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Don't lose your customers (but if you have to... do so gracefully!)

Nobody wants to lose a customer but it happens. For one reason or another customers choose to go somewhere else to do business. If we treat our customers properly we won't lose many. Sure some will leave for a cheaper product or service but you get what you pay for. Sometimes a customer leaving is just not within our control.

Here are some things that are in your control:

Great customer service
Consistent follow up
Fast response to problems or issues
Great products and services
Excellent relationship building

Sometimes even doing all of that is not enough to keep a customer. When a customer leaves your business for another you have to handle it with grace. Although it is disappointing to lose a customer it is very important to preserve the relationship. Chances are, if you have done all of the right things, they will come back. Burning a bridge not only ensures your customer won't come back but they'll tell everyone else not to. We have all been hot under the collar about a customer leaving or losing a deal but it is not worth ending a relationship on a bad note for. Sales is as much about integrity and understanding as it is about making money.

Maintain high standards and hold to a good value system and you will win more than you lose!

Good Selling,

Eric

Quote of the day (March 30, 2007)

Entrepreneurs are simply those who understand that there is little difference between obstacle and opportunity and are able to turn both to their advantage.

- Victor Kiam

Quote of the day (March 28th, 2007)

No sale is really complete until the product is worn out, and the customer is satisfied.

- L.L. Bean American Businessman, Founder of L.L Bean's

The Road To Burnout (Five reasons for sales burnout)

There is a high rate of burnout in sales. It happens for different reasons. Some are avoidable and some are not. Here are five reasons why burnout occurs in sales people...

1. Too much pressure put on sales reps

- Sales managers often take the joy out of sales by putting unnecessary pressure on their people. It is normal to have pressure in sales but too much will eventually breed resentment toward sales.

2. Not suited for sales

- Just because someone is good at sales does not mean they enjoy it. Many sales people are just in the wrong profession. Doing something that you dislike (even with success) everyday will inevitably lead to burnout.

3. Lack of recognition

- Most (if not all) sales people need or want to be recognized for their success'. They feel energized by getting a sale and being acknowledged for it. While being rewarded financially is great, being recognized for a good achievement can mean even more.

4. Stagnancy

- Selling the same thing over and over again without any change in product or responsibility can lead to burnout. Sales people in general, like to be challenged. Doing exactly the same thing everyday can strip motivation away.

5. No creative freedom

- Every Sales person has a different style of selling. We are all unique and our sales styles reflect that. Being boxed into someone else's idea of the "right way to sell" will take the enjoyment out of sales for them. Being restricted means eventual resentment.

Thankfully, four out of five of these causes of burnout can be avoided. Sales managers need to always be aware of these catalysts for burnout. It will keep your sales reps happy and producing.

Good Selling,

Eric

Quote of the day (May 25th, 2007)

Show class, have pride, and display character. If you do, winning takes care of itself.

-Paul Bryant

Quote of the day (May 24, 2007)

Whether you think that you can, or that you can't, you are usually right.

- Henry Ford

Don't Sell and Run

One of the most important steps in a sales cycle comes after the sale is completed. Following up on your customers after the sale will ensure the long term success of your sales career. The vast majority of salespeople out there don't even look in their rear view mirror after making a sale. They just move on to the next victim... I mean customer. When you don't care about your post sale responsibilities, customers can feel like victims of a hit and run. The worst part is that most sales people don't realize the customer feels that way. They walk into the same account four years later expecting to get the next sale and the customer has moved on. People like follow up. They like to know that the sales person actually cares about the post sale relationship.

Many sales people put everything into building the relationship and getting the sale but once it's over it's over. It is like building a friendship in order to get something from someone and then walking away. It may not seem that way to the average sales person but it does to the average customer. Continuing relationships means life long customers. Even when a sales person switches jobs. If a great relationship has been built it can span your whole sales career no matter what you are selling at the time.

