By Marc Weiner

Beginning in the early 1980s, organizations and well-renowned establishments such as the Harvard Business School, The Gallup Organization, the Chally Group, the Xerox Corporation, among others, began studying outstanding salespeople to identify the competencies – also referred to as the vital behaviors – that contribute to their extreme levels of success.

Two of the most surprising discoveries – and these are very important because it doesn’t matter what product or service you are selling – are as follows:

1. 39% of a customer’s buying decision is based on the salesperson’s competence.

2. Only 1% of salespeople utilize all the essential competencies. Furthermore, only 0.3% of actual sales forces and sales teams achieve what is considered to be world class status in the customers’ minds.

The vast majority of sales teams and companies will enjoy a tremendous competitive advantage – whether it’s a single sales person, a coach or a solopreneur, or a complete sales team – if they make even the slightest improvement in the required competencies.

Essential Sales Competencies

1. I use a partnering approach with my customers.

In all my years of working with people in sales training, every time I have asked the question, “Does anybody like to be sold to?” no one has ever raised their hand and said, “Yes, me.” No one likes to be sold to. Instead, you must become a partner with your prospective customer.

2. I am motivated by a compelling personal mission.

People are attracted to the passion we bring and the belief that we have in our products and our services. They may not understand every single process, but they can feel, touch, see and want the passion behind it. When they relate to you not only as a sales person, but a deliverer of those services, they become motivated by your compelling personal mission.

3. I use a listening/probing style with customers.

This is critical. If you’re not listening, you’re selling and you’re pushing. People want what you have, but only as it relates to them and if it can take them where they want to go. This can either be eliminating a source of pain, attaining a source of joy or achieving something of value to them.

4. I adapt my relationship style to various customers.

There are actually four quadrants in our behavior relationships. Each of us has pieces of all quadrants, but we always have a predominant quadrant. Some of us are analytical, some drivers, some amiable, and some are expressive. It is important to understand your behavior style, and to understand your potential customer’s style as well.

5. I build trust readily.

You’ve probably heard this before. We buy from people we know, like, and trust. Trust is especially important.

Think of a situation where you have purchased from, been involved with, or worked with someone you didn’t fully trust. It is not a comfortable relationship. Remember we started off by saying we use a partnering approach with our customers and my clients. Trust is a core component of partnering.

6. I express empathy well.

Empathy links to listening skills. In order to be empathetic, you must have the ability to understand what someone is going through. It doesn’t mean you judge them. It doesn’t mean that you necessarily agree or disagree with them. What it does mean is that you are listening and feeling their emotions to the best of your ability. It is the skill of viewing the world from their emotional perspective and unique set of circumstances.

7. I apply a higher level of thought and strategy in dealing with customers.

Do not simply shove something down somebody’s throat. Elevate yourself to a higher level in thought and strategy. This ties into operating with a partnership approach as well as listening and empathizing with your customers.

Your aim is to become not only a sales person, but a consultant, an advisor, a friend. Together you figure out how to work together, and determine the next step to positive action.

8. I hold myself personally accountable for achieving my customers’ desired results.

If you are simply selling a product and you really don’t care if it brings them their desired results, you will have less passion for what you are doing and you will not build trust with your customers. Hold yourself personally accountable to help that customer or client achieve what it is that they’re trying to achieve.

Evaluate these eight core competencies of top achievers and make sure you’re applying all of them in your own business to get the results you want and deserve.

Even incremental improvement in these core sales competencies will help you close more sales, build your business and improve your relationships with current and future customers and clients.

By John Yoder

I don’t know a thing about you, but I’ll bet that people find it tiresome and grueling to attend meetings that include not even the smallest amount of fun. Yes, business meetings should be formal and geared towards accomplishing the agenda but that does not mean it should not be fun, right? Why not include sale meeting entertainment sometimes just to maintain that enthusiasm of your employees and at the same time, energize them for another round of work?

