conversational)

Jim,
A while back we discussed your gizmo needs. I wanted to let you know that Acme has recently upgraded our product line. If you're still thinking about a change in your gizmo supply, I may be able to help. Does it make sense for us to reopen the discussion?
Joe

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Sales Training Article about the Deepest Source of Motivation

Sales Training Article: Deepest Source of Motivation

By Geoffrey James, INC. - Sales Source
 
Forget the carrot and stick. Motivation and innovation come from a desire to help.
 
For decades, bosses have assumed that the best way to motivate workers is by promising financial gain and threatening financial loss. With one hand they dangle a carrot of more pay while brandishing in the other, the stick of "get to work or you're fired."
 
However, according to a recent article in the New York Times, research in organizational psychology strongly suggests that people are more innovative and more successful when motivated by a desire to help other people.
 
This is a vast departure from the management theories of the past which have assumed that success in business is "the survival of the fittest." Under this way of thinking, helping others is a waste of time and effort... except insofar as it's self-serving.
 
What Do You Like Best About Your Job?
 
Over the past 20 years, I've interviewed hundreds of successful people, mostly top executives and top salespeople. I start nearly every conversation with a simple question: "What do you like best about your job?"
 
In every case, these highly-successful individuals have responded to that question with some variation of: "I like helping people." When I probe, I usually discover that they're not just talking about customers. They want to help coworkers, too.
 
When I look at the different types of writing I've done in my life, there's no question that I've been happier, more productive, and more innovative in exact proportion to the likelihood that what I'm writing will help others be more successful.
 
I'll bet if you honestly review the jobs you've done in the past, and the job you're doing right now, you've accomplished more when you were certain that you were helping others than when you weren't quite sure.
 
The lesson here is simple: when you focus on helping others rather than helping yourself, you draw upon your deepest sources of motivation. It frees your creativity and energy while developing simultaneously developing both empathy and patience.
 
It's not a dog-eat-dog world out there. It's a "let's make this happen together" world.

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Sales Training Article about Why They Will Buy

Sales Training Article: Why Will They Buy?

By John Holland, Chief Content Officer, CustomerCentric Selling® - The Sales Training Company

Many salespeople believe every opportunity in their pipeline is likely to close. Ultimately that is a worthy, but aggressive goal. Most sellers need help in getting there. In my view a competent sales manager is responsible for disqualifying transactions from each sellers pipeline that aren’t worthy of a seller’s time, effort and resources.
 
People that attend CustomerCentric Selling® workshops are familiar with the standard debriefing questions of:

• What organization/title did you call on?
• What goal(s) did the buyer share with you?
• For each goal what are the reasons it can’t be achieved today?
• For each reason what capability from our offering addressed it?
• What is the value of achieving the goal(s)?

For anyone that has not attended a workshop, I’d like to suggest another way to evaluate opportunities. Have sellers tell you the highest level they’ve called on. If they aren’t at a decision maker level, have them imagine their primary contact on the opportunity going to the CFO or controller of the company and have them try to answer the questions their contact is likely to be asked: 

• What is it that you want to buy?
• What’s the cost?
• What payback can I expect?
• Why do we need to buy now?
• What other vendors have you considered?

The answers you get are likely to make the seller and you realize there is more work to do before realistically thinking a given opportunity has a high probability of closing.

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Sales Training Advice about Sounding Confident - Even If You're Not

Sales Training Article: How to Sound Confident - Even If You're Not

By Geoffrey James, INC. - Sales Source

Give your great ideas the verbal boost they deserve with these six tips.
 
Even if you have great ideas, nobody will listen to them if you sound like a wimp when you open your mouth. By contrast, even mediocre ideas seem profound when spoken with confidence.
 
Fortunately, it's not difficult to sound confident if you follow these simple rules:
 
1. Imagine yourself as your audience's equal.
 
If you're speaking with a CEO, imagine yourself as a CEO. If you're speaking to engineers, imagine yourself as an engineer. Find and focus on the commonalities between yourself and your audience. If you're not a supplicant you won't sound like one.
 
2. Mentally rehearse each sentence.
 
You'll seem massively less confident if you trip over your own words or half-articulate a half-baked sentence. Before you speak, take a brief moment to imagine, in brief, what you're about say aloud. That pause makes you seem thoughtful and wise, BTW.
 
3. Speak from your chest not your throat or nose.
 
When people get nervous, their voices tend to move upwards so that the sound emerges from the throat or nose, which can make even deep wisdom sound like a whine. If you move your voice down into your chest, you'll sound (and feel) more confident.
 
4. Speak 20 percent slower than seems natural.
 
Many people also express nervousness by talking fast. (Hence the hoary archetype of the "fast-talking" salesperson.) People with real expertise tend to speak a bit slowly, as if they expect their listeners to hang on every word.
 
5. Eliminate your verbal ticks.
 
Some people use verbal ticks ("Uhhh....," "you know...," "I mean..., etc.) while thinking of what to say next. This makes you sound like you're unsure of yourself, so it's better simply to silently pause in midsentence. Record yourself and practice, if needed.
 
6. Never articulate a statement as a question.
 
A little uptick at the end of a sentence transforms even a definitive statement into a plea for approval. If you're confident, you make statements that reflect your knowledge and opinion. If you've got a question, you ask a question. No mixing the two.

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Need some help with your sales performance? Take a look at the sales training workshops available to you and improve sales performance.

