Sales Trigger 4: Handle Objections

If you’re selling something, then your prospects are already figuring out reasons why they shouldn’t buy it. These are called objections.

Common objections include the following…

The price is too high. Here the person may be able to afford the product or service, but he still thinks the price is high compared to the value you’ve demonstrated.

You can fix this by demonstrating more value (sharing benefits) and clearly stating your USP (unique selling position). You can also explicitly give people a reason the price is so high.

For example: The price for this inner circle membership is higher than what you’ve seen elsewhere because we only want serious business owners in this élite group.

TIP: Want to see how to prove high prices? Then start reading ads for luxury goods and services, such as Rolex, Mercedes, Bentley, Armani and similar goods. In most cases, you’ll see the price justification is based around their branding and USP.

The price is too low. Low prices sometimes get equated with the product or service being “cheap” or “junk,” so this objection makes people wonder why you’d price the item so low. That’s why you need to justify low prices, too.

For example: I know what you’re thinking – this price is crazy low! You might even be thinking something is missing from this package.

Nope, you get the FULL course for a fraction of the price.

Why?

It’s because I want to make this course affordable to everyone. It’s not fair if only rich people can afford this course. So for a limited time, you can get this course for a song – but hurry before this special offer ends!

I can’t afford it. This objection isn’t that the price is too high, but instead that the prospect is thinking he shouldn’t spend his money on that particular item right now. Sometimes that may be true. Sometimes that’s just an objection you need to handle because it’s nothing more than an excuse.

The solution? Justify the price. An excellent way to do this is to compare it to other activities or products which show why your product is a good value.

For example: If you hired a ghostwriter to create this report, you’d pay at least $750 for it. But if you’re one of the first 100 people to act now and get a PLR license, you get full rights to this report for $50. You can’t afford to pass up this steal of a deal!

Another example is to point out how the item is comparable to some small thing the person regularly purchases.

For example: You get this complete report for the price of a small pizza. You won’t find a better way to invest $9, so click the order button below now.

I’m not sure if it will work for me. For this objection, you offer a guarantee (AKA risk reversal).

For example: I’m so confident you’ll love this product that I’m willing to back this offer with an iron-clad 100% money-back guarantee. If you’re unsatisfied for any reason whatsoever, email me, and I’ll promptly issue a full refund – no questions asked.

So you can see how this works. Be sure to handle those common objections you just learned about. However, you need to take it a step further: you’ll need to look at your specific product and figure out what people might object to so you can handle those objections as well.

Next trigger:

Sales Trigger 5: Build Credibility

You need to give your prospects a good reason. In other words, you need to build your credibility. Whenever your prospects are reading your sales letter or other content, they’ve got their defence shields up. They’re sceptical. And one of the thoughts that will be floating through their head is this: “Why should I listen to this person?”

You need to give your prospects a good reason. In other words, you need to build your credibility.

Let me give you some examples of credibility-building statements:

• Why should you listen to me? Simple: because last year my business generated $1,117,922. I know how marketing works, and now I want to share my secrets with you.
• I lost 50 pounds using this diet plan, and I’ve kept it off for three years. I’ve helped 388 other people just like you lose at least 50 pounds too. This plan worked for me, it works for others, and it will work for you too.
• My books have soared to the top of the USA Today Bestseller’s lists three times in the past 18 months – so you know this novel-writing course is the real deal.
• I’ve spent ten years honing my copywriting skills. My sales letters have pulled in $200 million worth of frontend sales and created countless backend opportunities. Now you too can put my experience and expertise to work for you.
• Dr Simon has spent the last two decades learning everything to know about human metabolism. You won’t find a better-researched book or a medical doctor with more experience in this field.

So the bottom line here is to give your readers a reason to listen to you. Do you have experience? Credentials? A degree? Specific results in the field? Awards?

Whatever it is, build your credibility by sharing it with your readers.

Next up:

Sales Trigger 6: Use Social Proof

Here’s something to understand about your prospects:

They’re unsure of themselves. They’re not sure what to do. They prefer to see what others are doing and then follow along.

That’s right; people tend to be a little conformist.

I’m not making this up. Scientists have proven that people like to conform with others. For example, let me ask you which line is longer:

Line A: —————

Line B: —————————

There’s no question, right? Obviously, Line B is longer. You can show these lines to anyone with normal vision, and they’ll all tell you that Line B is longer.

So let’s imagine you have a guy named Joe who’s judging line length. Three other people in the room are also judging line length, and all three of them say that “Line A” is longer. These three people are shills – they work for the researcher.

After Joe hears all these other people say Line A is longer, he now has to give his answer.

Guess what?

Joe is more likely to say “Line A” is longer, even though you can see it in his face that he knows that’s not true. He is merely conforming with the group because it makes him feel more psychologically comfortable to go along with what everyone else is doing and saying. (Hint: This is why “peer pressure” makes such a significant impact on people.)

You can use this tendency to conform to your sales process. All you have to do is show your prospects that everyone else is buying your product, joining your mailing list, or “liking” your social media posts. This is called social proof.

Let me give you specific examples:

• Testimonials. Your prospects don’t always believe you (they figure you’re biased), which is why testimonials work so well to boost sales. What’s more, testimonials help trip that conformity reason as well, which also pushes people towards the conformity button.
• Tickers. This is where you show people buying a product or joining your site in a live ticker. Of course, you can’t share specifics, but you might have something such as “John from London just joined… Suzy from
  California just joined…” If you have a lot of sales, subscribers or registrations coming in each day, it’s a powerful way to use social proof to boost your conversion rate further.
• Numbers. Think of how McDonald’s Restaurant signs used to say things such as, “Over one billion hamburgers served.” That’s social proof using numbers.

Social media has social proof built right in. For example, anyone visiting your Facebook Page can see how many fans you have, and how many people like, share or comment on your posts.

You can share other numbers as well, such as how many customers you have, how many subscribers, etc. E.G., “3287 satisfied customers can’t be wrong, so order now!”

So here’s the bottom line: show your prospects and visitors that OTHER people are buying your products, subscribing to your newsletter, following you on social media, and other activities. This social proof will get even more people doing the same thing.

Chapter 3 covers Fear, Authority, Honesty and Consistency.

And just in case you missed, Chapter 1: Reciprocity, Curiosity And Specificity.

Publisher’s note – this article was originally published at Richtopia as A Comprehensive Guide on the Psychology of Marketing and Sales.

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In a situation like this, many a salesperson starts to feel pressure and loses faith in their pricing. They take their eye from the value of their offering and get consumed by price. Sometimes they become demoralised and demotivated. The kneejerk reaction is to discount the price to get the sale.

The issue for the salesperson is they are focused on closing the sale instead of helping the prospect.

Because the real issue with ‘I don’t have the money’ has little to do with the price. It’s because the client with the money doesn’t have trust in the salesperson.

When the client does have trust in the salesperson, the relationship shifts to something like a doctor/patient scenario where the client is waiting to be advised what solution will fix their problem.

They are expecting the ‘expert’ to give them the most suitable solution. In turn, the salesperson feels an obligation to provide a solution that aligns best.

Often this solution is substantially more money than what that client was originally going to spend … and (insert drum roll) the client buys (cue crescendo) because it’s the right solution for them (release the doves!).

When we are engaging with a prospect, they are looking for someone to understand them. Someone who gets what they need. The client wants to feel confident the seller is 100% aligned with them and will only present a solution that fits what they are actually looking for.

As a salesperson – ask yourself these two questions:

1. Are you 100% sold on your solution? If you are not 100% sold you can’t expect your client to be. 

• Do you know your solution, inside and out?
• Do you know the alternatives the client could buy instead from competitors?
• Do you know the value of your solution to the client?

2. Do you seek to understand? Your intent is to be a partner, the solution provider, the trusted advisor

• When you are with a potential client, are you mentally and physically beside them and seeking to understand?
• Are you 100% present and focused on them?
• Do you ask relevant, meaningful questions to really assess the situation?
• Are you are listening and absorbing everything the client is saying and how they are saying it?