Having sales meetings are vital for the development of your company. During these meetings, issues regarding marketing strategies and progress will be discussed and if problems arise, solutions will carefully be thought of. It is therefore very important that these meetings are well prepared and will serve their purpose.

There are different things that you can do to make sure that your sales meeting will be effective and will be beneficial to you, your staff, and the clients. How? First of all, sales meetings should be well planned. Having meetings with no specific agenda, or not giving guidelines to the people who are needed in the meeting will make things confusing. In fact, it may even make the meeting useless. Why? It is because you and your team won’t have a specific and concrete idea of what to accomplish.

During the meeting per se, you must encourage your people to talk. It’s not all about you, the head, or any speaker. Knowing what your team has to say about the strategies, tips they would want to share with others, or discussing any difficulties or problems encountered. In this way, you would be able to interact with them, and at the same time, discuss business related matters.

Lastly, do not fail to acknowledge the effort given by your team. Congratulate people who have achieved their marketing goals, appreciate their allotted time for the project, and thank them for working on deals. These positive reinforcements will serve as motivation to your sales team.

Now, aside from the tips given, another way to keep your meeting productive and fun is by including sale meeting entertainment. Sale meeting entertainment will make old style meetings exciting, memorable, and at the same time, effective. There are a lot of entertainment forms that you could choose from. For example, hiring a comedian to experience sale meeting entertainment to your employees is a good idea.

Variety acts like mentalists, jugglers, and magicians are also another option. Interactive events and game rentals add to the many ways of sale meeting entertainment. Sales meeting entertainment will not only bring in the fun to work, it would also help build team work and camaraderie between your employees. It is still best to work in an enjoyable environment where you could laugh with your teammates, right?

For 25 year, Funny Business Agency has been a top resource for companies and event planners looking for expertise in the corporate entertainment market. With over 3,000 entertainers and events nationwide, Funny Business has provided entertainment for such companies as Legos, General Foods, Kelloggs, Pfizer, Honda Transmissions, Frito Lay, Iams, Proctor & Gamble, Perrigo and more.

By Kate Tammemagi

Many sales professionals are very comfortable maintaining long term relationships and developing repeat business from existing clients. However, it is the goal of every company to retain existing business and to develop new clients and new sales. This involves identifying a pool of sales leads, and converting some of these leads to new business.

Key Points with Sales Leads

There are several key points when it comes to beginning work on developing your leads.

1. EVERY lead is precious, do not dismiss it easily.
2. Keep an open mind about every lead. Sales people make assumptions about the potential of each lead, whether this person is likely to buy or whether they will be interested in our products. Unfortunately, clients that prove to have a huge spend do not come with a label on their foreheads! Work every lead until you have firm evidence that this is NOT a prospect.
3. Think of yourself as competing with another very good Sales Person rather than an opposing Company. If this lead is a real prospect, they WILL buy from someone. Is it going to be you, or is in going to be the other guy who gets the sale?
4. Plan how you will work those leads effectively, develop a good personal management system.

Set Targets

Sales is a numbers game, the bigger the numbers the better the Sales Person! However, when it comes to managing leads, it is better to think in terms of conversion rates rather than flat numbers. The reason for this is simple. Take 2 sales people, one with 10 sales and one with 20 sales in a week. You might at first think that the second sales person with 20 sales is the better of the two. However, you then find that she contacted 100 people to generate those 20 sales, while the first sales person contacted 20 people to get their 10 sales.

The sales person with the 50% conversion rate is by far the better sales person. Indeed, the first sales person, with the 10% conversion rate may well be a liability. It would be much more productive to give her leads to your good sales person. This is the way to think about your own leads.

Plan how you will manage each batch of leads and set your targets in terms of conversion rates. Set a target of -

• How many leads you will convert to contacts
• How many contacts you will convert to clients

Managing your Sales Leads

To manage your leads effectively there is a useful model called the Sales Cycle. This gives us the stages from lead to advocate.

