Questions and answers

Going in to a customer meeting prepared is a very good thing.

Arriving to the meeting with the answer to the customers questions is excellent.

 

But how on earth would you know the answers beforehand?

 

It takes some doing and some thinking and a lot of training.

 

So your typical customer will ask you a number of questions that you are actually used to get and already have the answer to. So in fact by going through your customers most common questions and writing these down you can improve the way you answer them.

By adding value words like Increase (and such words) in your answer it will sound much better and your presentation will be more effective in persuading the customer.

By doing preparation work before going to your customer you will learn a lot about them and you can by this knowledge start a dialogue where you act customer and seller.

Ask yourself where this customers most likely have a problem that you with your product/service can solve. With this tactic you will be very much prepared for the questions that comes and will be able to respond with answers instead of putting these of to the future call-back/meeting. By training in this fashion you will also be much more coherent and professional and on the spot with your answers and this will in the end of the day give you better and more business.

 

Try the customers shoes and have the answers prepared to their questions.

 

Be successful in sales!

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Keep it short

English: A business ideally is continually seeking feedback from customers: are the products helpful? are their needs being met? Constructive criticism helps marketers adjust offerings to meet customer needs. Source of diagram: here (see public domain declaration at top). Questions: write me at my Wikipedia talk page (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Selling has a lot of do with presenting in pitch form right?

Sure…

Have you ever signed a deal with someone after a 30 second elevator pitch?

I’ve managed to sell in this short period of time a couple of times but that was directly to consumers.

It’s not that common in the business world and for a good reason.

 

Since selling is about the other party gaining trust in you it takes some time to achieve this so that would indicate that you have all the time in the world. Not so.

You still get a couple of seconds to do a first impression the rest of the time you are scrutinized to the core. Are you who I think you are? this is what the rest of the time is usually taken up by.

So what is a short meeting?

Well in my experience a sell meeting is usually around the 45-60 minutes mark and less than that means they are not interested.

Is that short?

 

Yes. Since in that time you present yourself and your product/service and your client to be, presents their company. After this time the decision to go ahead is usually taken but the dance towards a signed deal might take a bit longer probably 1 or 2 more meetings depending on how many questions that are still left to answer about the actual product/service.

Since you value your and your customers time make sure that your presentation is to the core of what you do and offer. Make it clear!

Use the words and material in your presentation that really need to be in it to get the message through. Then check it again and again and then let someone else check it.

If you have the money to pay someone in advertising now is the time to use them.

 

Keep it short since then everything you say is interesting (hopefully) for the customer giving you a greater impact and increases the value of you and your service.

If you sell paper make sure that you have different sorts of paper that you can show and let customer feel the paper to. Is it really important for the customer to know exactly everthing about this paper that they hold in their hand? Probably not. So cut the fluff out and concentrate on the things that they really need to know about the paper.

 

Keep it short!

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Moving sales forward or status quo and you!

The Status Quo Ladder, Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Status quo is an ugly place to be in sales.

Moving forward is good.

Getting a yes is better.

Even getting a no on a deal is better than status quo because then at least you know its time to drop it and move on to something/someone else.

When doing drive alongs with sales people the thing that separates and is the thing most easily spotted is that an average seller or poor seller does is staying in status quo because they are afraid to move things towards a No or a Yes.

Or to put it in another way the top seller always moves the process towards a yes or a no.
Towards the point of decision-making.

They (the top seller) know just aswell as the rest of the sellers that in order to make a deal happen you have to push things to this point but the big difference is that they don’t stop to contemplate the possibility to lose the customer when getting them to the decision point. They accept the fact that they will lose customers, its natural that some say no.

Just as its natural that the rest say yes.

So by staying in the status quo limbo the poor sales person wastes their own and their customers time!
And by doing so they hinder themselves in becoming the next top sales person.

For you and me the answer is an easy one.

Status quo bad.

Moving things forward good.

Increased profitability!

Patrik Olson

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Morning meeting pep talk

Words (Photo credit: sirwiseowl)

The pep talk at the morning meeting should be swift to the point and well rehearsed.

Since it’s so short (or should be) if talking to a small group 5-20 people then something between 60 seconds – 180 seconds to deliver your message. If you have statistics and information that you think must be addressed in this meeting then think again.

