Did You Ask Them To Buy?

I remember my first sales job out of college. My employer provided me with excellent product training and methods for managing my territory. I was prepared to become the best sales representative the universe had ever seen! On several of my initial sales calls, I was accompanied by a senior salesman who was very successful. After about ninety days of selling, however, I was very disappointed by my performance. My numbers were flat and I was working all day! I spent weekends planning my sales calls. I was motivated and very focused on making my numbers.

I remember discussing this situation with my manager and he said to my surprise, remain patient, a few categories “of your numbers were rising”.  This didn’t satisfy me.  About a week after this conversation, I visited the home of the most experienced sales representative in the district. He patiently listened to me as I discussed my sales activities, number of calls per day, who I spoke to, what I said, why I said it, on and on!!! He sat there for about thirty minutes and then he said the magic words that changed my sales career, “Did you ask them to buy your product?” I was speechless! I sat there completely silent. I remember this salesman saying,  “if I worked as hard as you, I would double my income! We had a big laugh!

My initial sales training was product oriented. Don’t get me wrong, product knowledge is critical. I knew almost everything about my products and competitive products. I could pitch with the best of them and I worked like a sled dog!  I forgot the most important thing, Asking For The Business, Closing! After I remembered this my numbers increased within thirty days.

Closing Is A Continuous Process

I’ve come to realize that asking for the business is not one final act but begins with the initial contact with a prospect. I urge my sales teams to begin asking for the business in specific ways throughout the sales process. Remember, asking for a prospect’s business is not some mystical final and grand act. It is a continuous part of the sales process.

Your success in making the sales depends on the many things you’ve done throughout the process. Sales has established trust, verified needs, presented a viable solution, and justified the cost. Asking for the business is a natural part of the process. You are influencing the prospect to purchase from you. You are uniting all the elements of your sales process to demonstrate to the prospect that by purchasing your solution, their requirements will be completely addressed.

Buying decisions are rarely made just based on presented proof or a single rational reason. Most often a decision to purchase is a combination of emotion and rational factors. But be assured, most buyers do carefully weigh many factors before finalizing their decision. Be attentive during every interaction with your prospect. Learn to recognize buying signals. When you have discussions with your prospect about how your product can be used in their environment, take mental notes! Use these conversations to get even the tiniest commitment to move forward and purchase.

Don’t Relax!

At the end of a sales process it is common for last minute questions and outright objections to arise. Questions about pricing, configurations, training, support, etc are common. If getting the business requires additional resources, find the resources! If you need the technical support team to have a conversation with their technical organization, arrange it! If finance needs to be involved, don’t wait! Quickly neutralize any negative issues by asking for the support you need. I have taken sales from competitors who were confident they had won the day and relaxed. Actually, I urge you to continue a supportive sales process even after the contract is signed. Never disappear even after there has been a hand-off to the implementation team. Is it over when you are implementing the solution? NO! Keep reading…

We need to retain our best talent, and whilst financial reward is often important for sales professionals, it is not the only thing that is going to motivate them. If their reward is down because of commercial realities then we need to be more creative – or perhaps simply do the right thing. Here are my ‘top tips’ for this:

1. When times are good it is easy to focus on the numbers. But when times are tough its an opportunity to pay close attention to individual performance: the skills, behaviours and beliefs sales professionals use to get their results. This is something they can control, and if we can work with them to help them make improvements (perhaps better questioning skills, more effective presentations, etc) and develop a set of appropriate performance goals, then we can increase their motivation.
2. Obvious, but often overlooked when sales are coming in easily. If we can build more trust with our sales people it will help develop loyalty and an openness that will lead to improved performance. One easy way to start this process (as long as you really do have the genuine intent) is to share your own thoughts and feelings about the changes in the market and what you feel is important. Disclosure and sharing encourages the same in others. If you build trust you can surface concerns that you might be able to address together.
3. Ask them what motivates them: money will not be the only thing. Do they enjoy the football, a good meal out, have a particular hobby? Knowing this enables you to create smaller rewards that may not have a high financial value but do show that you understand them and appreciate them. Giving these rewards based on some well considered performance-based goals is likely to increase motivation.
4. Understand their beliefs: beliefs really are at the heart of our performance. In tough times we should find out what our sales people believe about the potential to sell, the competition, the need to reduce prices, etc. If they have limiting beliefs (eg. ‘we must give a discount to get the business’) then these WILL hinder performance. With limiting beliefs we need to encourage them to question the belief and make them aware of the consequences of holding it. We can then help them explore evidence to the contrary.

