Leadership Secrets For Your Sales Team To Get Through The Down Market

Accepting the basic premise of How to Sell More in a Down Market is vital for success in selling more in a down market. The premise is for you to "take a leadership approach to your sales responsibilities".

This leadership approach is straightforward and practical. It has six elements.

 1. Accept full accountability for your results
 2. Adopt leadership attributes for success
 3. Become inspired and motivated
 4. Become a personal productivity champion
 5. Learn to plan like a leader
 6. Take responsibility in further developing your leadership and sales professional skills

Although a number of leadership elements comprise an exceptional leader, How to Sell More in a Down Market focuses on each of the elements of leadership mentioned above to help you improve your sales results.

Accepting Accountability

Sales volumes are at record lows; you've never sold so little, and your commission checks have never been so small. You need to sell more, and you need to make more money ... and you need it now!

Is it possible that:

* Previous good markets turned you into an order taker, and you forgot how to sell?
* You've worked your trap line for years, and it's finally dried up?
* You've convinced yourself that there is no business to get?
* You just aren't trying anything new to get new business?
* Your selling skills are a little rusty?
* You are talking too much and not listening for opportunities?
* You just don't know what to do about it?

If you are not selling as much as you'd like or if you're not making as much as you'd like, don't blame it on the markets, competition or others. It's time to forget the excuses and begin to accept accountability for any shortfall in sales volume or your paycheck.

Leaders are always accountable for results. If you are going to manage your sales responsibility as if it is your own business, you need to accept full accountability for the results.

Becoming a Personal Productivity Champion

As a sales professional, how is your time management, or as I like to refer to time management, how is your personal productivity?

It is essential for leaders of organizations to master the art of personal productivity. Yes, just like selling, personal productivity is an art form. A CEO who leads a worldwide organization cannot afford to waste a single minute when trying to profitably grow their business.

There are as many different ways to be personally productive as there are CEO's. However, I think few leaders will argue with these five "big picture" items as the solution to being productive in their responsibilities.

* 1. Plan - you have to plan your business and your time. Without planning factors such as where you are going, how you're getting there, when you're getting there, who is helping you get there, what you need to get there and why you want to get there, you will likely fall short of your goals in both good and bad markets.

* 2. Evaluate your progress - you have to take the time to evaluate how you are doing and make adjustments to your plan if necessary. This prevents you from wasting time on tasks that aren't working in both good and bad markets.

* 3. Organize - leaders need to be personally organized, so they can organize their team to execute the plan. You know without organization you will be less effective in getting results in both good and bad markets.

* 4. Prioritize - leaders have a great number of things to do and decisions to make. Without properly prioritizing, they can waste their resources focusing on the wrong areas in both good and bad markets.

* 5. Schedule - leaders schedule their day, week, month and year. Their daily schedule is set like television programming; you know what's on at what time and the only way that will change is if there is an earth-shattering development that needs to be communicated.

Get and Stay Motivated

Self motivation is an important ingredient to the successful sales professional regardless of the current market place. When the market is down, it is even more critical to create a self-motivating environment.

If you still are having a difficult time finding passion in the down market, here are a few suggestions for you to consider:

* Stop listening to the depressing news on talk radio and the 24-hour television news channels.
* Create a list of things that make you happy, and keep a copy with you wherever you go.
* Keep a photo of something that makes you smile near your side.
* Before you get in your car in the morning, walk around the yard and smell the roses.
* Find a mentor-someone you can talk to who will keep you on a positive track.
* Don't hang around people who aren't fun and exciting to be around. Find upbeat, positive, forward-looking people with whom to surround yourself.
* Find your favorite motivational quotes, write them on index cards, and keep them with you to read anytime you feel a need.
* Turn on some music, and dance like no one is watching* Phone someone you haven't talked to for a long time, and make them smile. I guarantee you'll feel good about it too.
* Write down what you're thankful for.
* Make one more sales call; don't give up; think positive* Get some exercise to clear the mind and rejuvenate.

Plan Like a Leader

Leaders spend a large portion of their time creating plans, implementing plans, measuring/monitoring plan performance and adjusting their plans.

In this section, we will cover the element of planning your business-your sales responsibility.

The components of a sales responsibility plan I recommend include:

* A mission statement,
* A SWOT analysis,
* A set of objectives that help you achieve your mission,
* Tactics or action plans to achieve your goals.

To develop a mission statement, here are the steps I typically recommend you process through:

Step 1: Brain Storming - Either sit down with a blank piece of paper, a white board, sticky notes or a flip chart paper, and start writing your values; your attributes; what you do; what you want to do; where you are; your strengths; what your customers like about you;, your company's products, services and systems; and any other relevant issues specific and unique to you or your sales responsibility.

Step 2: Identify - Begin to identify key words that are actionable and unique, and separate those from the others. Group the others into obvious categories such as "products," "services" etc.

Step 3: Form - Using the actionable and unique words, with one eye on the other word groups, begin to form a collection of different brief mission statements.

Step 4: Decide and Finalize - Using the process of elimination, select your favorite and tweak it if necessary; your mission statement is now finished.

As mentioned before, this is a process. It doesn't and shouldn't happen in an hour. It also helps to involve others to ensure you benefit from different perspectives. To demonstrate my point-with over 15 year's experience, I relied on a Mentor/business coach to help me finalize the mission statement for my business. She asked me a few questions that triggered a spark of inspiration and BOOM, a direction was set. 

Self Development

For some reason, many companies elect to slow down, minimize or entirely eliminate the expense associated with training and developing their people when there is a down market.

Most sales professionals don't typically set time aside for self development. They're usually too busy looking after customers or solving problems. You may have an individual development plan, but is it really aggressive enough to help you sell more in a down market?

Although there is this wealth of knowledge available to you online, there is also a wealth of knowledge available to you within your own company.

* Start with product knowledge. When was the last time you went through your company's manufacturing plant to get a detailed understanding of how the products you are selling are made?

* If there was a product knowledge test today, would you pass? Maybe you passed years ago, but would you pass today?

* Do you have a mentor within your company? You should because there is a wealth of knowledge and experience from which to benefit.

* Ask your boss or mentor to role play a realistic scenario of your choice. Upon completion, review with him/her. Question and ask feedback on your strengths and weaknesses throughout the situation.

* Re-vamp your value proposition statement delivery.

* Create a series of elevator speeches to answer basic questions like: 1. What you do for your company. and 2. Why someone should buy from you.

Closing thought;

Successful implementation of the six elements of leadership should help you sell more in a down market, and when the markets return - and they will albeit at a level less than the recent glory years - you will have developed some new habits to contribute to your continued success.

You will also experience leadership thinking, behaving and performing, which will elevate your career if you desire a management or leadership position in your organization.