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Ashley, a sales representative for a regional software company, makes several calls a week to new potential prospects to request a meeting to demonstrate her product. She gets lots of voice mails, speaks to lots of gatekeepers and sends a lot of emails with no response.

Every once in a while – statically five out of 100 – she will reach a potential prospect live. When she does, she is so excited that she doesn’t even recognize the excuse.

There are several excuses that a prospect will give a salesperson. What is most interesting is that the salesperson will likely not see them as excuses and believe them.

There are some examples that are almost always an excuse and not the truth. Let’s look at them one at a time:

The excuse: “Why don’t you send me/email me something?”

The translation: “It’s easier to ignore you through email.”

If this prospect were truly interested, she would take at least a few minutes and talk to the salesperson right then, just to determine if there is a need.

The excuse: “I’m in a meeting.”

The translation: “I have no time to talk and I’m hoping this illusion of interruption will get you off of the phone quickly.”

I love this one! So, you are in an actual meeting in your office, you don’t know who’s calling, but you pick up the phone anyway? Seriously? Salespeople fall for this one all of the time! At this point, the salesperson keeps calling, but the prospect now knows the phone number through caller ID and will just avoid the call.

The excuse: “We don’t have a budget/money at this time.”

The translation: “I just don’t see the benefit, and having no money will make you go away, at least for a while.”

Money is an interesting thing. People will find money for what they determine will bring them value. We often blow this one by trying to quickly show how our product will save them/make them money. The response: Yeah, right! (It doesn’t matter whether it’s true or not; you can’t shove your idea of value down a throat on a phone call.)

The excuse: “Call me after the third quarter.”

The translation: “Wow! I just put you off for at least a few months.”

Salespeople like this one because it gives them something they can follow up on – at least in their mind. This is where follow-up, in my opinion, becomes stalking. The salesperson keeps calling when this date arrives, and the prospect will not even remember she told you to call, let alone meant it when she said it.

The excuse: “We’re good right now, but you can check back.”

The translation: See the previous translation.

I say gee, thank you so much for allowing me to check back! You must really like me/be interested, etc. (Yeah, right.)

The excuse: “I’ll think it over and let you know.”

The translation: “I have no intention of reaching back out to you, but I asked for the next move to be done by me.”

This is no move, but sales people happily agree and wait and wait. What’s funny is they would rather take any of these excuses than hear whatever the real truth is – most commonly a no.

If we, as salespeople, could get comfortable with asking right up front for a “no” as an option, we wouldn’t be wasting so much time, energy and our control of the sales process.

 

Greta Schulz is a sales consultant for businesses and entrepreneurs. For more tips and tools, or to ask her a question, go to Facebook.com/schulzbusiness or email greta@schulzbusiness.com.

 

“I feel like nothing is working,” said Connie in frustration about her recent sales numbers.

“Whatever I do, it doesn’t seem to matter. I thought the economy was getting better but no one is going to buy right now”. I really think that once the economy truly turns around and people are feeling more confident, then things will start to move again, but until then, it’s just not happening”.

“I may actually have to get a part time job or something until that happens because I am scared that I cant pay my bills”. Ranted Connie.

 

Connie and I talked about some of the scenarios that she had been dealing with and she told me that people really like her product but the just can’t afford it right now.

“Greta I hear this everyday. People are just not spending right now. My numbers are down so far that I think it’s just a waiting game”.

When I hear Connie’s story it isn’t unusual but it is self-fulfilling. Why are some people thriving and others are in Connie’s boat? I truly believe it is less about the external situation and much more about the internal self-talk we have going on.

 

I have narrowed it down to what I call “ITALK”. I Talk is an acronym that I think might explain what’s going on.

I – Initial Situation. The initial situation here is that the economy went through a one-two punch that most of us have never seen the likes of before and hopefully once fixed, will never see again. The fact is this truly did change a lot of people’s way of life and certainly the way business is conducted today. The initial situation is what it is. It’s fact.