Often a salesperson is selling at the buyer. We call this ‘spray and pray’—spraying all the features and benefits of their solution with repetitive banter without adapting to this client. They are not making it clear what’s in it for them. They are not linking the benefit and value to how it will help that person’s situation. And they can’t know as they haven’t asked enough insightful questions. ­­­­­

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Without knowing the questions – it is difficult to know how you are going to help them.

Before you do any of these steps, you must have this foundation to start:

1. You need to be sold on what you are selling. You need to know the value to the client.
2. You are practiced in each step so that its natural. You are being your authentic self.

There are two different stages of questions.

Stage 1: Qualifying Questions

The time for qualifying questions is when you are calling out/prospecting and you are determining if they are in the market for your offer.

1. You’ve done enough homework to identify this client may well need your solution.
2. Your intention is to show 1) you are out to help them and 2) when they are ready to be helped, you are the ‘go to’ person – the trusted advisor.
3. You understand you will need to frame why you are calling. They were not expecting you, they don’t know you, the problem must not be on their mind right now.
4. You have a clear, precise elevator pitch which explains what your solution does.
5. You are calm, reasonable and rational. You are speaking clearly and at the right pace.
6. Your question pool is large. You will draw in the most relevant questions at the time along the lines of these types of ‘other clients have found/statement & solution’ questions:

• Many of our clients are reporting problems with areas A, B, and C. How are these areas affecting you? What do you think about them?
• Some people are doing … as that’s the easiest or the way they know best. Have you considered another solution?
• Sometimes we find other people in your industry may be having problems with [insert a couple of pain points]. Is this the case with you or your company?
• How is your current solution working out, on a scale of 1-10? (10 being perfect, 1 being ‘it’s not working out’.) Ensure you are having two-way conversations by this point.
• What concerns do you have about switching/implementing a new solution?
• If you would like other ideas, solutions on how to improve – reduce costs, create time, make money, be efficient – I’m here and happy to assist. I’ve been working in this area for X years and know all the different options available to you to make your life easier.
• What are your thoughts on what needs to happen to improve/make progress/change?

1. You realise they may not be ready with the answers, have patience. Don’t answer your own questions or give multiply choice!
2. You are 100% present – you’re able to listen carefully to everything they are saying.
3. You take detailed notes.
4. The flow naturally moves to the next stage (channel two) which may progress then or further down the line – this is the exploration stage.
5. You are not quick to take a no. If they do actually need what you have but the timing is out – then the timing is out. Ensure you leave the conversation positive with something like: ‘If it’s not right for you right now, I’m happy to send over my email and a top line of how we can help. And then when you are ready to tackle that we can reconnect.’
6. Don’t take things personally. 99% of outbound prospecting is all about timing. Smile, breathe, be grateful for the opportunity to serve more people and get on the phone to the next person you might be able to help.

Stage 2: Exploration Questions

This is when you are certain they are in the market for what you have. You may have had some previous engagement and they are aware of you and know that they want a solution to a problem.

1. You’ve identified they appear to fit your ideal client profile.
2. Your intention is to a) help them and b) be seen as the trusted advisor and solution provider.
3. You are calm, reasonable and rational. Speaking clearly and going at the pace of the client.
4. Ask open ended, investigating, specific and clarify questions. These questions allow you to delve deeper with that prospect, ascertaining everything about their needs, wants, desires, beliefs etc so you can see how your solution can serve them. The questions will likely include:

• Walk me through: how you are currently doing xyz, or explain how this works…
• How: How long have you had the problem? How have you gone about fixing it? How does your team feel about …? How does X feel about the issue? …
• What: What do you think the solution is? What do you know about the different solutions available? What is your timing? What happened when you tried X? What are you looking for? What does success look like?
• When: When did it start? When did that happen? When did X do that? When this took place what was the result? When are you looking to get it solved or started?
• If: If this was to be a solution what would that mean? If you were to allow yourself to run a ‘best case’ scenario (regardless of any restrictions like money, time, effort etc) what would that be? Why would you say that? How close are you to that now? If you were to fast-forward to 18 months from now, what will you be doing differently?
• Closed questions:
  • Have: Have you tried anything before/Have you considered…?
  • Which: do you prefer X or Y, and ‘why’
  • Did: you enjoy zyx
  • Do: you prefer x or z

5. You are 100% present – you’re totally engrossed in what they are talking about. You are aware of what they are saying, doing, getting excited or concerned about. You are noting their language, their beliefs, their knowledge on the problem and its fixes, the urgency, timing, key decision makers, what they think will fix it.

6. You understand they will be doing most of the talking.

7. You take detailed notes.

8. The flow naturally moves to the next stage which is further exploration, meeting further individuals in that business and the sale.

Questions are the key. If there is one area we ask leaders to train their team on its all about seek to understand.  This means have a pool of many questions so you can keep that client discussing the situation—so you know how you can best serve them.

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They will stop to question whether they should proceed with the purchase or abort the mission. In other words, they will object. Sometimes the objections are totally legitimate, and sometimes they’re completely absurd, but salespeople have to resolve them nonetheless. Otherwise, a promising sale will come to a screeching halt.

‘Objection handling’ is therefore a topic that is commonly found in sales training programs. The more prepared salespeople are to handle objections, the more comfortably and confidently they can discharge them. This training will often describe the most frequent objections that sellers can expect to encounter and then provide them with thoughtful responses to appease the buyers’ concerns. For instance:

Common Objection: Your price is way higher than your competitor’s.

Thoughtful Response: Yes, I’ve heard that from other customers as well, but once they saw the richness of our features, they totally understood how our product is superior to the competitor’s and why the marginally higher cost is justified by a greater return on investment.

Objection-handling skills are very important and useful, but some of the supposed wisdom that gets dispensed on the topic is laughable. One of my favourites is: ‘It is a great sign when customers raise objections, because it shows that they’re interested.’ Umm … maybe. I think when customers raise objections, it shows that they don’t like something about the salesperson or the product. A much better sign is when they don’t object at all. That means that the salesperson and the product are both doing their jobs.

Another classic gem is: ‘The best way to handle an objection is just to ignore it, because the buyer will either forget they raised it, or they’ll answer the objection themselves in their mind.’ Umm … no. If your buyer raises an objection and you don’t address it, it’s not going away—it’s just going unresolved. It will resurface later in the sales cycle and sink your chances of winning the deal, while you excitedly update your sales forecast to reflect the smooth sales call you just conducted. I sometimes try to ignore the weeds that grow in my lawn, but they never seem to go away. Instead, they tend to grow bigger despite my proactive neglect.

And this leads me to my all-time favorite insane approach to ‘handling’ objections. In fact, it is the exact opposite of the ‘ignore it’ strategy. This one states: ‘Address all possible objections before your customer has the chance to raise them.’ Then your customer’s mind will be carefree, and those pesky objections won’t interfere with the rest of your sale. Yeah, right.

The Worst Practice

Management consultants are frequently asked to ‘shadow’ salespeople in the field. In other words, you follow the sellers around and observe them in their natural environment, hoping to gain some insight into their skills or behaviours. It was during one of these shadowing exercises that I first encountered the dubious strategy of frontloading a sales call with all potential objections.

I was riding around with a well-regarded salesperson for a software company. On this particular day, he had an important meeting with a prospect that he’d been pursuing for several months. The meeting was with a team of mid-level managers who had been chosen to evaluate solution providers and narrow the field to two options for their executive team to then interview. Therefore, this was a critical point in the sales cycle—if the salesperson messed up this meeting, he would be knocked out of contention.

The seller and I were discussing his plan for the meeting over breakfast that morning:

Me: So, do you mind sharing with me your agenda for today’s big sales call?

Seller: Sure. I’ll open the meeting with introductions, since I haven’t met a few of the people who will be in the room. I’ll introduce myself and then ask them to introduce themselves, telling me what they’d like to accomplish during our time together.

Me: Sounds good.

Seller: Then I’ll take five or ten minutes to address several objections that they’ll have.

