 Track Selling Times - October, 2001
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Track Selling Times
The Voice of the Sales Profession
Issue No.143
October 1, 2001
Published by Max Sacks International,
Home of 100% Guaranteed World Class Sales Training
Developers of the Track Selling System™.
"We Take the Mystery Out of Selling!"™
Author/Editor: Roy Chitwood, President, MSI
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Feature:
"Selling after the tragedy"
by Roy E. Chitwood, CSP, CSE
-Learn how you, as a salesperson, are positioned to be a hero as our nation recovers from the tragedies of September 2001.
Sections:
Newsletter Archives
"Selling after the tragedy"
by Roy E. Chitwood, CSP, CSE |
Since the terrorist attacks that shocked and devastated our nation last month, so many thoughts, emotions and feelings have raced through my mind. Just as I did, I'm certain you shed tears and said prayers for the victims and their families and wondered what might happen next. But as we've awoken from the terror, we've realized the sun does continue to rise and we must continue to live. And the best things we can do are to be thankful that we're alive, become closer with our loved ones, get straight with our God, and be true to ourselves by living life fully.
I've always believed that selling is the greatest profession in the world. Today, during the aftermath of this tragedy, I believe this more than ever. The pictures and stories of people helping people after this tragedy move us all. From the rescue workers literally searching for survivors bucket by bucket, to companies and employees donating their earnings and pay to the recovery efforts. The genesis of all of these acts is to help a fellow person. And it's this genesis - to help people - upon which selling is founded.
Thankfully, life isn't compromised primarily of catastrophic events and the heroic acts witnessed during these most dire of times. Life is instead a progression of common activities that, unfortunately, often aren't rooted in helping people. Sometimes we get so caught up in making a living that we don't make a life or honor the true genesis of life: helping and sharing with people.
Fortunately for us, selling is about helping people. We're in the people business and we're only successful if our customers are successful. This is because a professional salesperson makes a sales call for one reason, and one reason only: to be of service to the customer. Now, more than ever, our customers need our help. Not only from the benefits resulting from our products and services, but from the strategies, knowledge and expertise we can share with them to help their business in this most challenging time.
Think about the irony of how salespeople are compensated. Top salespeople can earn an extraordinary income. But in order to do so, they literally must have helped thousands of people along the way. It's impossible for a successful salesperson not to also be successful at helping others. For this you should hold your head high.
But when we hear about the massive layoffs occurring at companies across the country, the growing recession, and the dismal economic prospects for the foreseeable future, it's difficult at best not to become soured. As a professional salesperson, however, when you contemplate these negative possibilities, I urge you to consider your opportunity - and your obligation - to help minimize these potential negative effects. How do you do this? By selling your pants off and helping companies meet their challenges!
At the most basic level, what causes a recession? The answer is a lack of sales. How many professions other than selling directly result in sales being made? Not many. Therefore, I challenge all sales professionals, now more so than ever, to do everything they can to help jump-start the economy. Consumers are fearful and it's "buyer beware" everywhere. You must ease people's FUDs (fear, uncertainties, doubts) and help them buy. Doing so will help protect your future, their future and the future of our economy.
Remember that after you die, you're judged not by the money you have in the bank but by those who continue to benefit from having known you. As a professional salesperson, by selling your product or service with absolute dedication and integrity, you're giving back to your customers who benefit directly from your knowledge, expertise and effort. And just as importantly, you're doing all that you can do to help the nation's economy and protect the futures of fellow Americans. That's a heroic fact.
Integrity Pays:
"Honor your integrity when using perks to win business"
by Joe Ellis
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Joe Ellis is Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Adinfonitum, Inc., a provider of online and offline-marketing services based in Seattle, Wash. Joe has more than 25 years of marketing and fundraising experience and has been focusing on online marketing for the past three years. For more information, please call (206) 682-7777 or visit www.adinfonitum.com.
