The first two chapters have been invested in preparing you to become more successful in your conversations. The art form of selling is heavily geared toward your ability to create opportunities and influence the decisions of others to part with money and get the goods or services you supply.
Earlier you learned that to commercially succeed in sales, you must know the answer to two very powerful questions:
The more you gain clarity over your answers to these questions, the more you'll realize that the profession of selling is not only essential but also remarkably helpful to the entire community. People can be notoriously indecisive, procrastinate repeatedly, and fail to achieve their own goals and wishes because of not knowing what action to take. In your profession, you hold a responsibility to look out for the people who need your help, be ready to win their trust, and help guide them through the decision‐making process, so that you help those who can benefit from what you do to go on and actually realize that benefit.
Decide today that you are on a mission to help people and that the role you play as a sales professional is in service to those people. Quickly you will start to see that the opportunity to help is everywhere and the potential for you to grow your customer base is abundant.
This chapter explores precise techniques and skills to capitalize on the amount of opportunity that does exist and to lead you to more opportunities to sell.
Building rapport is a crucial skill when you are looking to attract new customers, and it starts with one simple action that is often overlooked. The first thought someone has when they meet you for the first time is “Do I find you attractive?” We are all proven to be more attractive when we are smiling.
The wondrous thing about a smile is that it is infectious. If you smile at someone, they can't help but smile back! Think back to the times in the past when you were dating or, dare I say it, flirting. It all starts with a smile. Smiling is the best ice‐breaker you have to start a new relationship, and its importance is often overlooked. Your smile is far more than just lifting the corners of your mouth and showing your pearly whites. Transferring the warm energy of a smile affects many more areas.
You probably think that you are a pretty happy person most of the time, but sometimes it can be too easy to forget to tell your face! As creatures of habit, we need reminders. Reminders to turn on your “happy face” when you are in the marketplace can be the nudge you need to smile more. Place memory joggers in your environment that act as a switch to trigger your happy face. Over the years, I have introduced mirrors on the doors of retailers' staff areas with sayings like “Smile—you are on stage” attached to them, placed yellow happy‐face emojis on the handsets of telephones in call centers, updated screensavers for office workers and created affirmations for the sun visors of traveling sales reps' cars—all with the purpose of creating a physical reminder that it's time to put your game face on.
As a professional, no matter your area of expertise, it is likely that at some stage you will find yourself within the mysterious world of business networking. Rooms full of new people, forced activities, business cards being tossed around like confetti, and an expectation of needing to see a return from your investment in time spent there can result in the entire experience being remarkably daunting.
Whether it is a formal, structured event or a large opening networking session, you are aware that within the room there is potential for new business and success could be just a conversation away. Why, then, can this exercise still strike so much fear into the attendees?
The reason you may find it difficult is because you were possibly conditioned as a child through a simple sequence of words: “Don't talk to strangers!” The first challenge is to defy that conditioning, and I've found that the easiest way to resolve this is to decide that pretty much everybody else is feeling the same as you. The belief that everyone is sharing a similar thought can reduce the anxiety a little, allowing you to relax enough to get involved.
Getting over the initial fear is one thing, however. To succeed in a network, here are some simple rules that have worked for me. I am sure if you choose to employ them, they could have significant benefits for you too.
The most important person in your life is you. To test this claim, remember back to your grade school class photographs. Whose was the first face you looked for?
This means that, when connecting with others, you need to understand that they are the most important people in their own lives. When given the choice, people look to do business with those they feel they know, like, and trust. Building these feelings is rarely achieved from anything you can say about yourself.
Decisions are made with emotion before logic, so the result you are looking to achieve is that it “feels right” to do business with you before you ever look for it to “make sense” to do business with you. The most successful approach you can take, to make progress in this area, is to understand that your prospect is the most important person in their life. By showing a genuine interest in them, you demonstrate a true level of connection with them, their situation, and their circumstances. This means asking questions and listening. Refrain from using their answer to a question to educate them on your similar experience. Instead, encourage them to share more details of their answer.
By listening intently, you are demonstrating that they are important to you, and this will help them feel good. Many service‐based industries that rely on repeat business demonstrate this skill at a very high level. Examine the providers that you are most loyal to: places like your hairdresser, your local restaurant or bar, and perhaps even a taxi or car service. The chances are that your decision to continually do business with them is influenced by your feeling that they have a genuine interest in you.