Me: What objections? You will have done only the introductions at this point in the meeting. What kind of objections could they possibly raise to introductions?

Seller: No, no, no. Of course they won’t have raised any objections at that point, but I always like to go ahead and address the objections that I know they’re going to have.

Me: So, you’re going to raise their objections for them?

Seller: Sure. People always have the same objections, so I just handle them up front. That way we can get them out of the way, and they don’t sit there with the objections festering in their minds. You know, kill the monster while it’s small. That way it doesn’t grow into something you can’t defeat.

Me [willing to learn something new]: Okay. Let’s see how it goes.

True to his plan, the salesperson opened the meeting with a round of introductions and wrote the attendees’ goals for the meeting on a flip chart. He then launched his pre-emptive strike.

Seller: So I thought I would begin by addressing some of the concerns that you probably have regarding our company and our products.

The buyers cocked their heads slightly to the side as they looked at the salesperson standing in front of them. Clearly this was not the agenda item that they were expecting to hear immediately after the introductions.

Seller: Many people are concerned about the small size of our company relative to our much larger competitors. In fact, this will be an advantage to you if we earn your business, because we will assign a senior team to you that will be much more capable, attentive, and responsive than our competitors can provide you.

I noted a few nods around the table. Perhaps this was actually a good strategy?

Seller: You might also find that the pricing I’m going to show you toward the end of the meeting will be higher than you expect. You should know that we offer a superior product that commands a premium in the marketplace. This too should be comforting to you, because you will be purchasing the absolute best-in-class solution.

I’m pretty sure I observed shock on the face of at least one attendee. They surely didn’t see that one coming so early in the conversation.

Seller: And a few customers have told me that they found stories online questioning the security of our technology. I can assure you that our technology is as secure as any of our competition’s. In fact, I’d be happy to put you in touch with several of our current customers who have extensively tested our product and will attest to its bullet-proof security protocols.

At least two of the attendees started taking notes after this revelation. I assume they were making reminders to do some online research on the product’s security flaws. Apparently this was a hot news flash to them.

So it went for another five minutes. The salesperson must have ‘handled’ at least a half dozen objections that the buyers may or may not have had before he raised them. He told me afterward that he was happy to have killed all those monsters while they were still small, though I suspect they were small because he’d given birth to them right there in that room.

His stated strategy was to clear the buyers’ minds of all their latent objections so they could pay closer attention to his message. To the contrary, he appeared to have burdened them with a collection of new concerns to hold in reserve for later consideration. That, coupled with their general surprise at his unprovoked defensive stand, set a strange tone for the entire discussion. They seemed to be judging him for the remainder of the meeting, trying to decide if he was the most honest salesperson they had ever met, or just the stupidest. Either way, no sale was made.

I suggested to him that future monster slayings might be better placed at the end of the sales call, rather than the beginning. He disagreed. I can’t help but wonder how many of his prospects have stared at him in similar puzzlement throughout his career. Regardless, I’ve never seen anyone else open a sales call by turning a weapon on himself—inflicting potentially fatal wounds to his sale, not to tiny monsters.

The Good Ideas

Good Idea 1: Don’t Assume You Know What Buyers Are Thinking

Part of the sales challenge is to uncover buyers’ needs, so you can then try to satisfy them. As a corollary, you also have to uncover their objections, so you can try to dispel them. But you can’t pretend to know what your prospects are thinking—you have to ask them questions to uncover the truth. Making assumptions about their state of mind or their state of affairs is high-risk behavior. Behavior that will cost you sales.

Good Idea 2: Never Raise Objections on Behalf of Buyers

During the course of a sale, there will be plenty of forces campaigning against you—ferocious competitors, skeptical buyers, and market detractors, just to name a few. Don’t join their team. There’s nothing to be gained by printing your own bad press. Raising objections on behalf of your prospects won’t make you appear more proactive or credible. It will just make you appear more objectionable.

Sales Insanity by Cannon Thomas is a mind-blowing compilation of actual sales blunders made by real people in real businesses being real stupid. Every salesperson and business leader must read this excerpt but who is Cannon Thomas… really? It’s not his real name and I managed to uncover his identity and then obtain his permission to share some of the insanity in this article. He is one of the best sales consultants on the planet. I hope you enjoyed this almost unbelievable true story and if you think you know who he really is, send me an InMail and I’ll confirm.

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I can’t quite remember how early in the piece I uttered those words. But I did. To my then business partner, Glenn Dobson, as we joined forces and began to build what would become known as The KONA Group. The irony of that statement was that our business… was a sales and sales management, training consultancy! My title was Director of Quality and I developed what would become some very well regarded training programmes – which delivered outcomes the likes of which our corporate clients had never seen before, consistently, over a 15-year period.

Our particular distinction was that of building scenarios which allowed our participants to practice the techniques and methodologies we were teaching them, on ‘real’ clients. Well, when I say ‘real’ – in the design phase of the programme for any client we would spend days out on the road, with multiple members of their sales force, often all around the country, observing both their techniques but also gaining insights into the reality of their clients’ environments. As we did this, not only were we assessing the current levels of competence and seeing the current sales methodology, we were seeing their clients’ worlds too. We would get to understand what the various sets of circumstances were for our clients’ clients – their operating environments, business objectives, their blockages, their concerns, their business drivers, their decision-making processes etc. and with this intelligence, we would then write “adaptive-fiction” scenarios based on these client realities, ‘changing names to protect the innocent’.

In our ‘live-action’ workshops our students would then meet a new bunch of ‘prospects’, who seemed somewhat familiar to them and they’d practice using the new methodologies we were teaching them, to develop a stronger understanding of the real drivers that would lead to a successful sale. They got to practice, rehearse and refine their newfound skills and techniques in an environment which was safe (no deals were harmed in the making of this skill set) yet were incredibly realistic. The learning was often described as ‘profound’ and certainly ‘the most realistic’ scenario-based training they’d ever experienced. People left our workshops, most definitely, armed with real skills which would help them increase their sales capabilities and enhance their sales careers.

Yet, I had developed a phobia of sorts about actually selling our solutions…

As it turns out, I wasn’t alone. It seems that a great swathe of small business owners also dislike the idea of being in sales. “I didn’t get into business to sell.” I hear. Or, “I’m the CEO, I’m not in sales.” Or worse than these, I see small business owners who subscribe to the old “Build it and they shall come!” Well, I’ve got news for you… yes you did, yes you are and no they won’t. I call these perspectives the S-Myth.  The myth that suggests that as a business owner, (aka Founder, aka Managing Director, aka CEO, aka Director of Quality) sales is somebody else’s concern.

Sales, is absolutely your concern. It always will be your concern. Even when you become a global juggernaut – sales will always be a pressing concern. Let me assure you that Alan Joyce (Qantas CEO), Gerry Harvey (Harvey Norman, Executive Chairman) and Janine Allis (Boost Juice founder and Executive Director) have always got their finger on the pulse of sales in their hugely successful and long-enduring businesses. They may not be out on the hustings but they absolutely understand that ongoing sales are never guaranteed and that, in my words, if you’re not selling shit, you’re gonna be in the shit.

So why is it that so many of us small business-owners are resistant to selling?

20 years of experience, in both selling the various services that my 7 different businesses have offered, in concert with observing, coaching and mentoring in-excess of 10,000 sales professionals, sales managers and business owners suggests that while the reasons have subtle variation, there are some central themes:

• FEAR – the prime suspect. Primarily fear of rejection;
• Misconception – an unhealthy view of what the art and science of sales actually is;
• Limited knowledge of the methodologies of selling;
• All resulting in a deficit in ‘the 3Cs’ – competence, confidence and commitment.

Let’s take a look at each of those in a bit more detail.

Chances are you’ve heard the use of fear as an acronym – F.E.A.R. It stands for False Expectations Appearing Real. In other words, the suggestion is that fear is a product of a vivid imagination, which presents the possibility of negative outcomes/consequences, in such a powerful and compelling way, they end up paralysing the person experiencing those thoughts.

I often see fear coupled with a mantra of “the best way to not fail… is to not try!”