As salespeople, one of the big things we're up against is a buyer or decision maker in a company that still wants something for themselves. In our city, this may be revealed by comments like, "Seattle Mariner tickets are sure hard to get. I'd love to get a pair." Or, "I would really enjoy attending a Sonic game in a company suite."
Many of our competitors will drop these kinds of perks (or almost any other, for that matter) to win an account. I have no problem condoning the use of perks to win accounts. It's still an important part of the courting process. However, I have one rule all of my people must follow: the perk must fit within the guidelines set by the decision makers' company.
Therefore, the way we handle such direct or implied requests is by asking the decision maker for a copy of his or her company's policy towards accepting perks. We position it in a way so as to demonstrate our professionalism. We tell the decision maker that we operate with only the highest level of integrity and we don't want to jeopardize our potential relationship or his or her position in the company by doing something that's prohibited. We believe this also demonstrates the level of honesty and integrity we will always adhere to if we become business partners.
Typically, the person has no problem with this request. If it's against his or her company's policy, he or she will typically laugh it off. If it's acceptable, and we're shown written guidelines that prove as much, we'll gladly provide the perk provided it secures the account. However, if we don't hear back from the decision maker and are never given a copy of the company's guidelines, this is an account we don't want, no matter how lucrative the potential. This is because the account won't be based on honesty and who knows when our contact will demand further perks that could jeopardize the relationship and/or put us at legal risk.
I think a good rule to live by professionally is to always tell yourself: "I want to operate my business dealings in a fashion so that if they were printed on a billboard in my neighborhood it wouldn't cause my family embarrassment." If you're true to this, your honesty and integrity should never be at question.
World Class Sales Management:
The Journey to SuccessTM
by Al Kauder
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Al Kauder is owner and President of The Jostan Group, a sales training and professional development firm based in Minneapolis, Minn. He has more then 36 years of sales, sales management, and executive level experience. For more information, please call (888) 442-6199 or visit www.jostan-group.com.
The heads of manufacturing or accounting departments in a well-run company can closely predict what their output is going to be on any given day. It is no mystery to them. However, very few sales executives at these same companies can closely predict what their output, or sales, will be on any given day. It's always a mystery.
What does the manufacturing and accounting departments have in common that contributes to their confidence in predicting output? They use a process that ties all the elements of their operation together. What's missing in many sales organizations? A process that ties all the elements of their operation together. As a result, we've developed that process and named it the "The Journey to Success."
In order to have a successful journey, you need more than just the vehicle to get there. You also need to know the following: Where you're going? What route you're going to take? What you're going to do en-route? What maps and plans you'll use to assure a good journey?
To have the most effective sales process possible, you must develop four key components that answer the above questions. In "The Journey to Success," we call the four components The Strategic Road MapTM, The Sales EngineTM, The Sales NavigatorTM and The Sales Itinerary WorksheetsTM. Regardless of what you name them, these components should address:
1. Strategic direction. It's been said that, "If you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there." Consequently, an effective process for "sales cycle management' must exist to ensure the correct path is followed so as to close sales faster. The process should identify the phases in your most often employed sales cycle, the sales calls required within the phases, the objective of each phase and sales call, the Act of Commitment required to move the sales cycle along, who typically attends each of the sales calls, what is recommended to bring to the meeting and provide after the meeting.
2. The sales process that drives sales. "When selling becomes a procedure it ceases to be a problem. If it is not a procedure it will always be a problem". Companies must have a duplicable process that has a philosophy of putting the customer's interests and needs first and addresses how and why people buy. The best process we know of that covers all the steps in the selling process and leaves nothing to chance is the Track Selling SystemTM.
3. A single comprehensive field sales tool. This tool should be a highly effective tactical resource for your salespeople that helps each make a highly focused sales call. This single page tool should include a buying motives based feature-benefit matrix, a concise sell the company statement, interest getting statements and questions, as well as fact-finding and feeling-finding qualification questions.
4. Effective tactical sales tools. These include a pre-call sales plan, sales research form, and a sales presentation document which, when all combined, chart the course of each sales call.