Maintain eye contact in your conversations, repeat back what they have shared to show understanding, and catalogue key pieces of information that they share for you to bring back into future conversations and discussions.
The sweetest sound to any person anywhere in the world is the sound of their own name. You probably already know this and can recall dozens of moments when you have heard your name mentioned in a crowd or seen it written on a sign and could not help but be drawn toward it.
Remembering, recalling, and using the names of others is a great way of demonstrating your genuine care for other people. Think of the difference between someone saying “As your wife was saying” versus “As Charlotte was saying,” or someone asking “How are the kids?” versus “How are Amelia and Emily?” This little adjustment changes everything. One is an attempt to show that you care, while the other is a demonstration that you have taken the time to care.
Remember the names of all of your important people, and then remember the facts of all that is important to them. Whether it is their family's names, pets' names, favorite sports teams, the school they went to, or the city they are from, if it is important to them, then make it important to you. Translating this information into future conversations, follow‐up e‐mails, proposals, and account management visits is a huge opportunity to stand out and make more of the opportunities that you create.
In addition to remembering key facts about others, you probably want to make yourself more memorable to others too. Remembering names is not easy, but others remembering yours will certainly have an impact on your success. When you are meeting a stranger for the first time, there is a strong possibility that they will fail to catch your name because their mind is elsewhere in the split second that you share it. A very simple trick to increase your chances of being remembered by name is to slow the process down. When introducing yourself, you should give your name twice. First, you should give your preferred method of being addressed, followed by your full name, including your last name. This means that I introduce myself as “Phil, Philip Jones” and give others multiple opportunities to catch my name. It is simple and it really works.
If you are looking to create more opportunities, open more doors, and create a barrage of inbound inquiries, then you must be seen as the expert in your field.
The word expert may make you feel uncomfortable and could make you wonder how you could possibly position yourself as such. The little inner voice can easily start telling you that you haven't studied enough, learned enough, or simply don't yet know enough to be perceived as the expert.
When you take an honest look at your own experience, you can start to realize that there are many areas of your experience in which you have expansive expertise. Perhaps it relates to how your skill affects a certain group of people, perhaps it is a personal story associated with your profession, or perhaps it is even a very specific skill that is just a fraction of your overall work yet is something in which you hold a wealth of knowledge. Unlocking your expertise and positioning yourself as that person outwardly allows you to build your reputation quicker, establishes your authority, and starts more conversations with bigger potential customers.
Your goal is to become the x for y. Consider how much easier it is to become the expert as
These specific micro‐niches provide you with a razor sharp focal point to develop expert‐based platforms that help create more opportunities. One of the fastest ways to be perceived as an expert is to be caught delivering presentations on your subject to audiences of potential customers. This instant leverage provides a wonderful lead‐in for new sales opportunities. With the volume of events happening local to you, there are always opportunities for you to showcase your expertise.
There are many platforms from which you can share a powerful message that will have you be seen as the expert:
All of these media platforms are areas in which you can start delivering effective presentations in order to build your position as an expert in your area, grow your audience, create leads, and increase your sales.
So many businesses continue to produce printed literature and brochures with the goal of supporting their sales efforts. I have no doubt that in certain industries a product catalogue is an essential tool. However, in many scenarios what is intended as an aid can quickly become a hindrance. In place of a brochure, and in particular when you have a service attached to your offering, it may be better to replace the printed literature that shares what you do with a useful tool that demonstrates the value you provide.
Examples of great brochure alternatives that build on your expertise would be
These examples are often received as a gift by your prospect, are less likely to be disposed of, and carry far more value than a brochure. They provide visibility and credibility to you and your service, as well as create a leverage point for you to continue the conversation.
Technology continues to move at a rapid pace, and staying in the game is a continual challenge for all of us. The biggest change I have experienced in my lifetime is the introduction and evolution of social media as a tool for communicating. A myriad of platforms exist that make it possible to reach and stay connected with literally millions of people across all parts of the globe. What is an incredible tool for expanding your business can also create a minefield of confusion for many sales professionals, as it becomes almost impossible to apply yourself and be true in all areas. These networks provide us with the tools to reach others, but they also provide others with the ability to reach, watch, and judge you, all without ever engaging in a physical conversation.
