Sales Tips Blog by Scott R. Sheaffer

These Two Words are Killing Your Sales

Scott Sheaffer — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 08:00:08 +0000

I’m going to tell you two words that are killing sales professionals and we need to stop using them right now. I’ll then provide two sales tips that you can use to take their place.

The Killer Words
The two words that are sabotaging our sales efforts are “the economy.” I hear those two words strung together dozens of times each day and it’s starting to make me sick.

“My commission check is going to be smaller because of the economy.”
“The economy is causing my customers not to return my calls.”
“With the economy the way it is, I’m not going to waste my time prospecting.”

“As sales professionals, we will always have to manage ourselves in either growing or shrinking economies.”

Have you noticed there are legions of articles, podcasts and a sales blog around every corner telling you how to sell in our current economic climate? Everyone seems to have a mystical and complicated answer. I’ll give you two simple sales tips that cover everything you need to know about selling in the economy. This is more straightforward than you have been led to believe.

Two Sales Tips for The Economy
1. Every time a professional sports team is in trouble and recruits a new coach, what is the first thing the new coach always wants to focus on? Basics. “This team needs to get back to basics because that’s 95% of the game.”

We must do the same. Focus on the sales basics that we know and that also appear in this sales blog. Planning, prospecting, follow-up, cross-selling, up-selling, networking, relationships, information gathering. These are pillars of sales and they are more important today than they were yesterday. We all know that working hard is a basic too.

2.There is an expression airplane pilots use that applies to sales professionals. “When one of the engines quits, don’t forget to keep flying.” That’s powerful. If a pilot fixates on the mechanical problems he or she is having with a plane, they could easily get so distracted that they fly the plane right into the ground. If the pilot keeps his or her hands on the controls, the chance for a successful outcome is greatly improved.

This principle applies to us. When our selling environment changes we must keep selling. Allowing ourselves to be completely sidetracked by the economy can unconsciously cause us to pilot our sales career into the side of a mountain.

Sales Blog Epilogue
Economies are just like climates. They are always changing and are unpredictable. As sales professionals, we will always have to manage ourselves in either growing or shrinking economies. Stay with the sales basics you know and remain focused on selling. Keep flying.

Further reading:

The Four Mandatory Steps of Customer Meeting Preparation

Scott Sheaffer — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 08:00:31 +0000

Imagine this scene. We’ve all been there. You’re in a customer meeting with six people from your company and two from the customer. Everything is going fairly well until the customer asks a question and everything goes quiet. You and your comrades start looking at each other with a “Do you have an answer to this?” look on your faces. It’s obvious to everyone that you don’t have an answer. As the Account Manager, you feel embarrassed.

“…[This step]…can be a little frightening because it makes us realize how fragile a sale can be.”

Four Sales Tips to Cure This Problem
After years of suffering through meetings like this, I formulated the following not-always-popular plan that eliminates the problem about 99% of the time. It increased my meeting effectiveness tremendously and I want to share it with you now in this sales blog.

Follow these four sales tips, in the order presented. The more important the customer meeting, the more important it is to make sure every step is covered.

1. If your company feels compelled to send a cast of thousands to every customer meeting, then eliminate some folks prior to the meeting. When you drag ten people into a customer meeting you aren’t going to be able to maintain control and the likelihood of a dumb answer being uttered by someone on your team skyrockets. Come on, if you can’t tell your story with a maximum of three people, there’s a problem.

This will not make some people at your company happy (i.e., those not selected). It will, however, make your customer more comfortable and the meeting will go more smoothly.

2. Prior to the customer meeting, sit all the participants down and ask the following question, “In what areas are our products or services weak compared to our competitors?” Oh yes I know, you’ve been told that you work for the biggest, best, strongest, best dressed and most intelligently run company in the known universe. But you don’t. No one does. You have weaknesses. Talk about them ahead of time and have smart answers ready for when your customer mentions them. Sure beats making things up on the run.

