I had a desire to wait to make this post, which is my 5,000nth on this board, for a topic that could be meaningful, have a voracious follow-up and hopefully be filled with enough informative content, that it will be looked at as an entire reference guide from all of the well thought out input from all of the brilliant posters on this forum.
I always like to use downtime for pursuing goals, reinforcing past lessons, doing research about pertinent topics to either life or business, or improve my understanding of lead follow up and understanding how my own psychological uniqueness develops forward towards achieving a higher rate of personal achievement and closing sales, which enhances those personal goals.
Much is always discussed about lead generation and turning that dust into gold. There are many interpretations on how to make a sale, but in reality, unless one is giving away their services, there are common steps to successful sales. If there were not, all of those business coaching and sales Guru's would not be re-inventing the wheel with their own introspective analysis on the subject.
Lets try to provide an overview of a successful sales, from inception to formal closure and beyond.......
The primary source for the initial overview of this topic is taken from Dale Carnegie and his focus on personal fulfillment and additionally, from his book on "How To Win Friends and Influence People".
Carnegie's concepts and methods point out, which should be so obvious, that "People are all different and therefore all have different perspectives. The more we can emphasize with the other parties goals and feelings, the better off we will be able to develop a relationship of trust with them and can better off reach a mutual agreement with both parties goals, which can achieve an acceptable level of understanding and commitment by each of the parties involved.
Rather than just posting a response to others, telling them to: "Read This Book", I figured that we could actually discuss and enhance the topic in the open forum.
Let me start this off and now see what plateau we can climb to.......
I always like to use downtime for pursuing goals, reinforcing past lessons, doing research about pertinent topics to either life or business, or improve my understanding of lead follow up and understanding how my own psychological uniqueness develops forward towards achieving a higher rate of personal achievement and closing sales, which enhances those personal goals.
Much is always discussed about lead generation and turning that dust into gold. There are many interpretations on how to make a sale, but in reality, unless one is giving away their services, there are common steps to successful sales. If there were not, all of those business coaching and sales Guru's would not be re-inventing the wheel with their own introspective analysis on the subject.
Lets try to provide an overview of a successful sales, from inception to formal closure and beyond.......
The primary source for the initial overview of this topic is taken from Dale Carnegie and his focus on personal fulfillment and additionally, from his book on "How To Win Friends and Influence People".
Carnegie's concepts and methods point out, which should be so obvious, that "People are all different and therefore all have different perspectives. The more we can emphasize with the other parties goals and feelings, the better off we will be able to develop a relationship of trust with them and can better off reach a mutual agreement with both parties goals, which can achieve an acceptable level of understanding and commitment by each of the parties involved.
Rather than just posting a response to others, telling them to: "Read This Book", I figured that we could actually discuss and enhance the topic in the open forum.
Let me start this off and now see what plateau we can climb to.......
Successful Steps To The Sale:
The Steps of the sales process can be looked at as the entire process involved in arriving at the final desired destination.
For this summary outline, let's presume that the lead has already been generated or the cold call appointment has already been agreed to, so that we stay on track and do not go off in tangents on how to get them to contact your company for your services in the first place.
7. Following Though And Delivering At Least Or More Than Expected
Starting with point number 1:
"Planning And Preparing For The Appointment"
Does the Sales Presenter know his product inside and out?
That should be a given, but is just taken for granted that a gifted "Closer" can fill up the presentation with enough smoke and mirrors to deflect from actual real hands on knowledge of the services offered, with only a cursory understanding of what needs to be done. Does the representative have a clear understanding of the problems or desires that the customer is contemplating? The advantages and benefits that you propose must be a precise fit with the customers objectives. Are they relevant to your customer, or does the rep just go on auto-pilot and deliver the same canned specifications for everyone? Pry as much information out of the customer, for their own good, that will better equip your company's proposed solution to them.
If the sales rep over promises and the team under delivers, that can be fatal down the line, either through buyers remorse or by the follow up performance not meeting the customers expectations due to superfluous incentively laden items thrown in, just to close that sale immediately.
Does the Sales Representative truly understand the features and benefits of the products and services they are attempting to provide?
How can the Rep best create an image or vision in the customers mind, on how their company's unique delivery of the product and services will be an added benefit to their dilemma? What is your, or it's Unique Selling Benefit? How can that best be demonstrated to the customer?
