A Magical Selling tale
A Magical Selling tale
Yet those tantalizing moments of achievement got me hooked on a lifetime quest to discover the key to guaranteed sales success. All my instincts told me that there had to be an easier way for people to sell more.
I heard this story once about a rich socialite in Paris who needed a hat urgently for an important occasion. Her Milliner arrived at her apartment and within twenty minutes had created an amazing headpiece from a single strand of ribbon. The socialite was enthralled and asked the Milliner his fee; the Milliner replied "1,000 francs". The socialite gasped, "That’s so much money for a piece of ribbon!" The Milliner unpinned the ribbon and handed it to her, "Madam the ribbon is free, it’s the ‘know how’ that you’re paying for."
Serendipity (or was it a thirst for know how?) brought me into contact with Vic Conant, President, Nightingale Conant, and together we undertook a careful study with over 2600 organisations, to identify why some organisations are able to attain sustainable sales growth while the majority struggle in the face of ferocious competition.
Fundamentally we were able to identify that there were 5 pitfalls that many organisations fell into, regardless of the market sector in which they operated and if these pitfalls were avoided then sales increased immediately. (I guess every fairytale has its own version of a wicked witch to fight, otherwise what satisfaction can you gain from a happy ending?)
Grab yourself a cup of coffee, take a deep breath and prepare yourself for some ‘insider knowledge’ that will send your sales spinning higher than you ever dreamed possible …as to the value of what you’re about to read, we’ll let you be the judge of that!
Pitfall No.1
A Poorly Defined Sales Process That Dilutes Sales Revenues
“Then I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow your house down!”
The Three Little Pigs
Far too often competent salespeople are counted upon to channel their own activities into the areas that will produce the biggest and quickest wins. But, left to their own devices, salespeople generally don’t develop and pursue a formal plan for moving a prospect interaction forward toward a sale. Instead, they end up ‘dancing around’ hoping they will get to their chosen point on the floor (the sale).
This is often fatal, because, as recent research from The Results Corporation Plc shows, the average prospect says "no" seven times before saying "yes" and over 80 percent of salespeople give up after the first "no." When their efforts don’t pay off quickly, even capable salespeople tend to get discouraged. They may spend longer hours struggling to meet their sales quotas, working less efficiently. The details of what goes wrong differ for each salesperson, but the net result is always the same: wasted time which fails to produce high quality sales and consequently, increased cost of sales.
For Sales Directors, this means developing a comprehensive, realistic and step-by-step outline of what salespeople are expected to do. It’s only when such an outline is in place that sales management is in a position to monitor the salesforce’s activity, progress and results. Only then is the stage set for transformational performance improvements.
Pitfall No.2
Lack of Essential Skills Which Leads to ‘Below Average’ Performance and Consequently ‘Below Average’ Sales Results
“Who’s been sitting in my chair – and broken it into pieces?”
Goldilocks and The Three Bears
During the 1970’s and ‘80’s, it was common for large corporations such as Hewlett Packard and IBM to put their new sales recruits through a 12–18 month training programme. Today, salespeople consider themselves ‘lucky’ if they get an initial two weeks of training. Yet sales targets haven’t plunged proportionately!
According to Pavita Walker, Director, Organisation and Leadership Development, Barclays Group, "The greatest differentiator amongst sales organisations of the future will be the ability to build world class capability and skills". Adds Giles Watkins, Global Competence and Learning Manager at Shell Lubricants, "Skills development is critical … once a salesperson is really fluent with what they do, they become more responsive to customers’ requirements."
So, what’s going on? How should a Sales Director reconcile the fact that many organisations today provide less upfront training for their sales staff than in years past with the increasing importance of staff development? The fact is that selling in today’s climate is a profession that demands a wide range of skills that require continual fine-tuning. According to Steven Reinemund, CEO PepsiCo Inc. "To have growth in products you have to have growth in people". Yet training alone does not guarantee peak sales performance. This can only come from ongoing coaching from sales managers and those organisations that have a strong coaching culture attract and retain the best salespeople.
