Are You Committing The Seven Deadly Sins of Selling?

 

Whether you are an established company or a startup, what you probably need most in this economic climate is a positive revenue stream. It’s possible with a higher-performing sales staff.

So you might wish to consider the latest strategies of a globally known sales trainer, Roy Chitwood, who is based in Seattle.

He says salespeople often commit seven crucial errors. Mr. Chitwood, of Max Sacks International, has the credentials to address the topic – more 250,000 salespeople at 3,000 companies in 18 countries have used his sales counsel.

He’s released a white paper, “The Seven Deadly Sins of Selling.”

Here’s an excerpt:

Sin No 1: Talking too much, listening too little. The typical salesperson walks into an office, gives the official two minute warm-up – asking about the fish on the wall or the family photo on the desk – then, like a high diver, leaps into a hot presentation about this feature and that feature, the options available, the price and the savings. There is no close. Most interviews are terminated by the prospect so they can get on with their life. Knowing what questions to ask and how to ask them is the only way to find out if you’re making a presentation to the person with the real need, the authority and the money.

Sin No 2: Selling the product, not the benefits. When someone buys a drill bit, it’s not the drill bit the customer wants, it’s the hole. People buy to fill a need or solve a problem. No one is willing to pay for a product or service they don’t need or does not perform. Yet salespeople sell as if they will. Presentations continually focus on the width, height, weight, power, speed, buttons, bulbs or whatever of the product/service. Whether they’re individuals or committees, people buy benefits, not features. Prospects have hidden buying motives. There are reasons why they select one brand over another, why one product/service seems to fill the need better.

Sin No 3: Never asking for the order. As a prominent study proved, more often than not, customers don’t have to worry about a pressured close, because in 62 percent of the cases, the salesperson never asks for a sale. For most salespeople, selling is an uncomfortable experience because they don’t know where to go in their presentations.

When prospects say “I would like to think it over,” “Your price is too high,” “I want to shop around,” what they’re really saying is, “You haven’t convinced me to buy.”

Sin No 4: Pushing for the close too often, the salesperson tries to “sell” rather than help the customer “buy.” When the salesperson is ready the trick closes begin. These old closes and gimmicks are outdated and backfire more often than they work. The prospect has fears, uncertainties and doubts about the decision to spend money, and when closed too soon, reacts negatively to being forced to makea decision. Pushing too hard means the salesperson is forcing the prospect to build a defensive wall that won’t come down easily. Following the sequence of a well- given presentation means asking for the order will be at the right time.

Sin No 5: Wasting selling time. Selling is a problem for most salespeople because they don’t know how to spend their time profitably. Selling is prospecting, cold calling and obtaining leads. It is traveling to meet strange people, having to send emails and proposals, make phone calls and hand out brochures. It is doing the paperwork and servicing the client. There is only one way to insure you get to the close, and that’s by having a logical sales procedure. This is why the salesperson should learn the buyer’s decision-making process.

Sin No. 6: Not identifying prospects from suspects. There are many people who will listen to a sales presentation. It may make them feel important or help them fill their time. Whatever the reason, it doesn’t help the salesperson get any nearer to the sale. In fact, it takes the salesperson further away from the sale because time has been wasted and the point-of-entry into a company has been mismanaged.

Presenting to people who are not qualified is just that – presenting. It is not selling. And a company or a salesperson can’t make a profit by just presenting. Probably the greatest misuse of a salesperson’s time is presenting to someone who doesn’t have the need, the authority or the money.

Sin No. 7: Making a sale, not a customer. A professional salesperson is someone who helps a prospect satisfy a need. And most importantly, your company can count on the loyalty of a new client – one that will return with repeat and increasing orders. For many salespeople, just getting the sale is the only objective. To accomplish this end, they use whatever means are available – assumptive closes, high pressure tactics, promises of extra incentives, threats of price increases or whatever other tricks are in the bag. Salespeople like this sometimes walk out with a sale, but they don’t sign on customers. In fact, the customers may be so resentful of the pressure and tricks, they may rethink their commitments.

Mr. Chitwood’s Web site: www.maxsacks.com.

From the Coach’s Corner, a study confirms the importance of maintaining your Web site for higher holiday sales. A research firm, Nielsen Online, identified the top five reasons why customers visit a retailer’s Web site before visiting its store.

