In the competitive markets in which every business operates, mastering the art of sales is crucial. In fact, without sales, you have no business! So, whether you’re starting out fresh or trying to improve your sales performance, a little more thought in your strategies can make all the difference.
This article delves into 10 sales ideas designed to get your business selling and thriving.
1. Selling is a Service
Many people have a negative perspective of sales. They believe that selling is about being pushy or slick. If that’s how you do your selling, then you’re the kind of salesperson that people shy away from!
At its core, sales is an act of service. When you see yourself as helping your customers with their needs and products, everyone wins. Instead of pushing a product at people, think about how the customer’s problem or need will be met by your offering. This approach shifts energy from sales to service: it’s more sincere and gets the best results.
It follows that exceptional salespeople are customer centric. The customer is at the forefront of everything a great salesperson does. Exceptional salespeople serve their potential customers, meaning they provide the customer with options, features, and benefits and ask great questions to uncover their needs. They don’t stop selling because of a recession or economic downturn. Exceptional salespeople do not make assumptions about their customers, instead, they go deeper and ask great questions.
2. Selling is a Passion
The latest scientific research says that the electromagnetic field created by the human heart is 5000 times more powerful than the electromagnetic field created by the human brain. What that research is also saying is this people can actually feel that field a few feet away from you which is a profound point.
It means that your passion is contagious. If your heart is not wide open, if you really don’t care about your prospects and clients, if you really don’t believe in the product and services you are offering to the marketplace, no matter what you say to people, no matter what you vocalise, people are going to feel it at an invisible level. Who you are speaks far more loudly than anything you could ever say.
Therefore, sales is about connecting. It’s about presenting your authentic self to the world, which is what really connects us to our prospects and our customers and what really creates extraordinary success in sales.
3. Selling is a Mindset
In order to be a highly effective salesperson, you must also build a positive sales mindset that is driven toward building relationships with your customers and being committed to getting results.
The sales process can often be characterized as a ‘marathon’ that requires many touch points with a customer before selling something – as opposed to a ‘sprint’ where fast sales and cold calling dominate.
Research has found that a successful salesperson has to do at least 8 outreach attempts before a prospect will book a sales call. This can “feel” like a gruelling and often frustrating process, if you don’t maintain the right sales focus and mindset.
Having a sales mindset rooted in positive thinking is what ultimately drives salespeople to see opportunities for selling where others may not. In addition, the right mindset will also keep you agile, open-minded to change, and ready to pivot when things don’t go as planned.
4. Selling is a Process
A structured sales process means that everything is both consistent and efficient. From finding leads on to closing deals, every step should be clearly defined and followed. Not only does this assist in keeping track of progress; it also enables identification of weak spots.
A sales process is a set of repeatable steps that a salesperson takes to take a prospective buyer from the early stage of awareness to a closed sale. Typically, a sales process consists of 5-7 steps: prospecting, qualification call, presentation, handling objections, closing, etc.
While most sales teams are aware that they go through a similar process, not many of them decide to outline and standardise the process, leaving it all up to individual sales reps to decide what steps to take and when.
5. Selling is a Dialogue
It is in conversations with prospects that sales actually occur. The purpose of a sales conversation is to explore the client’s needs and determine the best solution for them. Good conversations require presence, questioning, listening, positioning and checking. This allows you to create a dialogue; understand client needs, priorities and perspective; and close profitable business.
This can’t be done from behind a keyboard. Many owners I see expect that they’re going to get a client from behind a keyboard. They’ll do some social content. They’ll send them an email. They’ll write a blog post.
No one will become a client of a service professional unless they’ve had at least one, and often two or three, conversations.
So, your goal has to be: “What’s the best, fastest way that I can get a conversation going with this prospect?”
6. Selling Requires Answers
It doesn’t matter what product or service you offer; your prospects will have 5 fundamental questions that they will want answered:
- Who are you? Can I trust you?
- Can your company help? (Remember that your company is an entity separate from you.)
- Do you have something to offer that can help me with a problem?
- How much is it? Is the value appropriate?
- When do I have to decide?
You need to make sure you answer them – in the order listed – as part of your sales process.
Dealing with the questions that are most important to potential buyers can greatly improve your sales results. Look ahead to some of their common queries and give detailed and forthright answers. Not only does this show your expertise, it also earns trust.
7. Selling Requires Action
You can’t afford to wait for the perfect plan, the perfect website, the perfect logo and the perfect pitch deck before you start. In sales, incomplete actions often yield better (results) than waiting for the right thing. This means making calls, sending off those e-mails, and linking up with potential buyers even though everything’s not completely laid out.
Perfection isn’t needed. A one-page website to legitimise your business, along with an email address connected to your business name, is all you need to get started. Then you need to go find people and start talking to them. No complicated plan is required.
8. Selling Requires Monitoring
Imagine your ship is in a battle, and you have no command centre giving visibility on whether or not your ship has been hit until 30 days later, nor visibility on whether enemies are behind or in front of you. What do you think will happen to your ship? You sink.
Pretty much sums it up, doesn’t it?
To be successful in sales, you need effective tracking of sales performance through your sales process. This will provide you with crucial insights that will make you more effective at selling, helping you save time and effort, earn revenue, and, more importantly, boost your sales career.
Implementing a sales monitoring system can seem like hard work. But the good news is, it doesn’t always have to be.
9. Salespeople Require a Balance of Ego and Empathy
Very good salespeople have both empathy and ego drive in balance. Empathy lets you connect with your prospects at a deeper level, while ego drive keeps you motivated to achieve your goals. Together, they make for an exceptionally effective combination in sales.
Empathy is the ability to identify with other people’s feelings and frustrations. It requires establishing rapport, good listening skills, and curiosity.
Bad salespeople think that it’s all about “what am I going to say next?” Good salespeople ask questions and then just listen.
Ego drive is about competitiveness. Salespeople with strong ego drive look for ways to measure themselves. They possess leadership qualities and are not afraid to exert pressure.
Ego drive without empathy leads to the stereotypical “salesperson as shark” behaviours, whereas empathy without ego drive leads to lacklustre results. You want to develop both.
10. Selling is Leadership
To do all of the things I have listed above and become a top-performing sales professional, you must be a great leader. It is a fundamental character trait. Leaders are people who empower others to do seemingly impossible things, whether individually or as part of a group. They help people see issues and opportunities they would not normally see themselves. Most importantly, they instill a level of confidence in people that makes them proactive in dealing with situations they otherwise would be hesitant to handle.
These leadership traits are essential for top-performing salespeople to exhibit on a daily basis. By demonstrating these qualities to your prospects and clients, you are communicating your value to them. They will see that you have their best interest in mind and are not out to just “make a sale.” You will create the confidence they need to desire to do business with you.
Conclusion
Becoming good at sales is something every business owner needs to do. Without sales, you have no business. Some owners try to get around this by trying to delegate or outsource their sales too early. As much as I tell my clients they need to delegate, I also advise them that sales is one of the last things to delegate. Instead, make a commitment to get good at sales. Your business will benefit from it. And you may even begin to like it.
I’ve helped many clients overcome their discomfort with sales, develop a system for selling, and increase their revenue dramatically. If you’d like some support to develop your sales skills or your sales team performance, you can book 15 minutes to talk about business coaching here at TimeWithShane.com.