Pitfall No.3
Failing to Focus Sales Representatives’ Activity Which Reduces Efficiency and Consequently Results
“Although he worked hard, times were bad and he became very poor”
The Elves and The Shoemaker
Maximising a workforce around one common goal that creates value for the customer, the organisation and the employee is the only way to focus the activities of a sales team. Time is a huge constraint on salespeople’s activities so that when their manager asks them for more, it’s no wonder that they buckle under the sheer weight of overwhelm! Frequently there are two main pitfalls that even experienced salespeople can fall into in terms of activities.
First, they simply aren’t doing enough and secondly, but equally important, salespeople often aren’t clear about how to identify the prospects most likely to have a genuine need for their product or service. Salespeople who lack a disciplined, future-oriented plan for generating new contacts and sales, often find themselves spending more time attending to ‘urgent’ activities rather than ‘important’ activities that will develop their business.
Pitfall No.4
Allowing Self-Limiting Beliefs to Constrain Salespeople’s’ Performance Which Causes a Reduction in Sales Results
“Why, I’m a swan!”
The Ugly Duckling
Like everyone, salespeople hold stubbornly to private beliefs about themselves and the people they work with…beliefs that can have an enormous impact, either positive or negative, on their sales performance. Yet while most Sales Directors grasp the concept of activity management, skills and knowledge development far too many feel powerless to help their salespeople turn their negative beliefs into positive ones. Those who do tackle beliefs and are able to change their representatives’ self-limiting beliefs into empowering ones have found an unbeatable path to success.
Pitfall No.5
Failing to Choose and Develop a Sales Leadership Team That Nurtures and Develops Their Sales Representatives’ Potential
“Immediately, the witch flew into a great rage and cut off Rapunzel’s hair”
Rapunzel
The single most common mistake that organisations make is promoting their number one sales representative into the role of sales manager, thereby depriving themselves in a single stroke of their best producer and hamstringing their salesforce with an ineffective manager. The skills required for managing, mentoring and developing sales teams are totally different from those for selling. As a result, it’s not uncommon to find newly promoted sales managers who regret having taken a management position and may even leave to get back into sales.
The majority of sales managers say they do not have sufficient time to train and develop their sales teams. They are so focused on sales results and so accustomed to achieving success through their personal pursuit that they overlook their greatest potential source of power: the power to increase sales performance by developing their people.
Even when they do recognise the importance of developing their representatives, many sales managers find that they lack the skills and resources to do it effectively. It then becomes easier ‘not to bother’. To make things worse, most sales teams consist of a number of individuals with differing levels of experience and ability, so the whole issue of team development becomes too daunting to contemplate. Giles Watkins, Global Competence and Learning Manager, Shell Lubricants believes that the best people to start developing are sales managers, their coaching then produces a multiplier effect.
A COMMITMENT TO EXCELLENCE
Organisations and salespeople who have one hundred percent commitment to doing whatever it takes to elevate their sales to a whole new level are the ones most likely to succeed. Trying to operate a sales organisation without total commitment is like trying to drive a car without fuel. Every organisation has the potential to harness the power of their salespeople just as surely as oxygen pumps life into the human body.
… For a moment the handsome Prince stood gazing at the beautiful golden – haired girl, wondering how he could break the spell. Stooping he kissed her; instantly Princess Aurora opened her blue eyes … they lived happily ever after and had many children, all who grew up to become successful sales representatives.
A Magical Selling tale - To learn more about this author, visit Nikki Owen's Website.
Like this article? Share it with your friends
As I began my career in sales, looking back I now realize that I was embarking on a rollercoaster ride; moments of exquisite exhilaration heightened by the fear of the unknown, then the sudden free-fall into the gloomy pits of failure.
Yet those tantalizing moments of achievement got me hooked on a lifetime quest to discover the key to guaranteed sales success. All my instincts told me that there had to be an easier way for people to sell more.