In tough times, as with sales success generally, it all comes down to focusing on the right things!  Do you have any of your own top tips to add to this?

Read the quote a couple of times… gets you thinking doesn’t it?  Of course Bandler (of NLP fame) did many remarkable things in his career often borne from innate curiosity.

But think about your own career in sales.  How often do we spend time really focusing on new ideas and new opportunities?  Often we just stick to what is (or is not!) working. Tom and I wrote our book ‘Brilliant Selling’ on the back of brainstorming in this precise area – things that we could do but had never considered.  So here are a few questions to get you thinking about things you may never have considered doing:

• What clients would you really like to work with?

• Which clients are more trouble that they’re worth? What’s stopping you firing them?
• What would it mean if you put your prices up by 35%?
• What markets would love your products/services even if you have no experience in the sectors?
• If you focused on just one skill to improve that would make the biggest difference, what would it be?
• What would be the implications to you and your business if you doubled your turnover in 3 years?

So now over to you – when was the last time you created an opportunity by changing your thinking?

I couldn’t agree more.  But whilst I absolutely believe that anyone can learn the skills to be brilliant at selling, the true gain is in having both the awareness of your strengths and weaknesses and the flexibility to do something about it.

In my training experience there are many different types of sales person and all can be successful by finding the buyers that relate best to their way of selling.  If you are aware of the strengths and weaknesses of your selling style and can add to this flexibility, then you can adapt to appeal to a wider variety of buyers and this can often make up for a specific skills limitation.

There are a couple of things I know I have as ‘weaknesses’ and these include a couple of sales skills.  I can work at improving them and probably will make some headway, but I can improve more if I focus on some existing strengths and look for opportunities to make more of them.  If I can at least use behaviours that will lead to success I don’t have to have them as a skill to be effective.

So whilst having passion and skill is ideal, I would take passion, awareness and flexibility every time.  Would you?

But in the target-driven domain of sales, can this be true? Surely sales is the lifeblood of a business - and for the business to grow isn’t there a definite and undeniable need to focus on targets?

Well, at one level it is true that a business needs to plan, and goals in sales are a key facet of this. But if we look further at sales leaders and their approach we often find that a sales manager has been promoted because they are a very good sales person. And as they are achievers it is often this sales ability that directs how they manage others.

But ‘doing’ something is very different from helping others to ‘learn’ how to do it. This is especially true in sales where the role of beliefs and attitudes in the selling function has a huge impact on individual performance. In the same way that if the only tool you have is a hammer then every problem you approach will be a nail, if you have achieved sales success through an active ‘doing’ approach then it is very different to have to manage and lead others to achieve results. It is, of course, easier to tell and instruct (through targets) rather than to help someone learn for themselves.

Perhaps the biggest lesson to sales leaders from the research is this: you cannot get away from sales and performance targets in sales – there need to be measures of success and achievement. But once you have these targets in place, the clever sales leader focuses on engagement of their people. You do this by coaching them, understanding their motivations, beliefs and challenges and then by helping them to learn rather than simply trying to direct them.

And an engaged and motivated team will of course be more likely to meet their targets!

 When was the last time you sacked one of your customers?  Recently?  A long time ago?  Never?  Go on – give it a go, it’ll be the making of you!

I was worked with a colleague in a training company who insisted that the one course he wished he could run was ‘how to be a customer’.  He had got increasingly fed up with the missed deadlines, delayed responses, poor feedback and downright bad manners.  And I know how he feels.

Yes of course we all need customers.  We all know that.  And there are some gems.  But sometimes you need to be strong and get rid of some.  Too many organisations, big and small,l pay too much attention to customers who are more hassle that they are worth.  If they are not worth it, sack them.

