The One Piece of Sales Advice To Be Successful In Selling

Those new to sales are often overwhelmed with advice from senior sales reps, sales managers, websites, blogs and from conferences and sales training events. Each of these sources of information is eager to provide a new sales professional with a “proven method” or the “sure formula” for sales success. This information overload is sometimes overwhelming and must be sifted through in order to determine what works best for you as an individual.

In fact, there are a lot of different elements that have to be in place to be a successful sales person. There needs to be a structured approach to the sale, research, and preparation on the company and the buyer, a good understanding of the product or service as well as the ability to close the deal.

However, and here is the foundation for every successful sales person, no matter how disciplined you are at applying a method, how polished the presentation may be or how effectively you can detail the benefits and features of your product, nothing matters if you cannot connect with the customer.

Communication and Connection

Every successful sales professional is an expert in communication and connection with his or her clients. This skill is part natural ability to build rapport quickly and easily combined with learning about the most effective ways to communicate with different people.

Having the ability to engage a client in a conversation creates an instant sense of friendship, camaraderie and interpersonal connectivity. Connecting well with your clients builds long-lasting connections and recommendations. This comes from being able to tease out interests, passions, and information about the buyer and the company and then build on these to find areas of concern for the buyer that your product creates an answer.

Effective communication is not just about being friendly or being seen as a trusted resource; it is about knowing how to communicate with an individual in a way that meets their needs. Learning as much as you can about building rapport and developing effective communication skills will be the key to success in your sales career. This bit of sales advice will help you succeed in your sales endeavours, always communicate, collaborate, and connect!

 

Related Article: The Power of Positive Sales Habits

 

At The Sales Coaching Institute, we offer training for sales representatives and sales managers that are tailored to your sales needs. To find out more, see us online at salescoach.us.

Commissions, Bonuses & Incentives

 

The field of sales can be a very lucrative venture for anyone willing to invest the time and effort required to make their sales numbers. Sales puts you in charge of your financial future and can give you a lifelong career that will be satisfying and provide you with financial freedom. It’s no secret that you have to sell in order to make money and be successful. The more you sell the more you will make and vise Versa. The amount of work that you dedicate towards making sales will improve your numbers in commissions, incentives, and bonuses.

 

Making a Commission

Most sales jobs are based on commission. A commission means that for every product you sell you will receive a percentage of the profit. If you sell a 150-dollar vacuum cleaner and your commission on that product is 5 percent you will have 7.50 added to your paycheck every time you sell one. This may not sound like much, but if you make 9.00 per hour and work full time this can add up. If you sold 60 vacuum cleaners in the pay period and worked 40 hours you would make 450 in commission and 360 in base pay bringing your gross total to 810 every week. Not too shabby for selling 30 vacuums a week. Another example could be basic commission for a car salesman. He makes 11.00 per hour and makes a commission of 100 for every compact car, 150 for every sedan, 200 for every truck and 250 for every SUV. This week the salesman worked 40 hours and sold 3 compact cars 2 sedans a truck and 2 SUVs. At the end of the week he made 440 in base pay plus 750 in commission bringing his gross total for the week to 1190 dollars. The more you sell the more you make.

 

Bonuses and Incentives

Most companies offer their sales reps bonuses and incentives to keep them motivated and excited about selling for the company. An example of a basic incentive would be every time you sell 100 products you get an extra 100 dollars on your paycheck. Or when you reach 500 products sold you get a 200 gift card to your favorite retailer. These incentives give the sales rep a goal to achieve and something to look forward to for all the hard work they put in. A bonus is similar to an incentive, but it is usually given after a predetermined amount of time. For example, every quarter your company might reward the top 5 sales reps with 500 dollars’ cash. This money is a bonus on top of all the incentives the top 5 sales rep may have already received. Once again the more you sell the more you make. You get out of selling what you put into it. You are in control of how much money you get on your paycheck. If you sell very little your paycheck would be relatively smaller than if you sold more.

So, in selling you don’t get what you deserve, you get what you sell!

When it comes to sales there are three sales soul searching questions you can ask yourself to stay focused and be the most effective sales person possible.

 

Is This Product Something I believe in?

If you are trying to sell a product you wouldn’t even buy yourself chances are you are not selling it well. You may believe that a good salesperson can sell ice to an Eskimo, but it wouldn’t be without a clear conscience and often not for repeat business. It all depends on what you sell and how you sell it. If you can’t convince yourself it is a good product, you will never be able to convince some else no matter how charming you think you are. You may have started out with passion but the same old thing day after day is getting you down. Look inside yourself to find that drive and passion again. Remind yourself of the positive outcome that comes with accomplishing your goal. Look back at what you were doing differently when you had drive and vigor and pull it out again. This will reflect in every sales meeting. With passion and drive you can sell almost anything because you believe in yourself and want to convince people they can’t live without the product that means so much to you.

