ROOKIE SALES PEOPLE DON’T ASK QUESTIONS

OMG – sales people, pls, ask questions!!!!!

Just got off the phone with a salesperson with a service I actually want but she didn’t stop talking long enough for me to ask a single question. She just kept throwing more and more and more and more and more and more and……more info at me.

Rookie mistake.

Their focus is all about THEM and getting what THEY want.

  • Good sales people make the interaction about the PROSPECT.
  • Good sales people remain neutral and don’t mind if they get a no.
  • Good sales people have one goal…provide a product or service that best matches the customers needs.

This is how you get a good match and create raving fans that refer more customers to you. And I have yet to meet a business that didn’t tell me referrals are their number one lead generation tool.

To do this requires asking questions, and tailoring the info to specifically answer those questions.

When pitching your product or service, regularly check-in with them to confirm you are providing the info they want.

State a feature or benefit in one sentence, and ask “Is this something that is important to you?”

Don’t waste their time or yours talking about a feature for 5 mins only to find out they don’t care about that.

YOUR FM STATION COULD BE AFFECTING BUSINESS

We all tune into an FM station…and this station dictates how we feel.

What we choose to ‘FOCUS’ on.
And the ‘MEANING’ we give it.

What station have you tuned into this past week in your business, personal life? How did it make you feel and most importantly, how did you act as a result??

As business owners, the station we pick can make or break us!

For example, how’s your mood when you focus on all the knock backs or sales you haven’t won, or customers that weren’t happy?

vs your mood when you focus on the amazing happy customer(s), how fortunate you are to be able to serve, and how another day is another amazing chance to win.

To get different results we need to think differently. Picking a different FM station is the key.

What FM station will you tune into next week?

QUICKEST AND CHEAPEST SALES BOOST

Just finished a session with a wonderful client who is a high-end car mechanic. He generated two weeks of extra work by a few phone calls to old clients.

Mining your database of past customers (and even their friends, family, clubs, networks) IS THE FIRST MARKETING STRATEGY YOU SHOULD EVER DO!

Your list of past customers is like ‘gold in your hand’. It’s a goldmine!

If you need more sales fast.

I’ve rarely seen it fail. It generates immediate results because the customer has already passed that invisible barrier of trust and uncertainty about whether they will get value.

BTW – I should mention the next most important thing you should do before ramping up your marketing spend is work out what you should be selling. What are the profitable products/services? And which ones will take you to your vision?
No point spending marketing dollars and time in order to sell more stuff that will make you less, or steer you away from your vision.

UNFOCUSED? THIS CAN HELP

 

Core Improve Innovate
Focus on getting core right before improving or innovating.

This might help and maybe something to think about over the weekend.

 

It’s the CORE, IMPROVE, INNOVATE model by Sharon Pearson.

In a nutshell…only focus on core business activities and getting them right before you focus on improving your core. Only spend time and money innovating when core and improvements are done.

Core activities is your day to day stuff that makes money, brings business in, processes orders, keeps customers happy, sends out invoices, keeps staff happy etc.

My tendency, because I love innovation, was to get distracted with improvements and innovation and I dropped the ball on ‘core’.

This is like building a house on wet soggy, soft soil that isn’t compacted or even right for the job!

As a result my innovation might work but would fall over because core business was up to scratch.

So…if you are switching between ‘this and that’ in your business and not sure what you should focus on…perhaps you are doing what I used to do and are distracted by innovation or improvements?

This weekend, have a think about your core activities. What kind of shape are they in?

Do They Know Where the Bus is Going?

Business Turnaround Example – and one of the reasons why I love my job.

A client this week has just taken his first holiday away from the business in 6 years. And the staff were absolutely determined to prove they can man the fort, keep the jobs flowing and the customers happy…and prove to the boss they can do it. And they did. And they were really proud of themselves. And so they should be.

3 months ago this boss was seriously contemplating throwing in the towel.

He felt he had no more fight left in him.

It was a ‘fight’. Doing anything, when you don’t know how to, can feel like a ‘fight’.

He certainly knew how to do his trade real well…but he didn’t know how to manage his people. As a result he had staff that were milking the system, not on time, moody and threatening to leave.

The solution was not hard or complicated. And it’s a solution I’ve seen work wonders time and time  again. It’s so effective and quick, it’s like magic.

First step was the boss brought me on board – but that isn’t the magic part. I assessed the situation, interviewed the team and identified the issues.

The major ‘fix’ I want to share in this post is the need for your staff to know where they are going.

An analogy I like, is to think of your business as a bus and it’s taking you and your staff on a journey…preferably to a destination you want.

When the staff don’t know where the bus is going, they start to get fidgety and think about getting off the bus.

Add to this confusion poor driving by the boss and you have a situation like my client in this example.

The major turnaround by the staff was due mainly to the following:

1. We met with them and found out their career goals and what they liked doing and wanted to do more of, and what they wanted to do less of. We then rewrote their position descriptions with these changes and included a career plan which mapped out their growth in the business.

2. We implemented team meetings every week initially and then reduced this down to every two weeks. These meetings focused on hearing from the staff what needed fixing or changing, and sharing with them great actions taken by the team, number of jobs completed and updates to strategy and where the business is heading.

Both of these actions have given the staff the certainty they wanted in where the bus is going. They are no longer on a mystery tour. One way of looking at this is appreciating that your team are sacrificing time in their lives they can’t regain…how would they feel if they didn’t know where it was taking them?

The two actions have

Let your staff know where the bus is going
Your staff need to know where the bus is going.

given them a sense of belonging, significance, contribution and growth.

One particular staff member who was really playing up and looking for work is now busting his butt, cooperating, hitting targets, going the extra mile and even telling others they should come and work for the company.

If you are having staff issues, and you are not discussing their goals, their challenges, their opportunities and where the business is going, this could be why.

As always, I’m just a phone call away if you need some advice or want to run an idea or issue past me.