OK, so we are not in the habit of sacking too many of our own customers.  But I have done it twice before.  Both for different reasons – but it boiled down to the fact that they were much more hassle that they were worth.  I sent a letter to each explaining the reasons and I have to say it gave me some satisfaction and allowed me to focus on people who appreciated what we deliver.  They never troubled me again!

So – have a look at your customer base.  Are there customers you can sack?  Are they more trouble than they’re worth?  Then do the decent thing….

We thought the survey findings made interesting reading - we have identified 3 core areas which make the difference between a salesperson and a brilliant salesperson.

• The first key area is around beliefs – brilliant salespeople hold very positive beliefs about themselves, they believe in their product or service, and they believe they have very positive relationships with their customers.  Interestingly, 91% believed that they and the customer have an equal footing in the commercial relationship, rather than seeing the customer as holding the power and the leverage.  And 64% believed that attitude in selling was more important than skill – hence anyone can be a brilliant salesperson if they can achieve the right attitude and beliefs.

• The second key area is trust – brilliant salespeople have told us that trust has 3 elements – competency (ie. ability or skill), integrity (honest, sound, moral) and benevolence (trying to do good).

• The final key area is effect – the consequences of our actions.  We cannot control everything in a sales situation (such as the economic situation, financial restrictions placed on the buyer, or past history with your business) but we can control the effect we produce in two areas: the relationships we build, and how we are perceived by decision-makers. In building relationships, 92% of our respondees try to educate the customer and add real value.  Questioning is seen as a key skill, and objections are not ‘handled’ but rather seen as an opportunity to seek further understanding of requirements and motivation.In the sales situation, 70% of our respondents follow a distinctive and recognised sales process.  They know the value of preparation – of client research, case studies, questions, agenda and objectives, and of visualising a successful outcome.  68% undertake a reflective exercise, and debrief, either through making notes, sending a summary of key actions, or planning the next steps.

Do you agree with our findings, or do you have another view?  We would love to hear you comments!

If you would like to receive an Executive Summary and find out more about our survey results, please email sue@brilliant-selling.com

The current climate

The current climate is tough. We need to be careful about how we utilise our time so that we make maximum benefit from it. Even in an economy that has shrunk by 3% it is still 97% of what it was! Now more than ever a salesperson needs to work smart and examine what the impact is on their business of acquiring and managing each of their clients. Accountants have a good term for it: opportunity cost - what is the cost of this activity in terms of what I cannot do because I am putting my resource here? Often, 80% of the business comes from 20% of the clients.

A salesperson is often targeted on both revenue and margin so the profitability of a client is an important factor. Our time is a factor that impacts profitability (as a resource, if we are spending time managing one client then we cannot be seeking new clients or more business from existing clients at the same time). Other factors that impact profitability include time taken to pay, other company resources (maybe technical support for example) that are taken up by clients and so on.

Now more than ever we ned to treat our sales work as if it were our own business, our own money and that means taking some tough decisions. Our time has significant value and we need to remember that.

Benefits of managing some customers out of your portfolio

 From personal experience of past clients that I have chosen to ‘let go of’ here are a few of the benefits as I see them:

1) I can make more profit from less revenue. Take, for example, a large corporate client I won a while back. Their company was huge but their spend was average. Sadly, their processes meant that they took, on average, 120 days to pay. Because margins were tight this meant that I was almost losing business by dealing with them and they took the same time as any other customer to manage! Sometimes, losing a customer enables you to be more profitable and release time to acquire new, more appropriate customers to meet your long-term objectives!

2) Just like personal relationships, some are high maintenance! Objectively considering the amount of management time that a client takes compared to others for the return that you get can be very revealing. All clients are important. All should expect and receive excellent service but at all costs? If we analyse the time we spend and the return (both current and potential business) it may show that some clients are simply drawing too much resource for the income - we are a business after all! At the very least, an objective evaluation of the relationship ‘cost’ might help you consider your approach. Relationships can develop based on unconscious expectations and we are often not aware of the cost.