 

T-Thought. The thoughts that we create because of the situation we are presented with are completely ours. This is the filter we see the situation through. How do two people see the same situation differently? It is this filter that creates our thought. Connie’s thought is “people can’t afford it right now”. That is certainly a big assumption and we all know what happens when we assume…

 

A- Attached Feeing. The feelings that we have based on the assumptions we make are very damaging. They are damaging because of the depth of feelings or in other words ‘beliefs’ in the way we conduct ourselves. Connie was so scares she actually thought about getting a second job.

 

L- Lead Action. Our lead action is what we do because of our beliefs. It is the way we approach a particular situation and will be different in approach depending upon the belief. When Connie approaches a prospect she doesn’t have confidence to handle the money objection because she herself believes it. Therefore she is practically waiting for it to come and with it is either feeling defeated or is quick to offer a discount. Neither of which is the outcome she would like.

 

K- Known Result. The known result is what actually happens as a result of these beliefs. This is very difficult because you will almost always get the result you believe you are going to get. When you do, you say to yourself, “see, I knew it” and the cycle continues.

 

ITALK is the talk we have with ourselves. It is our internal dialog, our internal beliefs. In my opinion there is nothing more dangerous then this. No matter how many times someone tells you it’s not that way, your subconscious is much more powerful then your conscious or anything someone might tell you.

 

Fix your internal negative thoughts and you can change your outcomes. It’s not the economy…it’s your thinking that is hurting you the most.

Will training help your sales people?


 

This is the million-dollar question, isn’t it? Unfortunately, it isn’t as easy as yes or no. There are certainly variables, and some are very basic. Here are some questions to ask:

• Is your sales training actually product training?
• Is it a one-day training that is packed to the gills with information?
• Is there follow-up coaching and maintenance to assure success?
• Are there activities set up to create true accountabilities, not just meet the revenue numbers?
• Are your salespeople trainable?

I recently read a survey of 500 small and medium-size businesses that I want to share with you.

This particular survey found 6 percent of salespeople are at the top of their game. They are consistently beating their goals. As a matter of fact, they set their own goals, depending on what they want to earn.

An additional 20 percent are doing well, but could do better. They are fairly consistent, but could really sharpen their tools a bit more and be unstoppable.

Then there are 74 percent who are not cutting it. Most of the people (about two-thirds) in the 74 percent bracket can improve if they get training.

The other one-third in this group are in the wrong job and really aren’t fixable. Unfortunately, we spend more time with these bottom-end performers and try to get them to improve, when our time and energy should be really spent at the top.

It doesn’t seem to make a difference what industry you’re in, or what type of company you are. Not sure? Ask yourself: What percentage of your sales representatives are consistently successful? Out of 20, two are typically successful, five are pretty good and the rest are not really cutting it. Out of a group this size, the Top 2 are trainable, but will not change what they are already doing right away. (If it ain’t broke ….)

Twelve or 13 will improve quite a bit with training, and the last five or six should be gone. We hold on to salespeople for much longer then we should.

Here is another brilliant comment about training: “I like to go to training seminars, even if I learn just one tip.”

You want a tip? Here’s one for losing weight: “Eat more vegetables and less carbohydrates.”

How’s that?

How about: “To be a better spouse, be a better listener.”

A tip is nice, but will not change behavior. It is, of course, the easy way to “get motivated,” but continue to do what you’re doing.

Sales tends to be a misunderstood phenomenon. We feel like the excuse of doing pretty well or getting close to the goal is OK.

Here is the question I ask salespeople when they say that: If your company’s payroll department says “well, we may not get to create and sign all of the paychecks this week, but we will do the best we can,” would your sales rep kick up his/her heels? You bet. So what is the difference?

 

Greta Schulz is President of SchulzBusiness, a sales Consulting and Training firm. She is a best selling author of “To Sell IS Not To Sell” and works with fortune 1000 companies and entrepreneurs. For more information or free sales tips go to www.schulzbusiness.com and sign up for ‘GretaNomics’, a weekly video tip series or email sales questions to greta@schulzbusiness.com

Will training help your sales people?


 

This is the million-dollar question, isn’t it? Unfortunately, it isn’t as easy as yes or no. There are certainly variables, and some are very basic. Here are some questions to ask:

• Is your sales training actually product training?
• Is it a one-day training that is packed to the gills with information?
• Is there follow-up coaching and maintenance to assure success?
• Are there activities set up to create true accountabilities, not just meet the revenue numbers?
• Are your salespeople trainable?