It’s a fair enough apprehension. Most rational people know that when it comes to selling, you are more likely to hear people say no to you than say yes. Anybody who has been anywhere near any kind of sales training in the last 50 years will have heard, at some stage and probably more than once that “it’s a numbers game!”. We get told that “another ‘no’ is one step closer to a ‘yes’!” So when it comes to selling we have read, heard, seen and/or been told that we’re going to be rejected. A lot. And of course, if you’re not a black belt in this mystery called selling, you’re going to be rejected a hell of a lot! Who on Earth wants to step up to that on a daily basis? Right?

This little monster absolutely sat in the dark corners of my mind for, I’d say, the first 15 years of business ownership for me. I’d start to think about the idea of picking up a phone or going on a sales call, or following up to see if they were ready to buy yet and instead of envisaging a positive outcome I’d feel that fear that comes when you look down into a drain grate built into the kerb and there’s one of those evil clown dolls grinning back at you.

OK, I’m probably exaggerating here but you get the gist right? The fear of being rejected and the subsequent feelings I might experience, of being incompetent, inarticulate, lacking in gravitas enough to be compelling to my prospect, intellectually inferior, an impostor – all of that was often enough to cause me to find ‘better things to do’. Things, which, I would kid myself, would lead to an easier way of selling. Perhaps I could devise a way of selling that didn’t involve actually selling! The perfect thing to waste time on.

Which helps us also understand that a misconception of what sales actually is can be a major obstacle to engaging in it. It had never really, consciously occurred to me until quite recently, that my subconscious perspective of ‘selling’ was that it was something you did to people, as opposed to for them. Selling seemed to be some sort of slight of hand where you used clever techniques and words, which eventually brought people to a place where they found themselves buying.  I knew, because I had been taught a number of moves, like a series of judo-throws of sorts, called ‘objection handlers’. Apparently people would try to resist the techniques and words and not buy from me. And so I had these moves in my arsenal to counter their resistance. So I learned quite early in the piece that people didn’t like being sold to. Therefore selling was something which was undesirable. I learned to ‘trial close’, to ‘always be closing’, to use the ‘hamburger close’, the ‘alternative close’, the ‘assumptive close’. These felt like techniques where, as a salesperson, I might be tackling an opponent down to the mat and putting them in a lock which ultimately resulted in them ‘tapping out’ – “Alright! Alright! I’ll buy!!” That just didn’t sit well with me. It felt like selling was really the art of manipulating somebody to do something I wanted them to do. That was a really good reason for me to not be in sales.

But I was fortunate, in comparison to so many start up founders and small business owners. I’d actually received an education in this called selling, as an employee of a global sales training business. And then, as I’ve shared I went on to create and deliver all sorts of sales training to thousands of people hired to sell for their companies. So at least I’d had exposure to this ‘dark art’ when it came to going it alone. Scores of business owners get their first exposure… when they start their business. Which means they really have very little understanding of professional selling. And in particular, professional selling in this ‘new’ era of internet, Google, Google My Business, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn – to name a few.

Right now, I’m in the throes of writing a book. I’ve named it “The S-Myth” in a nod to Michael Gerber’s best seller from over 30 years ago, The E-Myth, aka the entrepreneurial myth which is the mistaken belief that most businesses are started by people with tangible business skills, when in fact most are started by “technicians” who know nothing about running a business. Hence most fail. 30 years on and access to information, know-how and ‘hacks’ are readily available in the arena of entrepreneurialism. There’s no shortage of ‘how to sell’ tutorials on YouTube either – yet I see very few business owners who make that sort of educative investment in themselves. Certainly, few could classify themselves as masters of the profession of selling. So, the ‘technician’ still prevails. The person who is, invariably, incredibly emotionally attached to their product or service. They can see all of its beauty and possibility. They know and hold dear to their hearts why their offering is superior to the competitions’. They know exactly why customers/clients should be buying what they have to sell… but as it transpires they know very little, if anything about how to actually sell. (And by ‘sell’, I’m not just referring to the face-to-face interaction that occurs at the moment of purchase decision – I’m referring to the entire process of product/service positioning, creating market awareness – including your website, SEO, SEM, Google and Facebook ads – lead generation, qualifying ideal prospects, qualifying opportunities, defining solutions, understanding and then navigating the clients’ buying decision-making process, presenting solutions, securing the purchase – and after fulfilment, garnering the much vaunted ‘customer review’, in order to sharpen the cycle for the next prospective buyer).

Ultimately, all of the rationale I’ve shared so far can be distilled into a model that I have been teaching to managers and business-owners for nearly 15 years, known as TC3.  TC3 posits that a person’s performance in their role is a direct outcome of their level of competence in performing their routine tasks, their confidence in performing their routine tasks and their commitment to performing their routine tasks. Task competence, confidence and commitment – TC3. Wherever there is a deficit or shortfall in any of a person’s competence, confidence and/or commitment there will always be a corresponding shortfall in performance or results. There are actually six stages of evolution that we all go through in order to become highly competent, confident and committed at a particular field of endeavour – including selling.

So, on reflection, as I consider all of the thoughts, feelings and emotions I experienced when it came to the idea of being a sales person – especially a successful sales person, it’s not hard to rationalise why running for the hills seemed like a smarter move for the better part of 15 years.

Can you relate to any of this? Have I described anything here that you’ve experienced in the journey of getting your small business off the ground, or perhaps, to move from start-up to scale-up?

If you’re a business owner and the sales-voodoo thing is something you grapple with, connect with me on LinkedIn or visit my website where I share more insights.

The post I don’t want to be in sales! appeared first on Head Of Sales.

(1) What is your posture saying about you?

The way you feel will govern your posture and subsequently the energy you bring into a call. Once you’ve cultivated a positive mindset, and thanks to the pre-call preparation are feeling ready and confident, your posture will reflect the same, i.e. straightened, shoulders back, open hearted and positive.

So, take a moment to notice your posture. Is it upright, allowing you to breathe easily and fill your lungs, adding to your motivation and enthusiasm? If so, great – continue to the next point. If not, don’t try to force it. It won’t feel or sound natural, and your client will notice. Head back to the mindset and pre-call preparation sections to take a look at what’s impacting you and causing the slump.

Positive mindset = positive posture.

(2) Be your authentic self

Perhaps you have a colleague or mentor who’s ‘really good at sales’, and you feel you need to be more like them to succeed. Unfortunately, trying to ‘be like them’ will feel forced and uncomfortable – and your customer will pick that up. The same is true if you read from a script. Instead, aim to be your authentic self – your best, most professional genuine self – as you focus on understanding your client. If you’ve done the work on mindset from the first section and the preparations for each call from the second section, being authentic will come naturally and effortlessly.

Be the best version of yourself.

(3) Aim to help and rapport will follow

One of the biggest challenges of telephone sales skills is building rapport. Your ability to use body language and your physical surroundings to develop a relationship is temporarily out of reach.

Be fully present and engrossed in your calls. Turn off your emails, notifications and everything else on your computer and phone so you can focus. Start each call with a commitment to serve them, help them and be a solution provider. Rapport will then naturally happen, and the conversation will flow.

Rapport happens when you are genuinely focused on helping them.

(4) Know your intent for the call

Take another moment before you dial to get clear on what exactly is your purpose for the call:
• Are you trying to build a long-term relationship?
• Create credibility?
• Help the customer to buy from you today?
Whatever it is, make sure your intent is rooted in understanding them better and their needs, so you can help them. To do this, picture yourself next to them, on the same side as them. This visualisation helps set your motivation for the call to being one of integrity and genuine help. You’ll naturally emit that sincerity to your client through your words and tone of voice. They will see you as the trusted advisor and the solution provider.

Set clear intentions before every call.

(5) Take notes throughout the call

Jot down as much as you can of what your client tells you. Taking notes can help you stay focused on what they’re saying, and saves you having to keep information in a ‘holding pattern’ in your brain. You will be aware of their language and what they keep emphasising. It assists with confirming their pain points. Your notes form an essential guide for any follow-on email or proposal you send to the client after the call.

