Sales quantity and quality both matter if you are to have a fair sales contest, and a sustainable business. Sometimes, the two Qs are referred to as the two Vs, volume and value. Whether you use Qs or Vs, ignoring quantity or value, is a recipe for disaster. Is quantity more important than quality? Evaluating
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Permission selling is rarely practiced. This is unfortunate. You practice permission selling when you seek the prospect’s agreement before taking any action that involves them. Permission selling or permission based selling, involves the use of statements like, “Is it okay if I…?” or, “Do you mind if we….?” You catch the drift. Here are 3
Here are 3 reasons why it is important to help customers make purchase decisions. The word selling is ‘dirty’ Unfortunately, selling connotes negative, even fearful images in the mind of the prospective buyer (prospect). Actually, even the statement, “We will transfer you to sales” or “We will introduce targets in your job description” fires images
Prospecting is a science, not an art. Prospecting is the never unending quest to seek buyers for your product or service. I’ve said it before, and will keep shouting from the rooftops. If you don’t prospect, you die. If you do not have anyone to buy your product, it’s as good as useless. Quite unfortunately,
If you don’t measure it, it won’t happen. If you don’t measure sales performance, it won’t happen. And if you don’t measure process, choosing to measure results instead, good luck! Measuring process is King, measuring results is vanity. Believe it or not there are institutions that don’t measure sales processes. They measure results. Even I
Salespeople take risks. Scratch that. Successful sales people take risks. Mediocre ones colour within the lines. And their (mediocre) results show it. If you are recruiting for a sales person, capacity to take risks should be high on your checklist. If you are recruiting compliance officers, then acting in accordance with set rules it is.
“But we’ve never heard of you, customers keep saying. We could sell more if only Marketing did their job.” Not an uncommon accusation from sales people. Today, I’d like us to look at some sales problems marketing gets blamed for-unfairly. In fact, some problems are simply objections that need handling. They don’t know about us
To what extent does the product service mix, or service product, mix affect your selling? You see, your product attracts your prospect, but your service retains your customer. A majority of products carry with them an element of service but in varied degrees. The hospitality industry, for instance, has a heavy dose of both. Take
Ask for sales referrals. Prospects don’t volunteer them unsolicited. A sales referral is perhaps the most powerful weapon in a sales person’s arsenal. A sales referral happens when an existing customer or prospect gives the name (that is, refers) of another potential buyer, to the sales person. This means that asking for referrals is a
Ask. Just ask for the sale. Ask for the meeting. Ask for the cheque. Even ask for the referral. Ask. Just ask. And be specific when asking. It is tragic that many sales fail simply because the sales person did not ask. He did not ask the right questions, or worse, did not ask for