This meeting is all about getting your staff pumped for the day and the only statistics and information should be those that will further your goal of increasing the staffs sales!

This speech should be done the day before and distilled to be as short as possible because the staff will always have a short attention span for these kind of speeches.

First words should be the key words and the thing you are trying to get across and the middle part is more about talking about this while you modulate your voice to be more vocally and theatrically interesting since this will add to the attention that the starting keywords will get. In other words the middle part is more for building up to the punch line.

The punch line should be the same or close to the same as the key words in the start to really hit home.

To find new topics to talk about read about anything and every thing you can find time to since this will give you fresh and up to date topics to make these pep talks interesting.

The pep talk always be delivered with gusto and a positive energy. IF you don’t feel up to this then you should cancel the pep talk and since it will otherwise be counterproductive.

Also try to do a weekly “red thread” to make things more challenging for yourself.

Just do it!

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Charity work to boost your sales.

This might sting a bit to mix charity work and business, but really its a win win!

 

Do you wish to help others?

Do you wish to polish up your brand name /company name?

Do you wish to be the go to company within you market?

Do you wish to make more money / profits?

 

What better way than to do strategic donations to promote your company.

 

Lets do an example, low-budget first!

 

Take any sport that you particularly like. (im going to use soccer in this example.)

 

They always have problems with funding and since you got a marketing budget you are going to get a whole lot for your money by volunteering to pay for the socks,shorts and t-shirts.  In return for this nice gesture you would like to have your colors and logos /commercial text or whatever on said clothes for a season or two.

On a shoestring marketing budget i would suggest going for one little league team instead of the whole club. With a bigger budget (still small compared to a marketing campaign) you could option to do a series or a tournament with help from the club and get good press exposure.

What will this bring back to you?

These little athletes play a lot of matches away from home aswell as meeting teams on their home turf. There will also be plentiful of photos taken for family albums or Facebook and such meaning a great spread of your brand in a none aggressive way. This means that your sponsorship will be seen by all parents and as well as other teams parents and all of these have jobs and will sooner or later result in business coming your way and to start it all of you get a lot of brand recognition both by the adults as well as the children /youths.

 

Example 2.

 

Do you rent / own or have access to space ? This is useful since a lot of charity events need just that.

Pick an organisation that you like or can stand for and ask them if they would be interested in doing and event to raise funds.

If one says no (unlikely but..) ask another.

Invite the local press to attend be active in promoting the event. This will essentially only use up some time from your side (or your employees).  The upside is a real win win. The organisation that you have chosen will get free publicity as well as a boost of funds that it can use to benefit those in need. You will get a wide-spread free publicity and usually to potential customers that you wouldn’t have reached otherwise. The brand recognition factor will play in here aswell.

 

This will establish you as a good guy and everyone wants to be associated with you and that’s why you aswell as the team or charity will benefit greatly from doing this.

 

Contribute with what you can and you will be rewarded tenfold!

 

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10 Logo Designs Gone Wrong

Reblogged from Fettes Management:

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Author: Jennifer Moline @ HONGKIAT

Logos define brands and they create corporate images because logos are what sticks in people’s mind and creates associations. Think Coca-Cola, Nike, or McDonald’s – what do you instantly picture in mind? Right, their logos. Great logos will never allow their consumers forget about the brand – it’s what prompts them choose one product over alternative: people tend to stick to something familiar, something that brings up positive associations.

Read more… 523 more words

What i can i say sometimes you just need a good laugh! I sure hope that these companies changed their logos after this was brought to their attention.

Storytelling in sales!

The Boyhood of Raleigh, 1871 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This subject keeps popping up from time to time when being in sales.

“ah you mean like storytelling”

“storytelling is a great way to engage and create rapport”

“when i do my storytelling the customer just sits back and takes it all in”

 

So what is storytelling?

In my humble opinion it’s just another way at looking at and labeling pitching.

In essence it’s what sales is about.

 

You use your voice to intone and captivate your audience be it one buyer or an entire and packed congress room.

Using your voice and modulate in tones and variances that enriches the story and brings it to life and makes your audience resonate and creates rapport.

Does it matter at all what the storytelling tells?

Not so much as you would think.