Stay focused by taking notes.

(6) Be aware of your voice

Don’t be over enthusiastic, you’ll just sound manic.

The untrained (unpracticed) voice speeds up and goes higher in pitch.
Being genuine is essential. Talk to your customer in a voice that’s authentically ‘you’ – the you who’s in your calmest, clearest, most reasonable and rational state. Convey your maturity, your trusted leadership status – someone your client can rely on to offer good advice and have their best interests at heart.

Find your most natural voice with the right mindset.

(7) Know your opening hooks

Hooks mean you are engaging the client with a tailored opening which is of interest to them. Pick something from your research and have it as your opener, ‘John, I see that you are using xyz for… just thought I would reach out as my company provides clients with this xyz solution meaning they can quickly get this … result’.
You have 10 seconds to make an impact. Hooks are essential for cold calling. Make it interesting and different if you can.

Hooks get the client intrigued and engaged.

(8) Connect authentically with gatekeepers

‘Gatekeepers’ and your client are one. We need to stop thinking of them as separate entities.
They have been charged with protecting the decision makers’ time, because many reps simply ‘spray and pray’ their features and benefits with no specific connection between what they have to sell and what the decision maker may need. You are different. So, everything you do, and every interaction you have, needs to demonstrate how different you are. That’s why connecting meaningfully with gatekeepers is an incredibly important skill. Don’t fall into the trap of ‘working around them’ or even thinking of them negatively, as that will reflect adversely in your interaction and on you.
Respect their job and consider pitching to them. They are determining who gets to talk to the decision maker, so you want to make sure you create and leave the right impression.
Believe that your client contact will want to engage with you because you know you can help them. Remember, you want to be seen as a calm, confident, trusted advisor.

Be respectful and genuine with gatekeepers.

(9) Know what not to say

As well as knowing what to say we also need to be aware of what not to say. Watch your language.

• “I know you are busy” (why remind them, this sounds like you have no value in what you sell)

• “Doesn’t sound like now is a good time” (why project your opinion of when is a good time onto the client)

• “It’s tough out there” (sure way to remind them to close their pocket and be risk adverse)

• “I’ll call back when you’re not so busy” (get them to tell you this, don’t you tell them that)

• “I’m finding it hard; the kids are driving me mad, how about you” (our personal life is now ‘tripping’ over into professional life, call up a friend and have that whine – rather let the professional you impress a client)

• “Sorry to bother you” (devaluing yourself)

• “Yes, you probably should be cautious and only get six of those”

• “If you’re not sure what’s coming up, why not only get a few now and we can always top you up later”

Be aware of what you are projecting onto the client.

(10) Less talking, more listening

To truly understand your customer, you need THEM to be doing the talking.
This starkly contrasts with what most salespeople do: they land up doing all the talking! They talk ‘at’ a client, ‘telling’ them what they need without actually knowing if it is indeed what the client needs.

Master being curious, investigative and intrigued. To provide the right solution and really get to grips with their situation, you have to pose the right questions. Ideally you need to have crafted and comfortably practiced a minimum of 100+ questions. Why? Because you never know where the conversation may go. If you’ve only prepared a few questions you will push your clients down your own question path missing out on valuable information.

A great sales call is when the salesperson is asking relevant questions and the client is doing around 90% of the talking. The salesperson will be listening, understanding the situation to now know / propose the right solution.
Your mantra is ‘Seek to understand’.

That way you will know how you can help and give the compelling reason(s) to buy your solution, aligning what they need with what you have.
Open questions are best at getting them discussing their situation, they will give you insightful answers that can help you understand them better.
You need to always go with what question feels natural and right at the time. It needs to be relevant and meaningful. Throughout the conversation it’s imperative you be mentally present.

Watch what you are asking (I.e. not overstepping the mark in your relationship with intense questions about their business if you don’t know them well enough or they don’t yet see you as the trusted advisor e.g. how much money that will make you). Basically, if it feels right to ask – it probably is, if it feels wrong – it probably is. If they are an introvert, then make it easy for them to chat, ‘walk me through’ is more appealing than ‘talk me through’.

Example open questions:
• Walk me through…
• What did you find was working well on [blah de blah]?
• Where does this fit [blah de blah], into the future?
• How would you describe your experience with … [blah de blah]?
• How does [blah de blah] work?
• When this situation happens, [blah de blah], what happens?
• What would be most helpful for you to know about [blah de blah] right now?
• How will your team manage this situation over the next 6 months?
• How will they handle this challenge?
• What are your main concerns or questions about [product/service]?
• What persuaded you to call us today/use someone else’s solution?
• If this [blah de blah] happened, how would that roll out?
• And why was that /why is that/why? (I’m assuming your tone and intent is honourable and as the trusted advisor here – not interrogational).

If your call is to a new client, then the first questions you ask will be ones to get them talking, so choose intriguing yet easy questions for them to comfortably talk with and open up to you.

A ‘hard’ opening question will put them off and they will divert and say they are busy. I.e. saying ‘how does the next 6 months look?’, would be suitable for a client who knows you, but unlikely to land well as one of your opening questions if cold calling, coming across as too hard and too personal.

Your mantra is ‘seek to understand’.

(11) Are you really listening?

A lot of the time we are too busy focusing on what we want to say, instead on what the client is saying. Really listen to what they are saying. You need to be 100% present. Clients will know if you are in a bubble with them or just thinking of your next thing to say.

You need to be aware if you come into a call with judgement and a predetermined outcome. We assume. This needs to be acknowledged and released, for you to be truly present.

Drop the assumptions and really listen.

(12) Observe and adapt

No two customers are the same, so you shouldn’t be saying the same thing to each of them. They have different needs, wants, motivations and beliefs. Pay attention to how each one responds to your questions, and then constantly adapt so that the conversation makes sense to them. It should always be relevant and meaningful.

Your questions, pitch and compelling message should be adapted for each call.

(13) The biggest hurdle on the call

Processing styles, recognising and adapting to them, is the biggest call hurdle we face. For example, some clients will process their thoughts outwardly and ‘talk them through’, while others will silently process things internally. When we are with someone, we can literally see this process take place. If you tend to process your thoughts outwardly you may be inclined to fill those conversational silences on the other end of the phone, by jumping in and repeating or giving multiple choice answers. Be aware of your style and then ensure you master patience. The call should naturally have pauses, ebbs, flows and gaps. These permit moments of mutual reflection and contemplation. The calmer you are, the calmer the call will be and allow the client space and time to think.

Ensure you allow space in the conversation, giving your clients time to process their thoughts.

14. Educate your customer

While your customer knows more than anyone else about themselves and their problems, it is YOU who knows more about what your offering can do for them. So educate them. Educating your client over the phone comes down to how well you craft your sentences. Now, what you say and how you say it, has to both sell your product or solution to the person you’re speaking with, as well as enable them to similarly relay and sell it on correctly to others in their organisation, their own clients or the end user. Building mini stories starting with phrases such as ‘others have found that…’ give your clients the exact phrase to easily sell it on.

Make it easy for your client to educate others.

(15) Excite your customer so they block out distractions

As you speak to your client, notice any obvious distractions that come up – either in the conversation, or in their background. Are they working in a space that’s completely different to their pre-crisis norm?

Those distractions may affect their ability to be present with you – however, there is no need for you to become distracted! Once you have a great hook with intrigue and master quickly showing your call value to them, they will be immersed in the conversation with you and ignore any distractions.

Keep your client engaged.

(16) Over empathising can be costing you business

Some of us are quick to empathise. We have been taught it’s a good thing.

If your mindset is negative, you’ll miss out on the positive signals and inadvertently reduce your clients spend. This over-empathising with them may seem a way to build relationships but agreeing with anyone’s negative state closes them down to hearing your solution. It sends them into a cautious, let’s batten down the hatches, risk adverse place. Don’t join them in the ditch!

Instead, you should listen until they’ve emptied everything out and then focus on a positive or promising aspect of what they’ve said (unless of course, they’re tearful… in which case, you’re better off just listening for now).