3) We can be more positive and proactive. Silly as this might sound, some of my most resource intensive customers in the past have also negatively impacted how I have felt as a salesperson. I could begin to dread a particular customer ringing me up knowing there would be some other ‘minor’ problem that I would need to spend time resolving. Being proactive about managing these situations enables you to feel more positive and in control and this WILL impact your sales results. In my experience, you can spend a lot of time trying to ‘educate’ and ‘change’ your most challenging customers and that might just be time that could be better spent elsewhere.

4) You can grow your business. One company I worked for years ago had a strategy of letting go of its bottom 10%  performing clients each year. This gave salespeople a focus on seeking out higher revenue/margin clients and on moving existing clients up in terms of revenue contribution.

Now, you may not agree with all of these but they do offer food for thought.

What should you do now?

Well, at the very least, it would be worth considering your customers from the perspective of the cost / income equation. Taking some time to objectively evaluate your customers is one of those important but never urgent tasks. Think about how much time you spend on some of your clients and how you would spend this time differently if you had the choice.

I would be interested in hearing your views on a potentially controversial topic…

Price negotiation is something that most sales people need to manage and yet a lot of us have not been trained in some of the basic techniques and approaches. I learnt a technique - more a way of thinking really - that has helped me over the years and a lot of other sales people. It is especially important in these tough economic times to maintain good margin and so I thought you might be interested…

It’s amazing how a small adjustment in how we think of something can completely change our approach - quickly and easily. Often before agreeing to buy something the prospective client will ask for a deal on the price. They will have lots of ‘reasons’ why their request is legitimate and some of these may well be real. As a salesperson you need to make a judgement about the reasons and make a decision. Of course most ’sales training’ programmes would say that if you have done a good job of building the value you should not have to negotiate on price but, in reality, things are not always that simple.

Think about how you respond when the prospect asks for a discount? Be honest with yourself. Do you think ‘Yes, I can get this deal if I give a little’? A lot of sales people a) are too happy to give discounts and b) seem happy to negotiate on price in isolation.

The key concept to learn here is to trade concessions rather than give them away.

The analogy that really helped me understand and use this was to consider a negotiation as being similar to a box packed with different things that all just fit inside (if packed correctly). So, imagine a cardboard box. This is your ‘deal’ and inside it are all of the different components or parts of the deal. They have been packed in the box in such a way as they all just fit snugly inside - no spare room is available. What else might be inside the box - the different components of the deal? Price will be one thing. Depending on what you sell it might also include delivery timescales, resources (such as the people who deliver your service), payment terms, commitment to future orders, volume etc.

Now, imagine that the prospective customer wants to negotiate the price - they want a reduction (you don’t need to use this technique if they want to pay more for your product or service!). If this is the case, using our analogy of the box, they will want to take the price component out of the box, change it (by reducing it) and then put it back in the box leaving everything else unchanged. The problem with this is that the other components will rattle around because the size of the price bit has been changed.

This analogy can really help our approach to negotiating. If a prospect wants to negotiate the price and if I am happy in principle to do this then my approach would be to say that we can negoiate but that this needs to be done considering all aspects of the deal. I would want to unpack the box so that if we make a change to something we can ensure that everything else fits back in nice and snug. I wouldn’t mention the analogy to the prospect but it definately helps me say things in response to a price negotiation request such as:

“I am happy to negotiate the price but would need to consider all other apsects of the deal as well”

“If we reduce the price can we decrease the payment terms from 30 days to 14 days?”

“I would be prepared to consider the price if you can commit to a volume of x to be ordered over the next six months.”

So, whenever you are asked to negotiate on price, rememebr to think about it in terms of a box where price is only one ‘component’. Look to trade a concession on price by you with something that they will give in return that is in your favour. Remember, something that has a low ‘cost’ to you might have a high ‘value’ to the prospect and something that has a high value to you might have a low cost to the prospect. Always think in terms of costs and values to both sides so that you don’t undervalue the things you negotiate!

What are your favourite negotiation tips or techniques? Let us know and we will publish the best ones…