I recently read a survey of 500 small and medium-size businesses that I want to share with you.

This particular survey found 6 percent of salespeople are at the top of their game. They are consistently beating their goals. As a matter of fact, they set their own goals, depending on what they want to earn.

An additional 20 percent are doing well, but could do better. They are fairly consistent, but could really sharpen their tools a bit more and be unstoppable.

Then there are 74 percent who are not cutting it. Most of the people (about two-thirds) in the 74 percent bracket can improve if they get training.

The other one-third in this group are in the wrong job and really aren’t fixable. Unfortunately, we spend more time with these bottom-end performers and try to get them to improve, when our time and energy should be really spent at the top.

It doesn’t seem to make a difference what industry you’re in, or what type of company you are. Not sure? Ask yourself: What percentage of your sales representatives are consistently successful? Out of 20, two are typically successful, five are pretty good and the rest are not really cutting it. Out of a group this size, the Top 2 are trainable, but will not change what they are already doing right away. (If it ain’t broke ….)

Twelve or 13 will improve quite a bit with training, and the last five or six should be gone. We hold on to salespeople for much longer then we should.

Here is another brilliant comment about training: “I like to go to training seminars, even if I learn just one tip.”

You want a tip? Here’s one for losing weight: “Eat more vegetables and less carbohydrates.”

How’s that?

How about: “To be a better spouse, be a better listener.”

A tip is nice, but will not change behavior. It is, of course, the easy way to “get motivated,” but continue to do what you’re doing.

Sales tends to be a misunderstood phenomenon. We feel like the excuse of doing pretty well or getting close to the goal is OK.

Here is the question I ask salespeople when they say that: If your company’s payroll department says “well, we may not get to create and sign all of the paychecks this week, but we will do the best we can,” would your sales rep kick up his/her heels? You bet. So what is the difference?

 

Greta Schulz is President of SchulzBusiness, a sales Consulting and Training firm. She is a best selling author of “To Sell IS Not To Sell” and works with fortune 1000 companies and entrepreneurs. For more information or free sales tips go to www.schulzbusiness.com and sign up for ‘GretaNomics’, a weekly video tip series or email sales questions to greta@schulzbusiness.com

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Recently, I spoke to an organization that spent an ungodly amount of time, energy, and money on Social Media to create Lead Generation. So my question was, “Now what?” They asked, “What do you mean?” I said “Okay, so you got a whole bunch of people calling you or contacting you through a web form, email etc. How’s your closing ratio?” They looked at me like I had three heads.

The issue is a simple one, just because we believe that we have found a new way to generate business, it is not generating business…alone. Lead generation is Interest; lead generation is getting people to the door. Are they coming over the threshold and are you closing the door behind them? That’s a very important step. One without the other will result in no revenue.

 

Between Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Google and Bing ads on any of the Social Media sites, Blogs amongst other things we do today to build leads is it really working? That’s one question. If we’re doing all of the things that we need to do in Social Media and all the ‘white noise’ is going out, what is it bringing us? Well, it should be bringing us Leads. It should be bringing us Emails, filling out contact Information or a website, web forms and phone call, and if that’s happening, Great you have reached step one. This is a very important step but it is ONLY step one.

The million-dollar question is “Now What?”

It’s important to make sure that we know once people contact us or when we contact them back, we are using the right process to follow up from any kind of lead generation that we get. Are we setting some ground rules at the beginning of the conversation? Are we asking well? Thought provoking open-ended questions to engage them and truly understand their needs beyond what the told you? DO we have a true picture of all of this before we have the cost conversation and do you clearly understand the next step and what that means as opposed to just “checking back” or following up with them?

It’s important to understand that when someone contacts you, they are often contacting several people within your industry. You don’t have a relationship built, there were just some low levels of interest that got them to contact you. Is it better than you calling out cold? Well certainly it is but you still needs the same attention to process as you always did. Getting somebody to call you is only the beginning. So, what are the other steps: What are we doing when we contact them or they call us. Are we using the process properly? Here is what we typically see.

