Ready or Not, 2018 is Underway!
We are already a month into 2018, a new year. For those of us in sales and management, our numbers revert to zero. Have they come to you with a higher quota this year? Did they give you a stretch goal? Did they offer you anything to help you make this new number, or just tell you to go get it? If you are a salesperson or a manager, you have eleven months left to make your goal. The clock is ticking!
Tom Brady, whom many are calling the GOAT (Greatest of All Time), has a new show on Facebook Tom vs.Time. It chronicles how he, as a 40-year-old, prepared for this season. The footage shows how he trains to be the best. He has been successfully playing football for most of his life. He has won five NFL championship rings and plays for a sixth this Sunday. He is still getting coached. He is still pro-actively training every day. Even with his experience, expertise, and success, Tom Brady believes he can improve.
If we are having a conversation and you tell me your team is experienced and does not need training, I am cringing. Why do people think if they have experienced salespeople there is no need to improve? Would you choose to see a doctor with 15-20 years of experience who believes he or she has nothing new to learn?
For a salesperson to achieve greatness, they must take stock of what they do well and areas they can improve. A salesperson must be open to change and develop an intentional plan for improvement. Training makes weak salespeople stronger and strong salespeople great.
Sales Concepts offers individual public programs, customized group training, and a two-year continuing program consisting of 12 different courses. Let us help your team become the GOAT sales force at your company.
“Good is the enemy of great.”
The Toughest Objection You Will Ever Encounter.
We are often asked one unsettling question from students in our programs. What is the toughest objection for salespeople to overcome? Even though you may have presented the perfect solution to your customer, sometimes they still throw objections at you!
What is the toughest objection a salesperson encounters? Could it be one of the following?
- We don’t have the budget.
- Your price is too high.
- We need time to think about it.
- We are already working with vendor X.
- Company Y has this same solution for less money.
- There is too much going on now to make a change.
- We are doing great now, they don’t really see the need.
- Our team does not see the return on investment.
Which one do you think is the hardest objection to handle? If we could hear your thoughts, each of you would have a different answer. Why? The hardest objection to handle is the one you believe to be true yourself! If you believe an objection is true, then you will struggle to convince your prospects or customers otherwise. So, look at this list. Add to it. Then, rank the objections from the most difficult to the easiest. Focus on why the difficult ones are the most difficult. Work first to overcome the objections for yourself, then you will be better prepared to address the concerns and perceived risks of your customers.
Are you curious?
Curiosity is quite possibly the number one trait one must possess to be successful at selling. We have recently interviewed approximately 200 people who applied for an inside sales position with our company and have so far only hired one. We are truly disappointed in the candidates. All seem to believe selling is a telling business.
On the phone or in person the candidates talk and talk about their qualifications in glowing terms. Few, if any, ask thoughtful questions. Sometimes we even ask them to sell us something, most tell us about the item, but few ask what we intend to do with it.
Salespeople must be curious. This is a necessary trait for success in sales. How can you help a prospect become a customer if you don’t understand their needs and expectations? In our training, we emphasize asking open-ended questions that can’t be answered with a single word or sentence. We believe when trying to help someone purchase your products and services you need to ask thoughtful and insightful questions. If you don’t know exactly what a prospect wants or needs, ask! Ask more than one way to ensure you fully understand. Your questions should reveal your prospect’s story.
Only after you fully understand their situation can you help them paint a visual mental picture of your solution benefiting them. You’ll have a much better chance of winning business if your prospects visualize themselves using your solution, and like what they see. Questions help you paint the picture. Questions come from curiosity. Curiosity comes from truly caring about your customers and what they are trying to do. Selling is tough.
Selling when you aren’t curious is nearly impossible.
To be successful in sales be curious and paint mental word pictures. You’ll close more business.
Selling is not telling, so stop telling!
Be curious, ask questions. Win more business!
Successful Salespeople are Different
If you think it’s expensive to hire a successful sales person,
try hiring a mediocre one.
Here are some ways successful salespeople are different from mediocre ones.
- Successful salespeople ask questions.
Mediocre salespeople make statements. - Successful salespeople are naturally curious and care about customers and prospects.
Mediocre salespeople are myopic and self-centered. - Successful salespeople are persistent.
Mediocre salespeople are easily discouraged. - Successful salespeople understand and fulfill needs.
Mediocre salespeople assume what customers need. - Successful salespeople read, study and constantly learn about selling.
Mediocre salespeople know it all. - Successful salespeople have a strategy.
Mediocre salespeople wing it. - Successful salespeople have a system for tracking prospects like SalesTalk.
Mediocre salespeople don’t. - Successful salespeople are open to feedback.
Mediocre salespeople are defensive. - Successful salespeople are humble.
Mediocre salespeople have big egos. - Successful salespeople have a strategy.
Mediocre salespeople wing it. - Successful salespeople acknowledge and learn from mistakes.
Mediocre salespeople blame others. - Successful salespeople apologize when they are wrong.