I heard this story once about a rich socialite in Paris who needed a hat urgently for an important occasion. Her Milliner arrived at her apartment and within twenty minutes had created an amazing headpiece from a single strand of ribbon. The socialite was enthralled and asked the Milliner his fee; the Milliner replied "1,000 francs". The socialite gasped, "That’s so much money for a piece of ribbon!" The Milliner unpinned the ribbon and handed it to her, "Madam the ribbon is free, it’s the ‘know how’ that you’re paying for."
Serendipity (or was it a thirst for know how?) brought me into contact with Vic Conant, President, Nightingale Conant, and together we undertook a careful study with over 2600 organisations, to identify why some organisations are able to attain sustainable sales growth while the majority struggle in the face of ferocious competition.
Fundamentally we were able to identify that there were 5 pitfalls that many organisations fell into, regardless of the market sector in which they operated and if these pitfalls were avoided then sales increased immediately. (I guess every fairytale has its own version of a wicked witch to fight, otherwise what satisfaction can you gain from a happy ending?)
Grab yourself a cup of coffee, take a deep breath and prepare yourself for some ‘insider knowledge’ that will send your sales spinning higher than you ever dreamed possible …as to the value of what you’re about to read, we’ll let you be the judge of that!
Pitfall No.1
A Poorly Defined Sales Process That Dilutes Sales Revenues
“Then I’ll huff and I’ll puff and I’ll blow your house down!”
The Three Little Pigs
Far too often competent salespeople are counted upon to channel their own activities into the areas that will produce the biggest and quickest wins. But, left to their own devices, salespeople generally don’t develop and pursue a formal plan for moving a prospect interaction forward toward a sale. Instead, they end up ‘dancing around’ hoping they will get to their chosen point on the floor (the sale).
This is often fatal, because, as recent research from The Results Corporation Plc shows, the average prospect says "no" seven times before saying "yes" and over 80 percent of salespeople give up after the first "no." When their efforts don’t pay off quickly, even capable salespeople tend to get discouraged. They may spend longer hours struggling to meet their sales quotas, working less efficiently. The details of what goes wrong differ for each salesperson, but the net result is always the same: wasted time which fails to produce high quality sales and consequently, increased cost of sales.
For Sales Directors, this means developing a comprehensive, realistic and step-by-step outline of what salespeople are expected to do. It’s only when such an outline is in place that sales management is in a position to monitor the salesforce’s activity, progress and results. Only then is the stage set for transformational performance improvements.
Pitfall No.2
Lack of Essential Skills Which Leads to ‘Below Average’ Performance and Consequently ‘Below Average’ Sales Results
“Who’s been sitting in my chair – and broken it into pieces?”
Goldilocks and The Three Bears
During the 1970’s and ‘80’s, it was common for large corporations such as Hewlett Packard and IBM to put their new sales recruits through a 12–18 month training programme. Today, salespeople consider themselves ‘lucky’ if they get an initial two weeks of training. Yet sales targets haven’t plunged proportionately!
According to Pavita Walker, Director, Organisation and Leadership Development, Barclays Group, "The greatest differentiator amongst sales organisations of the future will be the ability to build world class capability and skills". Adds Giles Watkins, Global Competence and Learning Manager at Shell Lubricants, "Skills development is critical … once a salesperson is really fluent with what they do, they become more responsive to customers’ requirements."
So, what’s going on? How should a Sales Director reconcile the fact that many organisations today provide less upfront training for their sales staff than in years past with the increasing importance of staff development? The fact is that selling in today’s climate is a profession that demands a wide range of skills that require continual fine-tuning. According to Steven Reinemund, CEO PepsiCo Inc. "To have growth in products you have to have growth in people". Yet training alone does not guarantee peak sales performance. This can only come from ongoing coaching from sales managers and those organisations that have a strong coaching culture attract and retain the best salespeople.