This is not politically correct at many companies because you’ve been told repeatedly by management how flawless and perfect everything is where you work. It isn’t. Go in prepared with good answers and look like you have a grasp on market realities to your customer. They’ll be impressed.

3. Prior to the meeting ask your group the following additional question, “What questions do we fear the customer may ask that could lose us this deal?” This is a scary exercise because the number of questions can grow rather large. Think like the customer, not as an Account Manager. It’s amazing how you can come up with solid answers for what first appear to be deal killer questions.

Some of these sales tips, especially this one, can be a little frightening because it makes us realize how fragile a sale can be. However, if we prepare intelligent answers to these tough customer questions we can weather the storm and come out on the other side with sails flying high.

4. Prior to the meeting (are you starting to see a trend here?), designate who from your group is going to answer the questions noted above. Challenge them to be an expert on their assigned question(s). Get them to use this sales blog, and others, for additional sales tips.

Sales Blog Epilogue
Now imagine this scene and observe how the above sales tips come together. You’re in a customer meeting with three people from your company and two from the customer. The customer says, “We read recently that your company came in last in a customer service satisfaction survey.”

You listen thoughtfully, turn to Bob (who is on your team) and say, “Bob, you were talking about this the other day (which is, in fact, the truth). Could you shed some light on this survey?”

“No problem. This survey was paid for by one of our competitors. Not surprisingly this particular competitor ranked number one in the survey…”

Bob, the designated hitter, just hit it out of the park. How? Preparation.

Further reading:

8 Speed Traps in Sales

Scott Sheaffer — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 08:00:23 +0000

When I was learning to drive in high school the driving instructors sent all the young student drivers to the school auditorium to watch a series of little horror movies. These movies, which must have dated back to the 1940s, featured teenage carnage and mayhem on the highways. The theme was always some form of “speed kills.”

Speed Can Hurt Us in Sales Too
These types of movies made us laugh (not exactly the intended result) because they were produced in such a cheesy way. The serious point they were trying to drive home to their common-sense-challenged teenage audience interestingly also applies to sales. Speed can kill.

“Customers are frequently like Chinese Finger Traps.”

8 Speed Traps
I have frequently observed the “speed kills” problem in rookie sales professionals, but experienced pro’s aren’t immune either. The following are eight sales tips on how speed can kill sales:

As soon as the customer indicates they want to buy something, we promptly write the order, thank them for their business and head out the door or hang up the phone. All opportunities for cross-selling are missed.
When we successfully identify a decision maker, we don’t take the time to see if there are other decision makers we should be contacting in the same organization. We could be missing sales from an entire department due to our haste in this area.
In our desire to expedite the sales process we don’t make time to ask our customers open ended questions that could provide us with valuable information regarding their needs.
Our need for speed can result in insufficient time allocated for relationship building. Relationships take time. All sales professionals know that relationships are the key to high quality long-term customers. This is a frequent topic of this sales blog.
While we can influence a customer’s buying timeframe, if we resort to arm-twisting in order to get them to buy more quickly, we risk losing more than just an order.
What’s the number one complaint from customers about sales professionals from virtually every study that has ever been done? We don’t listen. When customers perceive that we are rushing, they know we aren’t listening.
Human behavior suggests that the more we are pushed, the more we naturally resist. Customers are frequently like Chinese Finger Traps. The harder we try to make them do something (e.g., hurry up), the more they resist.
The harder we spur a customer to move faster and place an order, the more desperate we look. Customers don’t like buying from desperate sales professionals.

I could provide more sales tips because there are plenty of additional ways that hurrying customers hurts us in sales. Please see “Further reading” below for related posts from this sales blog.

Sales Blog Epilogue
Am I saying that we don’t need to move fast with customers? No. Am I saying that we shouldn’t make every reasonable effort to close orders faster? No. However, I am saying that rabidly rushing customers in order to make them purchase faster can have many undesirable and unintended consequences.