Determine the true time-line that they would like to undertake the project.
Find out their motives for pursuing this project at this time.
Determine who will be the key decision maker that needs to become a believer in your process.
What is the initial open budget gap that they considering and are interested in?
Does this customer need any unique aspects tailored to their problem, desire and solution? If so, get them prepared in advance. These can include, but are not limited to; A photo album of similar jobs or a grandiose variety of multiple talent levels available within your company, Reference lists for them to review and check up on, current projects underway for them to see your team in action, business accreditations and organizations that you belong to, all of the bonding-licensing and insurance requirement certificates needed for legal contract fulfillment, a lap top presentation slide show or digital photo frame to highlight unique applications which would allow the imagery to do your companies talking for you, unique photos of your potential customers problems so that your visual solutions shown can provide them with peace of mind clarity in their decision, the company literature and/or brochures that they can review in a pre-appointment package, and finally, samples of the product offerings that you allow them to choose from.
Some or most of the information that needs to be gathered and understood, must initially come from whomever answers the phone cal for the request for an estimate. So, if that person is not the sales representative, they need to be tutored and conditioned on how to incite the caller to provide as much of the related information as possible. Prepare a list and practice it over and over again, to make sure you can obtain all of this advance knowledge.
Ed
For this summary outline, let's presume that the lead has already been generated or the cold call appointment has already been agreed to, so that we stay on track and do not go off in tangents on how to get them to contact your company for your services in the first place.
- Planning And Preparing For The Appointment
- The Introduction And Opening Warm Up
- The Interview Process, With Questions And Answers
- Presenting Your Unique Selling Benefit
- Trial Closes And Overcoming Objections
- Securing An Agreement, AKA, Closing The Sale
7. Following Though And Delivering At Least Or More Than Expected
Starting with point number 1:
"Planning And Preparing For The Appointment"
Does the Sales Presenter know his product inside and out?
That should be a given, but is just taken for granted that a gifted "Closer" can fill up the presentation with enough smoke and mirrors to deflect from actual real hands on knowledge of the services offered, with only a cursory understanding of what needs to be done. Does the representative have a clear understanding of the problems or desires that the customer is contemplating? The advantages and benefits that you propose must be a precise fit with the customers objectives. Are they relevant to your customer, or does the rep just go on auto-pilot and deliver the same canned specifications for everyone? Pry as much information out of the customer, for their own good, that will better equip your company's proposed solution to them.
If the sales rep over promises and the team under delivers, that can be fatal down the line, either through buyers remorse or by the follow up performance not meeting the customers expectations due to superfluous incentively laden items thrown in, just to close that sale immediately.
Does the Sales Representative truly understand the features and benefits of the products and services they are attempting to provide?
How can the Rep best create an image or vision in the customers mind, on how their company's unique delivery of the product and services will be an added benefit to their dilemma? What is your, or it's Unique Selling Benefit? How can that best be demonstrated to the customer?
Determine the true time-line that they would like to undertake the project.
Find out their motives for pursuing this project at this time.
Determine who will be the key decision maker that needs to become a believer in your process.
What is the initial open budget gap that they considering and are interested in?
Does this customer need any unique aspects tailored to their problem, desire and solution? If so, get them prepared in advance. These can include, but are not limited to; A photo album of similar jobs or a grandiose variety of multiple talent levels available within your company, Reference lists for them to review and check up on, current projects underway for them to see your team in action, business accreditations and organizations that you belong to, all of the bonding-licensing and insurance requirement certificates needed for legal contract fulfillment, a lap top presentation slide show or digital photo frame to highlight unique applications which would allow the imagery to do your companies talking for you, unique photos of your potential customers problems so that your visual solutions shown can provide them with peace of mind clarity in their decision, the company literature and/or brochures that they can review in a pre-appointment package, and finally, samples of the product offerings that you allow them to choose from.
Some or most of the information that needs to be gathered and understood, must initially come from whomever answers the phone cal for the request for an estimate. So, if that person is not the sales representative, they need to be tutored and conditioned on how to incite the caller to provide as much of the related information as possible. Prepare a list and practice it over and over again, to make sure you can obtain all of this advance knowledge.
Ed