By developing these four components within an overall sales strategy, you can chart predictable outcomes for your organization thereby taking the mystery out of selling.
Focus on the Professional -
"Terry Roberts"
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Terry Roberts is a Senior Consultant with Crestwood Associates, a marketing research and strategy consulting firm based in Kirkland, Wash. Terry has held senior positions in several companies and has extensive experience in marketing planning, management and research for both the business-to-business and business-to-consumer categories, with particular emphasis in recent years on dot-coms. For more information, please call (425) 827-6111 or visit www.crestwoods.com.
The feature article in the Track Selling Times several months ago addressed the misconceptions between the sales and marketing departments at many companies. Having consulted for the heads of these departments many times, I wanted to share a few thoughts.
One of my favorite descriptions of the difference between sales and marketing is: marketing is making sure that you have the right things on the shelf, and selling is getting those things off the shelf. But often times, the reason for the discord between the two departments is that they don't talk to each other much. Consequently, neither has a good understanding or appreciation for what the other does.
Marketing personnel don't think salespeople appreciate what they're trying to do in terms of positioning the company, building a brand and an image, etc. And salespeople believe the marketing staff has no idea of what it's like to be in the "trenches" with customers.
I believe the key for these two departments to work in harmony is that each must educate the other on what it does, and what it hopes to accomplish. A sound approach to making this happen can be to analyze the desired results of the company and then work backwards. Unless it's in the non-profit sector, the most basic result desired by any company is to sell its product or service. And everything each department does either directly or indirectly supports this objective.
So while the marketing department may not be directly responsible for making the sale, it definitely can make the road easier for those who are, the salespeople. And making sales shouldn't be the only objective of salespeople. They can bring valuable information back from the field to help the marketing staff pave future roads to sales. By looking at the big picture of the desired result - profitability - sales and marketing personnel can better work together in the pursuit of this overriding objective.
Book Review -
Business Is a Contact Sport
by Tom Richardson, Augusto Vidaurreta
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In Business is a Contact Sport, authors Tom Richardson and Augusto Vidaurreta, former Arthur Anderson consultants and co-founders of Systems Consulting Group, take a new approach in analyzing all of a company's relationships by introducing Relationship Asset Management (RAM). Classifying a company's relationships as its single greatest asset, the authors outline a 12-principle blueprint for managing every relationship within a company whether it's employees, customers, distributors, partners or other key stakeholders.
Although the RAM principle may seem like common sense, the authors - who both hold MBAs - reveal that most MBA programs fail to classify relationships as a prime asset of a company. Yet the authors make it very clear that you don't need an MBA to learn how to effectively manage and cultivate all of your company's relationships into loyal, deepening and profitable assets.
Business Is a Contact Sport is chalked full of real life examples and is much more "hands on" than theoretical. It offers a wealth of advice and will benefit any business professional.
| Ask Roy
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Jim Thompson of Raleigh, NC asks:
"In your opinion, what factors determine a salesperson's success with people and can they be learned?"
Roy's Answer:
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For a professional salesperson, I believe four factors determine his or her success with people.
-Your impact. First impressions may not be fair, but they exist nonetheless. Your prospect's initial impression will have a strong influence on the success of your sales call. How are your prospects perceiving you?
-Your sensitivity. This means how sensitive you are to your prospects: their personalities, their moods, their business, and the things they're trying to accomplish. How well do you read between the lines and sense the feelings your prospect is having? How well do you respond, letting your prospect know that you really do understand?
-Your perception. How do you perceive your prospects' problems and needs? How do you perceive their marketplace? Are you conveying to your prospect that you're viewing the situation through their eyes?
-Your judgment. How effective are the solutions you offer to solve your prospects' problems or fill their needs? Have you listened, evaluated the situation accurately, and offered something that is both practical and on-target?
And yes, Jim, these are learned skills.
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The Editor, Track Selling Times
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Tel: (206) 706-4119 Fax: (206) 706-5359
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