Sales Blog with Sales Tips

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Here are two things that I absolutely hate to overhear salespeople say to customers or prospects:

1. “My schedule is wide open next week. I can meet with you at any time.”
2. “I sure hope you need to reorder those filters. I’m having a terrible month.”

Why do I hate hearing things like that? This kind of verbiage is counterproductive because we always need to look busy and successful to our customers and prospects. Many studies have confirmed that people feel more confident buying from sales professionals that they view as in demand and very successful.

Do you want to be treated by a doctor that drives a 20-year old station wagon and is always available? Our customers and prospects feel the same way. They assume that if we are busy and come across as successful that we must know what we are doing. The psychological term for this is cognitive consonance. If we’re busy and successful looking, then we must be busy and successful.

What should we do if a customer or prospect asks us about our availability and we have nothing scheduled on our calendar? We answer by asking them what a good time would be for them. “You want to meet at 2:00 on Wednesday? That will work perfectly; that slot is available in my calendar.” There are a million ways to handle this, but the rule of thumb is not to give them the perception that we’re twiddling our thumbs.

How do we answer a customer or prospect when they ask us if sales are good? Regardless of how bad or good things are going, answer with something that sounds like, “Things continue to go very well for me here at the XYZ Company. Thanks for asking.”

People like to deal with successful people. We can make the buying decision easier for our customers and prospects by coming across as a winner.

To receive this sales tips blog by email <click here> to receive by RSS <click here>. © 2008 Scott R. Sheaffer

In my career I’ve found that the most straightforward and simple things are the most effective. The following is no exception:

“Different is not always better, but better is always different.”

What does this mean and how does it apply to our sales effectiveness?

We’ve all had brief periods in our sales career where things were not going like we wanted. Sales just didn’t seem to come too easily. In fact, it felt like we couldn’t give our products or services away. Anyone that’s been in sales for more than a year or two knows exactly what I’m talking about.

But how about those times when we hit a prolonged and lengthy sales slump? We normally react to these times by soldiering on with the same sales techniques that we’ve always used, but we do them faster and harder in an effort to regain momentum. We think it’s an issue of intensity. Many times all that happens is even less sales success and increased frustration.

However, it’s not usually an issue of intensity. Sales is not just a numbers game. To get out of our slump we’ve got to change something in order to get better results. The same old recipe isn’t going to make a different cake.

While there are no guarantees that a change in sales techniques will help, we know that if we don’t make an adjustment we’ll keep getting more of the same. What are some areas that we can look at for modification?

1. Are we going after the right prospects?
2. Do we need to reach out to different levels of decision makers?
3. Are we just chasing our competitors’ accounts and not finding our own prospects?
4. Have we forgotten about cross-selling?
5. Are we contacting our customers frequently enough?

Change can be scary sometimes. We feel comfortable with what we know even though it may not be working for us. We don’t have to make adjustments to our sales techniques all at once. We can make them a little at a time. Just remember that real improvements can’t be made in our sales effectiveness unless something is done differently.

To receive this sales tips blog by email <click here> to receive by RSS <click here>. © 2008 Scott R. Sheaffer

Price objections. Salespeople expect to get them and customers expect to give them. Most of the time we greatly exaggerate their importance and significance and I can prove to you that I’m right.

There have been numerous studies on the most important issues to buyers when they choose a vendor. The issues identified in these studies are consistently and virtually identical. These issues are (ranked in order of importance):

1. Availability of product or service
2. Risks of partnering with the vendor
3. Service
4. Quality
5. Price

Notice that only items one and five have an objective measurement associated with them. We can tell the customer if we have the product or not and we can certainly tell them a price.

However, we can’t provide meaningful quantification regarding risks, service or quality. Our customers know that we can’t accurately give them this important information so they don’t ask about it.

But they do ask about availability and price. Customers seem to have an unending stream of questions about price, which makes us think that it’s a priority to them. It’s not, but they know it’s a question with an answer.

How do our customers get data in order to answer their higher priority questions about risks, service and quality? They get it through time and relationship with us. Over time a customer’s experience with us and our company will fill in those information gaps for them.

Evidence of this can be found in long term customers’ price sensitivity. Generally speaking, the longer we do business with a customer the less price sensitive they become. Why? We have provided them with answers regarding risks, service and quality, so price has been relegated to its proper place in their perspective, fifth.

Remember that most price objections are stated objections, not real objections. Our prospects and new customers are simply trying to learn something about us when they ask about price. We’ve got to be careful not to read too much into questions about price.

To receive this sales tips blog by email <click here> to receive by RSS <click here>. © 2008 Scott R. Sheaffer

Most salespeople would never admit they have become an order taker.

There are two major drawbacks with being an order taker. One, order takers make less income both in commission and base salary. Two, order takers are easily replaced by customers and employers.

I’ve had times in my sales career when I slipped into being more of an order taker than a consultative sales professional. This can happen when we get busy and put less emphasis on our partnership with our customers. Before we know it, we’re just taking orders.

When the information flow between our customers and us diminishes to just part numbers, quantities and PO numbers we start to look like a generic salesperson. We become a sales commodity instead of a sales resource to our customers. A commodity is something with limited value and is commonly available, not exactly a prescription for high perceived value.

How do we know if we are slipping into the order taking mode? Here’s a short test.

1. Is your correspondence with customers predominately by email?
2. Do you only sell your company’s basic product lines?
3. Do you only have one or two contacts at most of your customers?
4. Are you only aware of your customers’ immediate needs versus their long term projects?
5. Is your knowledge of competitive activity at most of your customers virtually zero?
6. Do your customer records contain limited information and are they disorganized?
7. Do you feel you win the majority of your business on price?
8. Do your customers never or rarely call you with special needs?
9. Do you send out a disproportionately large number of price quotes for the number of orders you write?
10. Are you never or rarely involved with your customers socially?

If you answered “yes” to three or more of the questions above then polish up your customer relationship skills and get back in the game. Go through your customer list one account at a time and consider how you can renew your partnership with each of them. Customers are buying from you because of your personal value to them. Order takers are a dime a dozen.

To receive this sales tips blog by email <click here> to receive by RSS <click here>. © 2008 Scott R. Sheaffer