The reasons include:

• Wanted to compare prices between different retailers whose stores I might shop – 33 percent
• Wanted to see if the product I was looking for was in stock – 28 percent
• Wanted to find sales in the store – 26 percent
• Wanted to come up with holiday gift ideas before I went shopping – 22 percent
• I ordered online for in-store pickup – 12 percent

How to Get a Strong Return on Your Sales Investment

 

A sales manager for a large media company once asked me for my suggested reading on sales improvement. (I’ll answer the question later in this column.) The executive’s question underscored a lot of what I’ve been reading lately – there’s a sales talent war in this country. Companies simply cannot get enough good salespeople.

Not to oversimplify, but here are three basic solutions to the problem. You must take good care of your quality people. You need to help the good salespeople to find you and to recruit the best people. And, you should groom your employees on sales and relationship selling.  

Don’t settle. Countless articles can easily be found on how to take good care of your good employees and on recruitment.

Actually, many companies make the mistake of settling for mediocre salespersons when they hire. A published report recently stated that only 40 percent of applicants send a thank you note immediately following an interview. The logical solution here: Recruit people with an attitude of gratitude and attitude of service. Applicants will either give you a red warning flag or a green light to hire them.

Naturally, it’s easier to make money if your newly hired salespeople develop ongoing relationships with customers and clients.

So, do your salespeople ask the right questions? Do they keep detailed records? Do they approach the right people?

Moreover, are you asking the right questions about your business?

Naturally, every industry has unique circumstances, but here are 45 generic but salient questions to ask in evaluating your sales program:

1. What is your vision for your organization?
2. Where do you want to be this year?
3. Where do you want to be in 5 years?
4. Where do you want to be in 10 years?
5. What emergencies are coming up?
6. What are your five strongest strengths or selling points?
7. What are your weaknesses?
8. What are your competitive advantages?
9. What are your competitive disadvantages?
10. Who are your major competitors?
11. What are their strengths?
12. What are their weaknesses?
13. How do you pay your salespeople? What benefits do you offer?
14. What are your major brands?
15. What are your best sources of co-op funds?
16. Have you performed market-mapping or an analysis of demographic segmentation in terms of households, desired income levels, gender, and age?
17. Are you satisfied with your average customer profile? Why? Why not?
18. What would you like to improve?
19. What is your CSI or level of customer satisfaction?
20. What products do you sell?
21. At what price? Margin? Markup? What is your derived demand?
22. How much do you want to sell?
23. How many have you sold?
24. What are your peak sales months? Peak sales days? Peak sales hours?
25. What are your immediate sales objectives?
26. What are your long-range objectives?
27. What about your marketing plan? In order of importance, what are your most important marketing events of the year? What’s on your marketing calendar?
28. What does the cost-benefit-analysis of your marketing show?
29. What are your green/environmental goals?
30. What are your annual gross sales?
31. Competitive benchmarking – how does your budget and results compare with your industry median per capita?
32. Internet sales vs. bricks and mortar?
33. What drives unique-visitor traffic to your site? Conversion rate from visitor to customer?
34. What drives in-person visits?
35. Which strategies work? How do you quantitatively evaluate your expenses and where your dollars go?
36. How do you stay in touch with your customers?
37. What is your Mission Statement?
38. What is your branding message? Is it consistent?
39. What are your centers of influence and sources of forward integration?
40. What are your synergistic opportunities?
41. How do you view business conditions?
42. Are you following what state lawmakers are doing to help or hinder the business climate? What are you doing about it?
43. What do you view as the most important civic/societal problems?
44. What are your preferred civic solutions? Are you helping the community?
45. What are your non-business interests or hobbies? Hint: Are you getting enough R&R?

If you get the right answers to these basic questions, you’ve laid the groundwork for a great ROI on your sales program. As they say in Hollywood: “Break a leg.”

From the Coach’s Corner, there are a lot of good books on selling. What was my suggestion to the sales manager on what to read?

Read anything written by the Harvey MacKay, who inspired the checklist of questions. I ask similarly worded questions of new clients.

He’s written five bestsellers, he’s a syndicated columnist, and is popular on the speaking circuit. 

See: www.harveymackay.com.