Alliance Science

How to Internalize Sales Training

The stakes are huge for Salespeople.

• Blow a sale and feel bad for a day; do it 30% more often than your colleague and lose your bonus, promotion or job
• Convert 10% of your leads and waste 90% of your valuable, irreplaceable time; work with better qualified prospects and convert 20% of your leads and double your income
• Trade a 2 to 6 hours a week to set 3 to 4 prospect appointments a week; properly leverage each appointment into 2 to 3 more powerful appointments with ideal prospects without spending 4 to 18 hours more of your time and double to triple your income

Your competition is mediocrity.

Most professionals in careers outside of Sales are expected to develop themselves through reading and extracurricular training.  In general, sales is the least educated profession as it pertains to best practices and ongoing professional development.  "Sales Training" often starts and stops at company delivered technical product training and the tricks of the trade with perhaps some company-built sales process.  Most sales people spend more money on clothes and cars than on their most important asset -- their selves, as in self-development.

Engage in long-term, at least weekly, on-going, community supported sales training.

How to learn in Sales Training:

1. Before you start, decide that you are going to change.   After each lesson, decide what you are going to do differently and implement the change during the work week. 
2. Take copious notes during instruction.  Read.  Journal.
3. Teach others what you learn.  Share with others what you read.  Tell the world what you are going to do after each lesson, then report back to your peers what you've done.

How are you going to give it away?  It's in passing it forward (it's not "giving back" -- did you "take it" from someone else?) that you truly learn.  What are you learning today?

What do you Mean, You're NOT Going to Tell me What you Do, First?

This week I struggled at Wimp Junction

You know, the place where you're asked to tell the prospect what you do or how you can help them before you know what they need and, most importantly, helped them discover what they want. 

Frankly, I was dealing with prospects who were not qualified for other reasons than not having enough motivating trouble.  In one instance, the prospect wasn't going to spend money he didn't have and in the instance I was dealing with someone who wasn't the decision maker she pretended to be.  Their demands that they must first understand what I do before I understand what they do and do not do were stifling, smothering smokescreens. 

In the first case, the prospect was justifying that his current plan of struggle and hard work was the right one and that there was "no magic bullet" that could dramatically improve his business.  He'd been "burned before" as he had paid a large amount of money for sales training that he then decided he wasn't going to learn after a month or so of a 3-month program.  In the second case, the prospect was quickly trying to figure out how to "sell" me to the real decision-makers as it made little personal impact on her income and only risked her credibility, even though she was "going to make the decision."

What I struggled with was a polite and nurturing way to communicate to increasingly frustrated prospects that they were wasting my time and theirs. 

So what I did was to give them a little of what they wanted. 

And that's where I wimped out.  I presented before they were qualified. 

Until the prospect is clear on what he wants and why he wants it and is committed to changing his current situation and has agreed on trading the necessary money, time and resources to making the change, you don't know if he's ready to buy.

So, what's the matter with telling your prospect what you can do for them, first?

How can you accurately solve your prospect's problems if he hasn't clearly agreed on what they are and sold you on his commitment to change them.  Why present a solution until you have a clear agreement on his decision making process?  Who else will need to agree and what are their motivations and how will change affect or not effect them? 

You've got one shot to keep their attention at every moment.  Most people don't know what they need and why they want it.  They're conditioned by not-so-great salespeople to listen to features and benefits and secretly and singly decide if it's a match to what they think they want.  This often results in a lot of WASTED time and resources spent by the salesperson.

Other than keeping you busy, what's your cost of spending time with an unqualified prospect?

How do you work with only qualified prospects and, when you do, what's your success rate with the fewer prospects to whom you do show your goodies?

Four More Different Words

Create Powerful Client Networks

Sage Seth Godin says you or your company "have the opportunity to create value by connecting their clients to each other."  This idea is the most powerful underpinning of Word of Mouth (WOM) marketing.  In fact, in addition to value for your clients, you have the chance to create a sales phenomenon if you're excellent.

Your entire business to include product and service design AND marketing plan should be built with this directive in mind.  In fact, your customer service system should be be embedded with this philosophy.