 

When we get them on the phone, they will typically ask you a simple question that I call a “Wall Question” which is they put up a wall and the question sounds something like this “Hey, I see you guys sell widgets. Can you tell me if I bought a hundred widgets what that would cost?” and we say, “Sure, let me look. What can of widgets you are looking for?” “We’re looking for widget A or widget B.” “Okay well, widget A would be $75,000 for a hundred widgets and widget B would be $82,000. “Oh, that’s a lot of money. “Well, maybe I can do a little better.” You negotiate a price and they say “Okay sounds good, ah we’ll call you back” Or “Sounds good, can you send me a proposal / price sheet/ some more information?”

 

We get their email, we send that information in writing and cricket, we never hear from them again. We try to contact them back, they don’t contact us. We try to call them, they don’t take our call, and we leave messages.

Sound familiar? Of course, it does. The same situation that happened before when you did your prospecting more proactively occurred. Prospecting hasn’t changed. Sales and the sales process haven’t changed just because they’re contacting you. In fact, I would say that it is more difficult now because we are not as on top of our game since they contacted us we feel it is a ‘hot’ lead.

Not only do you need to do a good job on working on the sales process in closing the sale, you need to do a better job than you ever have before because remember, they have control. They’re the ones that are calling you but they’re also calling your competitor. So they’ve done a little homework, they know who’s out there and they know what the pricing is out there. That’s where the sale process comes in. If you don’t have a process, you’re going to fail whether they’re lead generating through Social Media or not.

Wess Roberts in his book “Victory Secrets of Attila The Hun” credits the battle-savvy leader with having said, “Chieftains should never intentionally place [soldiers] in a situation where the price of losing outweighs the rewards of winning”. How often can you honestly say that your sales managers apply this rule to their salespeople? And what systems do your salespeople have in place to ensure victory, even before they go into battle?

 

You have two challenges when your sales force prepares for battle:

 

Challenge 1: Like any kind of warfare, you have a distinct advantage when you can tap good and reliable intelligence. Here’s the problem: Your salespeople don’t get enough accurate intelligence about their prospects. As a result, their pipelines are filled with flaky opportunities. And your sales managers don’t have enough guts to call them on it.

 

Here’s the litmus test. When your sales people submit their forecasts, do you or your managers “adjust” them down for realism? It’s typically easier for salespeople and their managers to discuss why they didn’t win business, instead of asking themselves the right questions before going to battle.

 

The right questions:

 

1. “Can we win and should we pursue this opportunity?” If yes, then
2. “Which strategy should we adopt to ensure that we win?

 

To begin, ask your salespeople: “How much does it cost to win a new account?” Calculate the actual costs associated with generating a lead, a contact, an appointment, a proposal and a sale. Now add in the opportunity cost of missed business they could have won if they weren’t wasting time on business that won’t close quickly.

 

If you’re like most selling organizations, the cost per pursuit is several hundred or even thousands of dollars. Multiply that by the number of opportunities you chased and didn’t close in the last 12 months. Staggering isn’t it?

 

Before your sales people charge off to fight the next battle, ask them, “If this was your money, would you spend it?”

 

Challenge 2: Your sales people don’t do enough planning work before going to battle.

 

Before going into battle again, make sure your salespeople can answer these questions (honestly):

 

• What are you trying to sell and most importantly, why? Sounds simple enough until you actually try to quantify it.

 

• Is the project funded? What if there’s not enough? Who has discretionary use of the funds? Who can get more?

 

• What is the sale worth to the organization? Does the ROI justify the investment of time, money and effort?

 

• Have we sold this prospect anything in the past? Who? What? Where? When? How? Why?

 

• How many contacts have you already had with this contact? How many phone calls, face-to-face meetings and so on? Do you have a clear next step?

 

• Do you have an organizational chart? Do you have an inside coach?

 

• What has been (or will be) your sales strategy?

 

• Where are you in the selling process? Here is a checklist:

 

1. Were you invited in or did you beg for an appointment?
2. What were the prospect’s reasons for seeing you?
3. What were the challenges, problems, and frustrations that you identified in the interview?
4. How important is it to the prospect to fix those problems?
5. How committed is the prospect to fixing those problems? (Time, effort, money, willingness to fail?)
6. What is the agreement you and the prospect have reached concerning the decisions that will be made each step of the way?

