Category — Sales Techniques

Salespeople love to complain about buyers. One of the complaints salespeople share the most is that buyers never seem to make up their mind. Just about the time it looks like they’re going to make a buying decision, they suddenly hold off.

Yes, there are times when a buyer legitimately can’t make a decision. Many times, though, the delay is nothing more than a tactic on the part of the buyer to get a better deal. This is especially true of professional buyers, who see numerous salespeople on a regular basis.  Read more...

If buyers could get by without salespeople, do you think they would? It is an interesting question if you stop and consider the role of the salesperson.

Of course, considering the role in an abstract way is one thing, but what about when you consider it from a personal perspective?

What happens as a salesperson when you put your emotions aside for a moment, relax, take a deep breath and honestly ask yourself, “What role do I play with my buyers?”  Read more...

I’ll never forget the first time it happened to me. The presentation with the customer was going well. I had prepared extensively. In fact, I had not just spent more time than normal, I had stayed up nearly all night to make sure I had every element covered perfectly in my presentation. For me, this sales call was going to be a huge success. My boss had told me this was going to be a difficult quarter, and that’s all I needed to hear to motivate me to close this particular sale.  Read more...

We’ve all been there. After countless calls, meetings and an endless amount of work, you just can’t get the customer to say “yes” and move forward. There can be hundreds of theories and ideas as to why this happens more times than we care to admit. Let’s put all the theories aside and get to a solution you can use right now to determine if the customer is serious.  Read more...

Saturdays are great days. We get to spend time with our family, work on the yard, try to figure out exactly what we did the night before and my favorite, we get to go to the farmer’s market. An amazing display of vegetables, fruits, cheese and other homemade and homegrown goods are everywhere. It was at the farmer’s market that I watched in awe as a local farmer taught us a lesson on how to sell.  Read more...

Over the last twenty-five years I have heard more than my share of bad ideas when it comes to effective selling.

Here is the worst one that I have ever come across:

“Don’t be an unpaid consultant”.

I was recently reminded of this when I was asked to participate in a phone conference involving one of my clients. The company had a number of their senior executives together for a meeting, and they asked me if I would be willing to join their group for a teleconference during my lunch hour.  Read more...

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...

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...