Your body language and your use of your voice will account for mor than 97% of the experience and that leaves only 3 % of the information left for the actual content.

In other words selling snowmobiles to nomads in the sand dunes of middle east. (yes that is actually a true story).

 

The performance and the show that you put up when doing your storytelling should be well rehearsed if its short. By short i mean 10 minutes or less. The less time you have to do it the more prepared you need to be so for a 3 minute session i would prepare almost every word and rehearse it several times. Longer than 10 minutes means that you can wing it. For this i read everything i can about the subject (be it a company that i will try to get as a customer or an event as a speaker with a chosen subject). I put down mental headwords that i will incorporate in the storytelling and if i have the luxury of having computer or paper as aides i put the words down there so i can look it up and sign them off as i go.

For a short session its much harder to play with the audience. On 10 minutes plus you usually can get a good feel for some of the individual listeners and play them to engage the rest of the crowd. Sort of storytelling surfing . Some times you lose them and will have to get them back and that’s really a scary feeling but the audience will not notice this too much if you recover your footing. This will typically happen when you change audience with the same story. Doing a really sales inspiring speech for sales people gets them really going but the same speech for an audience of technicians will have slight effects so you will have to be prepared for less applause.

 

Also there is a strange thing with storytelling and that is that when you do it well people who are asked afterwards and are satisfied will mostly only remember the “pitch”  in the beginning and the end and not so much about what happened in between. The between part will be remembered in emotion based on how good you were at the podium what you projected and your company and your “pitch” will take on those properties and you have succeeded.

 

So to me storytelling is just like any other day out there pitching and creating rapport.

Storytelling is the essence of sales.

 

Veni vidi vici

Patrik Olson

 

http://www.essortment.com/five-storytelling-tips-34326.html

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All numbers are up except sales.

All numbers are up except sales.

 

“By all of the sales metrics, we ought to be doing well”, he told me.

Pointing to graphs and spreadsheets it seemed the sales force was a well-oiled machine.

1. Field Call numbers, up
2. Meetings with key decision makers, up
3. Expenses, down
4. Cost per call, down

You’ll have guessed what’s coming next.

Sales, down; gross margins, down.

Why?

Well maybe its as simple as we discussed earlier do the ride along with your staff to check them out in action and take it from there.

The explanation is often to find in the distance between the board of directors goal setting and the sales staffs real life experience.

Your sales staff is are goal archivers and if they can’t fill one goal they will concentrate on another in this case there are 2 that they can and will achieve and that is they make more calls and meet more decision makers. This should bring automatic results in, more sales. But what if the sales targets is communicated after the calls and meetings numbers? What if the middle exec communicated to the next level that the board of directors wants higher meeting numbers and much more activity on the phone? What if that is what is communicated as the goal to achieve?

This is not uncommon.

Set a goal like:

Make 50 appointments with the phone this month.

That should give you at least 30 meetings with key decision makers.

This should result in at least 5-10 signed contracts.

……………..

You can see where this is going right?

The seller will naturally concentrate on fulfilling their employers wishes and set out to do so. They will do it in the order presented and by the end of the month they will have concentrated so much on getting the 2 first right that focus on the actual signing will be a second-hand goal.

As a salesperson its important to reach the goals but you as the manager will have to give them the right goals to work towards.

 

The order should be communicated in the opposite order.

This month i want at least 5-10 signed contracts.

To get that i need you to get at least 30 meetings with key decision makers.

I  expect you to make 50 appointments with the phone this month to get this rolling.

 

Communicate in a clear way with your staff and they will respond in a clear way back. = signed contracts.

That´s why the sales execs should concentrate all their efforts on clear and well understood messages. In other worlds always enhance and present in positive words and build up your staff and point them to the contracts that needs to be signed. Getting the deal is the only goal that the salesperson should be concerned about.

Measuring the sales success and all the different parameters that goes in to that is for management.

veni vidi vici

Patrik Olson

 

 

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The ride along or going on a field trip with your sellers.

The time comes in every company. You need to do the ride along.

Unfortunately this is usually high in the mental priority list but seems to fade away under a flood of a thousand other things you need to do first.

Who is a ride along important to?

Both you and your salesperson/representative.

Why?

You are face to face for at least a day and will have plenty of time to bond and discuss all issues and ideas that has surfaced since the last time you was there.