 

Few salespeople understand the cost of pursuing sales and often fill their funnels with bad business. Fewer think through winning strategies before going into sales “battle”.

Ask your sales people these fundamental sales questions before committing resources to a battle you cannot win.

Successful sales professionals qualify vigorously, and religiously before committing time and energy so their closing ratios are 90% or better.

So, what are yours?

 

 

 

Training

 

Important vs. Effective

 

 

Training is an intrecle and ongoing part of sales force development. Not only initial product training but ongoing sales process training to include; prospecting, calling at the top of an organization, closing and the activities it takes to get there consistently.

 

 

Training

 

“To have growth in products, you need to have growth in people”

• Reinemund, CEO PepsiCo. Inc.

 

 

Training is an interesting subject. Most organizations believe at least at some level, that training is important. And most organizations believe that they have training in place. Typically when they say they have training they are referring to product training. Product training is the training of how the actual product(s) works. Thought it is important to understand this information, we tend to spend lots of time learning the ins and outs of product knowledge but not much time on how to take it successfully to market.

 

Most executives believe that “presenting” the features and benefits of the product and showing the knowledge of their product will sell it. It is only one part of the process and if I told you it was the less important of the two I am sure you would disagree…but it’s true. The other and most important part of the process is the ability to ask the right questions to get your prospects to “self-realize” that your product or service is a fit for them. This is not a natural way to approach selling; therefore training is an essential part of success in a sales organization.

 

A majority of sales organizations say they don’t have a sufficient amount of time to train and develop their sales teams. Another “reason” training doesn’t happen is that executives believe the sales manager has the responsibility to train. That is only partly true because training properly takes specific time and energy placed on the training task.

Often organizations overlook their greatest potential source of power-the power to increase sales performance by developing their people.

 

Executives attempt to solve sales training issues by hiring an ‘experienced’ salesperson. Someone that has been in sales before and just let them ‘do their thing”. This is an issue because we don’t know how successful they really were in the past and no matter how closely aligned your products or service is to what they sold before, it becomes difficult for them to break out of that mold.

 

If this issue is present it will show itself in many ways; one is each sales person is working as an island, meaning they all have their own way of selling, their own process-or lack there of. The difficulty with that is management can’t appropriately coach each individual without a process. Though each person has their own personality and their own style, a consistent process helps keep the entire sales organization on-track and adds the ability to forecast and coach for continual success. If your team is presently not hitting any of the benchmarks you’ve set look at their process. Is it broken?

 

Greta Schulz is President of Schulz Business, a Sales Consulting and Training firm. She is a best selling author of “To Sell IS Not To Sell” and works with fortune 1000 companies and entrepreneurs. For more information or free sales tips go to www.schulzbusiness.com and sign up for ‘GretaNomics’, a weekly video tip series or email sales questions to greta@schulzbusiness.com

 

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What if the bottom quarter of your sales team could produce as much or more revenue than the top quarter? What would that do for your company?

 

What would happen if you replaced the bottom quarter of your sales team with “A” players that get consistent over the top results?

 

When I talk to CEOs about this issue and ask these questions, they often give me these excuses (because that’s what they are, excuses):

 

Belief– We get fooled into thinking they are A players when we interview them. By the time we figure out that they aren’t, we are already too invested.

Reality– You aren’t assessing them properly. Sales people, especially ones that have had many sales jobs are professional interviewers. They know what to say and how to say it so you will be completely impressed and blown away by how much “potential” they have. We are blinded by the charisma and charm they have! You need a non-subjective sales assessment to help give you additional tools to get out of the emotion, the falling in love, and get to the heart of what this person is about.

 

Belief- “We really can’t afford to pay for “A” players”. They tend to be expensive.

Reality- Guess what? You are already paying for them through your lost business! Additionally if we monitored better the progress of a new hire and stop allowing excuses to drag out the pain, we would know sooner and loose less.

 

Belief– “We have loyal C players in sales that have been with us in sales for years, through thick and thin. We can’t just let them go!”