1. Leads
2. Contacts – we make contact with the decision maker, perhaps on a telephone call or casual meeting
3. First Contact Meeting – our first sales presentation meeting, where we build rapport, establish needs, present our offering and, hopefully, close a sale
4. Active Prospect – we have met, and the prospect may buy, but hasn’t made the decision yet
5. Client – the client buys from us
6. Advocate – the client is so pleased they recommend us to others

The idea is to work at each phase to improve our conversion rate and effectiveness at sales. The more leads we convert to contacts, the bigger the pool we have for the next phase. Work conversion rates for each phase of the cycle.

Improving your Conversion Rates

We improve our conversion rate at each phase of the Sales Cycle by using skills, recording and tracking systems, and good motivational techniques. Above all, every good sales person plans HOW they will improve each week and each month. As well as managing the normal weekly activities, they focus on an improvement area so that they are constantly increasing their potential.

For example, you could concentrate one week on improving the first phase of the Sales Cycle, generating more contacts from your leads. Isolate a time for making appointments. Prepare a list of contact names and telephone numbers, and anything else you will need to carry out an effective period of calling. Set a target of number of dials, or number of contacts or number of appointments made. Work out how you will motivate yourself to keep going till you achieve your target. After the batch of calls, review your performance, and use this review to plan your next session.

Spend the next week focusing on improving your recording and tracking system, with the target improving the conversion from your Active File to Clients. A good sales professional is always working at his or her role and is always working at improving.

We have had a theme going about Sales manager duties over the past month or so.

One of them “should” be to watch this video and take inspiration about a number of things including:

1. Any thing really is possible……………………………….yes even for you!

2. The power of connecting with an audience……………if you dont get emotional watching this there
really is no hope for you

3. Viral marketing and the use of video……………….now for some reason You tube wont let me embed the video player so you will need to click the link. At 9am UK time today this had received 18 million views in under a week.

4. Giving your market what they want……………Simon revels in mopments like this. He understands what audiences want do you know your audience that well.

Paste the link to watch Susan Boyle on Britains got talent inspire you!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY

To You and Your Teams Success

Denise and Sharon
PS. If you didn’t realise the people that watch this might include some of your market? do you know how to tap into their emotions and give them what they want?……………think about it.

One of my mastermind buddies just sent out his newsletter. There are some really interesting points I thought you might like! For any one in sales management or sales it provokes a re evaluation of what is actually important when it comes to being successful

Did you see the independent report on childhood this week? According to the panel, “excessive individualism” is to blame for many of the problems children face and needs to be replaced by a value system where people seek satisfaction more from helping others rather than pursuing private advantage.

This struck a chord with me. It is easy to slip into patterns of habitual behaviour that seem normal as everyone else is doing it. It was not long ago when the acceptable norm was for hospital doctors to work 56 hour shifts.

Today the kennel club are in a mess because what is acceptable in dog breeding has been challenged by the Panorama programme. Do you think it is acceptable behaviour for you to sleep with your daughter an official was asked? If not why is it for dogs? They have a point.

I would like you to consider two points.

Give and you shall receive – ‘….helping others rather than pursuing private advantage’. These statements are not actually exclusive. If you are generous in giving to others, it is human nature that usually you will receive in return. This is a great principle for business. If you add value to your customers in innovative ways you increase the likelihood of receiving more business in return. If you come from a position of what can I get; rather than what can I give; this is counterproductive and you will ultimately suffer the consequences. This is the same with children. Give generously of your time and you will be rewarded with ‘private advantage’ through a closer relationship. By helping others you can attain advantage.

It is worth always asking yourself ‘where can I add more value to others’?

Creativity not competition – The report said people are over competitive. We have been conditioned from early childhood to be so. However, it does not always result in an endearing character and can mean we are focused on what others are achieving rather than developing ourselves step by step to achieve more. Those companies who are really excelling, compete not by continuously using the competition as the benchmark but by looking to add greater value for the whole through creation. Take Apple IPOD who created a new market sector rather than price cutting in existing sectors. They got very creative. Nintendo Wii is another example.