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Sales Training Advice with Rule No. 1 - Get to the Point

Sales Training Article: Get to the Point

By Geoffrey James, INC. - Sales Source

If you've got something to say, say it in as few words as possible.
 
This will be a short post because if it weren't, I'd be guilty of doing what I'm telling you to avoid.
 
All companies today are trying to do more with fewer people, which means that everybody is short on time. That's why it's crazy to load up your documents (e-mails, brochures, websites, etc.) with fancy-sounding business cliches, and unsubstantiated opinions. Nobody has time to wade through biz-blab:
 
"In order to focus externally, we must focus both externally and internally (customer's customer and internal alignment necessary to respond), with internal collaboration with common focus/goals by stakeholders accountable for ultimate business results oriented, optimized, and coordinated outputs, aligned around the sales cycle and with a proactive approach to higher order competency investments and being unwilling to throw deliverables over the fence to sales teams and trust results will be achieved."
 
Yes. That is a real sentence from a real business document that somebody sent me. Translation:
 
"We must measure whether or how much our sales training programs increase our revenue."
 
Get to the point.
 
Nobody has time to wade through a string of your opinions:
 
"Our product is the most innovative in the market today, with the highest quality service and support. Our highly-trained technicians can meet your needs regardless of the size of your business. We can do what other suppliers can't because we are committed to excellence at every level of our delivery process. We are the best in our industry because our customers are satisfied and delighted with our superlative products."
 
And, yes, that's based on a real "sales message" I was recently sent. Translation:
 
"In our opinion, we're wonderful."
 
Get to the point.
 
Especially if you don't have all that much to say. That way you're not wasting everyone else's precious time.
 
This is not a difficult rule to follow. It is neither brain surgery nor rocket science. If you've got something to say, say it in as few words as possible.
 
Nuff said.

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Sales Training Article about Being Liked or Respected

Sales Training Article: Would You Prefer to be Liked or Respected?

By John Holland, Chief Content Officer, CustomerCentric Selling® - The Sales Training Company

Sellers are generally thought to be gregarious, outgoing and capable of connecting with a wide range of personalities. Many feel their chance of winning a given transaction is enhanced when buyers like them. Sellers feel a need to establish relationships as soon as they contact prospects. Buyers don't share the same need. Many will be cautiously skeptical of sellers that haven't proven themselves to be trustworthy (different from the negative stereotype). This is indicative of the subordinate position sellers are in until buyers conclude they offer something of potential value.

I can make relatively unimportant buying decisions with sellers I like. However when making important buying decisions I'll choose to do business with sellers I respect as professionals. These two decisions are not mutually exclusive. In fact liking and respecting sellers you do business with is a frequent outcome. I believe the sequence works better when respect is earned first. Trying to be liked early on can come across as forcing rapport, something most buyers despise.

In making initial calls, my belief is that before buyers are willing to bare their souls by sharing their goals or business problems they must draw the conclusion that sellers are sincere and competent. Sincere is not a commonly used adjective to describe sellers. Given the pervasive negative stereotype, my inclination is more geared to avoiding a negative first impression rather than attempting to "win over" buyers in the initial contact(s).

Having buyers conclude that you are competent goes a long way toward earning his or her respect. Establishing a personal relationship that often results in liking buyers (and hopefully vice versa) will usually play out over time.

I think it would serve sellers well to have two major objectives when talking with buyers for the first time:

• First earn the buyer's respect by being perceived as sincere and competent.
• Then attempt to have the buyer share his or her business goals or problems.

Uncovering a buyer's desired business outcomes early goes a long way toward establishing a peer-to-peer relationship and developing a personal connection over time.

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Sales Training Article with 3 Profit-Killing Beliefs about Selling

Sales Training Article: 3 Profit-Killing Beliefs about Selling

By Geoffrey James, INC. - Sales Source

If your beliefs about selling are broken, your company will fail, sooner rather than later.
 
Because selling is the soul of capitalism, whether a company makes a profit is entirely dependent upon how the people inside that company visualize selling. In my observation, the following broken beliefs about selling recur inside companies about to fail:
 
1. Selling means winning new business.
Firms obsessed with winning new customers almost always neglect their existing ones. Because of this, they tend to suffer high attrition rates, which means they must acquire even more customers simply to make the same amount of money.
 
To make matters worse, winning new customers is far more expensive than selling to existing customers, or selling to prospects whom your customer base has recruited for you through referrals.
 
Therefore, if you're always thinking about new business, you're gradually putting yourself out of business.
 
2. Making the numbers is our No. 1 priority.
No question that numbers--like your quarterly and yearly sales figures--are important. Even so, unless you're committing fraud by cooking the numbers, it's impossible for you to directly affect them.
 
The only way that you can actually and truly change your numbers is by making your employees your No. 1 priority. Those employees, in turn, must make your customers their No. 1 priority.
 
Unless you line up those two priorities, your numbers will inevitably decline.
 
3. Selling requires pitching the product.
Despite decades of seminars and thousands of books about "solution selling," many executives still believe, in their heart of hearts, that customers want to know all about their products.
 
Most customers are drowning in a flood of information and time-stressed to the max. As such, they have neither the time, the mental resources, nor the intrinsic interest to learn about your product category.
 
Companies sell with "spray and pray" product pitches are simply asking potential customers to ignore them.

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Need some help with your sales performance? Take a look at the sales training workshops available to you and improve sales performance.

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