Reality – Just let them go? How long have they been C players? If it just started, maybe you need to find out why and give them an opportunity to improve. If its been going on a long time, you at least need to wan them or see if there is another position that might be better for them internally.

 

Belief – We want to hire fresh new players in sales but we can’t afford to train them.

Reality– Typically go get raw talent and train them your way is the better way to go. You can afford to hire them, put money into training and monitor as you go. If they aren’t beginning quickly to “get it”, cut your losses quickly. We tend to hand on to seasoned salespeople longer because they “must just need more time”. In that case then the ‘newbie’ might be just the answer.

 

Belief– I’m not sure where to find “A” players. When I am looking for someone new I can rarely find someone I would consider an A player.

Reality– Of course not! “A” players aren’t out looking through the regular channels! They are either on a job and you need to typically seek them out or they put their feelers out when they are looking and are scooped up immediately! If a great salesperson is an asset, not a liability, don’t you want additional assets all of the time?

Here is the question I would ask you. If you found an A player today, someone better then your best salesperson, wouldn’t you find a place for them? Of course you would, so why aren’t you looking every day!! That’s right! You or your sales director should be interviewing at least 2-4 candidates a week even when you don’t have a spot for them. How else will you find the gold!!

 

Greta Schulz is President of SchulzBusiness, a sales Consulting and Training firm. She is a best selling author of “To Sell IS Not To Sell” and works with fortune 1000 companies and entrepreneurs. For more information or free sales tips go to www.schulzbusiness.com and sign up for ‘GretaNomics’, a weekly video series or email sales questions to greta@schulzbusiness.com

 

 

 
When it comes to selling, using strategies and tactics to get the job done, there are few who consciously think about the ethics in the way they sell. Ethics in selling will help the organization build a good reputation and consolidate its position in the market. Ethics are learned and they can make a big difference in having a loyal customer base and in making sales.

Ethics in selling can be:

1. Truly listening. Good sales executives are partners. Start being a true listener by understanding the real issue, not just what you want it to hear so you can attempt to sell your product or service. True listening is really understanding the underlying issues and the ‘whys’ behind those issues.

2. Pulling back. Most sales executives do not know when to push and when to pull back. No one likes to be pushed and hearing something a prospect says that may look like an opportunity is not the time to pounce on them with your solution. Pull back and ask more about what they’ve said. Pulling back at the right time can keep you in a respectful position as well as learn what the true issues really are.
3. Go to bed knowing you did the right thing. My father always taught me, if you can go to bed at night and know you did right thing you will have an easier time getting to sleep. You can also rest assured that those you have done business with trust you and respect your opinion.
4. Tell it like it is: The key to getting a loyal customer base is to be truthful at all times. When the customer asks you for suggestions, be truthful and offer the information in its truest form, even if its not you as the best option. That’s right. Doing the right thing is always more important then the sale. If a customer recognizes you’re doing the right thing they will keep you in mind for future business. If the customer recognizes you’re not doing the right thing and just said what you needed to in order to make a sale, you will most likely lose them forever.

 

5. Be innovative. The key to having a consistent sales base is to come up with innovative ideas for them. Know what your competitors are doing and stay informed. Use your own methods and strategies to stand out from the competition. Do not copy or borrow ideas. Instead, brainstorm as a team with your prospect or customer and take valuable suggestions. They need you to be a sounding board not just a pusher of your product or service.
6. Customer satisfaction. This should be given the highest priority. Come up with surveys and feedback options to know what you are doing right and wrong. Do proper research and know how to appeal to customers on a deeper level.

   7. What are they thinking about? Your customers have interests and concerns other then what you offer them. Be their sounding board and a connector. Who do they want to meet? What do they need outside of what you offer? Helping in ways that are outside of your scope is the key to being a true partner. That is about truly helping.

Ethics in selling may seem like a luxury you cannot afford but in the long run, standing out in the rat race, building your empire and loyal customer base calls for utter dedication and ethical selling.

 

 

Best Sales Speaker, Top Sales Speaker, Sales tips, Florida Sales Speaker, Sales Motivational Speaker

 

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