Another blogger, Becky Robinson of the LeaderTalk blog, recently asked her readers the question, “What do I know best?”

What an interesting question to ponder – “What do I know best?”  And it wasn’t as easy as it first appeared. She suggesed that we think about things that are easy for us, that we don’t need to prep for and that we can just help others with.

To come up with my list, I thought about this past week. What conversations have I had with others that were ‘teachable moments’ and I was able to pass along knowledge or insight that really helped someone else? My answers are simple (and it makes me wonder if I over complicate things in my training if it was this simple.)

So here goes:

1. No one has to appoint you a leader. You get to decide and can act as a leader day in and day out without a formal title.
2. Being a mom and a high level business professional is tough. And you will have to make tough choices sometimes – the mom part should always win – the time we are blessed with the kids passes quickly.
3. To be successful in business (whether you are in a direct sales role or not) means having to constantly focus on the WiifT – What’s in it for THEM. The more you communicate, act and live with the WiifT mindset, the more successful you will be.
4. The key to WiifT is undertanding others communication needs and then adapting your communication to it. Though each human being is very individual, there are tools and assessments that can help us with the understanding and ‘how to’ of doing this well.
5. I also know that everyone needs a ‘coach’ in life and business. It can be a spouse, friend, colleague or anyone. And that each of us can coach others by paying attention, giving them time and attention and sharing ‘what we know best’ when appropriate.

Now I ask you – What do you know best? It doesn’t need to have been learned in a book, in fact your life or work knowledge learned the ‘hard way’ might be what is most valuable.  You don’t have to be Einstein to know a lot of things best.  Please share with the rest of us – it will help us all know our ‘go to’ person on many dfferent things!

Looking forward to reading about more ‘knows bests’ from readers.

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Tags: learning, sales tips

Right now I am flying high.  Literally flying at 33,000 feet – probably somewhere over Indiana. I’m on my way to work with Alice Kemper, my Sharpenz.com partner, for the rest of the week.  (For those of you who have used Sharpenz – we’ll have three new boosters ready-to-go next week!)

I’m chuckling because the last post was about You Won’t Get if You Don’t Ask - well I asked the flight attendant the cost of wifi on the airplane – not because I really wanted to use it, just because I was curious.  She told me that she wasn’t sure but that I should go to the site because you can sometimes try it free.

Well, the Go Go site was more than Try it Free – they had a game you could play to earn free wifi for the duration of the flight. I tried it and won!  How cool is that?

So now today I am feeling lucky, confident and like a winner. How will that translate to my success today? I believe it will translate into energy and productivity leading to success.

If you aren’t flying high today like I am, how can you get your energy and confidence up?  A few things come to mind:

1.  Do the thing you are dreading the most for today. Tackle it head on and get it out of the way.  The rest will seem easier.

2.  Review your goals – what are you working toward? What progress have you made? Take one full minute to think and feel that progress. Doesn’t it feel good? Don’t beat yourself up over what you have left to do – acknowledge what you have done.

3.  Contact someone you have been meaning to. You know who the person is – just pick up the phone or send an email NOW!  They’ll be glad to hear from you.  It’s amazing how much connection we need as people.  Don’t want it to be work related? That’s okay!  Amanda shared with me that she found someone she had completely forgotten about on Facebook – they now have reconnected and she is so grateful.

Sometimes the little actions we take early in the morning can give us that boost of energy and confidence that will keep us ‘flying’ a winner all day!

p.s. For someone like who bemoans the speed of new technology, I’m loving it today!

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Tags: productivity, Sales Tips

Closing more sales. It’s the goal for sales managers and professionals alike.  And both are frustrated when it doesn’t happen.  How do I know this?  I ask!

During the needs analysis with a prospect, we always ask “What are the barriers to getting where you want to be?” or “What is keeping you from achieving the goals that are set?” Nearly 90% of the time, one of the reasons given by sales managers is that “My people aren’t closing sales. They do all the work and then the final decision is stalled. They don’t move them through the pipeline.”

If I ask sales people, “What keeps you from closing more sales?” I often hear, “The buyers don’t make decisions timely.”

When I ask buyers why they haven’t decided, they have said “They never asked!”

Okay, so what can be done to get buyers to decide and sales pros to close?  It may be more simple than you think – you need to ask! 

