---

Guest post by: Dave Kurlan Become an Author

Tweet

---

---

Dave Kurlan is a top-rated speaker, best-selling author, sales thought leader and highly regarded sales development expert.

I was working with a client's sales team yesterday and one salesperson shared that he had given up his "hopium" addiction. Hopium?

It's a new term - I couldn't find any documented use of the word prior to 2008 and most references are from the past couple of months. It's in the urban dictionary but not the traditional dictionary. Hopium is defined as a combination of Hope and Optimism. Okay, that makes sense.

But the salesperson who used it didn't mean he had given up his addiction to hope and optimism. He meant to say that he had given up his addiction to Happy Ears.

I've written four prior articles about Happy Ears.

Happy Ears - 2nd of the 10 Competenciethat are Key to Building a Sales Culture

5 Steps to Coaching Your Salespeople Beyond Happy Ears

When Agreement is Really Disagreement - Happy Ears for Salespeople

Happy Ears or an Empty Pipeline?

Your salespeople must have aformal, structured sales processthat they follow religiously so that they know exactly where they are and what they must accomplish next.

They must master the more challenging competency of advancedlistening and questioning skills-required for selling consultatively and achieving trusted advisor status.

They must be able to identify a prospect/customer's compelling reason(s) to buy from them.

Prospects have little incentive to answer qualifying questions and continue a discussion with a salespersonif they lack a compelling reason to buy from them. Salespeople intuitively know this and when unable to identify a compelling reason to buy, quickly skip ahead to the presentation. When prospects react positively to the presentation or demo, happy ears kick in. They like it. They're interested. It's cool. They could use it. Salespeople hear what they were hoping to hear and then make the mistake of drawing conclusions like, "Good opportunity for this quarter." "Qualified". "Closable". And then they chase.

The antidote to happy ears is to develop the ability to ask the questions that most salespeople are afraid of. One example is, "You already have a relationship with XYZ, so why would you leave them to work with us?" That's a scary question if you haven't identified their compelling reason to buy from you but if you know the answer, the question is powerful.

Hopium. The salesperson was able to give up his hopium addiction - addiction to hoping he would get the business - because he can now ask all of the tough questions that didn't occur to him or scared him before. Why was he scared? Lack of sales process didn't make it apparent that he was in a bad neighborhood. Lack of methodology meant that he was not taking a consultative approach. Lack ofconsultative selling skillsmeant that he didn't have the listening and questioning skills needed to ask the tough questions. Now he knows exactly where he stands, how it's really going, and whether he will close an opportunity - or not!

Do your salespeople have a hopium addiction?

Related Articles

  How Many Salespeople Shouldn't Be in Sales
  The CEO Who Needed to Hire Salespeople
  Manage Your Salespeople by Working Smart, More Stack Rankings
  Everyone has a plan. Some plans are better than others because they contain all or most of the necessary steps and sequence them in an appropriate order. Most plans have gaps where steps should be and the sequence doesn't lend itself to success. One area where we see this occur repeatedly is when companies are about to hire a Sales VP or Director AND
  Your Salespeople Can't Even Do That?
  New Metrics for the Sales Force - Unusual Thoughts for Unusual Times
  Happy Ears or an Empty Pipeline?
  The Pros and Cons of Hiring Green Salespeople
  Stress-Free Selling® - Close Three Times Faster
  Right Salespeople in the Right Roles and the Right Seats
  Top 10 Reasons Why Salespeople Let Price Drive the Sale
  Salesperson Wimp-Out: Cutting the Price
  The Sales Force with Over Achievers Who Don't
  What Have Your Salespeople Been Listening To?
  Half of All Sales Managers Should Consider...
  More Than Half of All Sales Managers Should Consider...
  Manage Salespeople One at a Time
  Why Salespeople Have Trouble Closing
  How to Ramp-Up New Salespeople in 90 Days
  Beating The 80/20 Rule

Related Forum Posts

Share this article. Fund someone's dream.

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

Rewards and Recognitions to Motivate Employees

Site Speed

Five Positive Traits to Enhance Flexibility

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.