For those unaware of what the term “social media” relates to, it is the collective term for platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and YouTube. These forms of media are changing the way that we communicate. This shift in communications sounds drastic, and many of us are fearful of change—particularly when there is technology involved.
Social media is just modern‐day “word of mouth,” however, and is little different than what you have always done. This is about building relationships with your customers and community, as well as understanding what others are saying about you, to build your brand and grow your business.
Embracing this world can be highly lucrative, but it also comes with sizeable risks. Regardless of the platforms that you choose to use and how technologies evolve, this simple three‐step formula will position you for sustainable sales success using social media:
On all platforms, visual appearance is also critical. Be consistent with your branding, your colors, and the style in which you write. Make sure that any graphics you use are cropped to the correct size for the platform and display effectively on all major devices. Check the profile's appearance on desktops, laptops, tablets, and phones before promoting it to the world. Choose your photography to convey the precise impression you want to achieve in a new encounter. Most platforms are designed to be “social,” so your outbound expression is likely to perform better as a human than a company name.
Physically getting your customers to connect with your profiles is harder than just asking. Running a competition or great offer to reward them for visiting your profiles and connecting with you will drastically improve your chances. Remember that investing in this audience is critical to achieving social media success, since without an audience, your great work could easily be wasted.
It does not matter how good you are at something unless you have evidence of that reputation in a place where others can see it ahead of time. We live in a world where consumers have the power to make or break the success of a company based on how they decide to review and rate its offerings. It is your job to prove to your future buyers that you are highly competent in all that you do and to make it easy for them to place their trust in your hands by showcasing the positive experiences others have had in the past, proving you can help build a more successful future.
Sporting greats are judged by what they previously achieved, and teams recruit new coaches based on their previous results. The same can be said when people are looking for new suppliers. If you can demonstrate that you have done a fantastic job for others in the past, it goes a long way toward suggesting you will do a good job for them, too.
This is more than having testimonials hidden away on your website, in a filing cabinet, or in a folder in your bottom drawer, along with your customer letters. In today's age, social proof is one of the best convincers you have, and growing your social proof has become an essential part of sales success for many modern businesses. Most reviewed, five‐star rated, award‐winning, and best‐seller status are all assets that allow you and your offering to stand out ahead of your competition. Using the words of others and third‐party credibility allows you to be profound without being egotistical.
The distribution of your social proof is important. Before you can showcase it, you must ensure that you collect it. The trick here is quite simply to ask for it. We are all busy people, and taking the time to say nice things about each other, in a usable way, is rarely top of the list; therefore, we have to help it jump up the list.
Asking after you have delivered your product or service is likely to bring you a better response than after that moment has passed. Asking in a format that makes it easy for them is also highly likely to bring a better return. With so many formats for reviews, ratings, and testimonials, it can be easy to dilute your efforts by spreading yourself too thin. Choose the platforms that have the biggest impact on your business, and start by building solid proof of your services there first.
You must decide on the assets that are likely to serve you best and how you plan to use them to create more sales opportunities.
An example that I have employed successfully for many companies has been the collection and use of video testimonials. Just asking brings you huge results, but being prepared will help even further. The ability to record video on the spot allows you to act in the moment and capture powerful comments from existing clients when they are in the perfect moment to express their delight in your service. Be prepared with your equipment, have your questions ready, and make them feel at ease. It is better to record too much content than too little.
Once you get good at asking, you will have so much content that you'll want and need to get in front of people. Examples of how others have successfully used social proof to increase their sales success include:
A simple lesson in all of the above is to put your social proof in front of as many people as possible. Linking your testimonials directly back to the source also adds to their authenticity and effectiveness in the decision‐making process.
“Hi (insert name), I was wondering if you could do me a small favor? (Pause and wait for positive response.) If you are happy with the work that we have done for you, then it would be a huge help if you would be kind enough to take a few moments and share it in writing. (Await positive response.) Thank you so much for that. We will obviously look to use your words in our marketing and share them with potential new customers. I look forward to reading your comments soon.”
Receiving testimonials is fantastic, but there is a lot to gain from giving them too. For each testimonial you produce, there is a strong possibility it may be used in someone's marketing, displayed in their workspace or shared with their network.
Take time to consider your words, and ensure that whoever comes into contact with your recommendation is aware of the people that you help and the problems that you solve for them. You may be surprised that sharing the value you received from working with someone else soon reciprocates in their network becoming more interested in you.