Dear business owner, If you’re selling on annual contracts, the measure of sales success is in your renewal rate. Managing the relationship between renewals is indispensable if you are to keep your business afloat. Customer retention – not acquisition...
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Just when you thought you had argued the debt collection dilemma and whether salespeople should take charge – and demonstrated that debt collection is in itself a formidable salesman – you come across a case that turns the debate...
If you are going to thrive in selling, you must be prepared to do other people’s work. “Other people” here includes customers and colleagues —and anyone else whose inaction could stand between you and the sale. Before you object,...
“What went wrong?” That’s the question I debrief my team with after every customer engagement. It’s how we review what happened in the previous meeting, with the intention of improving the next. This is what a small business owner...
Dear techie zungumziaga customer, boss. Tell us what you are doing, as you are doing it. When we don’t know what you are doing, our anxiety heightens and we assume the worst. You might as well be a doctor...
Your competitor isn’t always beating you because they have a better product. Often, they have a better sales offering. Sometimes they respond faster. Explain better. Follow up consistently. Make buying easier. Remove friction. Keep their promises. Or they do...
If you just accept what the customer says you aren’t adding value. Challenge the customer. Push back. Respectfully. Let’s unpack that. Challenge the customer: being agreeable isn’t the same as being useful “I want a drill.” “Sure, here.” “Jaza...
“I don’t want to see you! Your colleague lied to me. You are all liars!” The executive was fuming. How dare the company send another salesperson after he had told them off about being lied to by the first?...
Anybody can ask a question. But to thrive in selling requires one to ask insightful questions. Insightful questions don’t merely yield knowledge – they shed revelation by eliciting a protracted response. The importance of asking insightful questions in selling...
Driven more by esteem than need, buyers want all the trending bells and whistles in a product. And yet, will most probably use one ‘bell’. If in doubt, how many features on his phone do you suppose the average...