A great example (real life experience) comes from a local nursing home in New Brunswick. The executive director at the nursing home has used many of the same sales people over her 30 year career and those sales people have changed companies a number of times over that period. The loyalty the buyer feels toward those sales people comes from great follow up and well developed relationships.

Sales is about cultivating relationships as much as it is about making the sale. Repeat business and referral business are keys to long term sales consistency and those things do not happen without proper post sale care. Take time to follow up. It will vastly increase your customer loyalty and your bottom line.

Good Selling,

Eric

Quote of the day (May 23rd, 2007)

Our greatest glory consists not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.

- Confucius

Quote of the day (May 22, 2007)

One of the greatest discoveries a man makes, one of his great surprises, is to find he can do what he was afraid he couldn't do.

-Henry Ford

Defeated before you start

Sales is a hard fought profession. It is a competitive and sometimes dog eat dog world. There are many obstacles to tackle and many objections to overcome. So don't make it any harder on yourself. A lot of us make it harder on ourselves because we assume too many things about our sales cycle or our customer. We tell ourselves things like: "They will never pay that much for this solution." "They don't need this feature so I won't bring it up." or "This company probably isn't going to see the value in my product or service." You are defeated before you make the call. You can't expect your customer to buy into what you are selling them if you don't believe in the product or service yourself. Customers do not buy from people who do not believe in themselves or the product or services they represent. Our confidence is one of our biggest selling tools. We are fooling ourselves if we think our customers can't tell when we are not confident in what we are selling.

It is imperative that we do not defeat ourselves before we ever pick up the phone or walk into a customers office. Assuming that the customer does not need what you have is like kryptonite for you sales call. If you already believe there is no sale to be had then that is what will happen. It becomes a self fullfilling prophecy. You have to walk into every potential sale as if it is full of opportunity and assume that your product or service is just what the customer needs. If you want to survive in sales, believe that your customers want to hear what you have to say and believe that what you have to say is important.

Good Selling,

Eric.

Quote of the day (May 21, 2007)

"Lack of will power has caused more failure than lack of intelligence or ability."

-Flower A. Newhouse

Importance of sales people.... GOOD sales people

We should all know sales is the lifeblood of most any organization. I know it is in my business. A solid sales force, whether outsourced or in house, can put an organization on the map. It can exponentially grow revenue and cement a business' success. I came across these facts/statements on http://www.bizcommunity.com/ and wanted to share them. Take a look...

- Harvard research shows that, across a range of industries, there is a direct and consistent correlation between the calibre of the sales force and organisational growth.

- A world class sales benchmarking study reveals that the calibre of the salesperson, in the B2B environment, is the most important factor influencing customers’ decisions to buy.

- In many sales forces, 20% of the sales force deliver 80% of the revenues. This means that hiring talented salespeople is essentially a random event. Tossing a coin would be as effective.

- 64% of salespeople who fail, do so because they are in the wrong job, not because they cannot sell.

- Top sales producers outperform average producers by two to one and outperform low producers by 10 to one.

- Caliper Corporation reports that 55% of people making their living in sales should be doing something else.

- Sales is a talent-based profession and training can only improve this by 20%. So a 5% can become a 6%, but an 80% can become a 96%.

- Replacing your bottom 20% of salespeople with only average performers would improve sales productivity by nearly 20%.

- Over 50% of sales managers are too busy to train and develop their sales teams.

(This information was sourced from http://www.bizcommunity.com/ )

Choosing the right sales people or sales organization can make or brake your business. Personality profiling can go a long way in helping you not only choose the right sales person but also help you work with and coach the ones you already have. A great contact for this is Marylin Singh ( msingh@profilesglobal.com ).

Good Selling,

Eric.

Quote of the day

The true measure of "mental fitness" is how optimistic you are about yourself and your life.