I can’t count the number of times I have observed or coached a sales pro to find out that they do a LOT of work to build the relationship, identify the wants/needs and demonstrate their value.  And then wait. And check in. And wait. Then check in again. But they never have asked to find out the answer!

Instead, there are important questions to be asked after the recommendation is made!  They questions fall into two groups:

• Objections
• Decisions

Unless we ask for their opinion on concerns/objections, we may never know where we really stand.  Until we ask for a decision we may never ‘win’ the deal.

What can you do to close more sales?  First, find out where they are in their thought process and if there are any objections, ask,

• “How does what we’ve discussed sound to you?”
• “What concerns do you have about this solution or me/my company?”
• “What barriers do you see in implementing this?”
• “How does this align with your goals?

Notice these are open ended questions that ask for opinions, ideas and feedback?

Then after listening and responding appropriately, ask for a decision:

• “What is the next action for you in the decision making process?”
• “Have we covered everything you need to make your decision?”
• “Are you ready to move forward?”
• “Can we initiate the paperwork today?”
• “Should we wrap this up?”

Some of these are still open ended to allow you ‘test the water’ before asking for a decision.  But then you HAVE to ask for a decision!

Want to know if this works?  Try it and you will see that it does.

The reason I am writing this post today is because I just used this process with the IRS. Yes the IRS!  They never say ‘yes’.  But I looked at appealing a penalty charge as an opportunity to sell – to build a relationship with the agent, ask for concerns, and then ask for the removal of the penalty.  The charge was relevant – in switching the Sales Pro Insider accounting systems last June, one of the federal tax payments was not made.

It took me two letters and a phone call – which is what sealed the deal. During the call I focused on building rapport, working through the situation together and then asking for the penalty to be removed. The agent cheerfully – really cheerfully – said he would recommend a removal.  I just opened the letter that said it had been approved! A large penalty was removed from the account.

This situation is a great reminder for us all – you don’t get what you don’t ask for. 

My recommendation to you?  Look at your pipeline. What prospects are stalled?  Which situations did you maybe not ‘close’ with the right questions? Then determine how to initiate contact with the prospect. Your objective is to first identify if there are concerns, find out if what you have discussed is of value to them and then ASK for a decision.  The decision might be the buying decision or a decision that they will take an action or talk with  you at a specific time.  And if you get a ‘no’?  Then you know where you stand and can move on to more probable prospects.

In the spirit of asking today – I ask you – who do you know would find value from this blog? Send them a link please!

And if you haven’t already done so, what keeps you from signing up for the Timely T ips ezine here?  Every few weeks you will receive the ezine with helpful tips and fun tidbits. Just for signing up you receive the Timely Tips to Achieve Your Goals eBook – a great roadmap and toolkit for you!

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Tags: Open ended questions, Sales Objections, sales success, Sales Tips

In 2009 All Business initiated a new sales contest – Sales All Stars.  The goal is to promote the career of sales and to recognize those that excel in this very tough business!  I hope you have taken time to look into recommending someone you know for this award.

Yet, can’t we all become a Grand Champion in what we do?  What does it take?  The following Success Factors:

• Skill to perform to your best
• A strong work ethic to use your time and resources wisely
• A goal that is clear, written and attainable
• Competitive spirit to dig in and give it all you’ve got
• Emotional intelligence to weather the ups and downs

The following are also immportantk though not indivudal factors

• Having the right ‘goods’ that fit the situation
• Collaborative teammates who are supportive, skillful and in the right roles

I saw all of these in place last weekend – not in a sales situation – in a sporting event.  We spent 16 hours on a bus and 24 hours in a convntion center for the Jamfest Super Dance Nationals.  My daughter’s team came in as the unknown team from Wisconsin and were determined to make their mark.  The competition is over two days with scores only posted after Day One.

In their two genres – jazz and pom – they did well after Day 1.  Fourth place for Jazz and First place by a tiny margin in Pom.  We thought it was a good first day. Then were told that Day 2 is worth 2/3 of the total score at the end.  The coach, Kate Fabbri did a great job in coaching the girls and explaining what they need to do to advance to the win in poms and place in jazz.  She expressed her belief in them, review the judges’ comments and then got them practicing – they even raised their level of difficulty the week before.

