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Why Salespeople Don’t Make More Sales
(and how to turn it around)
Warning! This isn’t about dumping on salespeople or blaming
them for failing to meet their “numbers.” If that’s
what you’re looking for, this won’t help you.
Understandably, the pressure to improve sales performance is very real
both for salespeople and sales managers. Reducing sales costs, while maintaining
proper customer service, is a continuing and challenging business exercise.
Certainly, finding ways to use the Internet to facilitate the sales process
is a priority. At the top of any list is what can be called sales communication,
the task of making it possible for salespeople to stay in close contact
with their customers so that no customer is left behind.
While corporate America has come up with the term “Relationship
Manager” to describe this experience, it’s possible that Customer
Manager is even more descriptive. Although it is less “touchy-feely,”
it suggests that the salesperson’s role is implementing a wide array
or constellation of tactics to grow a book of business.
For this to occur, it may be helpful for salespeople to reconfigure both
their thinking and their practices in specific ways:
1. Move away from “it’s up to me” to “it’s
up to us.” Closing the deal is the salesperson’s
symbol of success. It’s coming home with “the big one.”
It’s the measure of one’s sales prowess. “I’ll
take care of it myself; I don’t trust anyone else,” is the
mantra.
Team selling is an attempt to move from a “me” to more of
an “us” approach. While it’s certainly helpful, it seems
to miss the mark.
First American Insurance Underwriters, Inc., a life insurance and annuities
wholesale brokerage firm, sees the winning formula as a combination of
a salesperson’s in-depth experience and the company’s specialized
expertise, particularly when dealing with complex financial issues. One
is not more important than the other; it takes both.
In other words, the myth of the salesperson as lone hunter is gone, even
though many have difficulty putting it out of their minds.
2. Become an extension of the customer. The Internet
is having a formidable impact on sales and not only as a distribution
channel. BI (Before Internet), the “bond” between salesperson
and customer was primarily a “relationship,” a quality that
most salespeople continue to believe is totally crucial to their success
and something the company they work for should treat with the utmost respect.
In other words, any and all dealings with the customer must go through
the salesperson.
With the advent of the Internet, that not only changed; it ended. A decade
ago, those salespeople made it clear their customers wanted to “talk
to a live person.” Those words aren’t heard much today. Because
buyers have learned they can depend on the Internet to perform up to our
expectations, they use it as an actual extension of themselves. The fading
of “paper back-up” is just one indication of this trust.
What does this mean in terms of the salesperson’s “relationship”
with customers? More and more customers may be measuring a salesperson’s
value against their online experience. This means they expect the salesperson
to serve as an extension of themselves.
And then this poses an interesting question: Are men or women best prepared
to meet this challenge? Ramon Avila, the George and Frances Ball Distinguished
Professor of Marketing at Ball State University in Indiana, indicates
that the scales may be weighted toward women. "In sales, you have
to be really people oriented," he states. "You have to listen
and understand the client's wants and needs. If you can empathize with
what they are going through, you are going to do well in sales. Women
are generally better at that than most men."
The salesperson’s value is in being an extension of the customer.
3. Move beyond product knowledge. Again, before the Internet
and, more particularly before Google, salespeople were the primary source
of product knowledge. They were necessary because they held the keys in
their hands. Finding the right information is only nanoseconds away today.
Equally important is the fact that software is simplifying all types of
products. On a recent evening, only one person showed up at an Apple store
for a class on using the iPhone! More and more products are becoming intuitive.
What customers need––whether b2c or b2b––is how
to maximize the benefits of what they buy––what can they do
with it that will improve their lives, make them more successful or increase
their income. Where salespeople generally stopped in the past is just
the beginning today.
4. Never dispose of prospective customers. “When
you conclude that you don’t want to spend more time working on a
prospect, what do you do with the information?” was the question
the marketing consultant asked the salesperson. “I keep the information
on file. I have to move on,” was the answer. Most salespeople can
relate to that scenario.
Although there are prospects that never become customers, there are others
who will. The salesman was clearly surprised to hear from me. “It’s
been several years since we talked,” he commented when calling back.
“Well, you kept in touch and the time came when we can use your
help,” I responded.
We never want to make a mistake when a buying decision needs to be made,
so we tend to rely on resources we already feel comfortable with instead
of venturing into uncharted waters. Ironically, these can often be the
easiest sales: the customer is ready to buy and price can become quite
secondary.
What’s so interesting about these situations is how pleased––even
excited––these late blooming prospects are to be placing an
order. It’s almost as if they are finally repaying an overdue debt
for the time and effort that had been invested in them.
5. Become marketing-driven. It may seem that the words
“marketing-driven” and “salesperson” are incompatible.
What has someone in sales to do with marketing?
The answer is found in what is happening in sales. Every salesperson is
expected to accomplish more today and that’s a trend that will undoubtedly
continue to accelerate, particularly as competition continues to intensify.
Few salespeople are able to manage successfully their book of business–unless
they become marketers. Many are being handed larger territories, while
others are having the size of their territories reduced. Still others
are being given additional lines of business. Inevitably, the strategy
is to focus on the biggest customers and the best prospects and to neglect
the rest.
When asked about this situation, the response is almost always, “I’ve
just been so busy, I haven’t had time to get to them.” Unfortunately,
this is becoming an untenable answer.
The goal of the marketing-driven salesperson is not to meet with or even
to speak with every possible prospect or customer. Some require regular
direct contact, either by phone or in person. The majority, however, can
be “touched,” at least monthly, with email bulletins that
offer new ideas, concepts and solutions (not just more product information)
and that encourage recipients to respond.
The goal of this marketing strategy is three-fold: 1) to demonstrate that
the salesperson is a valuable resource; 2) to give the recipient the opportunity
to respond immediately; 3) to create a stream of sales over time. While
you are working on immediate sales and leads, the marketing effort is
working in the background. In effect, a marketing-driven approach is not
simply to “get the message out,” but, more importantly, to
constantly connect with both customers and prospects in a way that helps
them recognize the salesperson’s value.
It may be noticeable that nothing has been said about “sales techniques,”
a subject for which there are literally tens of thousands of websites,
which hold out the illusive allure of instant success.
Will Pike, the hero of William Martin’s historical novel, The
Lost Constitution, could have been speaking to salespeople when he
talked to his family about their lives and their Massachusetts mill: "We
might be dreamers, but we have to be doers, too. So we get up in the morning,
we go to work, and we solve our problems."
In the final analysis, it’s the doing that makes the difference
in sales.
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John R. Graham is president of Graham Communications,
a marketing services and sales consulting firm. He is the author
of The New Magnet Marketing and Break the Rules Selling, writes
for a variety of business publications, and speaks on business,
marketing and sales topics for company and association meetings.
He is the winner of an APEX Grand Award in writing and the only
two-time recipient of the Door & Hardware Institute’s
Ryan Award in Business Writing. He can be contacted at 40 Oval Road,
Quincy, MA 02170 (617-328-0069; fax 617-471-1504); j_graham@grahamcomm.com.
The company's web site is grahamcomm.com. |
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