- Brian Tracy

The Rut

After 11 years in sales I can say that I have encountered my fair share of ruts. Many times we don't realize we are in a rut until long after we've been in one. I can guarantee I am not the only one! Sales people are prone to ruts. In fact, if you claim you've never been in one you're probably doing a really good job fooling yourself. Ruts range from a small impact on your numbers (when caught quickly) to near catastrophic impact if left to run their course. The faster we realize we are in a rut the more likely we will be to survive unscathed.

There are only subtle signs of a rut at first. Your sales calls become robotic, you say the same thing you always said that got you sales in the past but with no passion behind it. Day to day execution of your customer interactions lack fervor and poise. You lose the joy in your experiences as a sales person. Sales start to dip down.

The longer you stay in that stagnant pattern the more your everyday performance drops. If you are lucky enough to realize what is happening at this point you can make a change. If you do not see the early signs then you start to see a significant drop in performance. The most common comment by sales people at this point is... "I'm doing the same what I always did" "This always worked before" When you hear yourself saying this, the first thing you need to do is examine just how much heart you are putting into every customer interaction. More often than not we realize that we have let ourselves become complacent about our customer relationships and salesmanship.

The best way to get out of a slump is to force yourself out of your comfort zone. Shock your system with something new. Either a new approach or travel along with (or listen along) with a sales person you know that is really enjoying their sales experience (They will need the same from you at some point I'm sure.). Look for new ways to renew your passion for sales and for the product or service you represent. Try competing with a fellow sales person or challenge yourself to hit new goals. There is always something new that will renew your spirits.

Better than getting out of a slump is avoiding them all together. Much easier said then done I know. Avoiding a slump is much the same as keeping a marriage fresh. Try new things (stay with me now), keep challenging yourself everyday, focus on personal goals that will only be achieved by reaching new sales heights and be keenly aware of each sales call so as to not let complacency creep in.

Good Selling,

Eric

It's not the size that matters....

Companies big and small make buying decisions everyday. Obviously the big ones usually make bigger purchases than the small ones. To the everyday sales rep who wants to make commission, it would make sense to dream big and go for the big fish. Bigger sales mean bigger commission. However, Sales people can get too caught up in a big deal and forget about everything else. They are very susceptible to what I like to call... BIGDEALITIS (yes I know it's cheesy)... it is a nasty condition with terrible symptoms. Those symptoms include: loss of prospecting motivation, loss of focus on customers in the small to medium sized category, lack of follow up on some sales cycles and an inability to focus on anything other than the one big deal.

We get our hands on the whale and don't realize how many fish we are missing in the meantime. We lose focus on everything but the big deal we are working on. Unfortunately, it is a very common theme with many sales people. Even if the big deal is won, the sales person will have a tremendous amount of work ahead of them to build their prospect base up for the next month or quarter. For everything that was gained in getting the big deal, there may be as much lost in the process.

In most cases, the other prospects that the sales person was working on before they started working the big deal are either gone or put off by the lack of contact. It can take a lot of time to rebuild the sales cycles that were already on the go. This creates even more problems because there is no time to build new prospects... All in all the sales person will be lucky to break even after winning the big deal.

What if the big deal is lost? Well, the sales person is in a world of hurt. They have lost some of the old sales cycles, have to massage the rest of them back to life and have to find a way to build new prospects at the same time. All the while having to recover from losing the only deal they paid attention to for the past who knows how long.

How do you avoid BIGDEALITIS. Stay focused on ALL of your sales cycles no matter how big or small they are. Always treat every prospect the same way. They are all important. Every big company started small. Never stop prospecting. Prospecting is the life blood of a sales person. It is the only way to be consistent in sales. By keeping focus on ALL of your sales cycles and maintaining a good prospect base you will always have backup to cover any lost or slow sales cycles.

Sales Managers... Don't forget where you came from

Where do sales managers come from? They usually come from good sales people who were promoted to the "next level". You would think that these sales people would become great managers because they have done the job before. They know how things work and what it really takes to be successful in sales. However, I have seen time and time again that great sales people that take on a management role forget where they came from. Sure, out of the gates they are fired up and want to finally do things the way they should be done. After a while, though, they conform to the same management practices that they found counter-productive as a sales person. Now, the sales people under them are complaining about them. They are complaining because their manager has completely forgotten where they came from.

Sales people deserve a lot of credit because, in many cases, they are selling in spite of bad management practices and objectives. Many management practices inadvertently put their sales people in boxes. They take away their creative licence and force them into a sales methodology that has been put in place by number crunchers who only look at 1 + 2=3. Just because your sales people average 50 calls per day and $40,000 per month in revenue does not mean that 100 calls per day is going to equal $80,000. Unfortunately, a lot of companies have a numbers only executive somewhere who is hammering our fresh faced, just out of sales, manager with this philosophy and after a while they too start to believe it.

Now I am not saying that productivity metrics are not important because they are. Productivity metrics are a solid way to measure whether someone is actually putting effort in when there are no sales on the board. These metrics are certainly going to come in to play but they should never be put into play when sales people are putting up great results. Metrics can stifle a sales person and make them lose that all important ability to manage their day in a way that is most productive for them.

Effective sales managers cultivate the specific strengths of their sales people and help them to enhance the areas that need work. Growing revenue comes from growing sales peoples confidence in their own ability to sell. Forcing them into a mold will only frustrate them and in the end they will just find a way to make it look like they are doing what you ask them to do. They will expend a lot of energy hiding the sales strategy they use from their manager because they know the only way they will be successful is if they follow what works for them. We should be allowing them the freedom to use their own selling style so they don't waste energy trying to cover it up. Set boundaries that reflect the core values of your company and selling ethics and as long as your sales people fall within those standards then let them sell away. One thing I can guarantee is that if you encourage your sales people to sell the way that works for them, you will have a happy and productive sales team.

Also, I believe all sales managers and business owners (myself included) should take a half day every week (no ifs ands or buts) to make sales calls so that we can remind ourselves of what it is to be a sales person. When your sales people see you on the phone or in an office making calls you will gain tremendous respect in their eyes.

In the end, we all need to remember what being a sales person was like and to not stray too far from that now that we are responsible for the management of others. If we stay true to that, we will have happier, more productive and more understood sales people. Sales people who will sell for you all day long because you show trust in them and in their own selling style!

Walk a mile in your customers shoes

What was your best experience with a sales person? Chances are it was not with a flashy presentation or an infomercial voice saying "Do I have a deal for you!" In my case it was with a sales representative that took the time to understand my requirements but also related to me from my side of the fence. What I mean by that is that this person identified with me as if they were the customer buying the product. They treated me the way they wanted to be treated by a sales person. What a novel idea!?!

With the barrage of sales strategies and methodologies out there today, it is easy to forget that the best sales training we can give ourselves is from us. Right in front of our noses! Every experience we have with buying something is another piece of the sales puzzle. How do you like to buy? What did you like about the sales approach that was taken with you? What did you hate about the approach taken with you? Now for the scariest question of all... what did you hate about the approach taken with you that you also do to your customers? Sometimes we get wrapped up in sales tactics that seem really good that we never ask ourselves whether we would buy from someone using those same tactics.

Walk a mile in your customers shoes by taking a trip down memory lane and remember your best and worst sales experiences. We all buy from someone and we all know who we would go back to and who we wouldn't. Don't get so wrapped up in the latest sales methodology that you forget your own experiences!

Every sale is a good sale... right??

What makes a sale a good one? Is it how much profit? How about the length of contract? Maybe it's how many units of something were sold... Everyone has their own criteria for what makes a sale great. Each sale we make adds to our bottom line. It feeds our business and helps us succeed. We need sales to survive. So, I guess it would be fair to say every sale is a good sale... right? No. The trouble is that we focus so much on our revenue that we forget our customers in the process. Our sales people are so focused on making their budgets that they are cramming sales in to meet target. We are in some cases shoving square pegs into round holes.