Pitfall No.3
Failing to Focus Sales Representatives’ Activity Which Reduces Efficiency and Consequently Results
“Although he worked hard, times were bad and he became very poor”
The Elves and The Shoemaker
Maximising a workforce around one common goal that creates value for the customer, the organisation and the employee is the only way to focus the activities of a sales team. Time is a huge constraint on salespeople’s activities so that when their manager asks them for more, it’s no wonder that they buckle under the sheer weight of overwhelm! Frequently there are two main pitfalls that even experienced salespeople can fall into in terms of activities.
First, they simply aren’t doing enough and secondly, but equally important, salespeople often aren’t clear about how to identify the prospects most likely to have a genuine need for their product or service. Salespeople who lack a disciplined, future-oriented plan for generating new contacts and sales, often find themselves spending more time attending to ‘urgent’ activities rather than ‘important’ activities that will develop their business.
Pitfall No.4
Allowing Self-Limiting Beliefs to Constrain Salespeople’s’ Performance Which Causes a Reduction in Sales Results
“Why, I’m a swan!”
The Ugly Duckling
Like everyone, salespeople hold stubbornly to private beliefs about themselves and the people they work with…beliefs that can have an enormous impact, either positive or negative, on their sales performance. Yet while most Sales Directors grasp the concept of activity management, skills and knowledge development far too many feel powerless to help their salespeople turn their negative beliefs into positive ones. Those who do tackle beliefs and are able to change their representatives’ self-limiting beliefs into empowering ones have found an unbeatable path to success.
Pitfall No.5
Failing to Choose and Develop a Sales Leadership Team That Nurtures and Develops Their Sales Representatives’ Potential
“Immediately, the witch flew into a great rage and cut off Rapunzel’s hair”
Rapunzel
The single most common mistake that organisations make is promoting their number one sales representative into the role of sales manager, thereby depriving themselves in a single stroke of their best producer and hamstringing their salesforce with an ineffective manager. The skills required for managing, mentoring and developing sales teams are totally different from those for selling. As a result, it’s not uncommon to find newly promoted sales managers who regret having taken a management position and may even leave to get back into sales.
The majority of sales managers say they do not have sufficient time to train and develop their sales teams. They are so focused on sales results and so accustomed to achieving success through their personal pursuit that they overlook their greatest potential source of power: the power to increase sales performance by developing their people.
Even when they do recognise the importance of developing their representatives, many sales managers find that they lack the skills and resources to do it effectively. It then becomes easier ‘not to bother’. To make things worse, most sales teams consist of a number of individuals with differing levels of experience and ability, so the whole issue of team development becomes too daunting to contemplate. Giles Watkins, Global Competence and Learning Manager, Shell Lubricants believes that the best people to start developing are sales managers, their coaching then produces a multiplier effect.
A COMMITMENT TO EXCELLENCE
Organisations and salespeople who have one hundred percent commitment to doing whatever it takes to elevate their sales to a whole new level are the ones most likely to succeed. Trying to operate a sales organisation without total commitment is like trying to drive a car without fuel. Every organisation has the potential to harness the power of their salespeople just as surely as oxygen pumps life into the human body.
… For a moment the handsome Prince stood gazing at the beautiful golden – haired girl, wondering how he could break the spell. Stooping he kissed her; instantly Princess Aurora opened her blue eyes … they lived happily ever after and had many children, all who grew up to become successful sales representatives.
A Magical Selling tale - To learn more about this author, visit Nikki Owen's Website.
