Sales Articles

Customer’s perception is your reality: the case of muguka vs miraa

“Ala! Na si ungesama?” (Why didn’t you say so?) I thought your distributorship only sold beer. You’ve never said you sell wines and spirits too. That’s why we bought from your competitor. We would have really preferred dealing with you as we know you for years. Anyway, now that we know, when the contract expires

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Sell effortlessly: navigate from bloody sales waters to blue oceans

What does the hawker that roams the residential area in the evening and the medrep that sells at night have in common? Stay with me to find out; and no, it’s not that they are night runners. For now though, are you selling in bloody waters? Could this be limiting your sales? If you are

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Why you and not the competition? To win address both in your pitch

“Why should I buy from you?” This is what potential customers are repeatedly asking themselves when they are listening to your pitch. When customers listen to a sales pitch, they are not just passively absorbing information. They are actively (silently) comparing, questioning, and evaluating. “Why you and not the competition?” Addressing these two concerns puts

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Boost sales through precise customer query responses. Here’s how

Salespeople should say just enough to close the sale. Equally, to boost the customer experience, those in service should respond to customer queries with just the information sought. This is so, especially when it’s a direct query that could be a potential sale. Such is what an effective response to customer enquiries entails. For instance,

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To close with confidence, repeat back the problem to the customer

It is not enough to think you’ve understood the customer’s problem. No. Repeat the problem back to him to confirm. Miscommunication costs, not just immediate, but future sales and, unfortunately, trust. “I want a kioo in my cars (lifts),” so the mzungu prospect told the lift selling company salesperson. They had a good laugh at

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Mr. Branch Manager, is your branch an operations or sales centre?

Dear Branch Manager, do you run your branch focused or costs and operations or sales and profit? Perhaps yours is a service centre focused purely on the former and that’s what’s required of you. And if that’s the case, that’s okay. Just know that, that’s the exception, not the norm. Still, don’t sit too pretty

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Avoid high pressure selling: Use this 10:80:10 doctor’s prescription

To avoid high pressure selling, salespeople should take a page from the playbook of doctors when it comes to engaging with customers. Think back to your last visit to a doctor. As a percentage of the duration you took, what would you give for how long he took to prescribe? Better still, split the engagement

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Use the power of reframing as a catalyst for your sales success

Just by changing the frame of a picture, you make it look different. Try it. Easier still, watch the same video on your phone, in landscape then portrait- it’s a completely different experience. And that’s what reframing is. In sales it means getting the customer to see the same thing in a different frame of

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