We can't be in such a rush to make sales that we neglect to do our homework on our customers. We need to understand what they need in order to generate a good sale. Good sales come from proper needs assessment, proper treatment of the customer and the ability to sell yourself as well as the product. Bad sales (yes they do exist) consist of poor assessment of the customers needs. They won't come back to you when you sold them the wrong solution. Congratulations... you are now a one hit wonder! The same goes for the sales person that pressures a customer into a sale... All the customer will remember is how much they disliked the sales process. Sales managers and business owners can be as much at fault for this as the sales people themselves. We as managers can put so much pressure on our sales people that they make decisions that they would not normally make. The will push too hard or sell the wrong product just because they need to get it in for the month.

There are more bad sales out there. Sales that at first glance look great. They are the sales that could have been so much more. When a proper assessment is not done we miss things. Things that could have brought more value to the customer and more money in our pockets. When we don't do our homework we are doing ourselves and the customer a great disservice. With a proper assessment of the customers needs we can find more places for our products and services. Maximizing revenue while enhancing the customer experience.

We won't differentiate ourselves unless we make sure our sales are all "good sales". This is what separates the flash in the pan business or sales person from the businesses and sales people who stand the test of time. At the end of the day, our customers have to be happy and we cannot have left anything on the table.

There is nothing wrong with a good old fashioned cold call...

How many times over the last few years have you heard things like "no more cold calls" or "cold calling is a waste of time" or my personal favorite "cold calling is obsolete". I have never heard anything more absurd! The last time I checked, not many of us need to hire new staff to handle a massive influx of customers wanting to buy our product without making a single sales call. We are all too often sucked into this "get new customers without lifting a finger" gimmick. I am sure that some of the tactics presented by the "no more cold calling" supporters work to some extent. Having said that, I would challenge any of them to face off against a good sales rep making cold calls. I know who would be left standing.

The benefit to a great cold calling effort is most obviously, revenue but let's look at some of the forgotten benefits... Increased brand recognition, great company exposure and residual income. Residual income??? Yeah, customers that have had a positive experience with you on the phone will remember you first when they need something. You may be thinking... "how is this a positive experience? Nobody likes getting sales calls..." Well, you're right and you're not. Nobody likes to get a scripted, robotic sales call. Nobody likes to get a product shoved down their throat. What people do like is someone genuinely interested in their business and their needs. Building relationships with your customers instead of trying to find new ways to avoid them.

We all know making sales calls is the best way to help us win business, gain exposure and build relationships. So why don't we just suck it up and make the calls? Well, because most of us would rather spend time fiddling with these fly by night strategies that produce far lower results. Let's get back to calling our potential customers instead of crossing our fingers and hoping they call us....

Numbers game or not?

Auto Dialler's, burnout and quantity versus quality... Sales has become a numbers game because someone told us it was. This is not to say that making a hundred calls in a day is not going to yield any results because it will. The problem is that at the end of the day you have left a bad taste in several potential customers mouths. You have also decided that you are going to have a ton of turnover because of burnout and probably did not take the time with the sales you did make to give them the right solution. Having said all that, you can't make sales without making calls or visiting customers.

So, how do you know how many sales calls to make in order to be successful you might ask. I have a better question. What do we need to do to be successful? First we need to be deprogrammed. Then we need to look within ourselves and figure out how we buy and how we like to be sold to. Why do we think sales is a numbers game when none of us want to be treated like a number? Sales is about relationship and we have all heard this before but not many of us really apply that to our strategies. What if our sales calls were approached as if we just really wanted to understand what is working and what isn't within our customers environment? What if we approached our sales calls without having a product or service solution already in mind without having yet talked to our customer?

Understanding customer requirements, building relationships and waiting to provide a solution until we truly understand the needs and wants of our customers is the mark of a true sales person. The numbers game is only for those who cannot sell.