Further reading:

Rise Above Commodity Style Selling

Scott Sheaffer — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 08:00:11 +0000

I use the term “commodity” frequently in this sales blog. Let’s get on the same page regarding its meaning in a sales context. First of all, it usually has a negative connotation. It implies that our products and services:

Have few, if any, value added services.
Are easily and commonly found.
Are inexpensive.
Are not unique or “brandable.”
Are unsophisticated and simple.

“Commodity selling is a frame of mind…not a product or service.”

Commodity Selling Perspective
Selling a commodity product or service can easily deteriorate to price only…if we let it. If we’re not careful, we could turn selling nuclear power plants into commodity sales. However, we can also make corn (the ultimate commodity item) into something much more than just a commodity in the eyes of our customers.

Regardless of what we’re selling, we can control whether we create a commodity-selling situation, or not.

The Wrong Kind of Sales Tips
The following is the toxic formula that will result in your being a commodity salesperson regardless of what you’re selling (i.e., avoid all of these):

Always talk about price first.
Never discuss the added services your company provides.
Mention your competitors frequently.
Avoid all decision makers and spend all of your time with information gatherers or recommenders.
Never add-on-sell, up-sell or cross-sell. Never let the customer know you have a breadth of products and services.
Offer to quote prices on anything and everything, even if the customer doesn’t ask.
Provide the customer every brochure, flyer, reference sheet and catalog your company has ever produced. Help them kick-start their paper recycling program.

The Right Kind of Sales Tips
If you use the following recipe when selling, you can lift yourself out of the commodity classification. This works whether you’re selling wheat germ (whatever that is), buckwheat or space shuttles.

Commodity selling is a frame of mind…not a product or service.

Your first priority is to educate your customers about the added value you and your company make available to them. Negotiate price, etc. only after that has been done.
Talk about yourself and your company. Avoid discussions about your competitors. You’re not there to talk about them.
Find and get to the decision makers who will appreciate your added value. Decision makers understand ROI (Return on Investment) much better than recommenders and information gatherers.
Look like the multi-line company you are by teaching your customers what you have to offer.
Quote prices only when customers are serious about, and capable of, buying.
God gave you words to sell with; their power can be Biblical. Use them to sell; marketing collateral alone doesn’t sell anything.

Sales Blog Epilogue
You can decide to rise above a commodity salesperson regardless of what you sell and you can decide to do it right now. Powerful stuff.

Further reading:

A Really Big Number

Scott Sheaffer — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 08:00:00 +0000

How many companies are there in the United States? It’s a large number. I’ll give you the number a little later in this sales blog post. What I like about the number is that there are plenty of fish in the pond. You and your company only think you have tapped the potential of your markets.

“…quit wasting time on that prospect who’s playing a big game of hard-to-get when there are so many others interested in dancing with us.”

How Many are There?
A reliable and current source says there are 20,392,694 businesses in the United States. Over 20 million companies operate in the United States. And you know what? Sometimes we act as if there are 237 businesses instead of 20,000,000+.

He Needed Sales Tips for Dating
I had a friend in high school who fell in love with one girl who didn’t even know his name. His efforts to go out with her didn’t seem to work. He would obsess over this one girl. What drove us all nuts was that this guy looked like Brad Pitt. Many girls would have been happy to go out with him. However, he chose to put all of his “prospecting” efforts into just one girl. He didn’t date much.

When we’ve made a gallant effort to land a prospect but we aren’t getting anywhere, it’s smart to move on. There are many opportunities for us to “date” prospects, but we’re so focused on a handful of them that we lose site of the big picture.

Conventional sales tips tell you to “never give up” on a prospect. However, there’s a point where we need to quit wasting time on that prospect who’s playing a big game of hard-to-get when there are so many others interested in dancing with us.

Sales Blog Epilogue
Our prospect “black book” is huge in the United States. As sales professionals, we’re fortunate. Cross out the names of the ones that aren’t responding to your efforts and contact some of the other 20,392,693. There are plenty who want to go out with you, but first you have to pick up the phone and make a “date.”

Further reading: