Universal Principles For Selling Professionals
Interrupt,
you are deaf to needs.
Lecture,
you act the bully.
Wise crack,
you are considered flippant and dismissive.
Sloppily dressed,
you wear incompetence.
Poor diction, language and grammar
You appear uneducated.
Sellers experience fatigue.
Slipping just one aspect
the deal faces undue risk.
The Master Seller is disciplined
Professional in their art.
We show features during demonstrations,
but it is the benefits
that generate emotion.
We craft the demonstration
per the prospect’s request,
but it is not spoken needs
that differentiates your product.
We hammer professionalism and competence,
but it is the human connection
that builds trust
We work with seen
but non-seen is what we use.
Often times the buyer has a fuzzy idea about what they want. They will request you to demonstrate your product or service according to that ambiguous list. The Master Seller should know the buyer better than themselves. Understanding their world, they know the buyers desires and cleverly share benefits that differentiates from the competition. Often times, buyers don’t know what they want. But if you can show, that not only meet, but exceed their expectations, the deal is yours. You start with the seen, but it’s the unseen you use.
Interested
But not interrogating
Patient
Yet not wasting their time
Focused
Yet listening to what’s not being said
Optimizing
To discover a match
Respectful
Cutting to the quick.
As conceptual selling becomes more accepted, when cold calling, sales professionals commonly start by saying: “I’d like to learn a little bit about you and your business”. Although this is a step in the right direction, as a prospect it at times feels like an interrogation. Open ended questions about “my business”, that could have been easily found on the website, seem disingenuous. What the seller’s looking for is an opening to uncover some issue that they can help. It’s best to be straight with the buyer, saying exactly who you are, what you do and how you help clients. Then asking the prospect “is this an issue you’re struggling with too?” to see if they fit in that category. This optimizes the entire process and treats the buyer’s time with respect.
Respect your prospects time, remain patient yet get to the qualification question quickly, practice before calling, cut to the quick.
S
peak to the end
Beginning is an assumption.
Without a destination in mind
The journey is hard to fathom.
With map and compass
A path can be plotted,
But only if you know where you’re going.
Far too often we are thrilled to start projects with only a vague sense of how it is to be completed. Without an end goal in mind, intermediate steps cannot be formulated and soon the project becomes one in a number of “good business ideas” placed on the rubbish heap. Visualize the end, articulate it, share it with others and enroll them on your quest. The end is a very powerful tool for the Master Seller. Use it wisely.
There are many tasks in sales and some you naturally attract you; organizing your desk, preparing your script, going on cold calls, tidying your contact data or schedule . These things are all well and good UNLESS you’re doing them to avoid real work. Ask yourself “What do you dread doing?” Ask yourself , what are the things you find hard to do and then consider that maybe, just maybe that’s where you’re failure lives?
Take a moment and look inward. Do you have any suppressed self-destructive traits or childhood hang-ups that are roadblocks to promoting your dream? Are you putting yourself out of business? Today, focus on one thing you avoid. Put it on the top of your to do list. Do it right now!
See the world as it is
Focus on the hard
until the hard becomes easy.
Nothing in the world
is as weak as water.
Yet for dissolving granite mountains
nothing can surpass it.
The soft overcomes the hard;
the easy overcomes the difficult.
Everyone knows this is true,
but few can put it into practice.
Therefore the Master Seller
Remains cool under fire.
Prepared they are ready for all objections.
Because they have stopped avoiding work
their work gets done.
See the world as it is
Focus on the hard
until the hard becomes easy.
If the buyer is difficult,
don’t cast away the opportunity.
Awaken them with your demonstration,
Elevate them with your clarity.
Repay their rudeness with patience.
Don’t lose the opportunity,
Gain their trust.
Fill your presentation to the brim and it will spill.
Keep sharpening your pitch and it will blunt
Chase after money and the deal will spoil
Care about people’s approval and you will be their prisoner.
Do your work, then step back and it will all work out.
The Tao Te Ching of Sales 