In the words of ‘Wallace Wattle’ while writing about wealth creation ‘People must be taught to become rich by creation, not by competition. Every man who becomes rich by competition throws down behind him the ladder by which he rises, and keeps others down; but every man who gets rich by creation opens a way for thousands to follow him, and inspires them to do so.

How can you get creative?

Being creative and adding value for some sales people are new concepts for others the really successful ones maybe not?

Chris Cooper launches his new website in a matter of days you will find it here

Best Wishes

Denise

8 Steps To Creative Sales Management was part of a recent sales management seminar we ran.

The client was concerned that creativity was totally absent from his team so we ran a brief session. The top line chanks are below for some stimulation and suggestion.

With the increasing pressures in business and the need to perform at the top of your game. Creativity is probably the last thing on your mind. Am I correct.

Well fear not because with some basic easy to implement steps it is more than possible. The added benefit is it and will help boost your performance more than you ever imagined.

Being creative is an ability every one has. Yes even you. The fallacy over the years has been that only people in the arts and media are creative. Not so.

If you look at some of the best sales people ever it often boils down to their unique and creative way of presenting their product. This results in high volume sales they always seem to achieve.

Being the most creative sales manager in your division usually means you will have the best ideas to motivate and inspire your team to success.
The result of which is always an improvement in your sales line, through a combination of a motivated team inspired by a manager that is unique.

So let’s explore 8 steps to improve your creativity:

1. Nutrition

Think about what you eat and drink. Boring I know. A great time to start now post the festive season.The saying of having a clear head is actually true. The body is well over 80% water particularly the brain. That headache and mid afternoon lull is usually down to dehydration. Not wishing to sound like your mum here and, fruit and water will make a major difference to how you feel and process information.

2. Question Yourself

Ask yourself questions you want the answers to. This primes your subconscious mind to go out and find the answers.
Remember the last time you were wrestling with a problem and then suddenly the solution popped into your head. How often you wake up in the morning and the answer is there straight away.

Tell yourself the answer is on its ways. Not I am not creative!. Positive imprinting on the brain works. Don’t believe me though try it for yourself

3. Go for a Walk

When you feel yourself getting frustrated. Stop what you are doing and change your physical body position.If it is possible go for a walk. It is logical when you think about it. Physical movement helps you take in oxygen and increases blood flow to the brain.

4. Listen to Music

On a similar vein listen to music. Researchers in Germany studied in depth the relationship between music concentration and the ability to learn. We know it works. Music has a profound effect on mood. Worry anxiety and fear all block ideas. Music is one of the quickest ways to change how you are feeling and actually allow ideas to come through.

5. Define the challenge

Get a piece of paper, computer whatever. Then write out the challenge in question in real detail. Remember to throw some questions in to get the subconscious mind working on it.

6. Brainstorm

Great idea. Only if you do this without judgments though. Just throw all the ideas down on a flip chart or your business journal. Then group and analyse them later. Top tip do this when you are high energy and upbeat or it will be like pulling teeth.

7. Read

As much as you can whenever you can. About all sorts of different things. It really helps to stimulate the brain. If you put great ingredients into the brain that are varied and different. It can create results you never dreamed of. Instead of a run of the mill home page why not use one from the industry you are selling to? If its photocopiers for instance perhaps they have an online journal. Its amazing what you will take on board just by skim reading. It gives you a talking point with your customers and clients as well.

8. Meditation and relaxation

Now I am not going woo woo on you here. Even a well known business school beginning with H, recommends meditation for managers. We are such busy people juggling so many different things in our life. Both in and out of work. As a new sales manager on a steep learning curve probably more than most.
The brain need to have periods of relaxation so the best thoughts can bubble to the surface. Meditation gives it the space to actually do that.

Like anything nothing actually happens till you take action. Here are some simple steps to get you going.

Good luck!

Sharon