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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Linda RichardsonLinda Richardson is the Founder and Executive Chairwoman of Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company. As a recognized leader in the industry, she has won the coveted Stevie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Sales Excellence and she was identified by Training Industry, Inc. as one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals.” Ms. Richardson is credited with the movement to Consultative Selling and is the author of ten books on selling and sales management, including Sales Coaching — Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach, and Stop Telling, Start Selling. She teaches sales and management at the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton Executive Development Center. Linda is a frequent speaker at industry and client conferences, has been published extensively in industry and training journals, and has been featured in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Nation’s Business, Selling Power, Success, and The Conference Board Magazine. Learn more about Richardson's sales training and performance improvement solutions at http://www.richardson.com web - Visit Linda Richardson's Website |
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George LudwigGeorge Ludwig is a recognized authority on sales strategy and peak performance psychology. An international speaker, trainer, and corporate consultant, he helps clients like Johnson & Johnson, Abbott Laboratories, Northwestern Mutual, CIGNA, and numerous others improve sales force effectiveness and performance. Though it's George's strategies and processes that help corporations increase productivity and performance, it's his tremendous energy and dynamism that spark the transformation. Again and again, clients remark on his amazing ability to unleash human capacity and inspire men and women to break out of their comfort zones. The result is a whole new type of salesperson. His customized presentations teach achievers to make stunning advances in their lives. From helping salespeople realize cherished dreams to helping corporations exponentially accelerate revenue streams, George Ludwig leaves audiences and individuals empowered, emboldened, and clamoring for more. George is the best-selling author of Power Selling: Seven Strategies for Cracking the Sales Code and Wise Moves: 60 Quick Tips to Improve Your Position in Life & Business. - Visit George Ludwig's Website |
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John PowerJohn Power, founder of Biltmore Franchise Consulting, has extensive experience developing and marketing franchises and business opportunities. He has been in and around franchising for over twenty years. From 1980 through 1990 he conceptualized, organized, and developed the American Video Association. He grew AVA to 2,000 national members, before selling the company it 1990. It was later merged into another home video marketing company. From 2000 to 2005 he worked as a contract marketing and human resources consultant to several local and national companies. In 2005 Mr. Power began working as a franchise development consultant on a full-time basis. Since that time he has helped more than three dozen companies initiate and develop their franchising program. He notes that there are many companies interested in developing a franchise program, and who need his specialized assistance. Mr. Power is a “hands-on” franchise consultant. He said, “I am the ‘nuts and bolts’ person who tends to the details for my clients.” Mr. Power holds a B.S. degree with a major in Marketing. See: www.biltmorefranchise.com You may contact Mr. Power at: jpower@biltmorefranchise.co - Visit John Power's Website |
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Staging DivaDebra Gould, aka The Staging Diva®, is President of Six Elements Inc., an internationally recognized home staging company. Inspired by many requests from aspiring home stagers wanting to start similar businesses, Gould created the Staging Diva Home Staging Business Training Program. Gould has trained over 1000 Staging Diva Graduates worldwide to start staging businesses. Buying decorating and selling six of her own homes in four years lead to an interest in real estate staging which she turned into a career with the launch of sixelements.com in 2002. Since then she has staged hundreds of homes in addition to teaching home staging training. Gould is the author of several home staging resources including a series of popular ebooks made up of a Design Guide, Color Guide and Portfolio Guide. For more information about Debra Gould visit stagingdiva.com. - Visit Staging Diva's Website |
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Jay Kubassek(Jay's Full Bio: EvanCarmichael.com/jaykubassek) In five years, Canadian-born entrepreneur Jay Kubassek went from selling mufflers at a Midas franchise to revolutionizing Internet marketing with the 2004 launch of CarbonCopyPRO, a online marketing education company, now worth over $20 million with customers in over 160 countries.
As an independent film producer, his upstart film fund Aliquot Films is currently producing a films with Spike Lee and Abel Fererra (starring Ethan Hawke and Dennis Hopper.)
Jay's entrepreneurial spirit is irrepressible. He’s the owner of five companies, a professional speaker and trainer, international real estate developer/investor, extreme sport enthusiast and emerging philanthropist. Jay resides in NYC with his wife Jamie, son Milo and dog Cooper. Visit Jay's official website: www.JayKubassek.com - Visit Jay Kubassek's Website |
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