Solve it with a Holiday
“Sharpen Your Sales” Tune Up!
It’s that time of year again, when sales volume slumps during the holiday season. The CEOs and Sales Managers I work with have fits this time of year. They know their sales forces are mentally preparing well in advance of the holiday season for the usual mental check out, or what I refer to as the Seasonal Sales Melt Down, or Seasonal Sales Slump.
Their bad news is good news for me, because the Seasonal Sales Slump brings me business. My programs, SalesMastery, PerformanceMastery, GoalMastery, a Sales Tune-Up or my ESP Program all solve the Slump by keeping sales forces in line and on target.
The bad news for the Sales Industry is the lack of sales effort which yields low sales volume. Yet the one element that increases over the holidays ¡s the increase of excuses of why this didn’t happen, or why their usual markets weren’t receptive, and new markets were too busy with other things to give them the time and attention they need for an adequate sales presentation. That excuse list is long and wide all yielding little or no results (sales) for your department.
It warms my heart when my sales students actually L-I-S-T-E-N and I-M-P-L-E-M-E-N-T what they learn. More importantly, when they create those positive habits and apply them to their sales processes, then their revenue will grow by leaps and bounds.
Watch this short video as one of my students actually put into A-C-T-I-O-N something he learned from the T.I.P.S. “To Insure Prompt Sales Video” that is found on this website.
Now, for review, read: “T.I.P.S. “To Insure Prompt Sales”.
Need Sales Tools? Then check out www.cbsalestools.com
Questions and/or Comments?
Please respond to my blog at the bottom of this article!
Take a moment and think about your days in high school … when every so often, to everyone’s dismay, your teacher would stop right in the middle of class and deliver a POP QUIZ! In spite of all the moans and groans, you held out hope you’d get a passing grade that would improve your overall grade in the class.Well, today, I have for you a Sales POP QUIZ that I’d like for you to take. I need for you to grab a pen or pencil and a sheet of paper. Understanding the results of this POP QUIZ could add hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars to your weekly and monthly income.
OK, ready for the POP QUIZ? Here it is.
Holy cow! Have you been watching the UPSETS in college football this year? Check this out . . .It all started with:
Appalachian State UPSETTING Michigan 34 – 32
Then . . . look what followed:
Stanford UPSETTING USC 24 – 23
Oregon State UPSETS California 31 – 28
Kentucky UPSETS LSU 43 – 37
Personally, I am amused as I sit back and watch all the hoopla created by the media and the pollsters as to the changing status of the #1 College Teams and all the “analysis” of why these NUMBER 1 teams are being upset at an unprecedented rate. Come on, how many times this season are we going to hear “Quite possibly the biggest UPSET of the year, if not in all of college football!”?
How did this all happen? I am NOT a sports expert by any means, but the simple truth is that this topsy-turvy college football season has been caused by BELIEF! Appalachian State is the modern day “Roger Banister” story. Roger Banister BELIEVED he could beat the 4-minute mile. He did! Appalachian State had the BELIEF they could beat Michigan. They did!
Look what happened when people started to BELIEVE. Three major – and I mean MAJOR – college football UPSETS after Appalachian State beats Michigan. After Bannister broke the 4-minute mile, over the next 12 months following his amazing feat, more than 30 people broke the 4-minute mile. In fact, by now over 20,000 people have done it, including many high school athletes.
‘Tis The Season To Be Sales Smart . . .
T.O.M.A. Principle:
“Start Counting the People Who Count Versus Counting The People You Reach!”
Every fall at this time of the year I get astonished looks from my audiences when I tell them to STOP sending holiday cards to their client’s. That’s right, STOP sending holiday cards. Instead, super charge your holiday sales and START sending very personalized holiday cards that utilize TOMA (Top Of Mind Awareness) principles that will get you noticed!
Think of it this way. As fall arrives, most (please note that I said MOST, not ALL) salespeople, companies, and entrepreneurs DREAD the thought of HAVING to send holiday cards to their clients or clientele. Those who dread this task are often consumed by the daily grind of business. They WILL not (or DO not) want to take the necessary time it requires to really supercharge their Holiday Touches. Yet, you can implement some simple and practical ideas, starting today, so you can have the best holiday season ever.
But before we begin supercharging our Holiday Touches, let’s put some STOPS in place!
As we supercharge our Holiday Touches, I want to bring to your attention some major philosophies that I need you to understand and embrace.
First, understand the game you are in. When sending holiday cards, you are up against the busiest time in the world for mail. The more holiday cards that are sent, the less effective they become. You, just like everybody else, are competing for your clients’ attention. If you want to win your clients’ attention, start sending them 4th of July cards (in July, of course!) instead.
I have always found communication between salespeople and their clients very interesting. I usually refer to it as Humanities 101, where we get to witness first hand why, very often, salespeople dig themselves into a hole: Too much talking, not enough listening, not adjusting the sales presentation to the personality style of the client, and hundreds of other sales violations that occur hourly.
The good news is that every salesperson out there, with just a few good, new sales skills, can change their sales revenue dramatically by using the “Top Secret Sales Question.”
Here it is:
Can you believe how simple that is? Four words. That’s correct, only four words. One of the most powerful questions a salesperson can have in their sales tools box. It is easy to ask the question, yet it is easy NOT to ask the question if you don’t incorporate it into your sales process and really understand the significance of it. Most importantly is the client’s response to it.
Marketing Co: 94.7% Sales Increase from 12 months of Business Consulting!
Now, please note E X A C T L Y how the Top Secret Sales Question reads. It doesn’t say “Tell me about your business” or “Tell me about you personally” or “Tell me about your company?” It simply says: TELL ME ABOUT YOU. Here is why you MUST ask the question exactly as I pose it to you. When you ask it in the way I am emphasizing, the question is neutral and open ended, meaning that it does not prompt your client as to how they respond to the question. By your not prompting your client within the confines of the question, it allows for a free flowing response from them.