On Sunday, the dancers (24 of them) spent time together getting ready to ‘bring it on’.  After the jazz, we knew they did well.  And for poms they performed better than they had all year (which is saying a lot since they haven’t yet lost this season).  It was energetic, spot on and the dancers looked like they were having fun.  The short story?  They placed with a 3rd medal in jazz and WON pom.  More importantly, they scored so well they were also named junior champions.

It doesn’t end there. The top scorers are also in contention for the GRAND champion award – which involves judges selecting the team they feel had entertainment value, etc.  The girls were named the Grand Champions!

Isn’t it the same in sales? We need all the Success Factors listed above to be the Grand Champion and win the big deals. And still having the right ’scores’ isn’t always enough. We need to bring that ’something extra’ to our sales calls that makes us memorable, trusting, and respected so that the prospect WANTS us to win with them. 

I hope you will make time this week to strengthen one of the Success Factors so you can be a Grand Champion in your sales this year.

Think about the most successful sales pros you know – do you see these Success Factors in them? What else would you add to the list?

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Tags: goal setting, learning, Sales, Sales Tips

Recovery time. Most of us dislike the thought of needing time to recover from anything. We like to keep on going.  Yet, if we overdue our week at work, we need time on the weekend to recover. If we overdue our fun on the weekend, Monday is tough because we need time to recover. If we don’t take care of our health, we may need medical recovery.  Wouldn’t it be great if we didn’t need recovery time?

Recovering isn’t just for overduing it or a medical situation, Lynn Zimmer, of the Sales Pro Insider team, shared the following with me:

There are four things that you cannot recover in life:

 The Stone…………after it’s thrown,
 The Word………….after it’s said,
 The Occasion….after it’s missed, and
 The Time…………after it’s gone.

Today I share it with you because it is a great sales tip!  I am taking liberty to share the four things that are REALLY hard to recover in sales:

Your reputation….after it’s been compromised

Your word…after you have made a commitment and broken it

Your time…if you have used it unwisely

Your honor and integrity…if you ’sell out’ for a quick gain at someone else’s expense

Most things aren’t totally unrecoverable, but the effort to try and recover is significant.  It’s easier to not ‘lose’ them in the first place.  Every action you take – or don’t take – matters.

This weekend is Valentine’s Day.  The time to show those you care the most how much they mean.  Think about  how these four items are also hard to recover with your family and friends.  Make time this weekend to ‘be’ with those you love and build your reputation, honor your word, use your time wisely and show your honor and integrity.  Then you won’t need any recovery time next week.

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I’ll admit I’m a scrapper.  Yes, a scrapper.  A word that has more than one meaning – a scrapper is “a fighter or aggressive competitor” and/or someone who makes picture scrapbooks. Both are true in my case.  And both have interesting sales lesson opportunities!

Sometimes when I hear objections or a customer didn’t do something they committed to, I want to fight!  When things don’t go certain ways, I am aggressive and take it head on and am direct to get to the bottom of it.  As with most things, there are good aspects of this approach…and bad.  People know where they stand with me.  Some people appreciate that, some don’t. 

My approach is that none of us have extra time to waste in business, why not get to the real point and see if we can move through or over it?  What I always need to remind myself is that doesn’t work for everyone. Being an aggressive competitor is okay but being an ‘assertive’ competitor is better.

I’m also a scrapbooker. Not a fanatical scrapbooker, but I have been creating scrapbooks for 11 years now!  I have made family albums, anniversary albums, hostess gift albums, etc. The process is slow and tedious.  But I enjoy it because it gives me the opportunity to take a lot of ’scraps’ of this and that and photos and put them together to tell a bigger story in an attractive way. The journaling, writing about the photos,  is even more important sometimes than the pictures. My hope is that these become part of my legacy and help my children understand the ‘why’ of situations they experienced.

Years ago I found a ‘process’ to sorting, organizing and laying out my pages. It saves me a lot of time and I get more pages done than all other scrapbookers at events. (Oh, doesn’t that sound like an aggressive competitor comment And it works. The efficiency of the process – along with the right tools – allows me to ‘close’ my scrapbooks.

