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Greetings! Here is...
Skip Anderson's
Selling to Consumers Sales Tips Newsletter
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THE QUEST FOR CLARITY
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There is a direct link between achieving clarity with prospects and achieving top sales performance. Let's define clarity as "accurate mutual understanding between the prospect and the salesperson."
The Need for Clarity.
Wildly successful salespeople understand the need for clarity with
their prospects on issues large and small. Anxiety envelopes
top-performing salespeople at the slightest hint of a lack of
clarity with their prospect. High performers understand that lack of
clarity leads to decreased closing rates, wasted time,
misunderstanding, and disappointed customers. Consequently, they
constantly and actively look for evidence of the presence of low
clarity during a sales interaction with their prospect.
In contrast, low-performing salespeople do not experience this anxiety. Because of low perceptiveness
(perceptiveness is a trait of top sales performers), these salespeople are
less likely to be
aware of low clarity situations.
Clarity in the Needs and Desires Investigation
The purpose of the needs and desires
investigation is to identify prospect needs and desires so the
salesperson can present product or service solutions that will meet
those needs and desires. But if the salesperson's
understanding of these needs isn't perfectly congruent with the
prospect's understanding of his own needs, sales activity will
be ineffective.
Six Strategies To Increase Clarity with Your Prospects
Our sales training programs teach six strategies to increase clarity
during needs and desires investigations:
1. Don't jump to conclusions. Jumping to
conclusions is a common behavior among low-performing salespeople.
If you work in a retail sales environment selling
appliances, and a prospect asks you, "What do you think of flat ceramic cooktops?"
don't conclude that the prospect is interested in selecting
a flat ceramic cooktop (they may or may not be considering this
product). Instead, give a brief answer, and then ask if the prospect
is considering a flat ceramic cooktop.
2. Listen without bias. Pure listening leads to clarity,
while biased
listening leads the sales process astray. Wildly successful
salespeople have developed the ability to listen to their prospects
while
Continue reading... |
SKIP ANDERSON:
Available for Training, Speaking, Consulting & Coaching |
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Utilize Skip's consumer selling expertise.
651.681.8568
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| ONE-SIXTH IS A LOT! |
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From Skip Anderson's Selling to Consumer's Blog
October 31, 2007
It's the last day of October. That means there are exactly two
months of selling opportunities remaining in calendar year 2007. How
are you doing at meeting your 2007 sales quota or goal?
If you're on track to make your goal for 2007, I'm guessing that
you're motivated, engaged, and aggressively moving ahead to ensure that
you sell what you need to to ensure that both your boss and yourself
are happy on December 31st, 2007.
On the other hand, if you're not on track to make your goal, you're
probably like a lot of salespeople who have given up on 2007 and are
instead looking ahead to 2008 with such self-talk as "next year will be
a better year" or "I hope the economy turns around next year."
2008 will be here in due time. It's great to plan ahead. But
one-sixth of 2007 remains. Your 2007 will likely be made or not made
depending upon how you decide to look at the remaining two months of
sales opportunities in 2007. Don't blow off one-sixth of the year
because once it's gone, it is gone forever.
Here are four ways to keep your focus on 2007:
1.
Virtually every salesperson has one or more nagging "to-do's" floating
around in their mind. What is it you've meant to do for months or even
a year or longer that you haven't "gotten around" to doing? Do it now.
You know what it is.
2.
Set clear behavior goals for yourself for the next two months
(examples: "get to work by 7:30 am" or "cut caffeine consumption by
fifty percent" or "contact thirty of my friends and relatives and ask
for referrals).
3.
If low motivation is a factor in your situation, let someone help you.
Hire a coach. Or, two books (or audiobooks) I highly recommend are Jack
Canfield's The Success Principles and Seth Godin's The Dip. One is long and the other is short; Both are great.
4.
Your best source of revenue is most probably the group of prospects
you've already spoken with and have given presentations to, but who you
let slip through the cracks. I know, I know: you got busy and didn't
have time to follow-up to continue the selling process. Well now it's
crunch time, so make time to call them back now, along with the fifty
or one hundred other prospects who were interested in your product or
service at one time in 2007, but from whom you never bothered to get a
firm yes or no buying decision. There are buyers there waiting for you.
It might be one of them or it might be fifty of them, but I know
they're there - they always are.
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QUESTION AUTHORITY
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Questions from Readers
If you have a sales question you'd like us to answer in a future edition of this
newsletter, please submit it to www.SellingToConsumers.com/contact
Please include your first and last name and location. Please let us know if have permission to use your name in our newsletter. |
BOOK IT
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 What We're Reading
Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable
by Seth Godin
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THE QUOTE CRIB
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"You can't get unless you give. And you have to give without wanting to get."
Theodore H White
Journalist, Historian, Novelist
"It's not about the "haves" and the "have nots." It's about those that move forward and those that don't."
Roger Revak
Public Speaker | |
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