So for you its an excellent time to harvest small and big ideas that will enhance your product / service and get the grassroot perspective on things.

I always take notes that i can come back to and use, or you can use a mind map. But you need to put something down on paper or at least 75% will  just fly out the other ear.

Your official mission is of c to check out why the sales numbers are as they are.

This should always be checked off:

1. What is the purpose with the customer visit ( closing,curtsey, checkup, problem solving et cetera.)

2. How did the seller prepare for this meeting and do they have the right tools with them. ( Presentation material, Happy customer cases, The solution to the customer’s problem, et cetera.)

3. In what manner do they enter and represent you and your company. (happy, sad, indifferent, long-lost pals, nervous…..)

4. Where do they place themselves at the table and why.

5. Body language throughout the meeting

6. Opening

7. Presentation

8. Goal oriented or just rolling with the punches / action oriented.

9. Listening and comprehension skills ( do they really understand what their customer is asking and why).

10. Recovering from a negative remark or a negative response to a close attempt. (or do they close shop and calls it a day?)

11. How many attempts were made to close and how well-timed where they.

12. Closing the meeting with a signed contract or getting a new meeting for a new try. (who is ending the meeting the customer or your representative).

13. Walking out after the meeting, do they still have control and have they taken the initiative for taking the sales process forward.

Aftermath: Let the seller explain why they did things in this way and acted like they did and you tell them how you perceived the meeting.

If i want immediate changes in the sellers behavior i tell them what to change in a positive form since i firmly belive that a salesperson never should have negative critic in other words i only give them positive forms and tools to enhance their sales success i will however always write down the negatives so i have a record of it.

After 2-4 customer calls its evident what your sales persons benefits and drawbacks are and then you can take it from there.

If there are more than 1 person doing the same mistakes i use it in a written lesson as well as in a morning meeting since this will need addressing or it will happen again.

 

So hopefully you will leave the sales person with several new tools for getting more deals and with a sense of personal development.

This in turn will result in that evergreen company that you strive to achieve (or are already running).

 

Veni vidi vici

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Selling a feeling!

Selling a feeling!

How can you get paid for a feeling?

Yes you can get paid if you tie it with buying your product or service.

Can your product or service be sold with a feeling as the main marketing tool?

Most can be, you just have to use your imagination.

Lets take an easy example. Coca cola zero.

They sell a beverage in a can. Much like a lot of competitors. So why are they number one?

They deliver the beverage in a can as medium for your money but what they have really sold and you have paid for is:

1. the brand = premium = you can afford/deserve premium / or even are a premium person. = feeling good about yourself

2. Its cold (in every commercial anyway) = feeling cold/refreshed

3. Sporty and young, athletic. = Feeling young/athletic

4. Hero gets girls = feeling anything is possible (it can happen but you can see the chance percentage drop )= feeling Hope

Ok that’s it about the big company with unlimited resources (the earnings for a beverage is really good).

Lets try it again.

You sell planks and nails and every other hardware needed to build things. That´s very easy to touch so consequently its a product.

How do you sell this with a feeling?

Well you take a couple of your customers and ask them to tell their story about what happened after they purchased the goods.

They will tell you have the built something.  = feeling = accomplishment,fulfilled a goal, pride in ones capabilities.

You get the picture.

I /we did this when i started at sector alarm to.

They then sold a burglary alarm for houses and it protected you against evil. The Brochure was black and had pictures of broken glass, fire and ambulances. Pretty much like the competition.

We had step away from that to make the customers see us as the only choice to protect their home.

We started selling “safety in all homes” and did a new brochure that had happy people who projected calm and security. Light and happy homes with happy kids and parents. We started to sell the feeling of safety. This was really a turning point for us since up until then we were compared almost every time to our competitors and the customer then based their decision much upon price and what extra hardware one could add.

Now they didn’t do that anymore (at least very seldom). They wanted to know when we could come and deliver this and when they could feel safer in their homes again. The price tag fell out of many presentations since it was no longer important for the customer, they just wanted the feeling of security and that was worth much more than we would ever charge them so..

 

Start to think about what feelings you could sell your products and services with and you will be different and most likely more successful in your market!

 

Veni vidi vici

Patrik Olson

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