Be optimistic and your client will be too.

(17) Agree on a specific next action

On some sales calls, the ‘next action’ might be overtly asking for the sale – clearly, directly, and with certainty that the client wants to go ahead. On other calls, you might need to arrange a follow-up conversation with them. It may be that they need a proposal pinpointing how your solution solves their pain points.

By the time you’re at this stage of the call, you’ll have understood their situation, offered the perfect solution (delivered in a way that makes sense to them) and it’s a flow from prospect to client. The next action you’re seeking isn’t an answer to the question of ‘do you want to go ahead?’ Rather, it’s a movement sentence continuing the relationship. This conversation at the end of the call should be a logical and natural step.

For some salespeople they find that sentence tricky, so here are a few examples.
By the way, it’s ideal if the client has already been answering ‘yes’ to your questions just before, as then they are on a ‘roll’ of saying yes.

Movement sentences like these below can be particularly useful.
• ‘OK, we can get that happening by Friday. You ready to give it the go-ahead?’
• ‘Sounds like we’re ready to make it happen. Let’s get started’
• ‘Janet would like to get the backend of this lined up today. You ok with that?

Use movement sentences to glide from prospect to client.

(18) Trying to upsell?

Watch what you are thinking. Upselling can imply ‘pushing’ a product onto someone, whereas when your intent is to ‘seek to understand’ and ‘help’, you’ll naturally ask more relevant questions and find out more. It then becomes an obvious obligation for you to explain the most suitable solution(s) which will serve them best.

If your client is after ‘A & B’, yet with your questioning it’s clear that the right solution for them is actually ‘A, B and C, then your intent, language and demeanor are aligned. You are coming from a place of integrity and being the trusted advisor.

The same lesson applies if your intent is to ‘close’ then your client will pick up on that – meaning you are no longer looking out for their best interests but your own. Closing means ending. We would rather help clients and form long lasting relationships. What you think, becomes your reality.

Be aware of your language.

Did you miss part 1 or Part 2?

Telephone Sales Techniques For Success (Part 1): Mindset

Telephone Sales Techniques For Success (Part 2): Pre-call Preparation

The post Telephone Sales Techniques For Success (Part 3): 18 ‘On-The-Call’ Actions appeared first on Head Of Sales.

If you’ve been in business for any length of time, you’ve probably experienced being dropped into the “silent zone” — a key moment in the sales process when you say to yourself, “Why has selling become such a painful and arduous process”.

The “silent zone” is when you’ve worked with a prospect over a period of time, built a relationship over-the-phone or in-person (at least you thought you built a relationship), they expressed serious interest in your solution, then all of a sudden, they don’t return your calls.

“It’s not like I did anything wrong”, you say to yourself. In fact, as far as you’re concerned, you did everything right.

You’ve done all the work to create sales momentum and all you get from them is radio silence.

”Will I get this sale?”, you ask yourself. “It feels like my prospect has let me down and broken the relationship that I carefully nurtured throughout the selling process.”

The “hopeium” trap

I want to shed some light for you on how you can use a different mindset to pull yourself out of the painful “silent zone”.

Most of us get caught up in sales “hopeium”. Hopeium is a comical term that expresses setting our hopes and desires on only making the sale. This becomes a self-directed trap because it completely silences the critical importance of being aware that we should be focusing on something else instead: getting to your prospect’s truth.

When we solely focus on the outcome, our trajectory is towards the result of getting the sale. We’re anticipating where things are going throughout the process, and we begin to expect things to happen as we hoped they would.

Then when we get dropped into the “silent zone” and we start to lose our centeredness. 

Our sales process comes to a halt, we become anxious, frustrated, discouraged, and confused. Maybe we don’t even sleep well at night.

We’re preoccupied with what went wrong. And sometimes there’s even a sense of betrayal.  They said they would call, but now they’re not. Why?

Solving the mystery

Well, the only person who can solve that mystery is your prospect. And your prospect will only solve that for you when you shift to focusing on discovering the truth of what’s on their mind, rather than trying to close the sale. 

How can you approach your prospect when you know their avoiding you?

Something important has to shift in your mind first:

You need to be accept that there is a 50% chance the sale may not happen, rather than having your mindset locked into “making the sale” being the only outcome. 

Why do you need to learn to “let go” of the sale at this point?

Because if you approach your prospect while hoping the sale will materialize, you introduce sales pressure to the relationship. Sales pressure pushes your prospects away from you and breaks any trust you may have developed with them.

Instead, you can eliminate all sales pressure by telling them that you’re okay with their decision if they decide not to move forward, which is something you can assume based on their not having called you back. 

Step backward, not forward

In other words, take a step backward rather than trying to move things forward.

When you’re chasing a vanishing prospect with calls and messages trying to move the sale forward, you’re following the old mindset of chasing the sale. You’re focusing on getting a “yes”, without know the real truth of their situation. 

The solution is to let go of the end goal and start focusing on learning the truth of where you stand with your prospect and being ok with what the truth might be.
Read that a few times, and let it sink in.

You haven’t lost the sale. You just don’t know the truth yet. And all you have to do is call back and find that out. This puts you solidly back into a place where you can make a decision to let the prospect go, or re-look at how you can meet their needs.   

Here are 4 very important reasons to make the shift to this new mindset so you don’t start to lose your confidence in your selling ability:
 

1.  THE TRUTH WILL SET YOU FREE

In the old sales mindset, when a client suddenly disappears, we start blaming ourselves.  We don’t know where we stand with our prospect, and this state of limbo becomes really painful. Our self-talk is negative and full of self-blame. We’re on pins and needles, wondering whether the sale will come through. 

Anxiety and fear settle in, because we’re in limbo and we don’t know the truth of the situation.  

How do you get the truth? By looking for it, rather than looking for the sale. 

When you’re looking for the truth, your prospect knows you’re okay with either a “yes” or “no.” You’re essentially asking, “What’s the truth?” Rather than, “What can I do to rescue the sale?”

So, the next time you’re wondering if you’ve lost the sale, stop and recognize you may have fallen into that old trap of focusing on the sale. And start re-focusing on the truth instead. Remember that all you really want is the truth of where your prospect stands. 

It’s liberating. 

2.  LOSE ILLUSION AND GAIN EFFICIENCY

If you can shift your mindset away from trying to make the sale, then you can get to the reality of where the deal stands. And once you know this, you can either stay involved with the prospect or move on. 

What happens is that a “no” becomes almost as valuable as a “yes.” Because it frees up your time to find prospects who are a more likely fit for your solution. This adds a tremendous amount of efficiency to your work. It helps you weed out all those people you were chasing that you thought were good prospects. 

Getting to the truth provides a way of knowing when to walk away from a deal without that guilt-laden voice that says, “You gave up, don’t be a wimp. Get back in there and keep selling.”

Focusing on the truth translates into very real benefits that equal real dollars and tangible results. You’ll save hours of chasing prospects who have no intention of buying. And there’ll be a dramatic lowering of the self-sabotaging stress that comes from living in a constant state of limbo. 

3.  PRESSURE ALWAYS PUSHES AWAY

Good-hearted business people who sell, always fall into this trap. Whenever a prospect fails to get back in touch, we send emails and leave messages with a thinly-veiled invitation to move the sales process forward. But your prospect starts to feel trapped by you. 

Your prospect feels as though you’re looking out for your own needs, not theirs. They see you as doing exactly what you’re doing, trying to get the sale. 

And any trust you’ve developed starts to dissolve, fast. You start to slip into a downward spiral that takes you farther and farther away from your true goal, which is to discover the truth of where your prospect stands. 

4.  INVITING THE TRUTH GETS THE TRUTH

The main reason prospects suddenly vanish is that they’re uncomfortable telling us the truth. They don’t want to disappoint us, or they don’t want to feel sales pressure from us
— so keeping us at bay just feels better. 

And we can’t really blame them. How often have they been called and called, chased by salespeople who hope to wear them down?