Word-of-Mouth marketing and Social Media consultant Jeremy Epstein cements the point:

Create an environment (aka a platform) where folks can learn from each other and your position as Social Object is strengthened, which is exactly what you want.

Sales professionals (and/or their marketing colleagues) who believe referrals are the lifeblood of their business need to become Social Objects.  Yes, what you learned in high school is right -- it's a popularity contest and it's cool to be different.

Photo credit:  Gaping Void -- More thoughts on Social Objects

So how do you become a Social Object?

Besides the now obvious combination of traditional and Web 2.0 (there, I said it) vehicles such as write a book, write articles, hold a seminar, blog, exploit LinkedIn and Facebook, how can you create value for with your prospects or customers?

• Create a monthly or weekly public event featuring a different client each time. 
• Celebrate a personal victory or achievement for your client to which their friends, family members and clients are invited
• Hold a case study review of your top clients inviting their clients to participate
• Throw a surprise party for your client (How do you do that? Stay tuned)

So, please comment, how do you turn your client into a Social Object?

Four Different Words

Unique service; deliver differently.

I go to Starbucks because I'm part of a large demographic who feels rich when they spend a relatively small amount of money on a lifestyle luxury to receive a consistently stronger cup of coffee in an easy to find meeting place.  I keep coming back because they manned-up and replaced my prescription eye-wear when it was accidentally misplaced by one of the store's management a few years ago.

People talk about you when they are surprisingly delighted.  Do more than your customer expects and they will talk about you.

Solve a problem or fulfill a desire better than the rest of the marketplace.

Find out what customers expect and then come to agreement and publicize what they can expect.

Tell a story people enjoy believing and then make it necessary for them to be a part of it.

Oh, So that's what You should do After the Networking Event

How do you follow-up after a networking event?

I'm guilty.  More times than not, most cards I pick up at a networking event get stale.  I follow-up selectively, but this isn't necessarily my intention.   I currently don't have an adequate system, which for me, before I switched to a Mac, was to use a Windows-driven card reader and follow-up with promises I had made during the event.

Connector Jeremy Epstein posts a great approach and system to following-up to a networking event using social media tools.  In short, he immediately sends an email referencing something said or promised and then invites his new acquaintance to be his friend.  He takes an immediate first step to build a relationship. 

It's about Intimate Relationships.

Interviewer Ron Sukenick goes Beyond Networking to discuss in regular podcasts what to do after the networking event.  In an interview with Linked-in expert, Jason Alba, Jason states that LinkedIn is currently the most relevant social networking site for business people and shares some of the common mistakes made by new users and how to use LinkedIn's built-in polling and recommendation features. 

Jason points out that as LinkedIn is an outstanding tool, it's only a tool, and "what you really want is the relationships."

So, this is the beginning of the answer to the question, "How does one use social networking to enhance sales?"  How do you use social networking tools after the networking event?

Cartoon Credit:  weblogcartoons.com

Which is More Important, Promotion or Belief?

Your biggest competitor isn't other companies.

Seth Godin makes the great observation that promotion misses the bullseye without personal belief and pride in the service or product.

80% of the mail and promotion I get (and 98% of the ads) fall into this category. The enthusiasm of commerce, not of belief and pride.

The Oxford American Dictionary defines promotion as, "activity that supports or provides active encouragement for the furtherance of a cause, venture or aim."

Have you ever said, "I can sell anything if I believe in it?"  Technique and activity are equally important but sterile without passionate conviction. 

• Do you believe that every one or every company and their decision makers who meet your target profile would be better with your product or service?
• Is everyone a prospect until they convince you through proper needs-matching that they aren't?
• Are you the best of breed, have great customer delivery and a product or service that is designed to deliver beyond expectations?

If you lack faith in your selling abilities or your company's services or products, what do you to bring forth the conviction which delivers the sale?

Need a prayer?  Discover The 10 Big Breakthroughs in a Salesperson's Life and learn what I know -- Automatic Appointments is the best to double your sales activities with ideal prospects. 

Photo credit:  JDillon