Can I sincerely say I respect the people I work with?

Look around and watch what is going on. Truth be told most people don’t have to do this. They already know what is going on around them. What you need to ask yourself is: are you okay with it? Whether you have people who are constantly passing the buck, or clients who are trying to get away with murder with unreasonable demands, you will eventually have a moment when you have to decide if you can continue working with these people or not. If you are starting to feel like a doormat, are always biting your tongue when you are speaking with your boss and in general don’t enjoy the company of the team around you it will be impossible for you to be an effective sales professional.

Do I care about my clients?

The last question to ask yourself is if you still care about your clients. If you don’t they’ll know it and it will reflect in your sales. Find a way to get back to your clients roots or find your way to the door.

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If your sales team needs to ask some hard and fast soul searching questions motivational keynote speaker and sales expert Doug Dvorak can help. Visit http://dougdvorak.com/contactus.asp for information.

When it comes to motivation, many of us have it, but there are some of us that do not. Let’s explore exactly what motivation is. Motivation is a strength that induces us to take action on things that we want to accomplish. For every situation there is a different motivator that may cause us to take action and accomplish a goal or succeed in an endeavor.

Generally, there are six different types of motivation fit for six different situations that people experience, they are; Incentive, Fear, Achievement, Growth, Power and Social.

• Incentive motivation is a form of motivation in which you are seeking a reward.
• Fear motivation is a type of motivation that is associated with consequences.
• Achievement is a type of motivation in which you become determined to be as competent as you can.
• Growth motivation deters you from becoming comfortable and being stagnant in life, but allows you to always look for ways to change internally and externally to better yourself and your situation.
• Power is a type of motivation in which one desire to control more aspects of their own lives as well as other peoples lives.
• Social motivation is a type of motivation that a person gains when they feel the need to be accepted by others, generally a specific group. Now that we know a little bit about the six types of motivation, let’s look at the key to keeping your team ambitious and successful.

Motivation is a key factor to being successful in sales. The motivations that most sales teams possess are incentive and achievement, but those motivations often disappear throughout one’s career if a person is not reaching his or her goals. A salesperson needs something else. If you are the head of the sales department you should find ways to keep your team engage, determined, ambitious and successful too.

The key to keeping your team ambitious and successful is to encourage them constantly and consistently; if you find that hard to do because some people are simply not motivated, setting up quarterly seminars and having a motivational speaker come and talk to them is a great first step to keeping them ambitious and successful. You can even hire a very funny keynote speaker that could “break the ice”, and encourage your team in a very fun and entertaining way to meet daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly quotas. Providing incentives on top of this, whether it is compensation, time off or another reward, will give a boost to each individual’s efforts that are motivated by incentives. The professional motivational speaker hired to stimulate your sales force will also increase their self-esteem, social recognition, and overall the individual’s potential as a whole.

Most people that are in management positions are seeking the motivations of growth, power, and social recognition. As managers, in order to obtain growth, power, and social recognition, you must first possess the motivation to encourage your employees. Your employees will be your ticket to growing higher within the company, giving you the sensation of controlling a specific team within the company, and even giving you that social recognition that you are striving to obtain amongst your peers. Motivating and uplifting your sales force will stimulate productivity and quality work. Another key to success as a manager is to make sure that the employees are being treated fairly and equally. By doing this, you and your team will remain ambitious and successful, because your team will be comfortable and will be consistently looking for more incentives once they have experienced their first incentives (most likely a big juicy commission check).

As leaders, the motivation that you are seeking is primarily social. How you are perceived in the eyes of the public will be a reflection of how your employees perceive you in the workplace. As a leader, the key to keeping your team ambitious and successful will be to lead with integrity, this will automatically motivate your team by giving them a sense of belonging, trust, and pride while working with your organization. Making sure that every member of the team is performing well will ensure successful results in the working environment. Another key to building an ambitious and successful team is to make sure you are an excellent communicator, and especially a great listener. With good communication skills you will possess the motivational power to influence others. By showing your organization that you care, whether it’s through a mentorship program, encouraging them, or allowing them to be a partner in the organization, your organization/company will not fall short of success.

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Related Article: Motivating Factors: How To Create A More Effective Team