Now doesn’t that sound like sales? Taking pieces of information from the customer and what we offer, then matching them together into a collage that tells a bigger story or takes us and the prospect to a new state of understanding, is what consultative sales is about! 

Sometimes this approach to sales is tedious and slow – and finding a process to help is important.  This is very important in selling services because there isn’t something to really ’show and tell’ on demand. I gather information and then use a process to create the outline and ‘picture’ for the prospect. Often the picture is a beautiful vision of what can be and the path to get there. 

I feel like I just had a ’self help’ group meeting and that I stood up and said “Hi, I’m Nancy and I’m a scrapper.”  Kind of a fun way to start my day.

How about you? What’s something you scrap about?

p.s. Even scrapbooking has gone ‘digital’ and many of the tools are now online.  Though I use the e-tools to create some books, the creative aspect is limiting so I identified which tools work in different situations and apply the ‘right’ tool to get the job done.  Same with sales tools – finding the right tool for the job is what is important.  Miles Austin of Fill the Funnel writes about different tools in his blog.   He even has an eBook to help use LinkedIn more effectively!

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Tags: consultative selling, Sales Tips

Ever notice two people whispering to each other and as you get approach them, they suddenly stop talking?  How do you feel?  Uneasy? Confident?Annoyed?  Curious?

Well, when I saw this quote by the actor Erroll Flynn I thought – this is so true in business!

It isn’t what they say about you, its what they whisper behind your back. 

Not to make you paranoid – but it is TRUE!  What people – customers or colleagues – say behind your back is a good indication on how well you are building value for those around you.  Are the ‘whispers’:

• Stating how valuable you are?
• How full of integrity and honesty your actions show?
• Questioning some of your recent actions?
• Saying to others ‘You HAVE to work this person, they are so great!”

To build long lasting relationships – meaningful business relationships that provide value to you and them - you need the whispers to include only the best things about you. To be statemetns that you wish they would SHOUT from a megaphone for all to hear.  When you consistently act from a place of genuine care, integrity and honesty you’ll never have to worry about the whispers, because you know they are good.

What can you do this week to generate GREAT whispers about you?  Are there unplanned contacts or actions you can take?  Think about – there probably is something you can do. And hopefully the recipient will be willing to share a loud whisper of the value you brought.

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Tags: customer loyalty, Sales Tips

TGIF -  Thank God It’s Friday!  Do you feel like that this week? You don’t have to.  Let’s make today – FUF!  Follow-up Friday. 

Fridays are great days for follow-up.  Many people are at their desk today trying to wrap up their week and tie up loose ends before the weekend starts. It’s often a GREAT opportunity to for you to catch them!  You can make it a very productive day to:

• Send information of value to a prospect
• Telephone contacts in your pipeline – prepare in advance what to leave as a voicemail message (just checking in doesn’t cut it)
• Respond to emails that have been sitting for days
• Complete the paper work that you have not had time to do the rest of the week
• Prepare for next week’s calls
• Set appointments for next week and the week after
• Review your goals and decide what you will focus on next week
• Take 60-90 seconds and just sit and breathe thinking about what you HAVE accomplished this week.

For me today is about preparation and opportunity.  I have a really great sales appointment this afternoon that I am excited about.  It’s with a long-time customer of my sales training. Today we are broadening our discussion to see how I might help them meet their broader human resource objectives of recruiting, training and coaching a top notch sales team. I know I can help them move that needle to save time, money and their effort! 

A good sales appointment today will mean I have a follow-up Monday

What do you do on Friday to wrap up your week?

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Tags: focus, maximize sales productivity, Sales Tips

Every effective sales training course teaches sales professionals to ask open-ended questions.  These are the questions that start with who, what, why, when, how, etc.  Why are open ended questions so universally taught? Because:

• They solicit great information
• Get the person talking
• Allow you and them to find out if there is an opportunity
• Can show your expertise, IF you ask the right questions

All that sounds great, doesn’t it?  They really ARE effective.  But not 100% of the time.  Sometimes they can make a needs analysis seem like an interrogation.  Even though they are open they can be leading, forced, narrow, product focused and irrelevant.  Sales pros can come off like a robot reciting their list of questions so they can get to pitching their product! 

