November 4, 2009
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Business Forecasting 2012
Our special feature on forecasting sheds light on how to choose the right model, offers advice from Jack Stack and more.
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Sales.
I can already hear you groaning.
But before you dismiss this article as something you're sure you don't want to read, consider this: Sales is the most important job in every business. And there has yet to be any successful business that has survived with zero sales.
"Yeah, but, I don't like to sell," you may say. Fair enough. I don't like selling either, but I do like making sales.
What if I were to tell you that I have a way to help turn your assumption, "I can’t do sales" into the excited affirmation, "I can sell!"
Do I have your attention now?
You are Not a Sales Professional
The first thing you need to understand is that you are not and probably never will be a sales professional. What you are is, first and foremost, a business professional.
True sales professionals are trained to sell. You are not.
They know the difference between a "take-away" and a "tie-down." They are trained to overcome objections, deal with a 70% rejection rate, and close a deal as if it’s an art form. Are you?
Of course you aren’t! As a professional business owner, that's not your job. Nor should it ever be.
Slimy Sales People are Not Sales Professionals
Here’s the second thing you need to realize. Sales people who pretend to be your best friend, chumming up to you by giving you free tickets to the game and schmoozing you with false flattery to get you to buy something are not true sales professionals.
They are desperate people willing to say and do anything because they have neither the skill nor the training to make an "honest" sale.
These are the sales people who give sales a bad reputation. And you may be relieved to hear that their approach is about as far away as you can get from the kind of sales you will do as a professional business owner.
Sales 101 for The Professional Business Owner
The professional business owner's approach to sales has nothing to do with selling and everything to do with connecting and creating a buying relationship. It's about getting your product or service into the hands of those who appreciate its value and see how it will make their work a whole lot easier and their lives a whole lot sweeter!
Five Keys to Making a Sale
1. Treat your clients with respect, dignity, interest, and care.
This is the best approach to keep from looking like a slick sales person out to make a buck. Treat your customer, as you would like to be treated. When you do so, you attract the customers who are aligned with developing a buying relationship with you.
2. Forget about rejection.
It's not about you. It's about whether your product or service is aligned with what your customer wants. Remember, for the professional business owner, selling and sales is first and foremost a connection job. Forget about rejection and focus on connection.
3. Shine your light.
Your job is to make sure your product or service stands out above the rest. You can't just hope that your clients will see the value of your product or service. You have to make it glaringly obvious.
4. You have to believe.
You have to believe strongly in yourself. You have to believe solidly in your product or service. And, most important, you have to believe in your confidence to deliver the sale. Because, if you don't, the money simply won't flow to you.
5. Take the stress out of sales.
You are a professional business owner showing, demonstrating, and presenting your product or service. Money will flow to you not because you’re good at selling, but because you are aligned with the right customers. Focus on connecting with them and creating buying relationships.
As a business professional, you know sales are important to the success of your business. However, you can't have an aversion to sales and expect to sell anything. Therefore, you must learn to approach sales in a new way. You must be perceived, first, as a professional business owner and, second, as someone who has a product or service to sell.
Approaching sales from this perspective means that you will be looking for alignments, creating connections, and forming buying relationships with your customers. After all, the best sales person is the one who takes immense pleasure in the customer’s satisfaction. Who better to do that than you?
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About: Dr. Susan L. Reid is a business coach and consultant for entrepreneurial women starting up businesses. She is the author of “Discovering Your Inner Samurai: The Entrepreneurial Woman’s Journey to Business Success.” Her website is Alkamae.com.
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Ivana Taylor 2 years 3 months and 6 days ago
Hi Susan - FANTASTIC article. Selling is really a mindset. In fact, the best advice I ever got about selling was from my coach Cynthia Ronan who said "Why not just have a great conversation with the person you're working with -- and whatever you do -- DON'T try and sell them anything! Just listen and help and be who you are." When I looked at it that way, I saw things completely differently. My goal was to help my clients make great choices. Sometimes those choices included me and sometimes they didn't. In the end, the list you provided guarantees that the person who becomes your customer has chosen you because of the value you provide. That makes for happy, profitable and ideal customers.