Mediocre salespeople are never wrong. - Successful salespeople find customers for the products and services their company currently has.
Mediocre salespeople complain about what their company lacks. - Successful salespeople are seldom satisfied.
Mediocre salespeople rest on their laurels. - Successful salespeople set proper priorities and invest their time wisely.
Mediocre salespeople watch the clock. - Successful salespeople spend company money as if it were their own.
Mediocre salespeople spend their company’s money in ways they wouldn’t spend their own. - Successful salespeople make their numbers and are consistently over quota.
Mediocre salespeople blame market conditions or the economy for coming up short. - Successful salespeople actively listen.
Mediocre salespeople are easily distracted. - Successful salespeople have an ownership mentality.
Mediocre salespeople see selling as a job, not a career. - Successful salespeople enjoy what they do.
Mediocre salespeople don’t.
We hope you enjoyed our list. Please let us know if you think of one we missed. We’d love to hear from you.
Learning! Is it a gift, a skill, or a choice?
Anyone who has ever served as a teacher knows teachers learn as much, if not more than their students. The idea of discovery has always been at the heart of the learning experience. Great teachers are concerned with sharing what has been learned and discovered rather than positioning themselves as authoritarian figures who believe they are smarter than their pupils.
Winston Churchill may have said it best, “I’m always eager to learn, although I don’t always enjoy being taught.” Henry Ford said, “Anyone who stops learning is old; anyone who keeps learning stays young.” Brian Herbert, the elder son of science fiction writer Frank Herbert of the Dune Trilogy series said, “The capacity to learn is a gift; the ability to learn is a skill; the willingness to learn is a choice.” Magic happens in our classes when an attendee offers the group a gem worthy of repeating as well as incorporating in their daily lives. We believe learning is a community event. The more participation, the better.
Many people take learning for granted. They don’t appreciate the opportunities provided to grow and better themselves. An objection we often hear from managers is, “My people are experienced, they don’t need training.” This is shocking because experienced people still learn, grow, improve and share their knowledge with others. Learning is not just for new people. Would you feel comfortable seeing a doctor who has learned nothing new in the past ten years?
Ask what you’d like to tell.
Once a student shared, “Ask what you’d like to tell.” Six words that encapsulate the whole idea of selling and asking questions! Our instructors stress the value of asking questions in all our programs. Sales people must ask questions to move the process forward. They ask questions to understand the prospect’s needs. Ask questions to clarify ambiguities.
We once had a 42-year-old instructor leading a class that included a 68-year-old student. A quick calculation revealed that the student had been selling for the instructor’s entire life! A younger student asked the older student, “You’ve been selling longer than our instructor has been alive. Why are you attending a training course for sales?” The very experienced student replied, “I never stop learning; if I do I might as well be dead and I’m too young to die.” If only we all had this attitude!
The fun thing about teaching is that on the good days, you learn as much as you teach. When instructors create an environment where people share, everyone learns, everyone grows. That’s what we call Experiential Learning. The capacity to learn is a gift. Channeling that capacity is a skill. Doing it is a choice. Choose to attend one of our classes and experience how experiential learning will help you.
What words of wisdom have you created or learned? We’d love to hear from you. Please share your thoughts.
In the words of Mahatma Gandhi:
“Live as if you were to die tomorrow; Learn as if you were to live forever.”
Buyers are evolving. Has your sales process?
Despite what experts sometimes say, cold-calling or prospecting, is not dead. Despite the changes brought about by advancing technology, social media, and the Internet, generating new business still requires a pro-active approach. Technology and social media should be used in addition to prospecting, not in place of it.
Consider these three key components when prospecting:
-
Set appointments with yourself.
If you wait for a convenient time, you’ll never find it. Make an appointment to prospect, just like a sales call or a doctor appointment. Hold yourself accountable, make sure you keep the appointment!
-
Leave Voice Mails
Think of voice mails as advertisements. Studies show people engage with you after the fifth call; most salespeople give up after the third. Stay with it; if you set out to chop down a tree it will take more than two or three swings. Prospecting is similar. If you hit a tree once and leave it alone, it will heal. If you call a prospect once or twice and leave them alone, they will forget you.
-
Stay Focused and Organized.
It is critical to track your steps. If you found a gold mine and left to go get tools, you’d surely keep careful records of where the mine was found. Whatever type of CRM system you use, make certain you don’t lose track of what you are doing as well as how and when you need to follow up!
Sales Concepts prides itself on providing training that is process-driven, not event-driven. To that end, we’ve partnered with SalesTalk! SalesTalk provides cloud-based platforms that can be used alone or elegantly complement your current CRM system. SalesTalk helps salespeople automate the prospecting process and simplify the information they gather and use.
They also offer Lead Intelligence, Virtual Playbooks, Automated Sales Tasks and much more. Using Sales Concepts and SalesTalk helps your team increase sales to new customers and sell more to existing ones. Visit GetSalesTalk, call or email me to learn more.