When we use the 3 ‘I’ approach, our open-ended questions include: 

1. Intent
2. Intelligence
3. Interest

Intent.  I’ve seen sales pros launch right into a list of questions that might seem irrelevant to the prospect.  The prospect thinks ‘What’s this have to do with anything?” Instead, we need to explain the intent of the line of questions so the prospect can put it in perspective and answer thoughtfully.

An example: Yesterday I received a call for someone who had something to offer.  They immediately asked me “So, what are you working on?”  My response?  “Wow, that’s broad, in what context?” They responded, “Whatever context you choose.”  Well, I was confused.  I knew what this person was selling and thought, should I answer my question based on that narrow interest or is he really trying to find out more?

So, I turned it back to him and said, ‘What are you working on?”  And then he responded. After 15 minutes I knew the flavor of his focus and we continued.

But why should I have had to work that hard?  If I knew where the discussion was going we could have both saved time.

To share intent can sound like this.  “We are going to talk about your human resource needs. What we have learned is that understanding  how this fits into the overall company’s goals and objectives helps us narrow down the approach and we will be able to give you a more accurate picture of how we might help.  The first questions are focused on that broader picture. Then we’ll get more specific.”  Then we go into our list of questions.

Intelligence.  Your questions reveal a LOT about you. Here’s how to raise your ‘perceived’ intelligence level:

• Explain the intent  of your line of questions and ask questions that broaden the dialogue to a bigger more strategic discussion. 
• Focus on the solution or value desired versus just the product.
• Wait to LISTEN once you have asked  a question. When you ask more intelligent questions, the person may need to think before responding (this is usually a good thing).  How long? According to research, they might need 15-25 seconds to think and respond.  That’s a long time to wait, but it can payoff.

Interest.  The questions should be ‘of interest’ to the person. How?  Make the questions relevant to the situation and person. When it’s about THEM, it’s interesting TO them. Every aspect of the sales process should be wiift focused – What’s in it for THEM? – and this includes your questions!

There you have the 3 necessary “I”s for making your needs analysis informative and not an interrogation. 

Of course I have learned many of these things the hard way.  With confused looks from prospects as I took a direction that surprised them. What have you learned about open ended questions?

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Tags: Open ended questions, Sales training, skills

You know the saying, ‘I learned everything I ever needed to know in kindergarten?’ One of the kindergarten lessons on fire safety can be very effective in working through customer complaints and objections.

Yesterday a speaker shared a joke about two men who were chatting about their lives over drinks. 

The first man said, “Whenever my wife and I have a disagreement, she gets all historical on me.”

Man 2 said, “Don’t you mean she gets hysterical on you?’

“No,” said Man 1, “She gets historical.  She brings up everything that I have ever done wrong since we first met.”

I know – a cheesy joke.  Yet, how true is this when you have a customer who is unhappy?  Do they come to you with hysterics?  Or do they get all historical and bring up EVERYTHING they have ever been unhappy or dissatisfied about?

What to do in either case?  Follow one of our ‘kindergarten lessons.’  Stop, drop and roll! 

These 3 steps are used as the technique for when you are ‘on fire’ physically?  Ever felt  ‘under fire’ with a customer complaint or objection?  Well, we can use the same technique in those situations! 

Stop.  Stop talking.  Pause and listen.

Drop.  Your ego and defenses.  You won’t get very far if you also become hysterical or historical.

Roll.  Roll forward in a discussion that is open and focused on resolution.  How? 

1. First, assure them of your intent to help resolve the objection, question or complaint.
2. Then ask them an open question to draw out more information.  At first you might get more hysterics or history.  That is okay. 
3. Listen, paraphrase and ask another question if necessary. 
4. Restate that you want to help them and ask if they will explore possibilities with you.  (You’ve just changed the situation into a collaborative problem-solving opportunity.)
5. Work with them to share ideas, examples, ask for feedback and their ideas.
6. Agree on a course of action.

I think for myself the first part of stopping is the toughest. I want to jump right to telling them why they are wrong…and I make it worse.  Instead when I take that breath and stop.  I actually move forward more easily.  And very importantly, I help my customer stop the hysterics or the history lesson to resolve the issue. 

Something to think about isn’t it?  What do you think?

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Tags: Collaborative Selling, collaborative+selling, Negotiation, sales tips