Posts from — August 2010

The phone rings and the sales manager hears on the other end the all-too-familiar plea of a salesperson. The salesperson tries to convince the sales manager that it makes so much sense to offer the prospect a discount to get them to finally become a customer.

Of course, the salesperson has the expectation that this new customer will quickly become a high-profit customer. The sales manager has heard the same plea hundreds of times before, and yet for some reason, the salesperson and the lack of current sales suddenly make offering a discount very attractive.  Read more...

Too many salespeople view their buyers as anything but smart, especially those salespeople who deal with purchasing departments.

In far too many sales communities, there exists an attitude that buyers and purchasing departments are nothing more than barriers that need to be broken down.

Well, yes there are barriers. Ironically, though, they are barriers that more often than not are there due to the very actions of the sales community.

One simple thing salespeople need to keep in mind is the fact the professional buyer sees far more salespeople in the course of a week or month than most salespeople realize.  Read more...

I’m often asked about the effectiveness of letters as a prospecting strategy in today’s electronic world. You see email, cold calling, and webinar tips, but rarely hear about letters.

Direct mail has fallen off considerably. Anything suspected to be a sales approach gets tossed in the name of productivity savings. It’s harder than ever to ensure your letter reaches the intended recipient. Even when you pay the extra money to send it via Express Mail it’s frequently an assistant who opens your letter and determines if the boss will read it.  Read more...

There are over 9 million results in a “secrets to closing” google web search. And, no, this article isn’t about the top 4 hidden secrets to closing more sales. That is because we don’t believe that there is some special magical mystery to being effective at closing more sales. The challenge (not secret) lies in having the perseverance or following through to use a system that works.  Read more...

If you are not following a sales process, you are probably not in control. Consider this for a unique sales process – a “Buyer Focused” Velocity Selling System that is as simple as ABC.

A. You cannot build anything without a solid foundation and the same applies to the sales process. The A in the ABC of the Velocity Selling System is for Attitude – the foundation of all successful sales people. Without a positive attitude and belief in you, there is no foundation upon which to build a successful organization, or winning products and services or benefit from market growth.  Read more...