Or how often have you told your sales people, “Call them back and get the sale. Why is it taking so long?” – putting pressure on your sales team who then transfers that pressure to your prospect. 

This happens everyday. We’re stuck in that endless cycle of chasing prospects, trying to get them to respond to us. And the more we press, the more they run. 

But the opposite is true, too. The more we relax and simply invite the truth, the more straightforward they’ll be with us. Prospects feel okay sharing what’s really going on when they know we’re okay with hearing it. 

The only way to discover the truth is to communicate in a way that helps the other person feel comfortable telling you the truth. What you don’t want is for them to think you’re calling just to make the sale.

Remember, prospects will trust you and reveal what they’re thinking only if they feel like you’re on their side.

The post 4 Actions To Implement When Selling Becomes A Painful Process. appeared first on Head Of Sales.

And for a couple of reasons:

1.    Because they were from sales leaders and

2.    Because they were from salespeople.

There is a saying many of us have heard, that a ‘bad workman blames his tools’ and that was what I was seeing in reading some of the answers so I split the answers out into two lists – A and the A+.

Answers as to why only 20% met budget included (word for word):

• Bad quotas
• Lack of training and no company investment in people
• Bad coaching
• Not enough resources
• More than 80% of customers don’t need the product
• Bad hiring
• Targets are set quarterly
• Shitty product
• Bad/lack of marketing and negative brand sentiment
• Too much admin, installation type work
• No follow up
• Not knowing customer’s environment
• Through no fault of their own
• Economic downturn
• No strategy
• No goals
• They underestimate the amount of daily activity

And then some more….

• Don’t believe in self
• Don’t feel engaged
• Complacency
• Lack of execution
• Minimal effort
• Don’t believe in product
• Don’t prospect enough
• Don’t invest in development
• Don’t ask the hard questions
• Don’t push-back to those who waste time
• Don’t follow a proven sales process
• Wing their calls
• They can’t accept success

As someone who works with business owners, sales leaders and salespeople alike, I have heard all of these and even a few more, and herein lies the problem.

There is a difference between reasons why quota is not being met and excuses as to why it is not being met.

It’s a fine line, so I went to Quora for some help in defining what I know is a key missing component to success – knowing the difference between an excuse and a reason, and I found this explanation, with which I agree:

An explanation typically explains the facts of a situation, what caused it, all the factors that lead to it, even if some of these factors are self-deprecating.

An excuse, however, tends to run along the lines of an explanation except that the language is usually defensive and tends to try to protect the speaker from involvement in the incident in question.

If you notice, I segmented the answers to why only 20% of salespeople are achieving quota, into two lists above.

Can you pick the difference between the lists?

Let me help you…

List A are Excuses Yes, most sales leaders and salespeople who answered the question posed, with these answers, and there were nearly 100, all made excuses either as salespeople or for salespeople. In other words, they blamed someone or something. And these are the people who are responsible for generating our revenue and leading our businesses.

So what separates an excuse from a reason?

Pure and simply, accountability.

You see most people say they want to be successful. How many, though, will do what it takes to be successful in their given role? That is, how many people will do what it takes to be successful in selling? The question is a powerful one.

Another powerful question to ask is, ‘if you didn’t have the excuses from the top list, then how would you make sure you reached quota?’ Think on that a minute or two.

You see, each one of the items from the excuses list can be whittled down to being a valid reason, that can then be worked on.

Let’s take a couple and I’ll share with you what I mean, and you might also see if anything resonates with you personally, or with someone you know:

Lack of Training– In an era of unprecedented content with people giving away their once coveted golden IP for free, what are you doing to invest in yourself? When was the last time you read a book about prospecting in today’s sales environment, or are you waiting for the company to do it for you?

Not Enough Resources – Have you got clear on what resources you actually need and the difference they would specifically make for you meeting quota? Sometimes we forget that the thing we need is not more money, more tools, more shortcuts – that it could be a matter of tapping into our resourcefulness and finding a bit more energy and effort in doing something new and perhaps putting a business case together instead of whinging.

Bad Coaching – Do you know what good coaching looks like, sounds like and feels like? If so, are you also clear on the specific outcomes you would want and need from a coach? Great! Now start coaching yourself or set out those expectations with your manager. Step up.

More Than 80% of Customers Don’t Need the Product – My first thought was why are you in business then? Who, if not you, is responsible for qualifying a buyer and what is the depth of question you are asking or not asking, and the real reason you are asking those questions, or not asking? Who is creating the value proposition?

Bad Hiring – So let’s say it’s valid and your hiring person made a mistake – what conversations aren’t you having with that person to remove the pain for them and yourself? Who is responsible for hiring processes and what might THEY need to do differently?

Targets Are Set Quarterly – OK, so break them down to monthly, weekly, daily or hourly if that turns you on. You are the captain of your own ship, the CEO of your own mini organization so think like one and break the odd process rule if it is to serve you and the business.

Shitty Product – The first sale is always to yourself, so leave the company or go and find a product you believe in where you can stop wallowing in this story. Chances are the story will follow you!

Bad Marketing – Then Marketing need your input. You (Sales) can provide Marketing with so much in the way of stories, case studies and feedback and if everyone is clear on what the ultimate outcome is (to serve the customer), then these are conversations worth having – how are you initiating them? What channels of communication are you opening to make change happen?

Too Much Admin – What responsibility is being taken to delegate, say ‘no’ or ask for help? When command and control doesn’t work, what does? Personal leadership?

No Follow Up – What processes are in place, what is the company ethos on caring for the customer and what can you do yourself to set an example? Stand for something!

Economic Downturn – With this being a fact, is the same being said by your competitor who is still selling and one of those 20% making budget?

They Underestimate the Amount of Daily Activity Needed – We have 8 hours in a work day. By getting up 2 hours earlier what have you increased your productivity by? What will that do to your revenue opportunities and stress levels? Think about it and then act.

Usually for each excuse anyone gives, there is a valid reason sitting in the wings and that reason comes back to the person’s level of responsibility, commitment and personal leadership.

List A+ Are Reasons – the real reasons, and only by owning that fact, in all aspects, will you really smash it out of the park and become the 20%er that you know you have the potential to be.

Systems and processes, analytics, technology and automation are all key components of sales success, but behind all of those tools someone needs to drive them. If your levels of discipline are not enough, and you are big enough to admit it, get someone else to help you, because until you do, you will continue to make excuses for your lack of success. You will stay on the A List and you know you are better than that.

B an A+er and also …

Be Bold, Brave and Brilliant

The post Meet The ‘A Listers’​ Ruining Their Careers appeared first on Head Of Sales.

The following list of mistakes includes the root cause, providing you with the beliefs that encourage the error. Here are nine enormous mistakes salespeople make and their root causes.

Leading with Your Company: There are two reasons we teach salespeople to open a sales call by talking about their company. The first, and perhaps the original purpose, is that people think it establishes credibility. If the salesperson isn’t credible, the company’s credibility should be a strong enough substitute to convince the prospect to buy. The second reason is that marketers believe the company story is compelling and that prospects care. While these approaches may have worked in the past, you must establish your credibility by demonstrating your subject matter expertise, your business acumen, and your situational knowledge.

Allowing Your Client to Determine the Process: When your client has total control of the process, the result is a Request for Proposal, a process that isn’t likely to serve you well. It may also prevent your prospective client from making the right decision, often based on a one-hour presentation. Because you sell what you sell, you should have a better understanding of the conversations and commitments your dream clients need to make a good decision. In many cases (maybe most), you increase your chances of winning and your client’s making the right decision when you sell the process before selling your solution.

Speaking Poorly of Your Competition: Some people believe you should never mention your competition. More, however, wait to address their competition only when their contact tells them that their price is higher than the competition. At this point, the salesperson tries to differentiate themselves by describing all the ways their competitor is terrible. The result of this conversation inverts the outcome, causing the client to believe the salesperson throwing their competitor under the bus is terrible, as evidenced by their defensiveness. When you don’t know how to defend the investment you are asking your client to make, you might believe it is easier to tear down your competitor, in which case, you are wrong. There is nothing inherently wrong with speaking about your competitors, as long as you say nice things about them as a way to differentiate yourself early in the sales conversation.