Why should you ask this type of neutral question? The biggest and most significant reason is that through the client’s spontaneous response, two very important insights will become obvious:
1. The Personality Style of the Client!
IE: Director, Socializer, Relater, Thinker
Knowing this allows you to structure your presentations so you can mold it around the personality style of your client. This brings you closer to CLOSING the deal!
One of my Top Ten “sales-systems” that I encourage all my personal sales coaching students to use as well as my sales management students is a specific Prospect Follow-Up Chart. I have found through my sales travels that most sales people and sales managers “lack” what I describe as precision-based selling, meaning that most do not have any set sales steps or “flow” to follow – especially as it directly relates to the necessary sales steps to take with a potential client.
Therefore, I will implement a Prospect Follow-Up Chart with the sales person or company based on their industry and sales procedures. I examine closely the product, company and their typical salesperson. Looking further, I place their typical client style under a microscope and apply closing principles to my thoughts and ideas. From churning all this information, I can put together a follow-up chart, that, when followed very closely, will assist sales people in tracking their specific sales steps with their clients. In all cases, the salesperson will always know what their next action item will be. Even more powerful is when the salesperson utilizes MS Outlook calendar to make sure all their follow-up steps are recorded and implemented with the client.
As many of you know, I encourage all salespeople to have a plethora of sales tools at their disposal. From structured sales infrastructures, to personal websites, Fast Facts Profiles©, Main Point Cards©, and using video e-mail, there is a broad range of tools to use in all phases of a sale process.
On my TOP TEN LIST of sales tools list, you would find the book titled “Words That Sell” on the top of that list. This book has four main functions that each and every salesperson can benefit from:
Words That Sell has received many accolades from various salespeople and organizations and Advertising Age summed it up with this comment: “You’ll wonder how you ever managed without it.” How true!
When I first found the book I was shocked at how much useful information was contained in it. I was so impressed I did two immediate things. One, I purchased books for my entire Sales Tools Development Team, including my staff writer, proofreader, graphics artist and webmaster. Secondly, I contacted all my current sales coaching and sales management students and encouraged them to make a small investment and purchase one. Hello . . . it is only a $12.00 investment at amazon.com!
Reviewing the chapters in the book will give you an immediate idea as to why this needs to be a book that should be within reach of your laptop at all times. Here they are:
Grabbers
Making The Reader Sit Up & Take Notice
Descriptions & Benefits
Conveying The Value of Your Product or Service
Clinchers
Closing Statements That Motivate Your Audience To Respond!
Special Strategies
Building or Bashing an Image, Selling Yourself, and More! Now, don’t let the fact that there are only four chapters in this book sway you away from investing in it. In fact, just look at the sub chapters found under Clinchers & Special Strategies:
As usual, IMPLEMENTATION is at the heart of all my trainings! Do yourself a favor, invest in the book, implement with some action and activity, and e-mail me with your progress and let me know how this book as a sales tool is helping you!
Need Sales Tools? Then check out www.cbsalestools.com
Questions and/or Comments?
Please respond to my blog at the bottom of this article!
One of the very best closing tools that you all have in your back pocket is the ability to REALLY listen to a client. That’s correct: Really listening to a client will move you closer to closing the deal.
Why? Actually the answer is very simple. When we REALLY listen to a client, when they FEEL they are being listened to, when their need to be HEARD is being fulfilled, they move towards gaining intimacy with their salesperson which in turn moves them closer to closing.
On a weekly basis, I get to sit “chair-side” with many of my clients when they are sales pitching, either on a live one on one appointment or live during a phone call. It is very powerful, as a sales coach, to be able to sit back, listen, watch and observe “humanities 101” in process, the exchange between a salesperson and a potential client.
Chuck’s Client Success Stories
Franchise Owner: 40% Revenue Increase from 12 months of Business Consulting!
It is amazing that something as simple as listening falls by the wayside and takes a back seat to the sales pitch. I am not talking about a back seat in the sedan; — I am talking about the back seat in a Boeing 747! We as salespeople have done this to ourselves. We are so engrossed in wanting to convince our clients, that in many cases we forget plain and simple mannerisms’. Typical things I see are unnecessary interruptions, speaking a mile a minute, fidgeting, no eye contact and other non-professional conduct.
A survey was conducted many years ago that showed us in a typical sales conversation of 100 words – We stop listening to the other person by the 7th word spoken and by the 10th word we have already formulated our answer. The survey went on to say that from the 10th word to the 100th word spoken by a client, the salesperson would “check out” of the conversation and for the most part ignore the last 90 words that a client would speak. Talk about a disconnect of the human spirit! Salespeople do it to clients, parents do it to their children, and spouses do it to each other.
Each week I am in a sales office in Dallas, consulting and coaching to what I believe is one of the very best sales forces I’ve ever come across. Their sales process and product are the most difficult I have ever experienced, and, certainly because of that, they only have highly trained sales professionals working there.
One of their top producers uses visual impressions in his office. When walking down the hallway towards his office, the first thing you notice is a large poster on his door. As you move closer to the poster, you see his monetary goals, both weekly and monthly. These income goals are written with a large colorful ink pen so EVERYONE in and around the office knows what his specific weekly and monthly income goals are. Furthermore, he has his main sales efficiencies metrics posted – basically, how many client calls and appointments he must make daily to be successful.
"Chuck's help with both my personal and business lives has been and will continue to be invaluable. Thanks Chuck, as I have found your SalesMastery AND AttractionMastery courses very helpful."
Chris Logue
Logue Asset Management, Round Rock, TX
