Our customer’s loyalty is earned as solutions are provided and relationships are formed. The business times we are in are testing OUR loyalty to our customers as never before. Yesterday I heard a radio ad encouraging listeners to call them if they haven’t heard from their service provider recently. Though this was a financial company, it could be a message to anyone in sales or service. Your competitors are ready to take care of your customers if you aren’t.

With today’s economic situation, the old adage, “no news is good news” may not be the best approach to demonstrate your care for your customers. The headlines are full of news about companies who are struggling and customers aren’t sure which companies will fall next. Do you they know you are still around?

A simple message of “I’m calling to let you know that I am thinking of you.” or “I was wondering how you and your company are weathering the recent economics?” will be very welcome by most. The comment and question may not matter as much as you contacting them and making them feel they are valued.

If your valuable customers heard a radio ad asking if they heard from you recently, would they be able to say “YES, my provider is loyal TO me” and change the station?

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Tags: customer loyalty, Sales

As I’ve been writing about all week, the Sales SheBang conference gathered successful sales pros – women AND some men – for sharing and learning sales skills. During the week, there was a particularly energetic and engaged member -Matt Donnelly.

Matt is 84 years and old lives in the San Francisco Bay Area in California. For two years, Matt has been the first to enroll in this conference. I heard about Matt in the Sales Expert Summit sessions the day before the actual conference. And thought “he’s just there to be with the women”. Was I wrong!

Matt has the energy and smarts of people half his age. With his blue blazer and a coordinating beret, his trademark, Matt was a willing participant for 2 days. I couldn’t resist talking with him to find out “is he really still selling”? Well, indeed he is! He started his business appraisal business 21 years ago and is still selling himself today.

He told me that he can always improve and he still has a lot to learn. His goal is to stay with it until he is 103 and a half years. But that is not the shocker, at the end of the conference, Matt wanted to address the 100+ attendees. He produced his check for next year’s conference to guarantee that he is again the first enrolled.

Lessons observed from Matt…no matter how long we have been doing something, we have more to learn. And when work is fun, who needs to retire?

What are some of the lessons you have learned from those that have been “at it” longer then you?

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Tags: learning, sales conference, skills

Cold Calling is not usually high on many sales pros’ To Do lists. There are so many reasons I hear for doing almost anything else before picking up the phone to call people you don’t know about your product or service.

In a workshop on The Golden Keys to the Gatekeeper, Top Sales Dog Leslie Buterin, shared some powerful ideas on getting appointments with high level decision makers and executives:

1. Have the mindset that it is your obligation to reach out to start a relationship so that this person/company can benefit from the wonderful solutions you offer. You are not interrupting them to kill time, you are contacting them to help them.

2. Prepare to get to the point.

3. Make sure you speak their language. Executives have three main concerns:

• Increase profits
• Decrease costs
• Mitigate risks

4. Be able to succinctly state what you can do for THIS person or company. Giving them a 3 minute, or longer, blah blah blah does NOT excite them to want to meet you. Instead, state a specific result that you could achieve for them.

“We can increase your profitability by ___%. I’d like to meet with you to discuss.”

“We can reduce the liability inherent in your hiring processes…”

“I’m calling to see if we can decrease the costs of recruitment process by 50%.”

5. There is some debate on this next one…skip the niceties when they pick up the phone! You should only be on the phone 90 seconds – they don’t want to waste more time being asked about their day, the weather, do you have time (how do they know they have time if they don’t know who you are or why you are calling?) Respect their time.

In reading this list I noticed an overlying concept – that even when cold calling, the subject and focus should be on What’s in it for THEM!

As you contact your prospects, what are some things you have discovered?

In a future blog I will lay out more on the emotional aspects of Cold Calling.

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Tags: prospecting, prospecting, WIIFT

What is an expert? Dictionary.com defines expert as a person who has special skill or knowledge in some particular field; specialist; authority. This week I am with a group of experts – focused on helping people and companies increase their sales.

The conference is called the Sales Shebang. Author and truly inspiring business professional, Jill Konrath, started the conference in 2007 to showcase women sales experts. A pre-conference session yesterday was for a special group of Sales Experts who shared their stories and tips for business success with each other.

What is fascinating is the openness to sharing the “inside secrets” to our business. Nothing held back, and no question unanswered. My mind is still spinning with the actionable ideas shared to enhance business. Topics included: Strategic Alliances, Membership Sites, Sales Coaching Models, Maximizing Sales Results, Creating a Strong Referral Network and more.

As I thought about YOU, I wondered, do you have a format/venue to exchange ideas with the experts in your field? It doesn’t matter what your “field” is. Who is someone you can learn insider secrets from that will help you be even more successful?

Before contacting anyone to tap into their expertise, something to consider…One of the speakers, Colleen Stanley, spoke of the Generosity – Reciprocity Effect. A main point from this is that when building relationships of mutual benefit, we have to share and help others first. These women demonstrated that attitude of giving yesterday – 13 hours of it!

In the upcoming weeks I will share more of the wisdom from these fascinating experts.

Until then, back to you…What is one piece of expert knowledge you have that you could share with others? What can you do today to share your expertise?

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Tags: coaching, networking, sales expert

This week I had the opportunity to work for nearly 2 days with the best of the best sales pros in a client company. We spent our time together focused on taking their game up another notch with Powerful Presentations. One thing I noted is that really successful people generally are very open to new ideas and skills that will allow them to be even more successful!

A Key Idea I shared in this workshop was that our presentations are more powerful when we focus on WIIFT – from the open of the presentation through the close. Who wants to listen to 10 or 15 minutes of background on the speaker and their company? Do you really care if they have been in business for over 75 years? About three minutes into the “background” about you, they have disengaged – you can see it in their body language. Tie the message about YOU into what it means to THEM and they will engage! WHY is it beneficial to them that your company has been in business so long? Will it mean a better product? Or more expertise that will solve a problem for them?

Initially there were some skeptics who weren’t sure the WIIFT was THAT important. Until…the first practice presentations began and each professional had to sit through all the other presentations. Being on the other side allowed them to feel what its’ like to have a lot of information shared AT them and not tied specifically TO them.

As we ended today, these successful people commented that it IS powerful to make our message not about us – but that it is hard to do! The more successful and experienced we are, the harder it may be to do something different. To send a message adapted to our audience, with only enough detail that is important to them and then to link WHAT we do into WIIFT statements is not easy.

How much effort does it take to link the WHAT of your message to the WIIFT? Post your comments and let the rest us know we are not alone!

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Tags: Communication, Presentation, Sales, WIIFT

A powerful question isn’t it? What would happen if you reflected on this question before any interaction?

It’s exciting to start this blog for sales and service professionals to discuss and discover ideas and tools to help us be more productive, create stronger customer and employee loyalty and feel good about what we are doing! This blog will be successful with your comments, opinions and suggestions.

Our first topic is one of the foundational components of What’s in it for Them? – communication!

As the sender of any message, consider that the message sent is filtered by the receiver’s past experiences, style, mood and many other individual factors. As we identify the message we need to send, we should also consider how to best communicate it so that the filters will not distort it and our message is mis-read or mis-heard.

A phrase that I use to keep this focus is Communicate with people the way THEY want to be communicated with. It may not be grammatically perfect, but it works!

Consider your customer interactions – whether they are internal or external – what do you do so that your message is best heard by THEM?

Post a comment, share your knowledge, and let’s get the discussion started!

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Filed Under: Uncategorized
Tags: Communication, Leadership, Sales, WIIFT