Going Faster Than Your Client: You don’t want to take longer than you have to win a deal, and you don’t want your client to have to wait longer than is necessary to produce better results and reap the benefits of your solution. However, going faster than your dream client can cause you to become disconnected, with you far ahead of them in the process. You may know all you need to know to provide them with the right solution, but your prospective client may need more conversations to move forward. When this is true, you bring the process to a halt. The desire to go fast cause things to go slow. If you want to go fast, you go slow enough that your prospect can keep up with you.

Choosing a Poor Prospecting Medium: All the mediums available to you have value, even if that value is contextual. Meaningful conversations are best held in person. Email works for following up meetings. For all the wonders of the information age and the ubiquity of computers, we have borrowed ideas from computers that don’t translate well to human interactions. Ideas like multi-tasking pretend human attention works like a chip. It doesn’t. The notion that efficiency is more important than effectiveness is to believe that the ease of effort outweighs the outcome. If there is no outcome, you are inefficient. The reason some salespeople use email for prospecting is that they believe it is efficient, while others believe it allows them to avoid conflict. The best medium for prospecting is still the phone, even if you use all the others as part of a campaign.

Emailing Pricing and Proposals: Your client asked you to send them a proposal and pricing, something you believe to be a keen interest in buying what you sell. So you submitted it to them weeks ago, and now, radio silence. Because you didn’t believe it was worth the time or effort to meet with the client to review your proposal and resolve their concerns, they flipped the pricing component, and decide to hold off. You disconnected the value of the solution from the investment by not presenting the outcomes. You know your prospect didn’t read your proposal, and you allowed them to say no without having to speak to you. Because you wanted to make it easy for you and your client, you ended up losing the deal—or causing a stall. The right answer is not to take yourself out of the deal.

Avoiding Difficult Conversations: Interminable. The difficult conversations you may have to engage in as you pursue and serve your dream clients are as many as there are stars in the sky. Asking your clients to change can be an awkward conversation, just as telling them the problem they have requires them to make internal changes can be, meaning it’s not you or their past partners. Discussions about the investment also offer a potential place for conflict or a complicated dialogue. You avoid these conversations when you believe they will cause you to lose a deal, but what makes you a trusted advisor is your willingness to engage in the challenging, messy, and complicated conversations necessary to better results.

Single-Threaded: Maybe you work on deals where there is only a single contact. If this is true, it is unlikely you work in business-to-business sales, and it is certain you are not engaged in a complex sale. In larger, complex deals, there is almost no chance that you are going to win without consensus. When you are working with a single stakeholder, you may believe you shouldn’t ask to bring other people on their team, especially an executive sponsor, assuming you will offend them and lose the deal. How you lose is by not gaining consensus.

Treating a Complex Deal as Transactional: If what you sell is transactional in nature, you should transact. What makes a sale complex is that it requires a decision your client doesn’t often have to make while also being significant or strategic in nature. When you treat the client’s decision as if it should be easy or avoid addressing the significance, your approach doesn’t match your prospective client’s needs. The approach makes it impossibly difficult for your client to move forward when they need information, insight, and help to ensure the decision is sound. Because the solution makes sense to you and you know it will work doesn’t mean these things are true for your client.

Avoid these mistakes by understanding the root causes. You are always better addressing things that are difficult and giving your chance to win than avoiding them and losing.

The post 9 Enormous Mistakes Salespeople Make and Their Causes appeared first on Head Of Sales.

Over the years, I have constantly asked sales people and sales leaders why they got into sales in the first place and why they remain in sales? The variety of answers always intrigued me – many people get into sales because of the attraction of earning high income, of receiving recognition and some even to create something meaningful for their customers, although this answer typically represents a small minority. When asked the follow up question of ‘what is the most challenging aspect of sales?’, overwhelmingly the response is rejection and not achieving. This is only human nature, as most people do not like to be rejected and they do not like the word ‘No’. However, what is the single biggest word a salesperson must hear in order to be successful? ‘No’. And lots of it!

The world of sales is one of the oldest professions on the planet and can be exceptionally lucrative, even if only enjoyed by a small percentage. In fact, as I have written about many times, sales is the ultimate form of service and if you are able to match a customer’s problem with a solution that is tangible, you would be doing them and yourself a huge disservice by not selling your product or service.

However, there is one attribute that a highly successful sales person possesses that differentiates them from all of their competition and allows them to exponentially achieve higher results, and more sustainable results. When you grasp this attribute, when you own it and embrace it, and learn to use it to its fullest potential, it could literally help you make millions. And contrary to what many believe, it has nothing to do with your ability to ‘close a sale’. The attribute is RESILIENCE.

In all areas of life, Pareto’s Principle plays out all the time and sales is no different. And it has been my experience that 80% of the sales and revenue achievement is delivered by 20% of the sales team, meaning that 20% of the sales and revenue is delivered by 80% of the sales team. What I have also come to learn is that the majority of sales people want to be part of the 20% delivering the bulk of the results however, they are missing the vital ingredient that prevents them reaching that threshold – resilience.

When the market is buoyant and customers are enthusiastic and optimistic, sales can become a little easier and this can often lead to a false sense of security and achievement, with many sales people merely reverting to ‘order takers’ rather than remaining as true ‘problem solvers’. However, it is when the market turns and people become a little more cautious, that the great sales people rise to the top, because their focus all along has been on solving problems, not ‘closing sales’. And whilst sales at its fundamental level is a numbers game, the great sales people know how to stack the numbers in their favour through their daily focus on resilience.

So if resilience is the core attribute that can make millions, what makes it so? Here are a few areas to contemplate:

• It is not what happens to you – great sales people who enjoy sustainable success understand this fundamental principle. It is not what happens to you that is important, it is how you respond to what happens to you that makes the difference. Successful people understand that not every sales call or meeting will result in a sale, and that many times things will happen which are completely beyond their control. And when these things happen, they have the ability to choose their response and move on quickly.

• Rejection is never personal – great sales people embrace the concept that rejection by a customer or a prospect is very rarely personal, and hence have the ability to disassociate from the situation. They realise that the more disassociated they are, the less emotion is involved. A great example of this is on display at your local McDonald’s restaurant. The 16 year old behind the counter will often ask you ‘Would you like fries with that?’, and when you say ‘No’, do they spontaneously combust or melt into a pool of water on the floor? Of course not, they know it is not personal and they move on quickly. In fact, they may even say or think to themselves ‘Next’. Great sales people do exactly the same – Next!

• Mindset is critical – have you ever had days when you walk into the office or to a customer meeting, and things don’t quite ‘feel right’? If you were to rate your mindset on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being terrible, and 10 being super positive, chances are, on these days, your mindset would most probably be below a 5. And what do you notice about your ability to solve problems and be creative, when your mindset is under 5? If you are like me, you probably find it near on impossible to get the creative juices flowing. Now contrast this with a mindset of 8-10, how easier does it feel to generate ideas and get into the ‘creativity’ zone? Much easier. So mindset is absolutely critical to your ability to be resilient, and the great sales people will constantly check in to identify where they sit on the mindset scale.

• Great sales people maintain curiosity – even when they are in the middle of a difficult sales conversation or they have just been ‘rejected’, great sales people will maintain their curiosity, and hence, perspective. They may even say, as the late Jim Rohn said, ‘isn’t that interesting?’ (not always out loud of course!) – 3 very powerful words that enables the sales person to objectively observe what has just happened, and then plan the appropriate next step, always with a sense of curiosity.

So if you and/or your sales team are currently not achieving the results you are seeking, ask yourself why? It could be that you are allowing yourself to be a victim of circumstances, rather than taking full responsibility for what is happening. The person who takes full responsibility deeply understands the above 4 principles and they consistently apply them. Please help your team develop resilience – as the title of this article says, it really is the one attribute that can earn you millions!

To your continued sales leadership success.

The post What single attribute determines sales success? appeared first on Head Of Sales.