Articles under ‘Blog’

I had some heart warming news yesterday when someone who had attended my last Lead Conversion Masterclass told me excitedly how he had used one of the simple soft selling questions he learnt on the course and lead to a much bigger and smoother sale. He couldn’t believe how simple and yet powerful the approach is. I could tell from his voice that he was feeling so much more confident with his ability to convert interest into a sale,

The question is nothing earth shattering to someone skilled in consultative selling - quite basic really as I am sure some people will be quick to say. Its not something I invented - I was taught it when mentored early in my own learning. Yet if you are an accidental sales person it may seem totally counter intuitive

When someone asks to buy something or asks about your product the intuitive thing is to sell it to them or to give them the information they want.

Next time this happens to you - stop yourself and ask the all important question ‘Why?’

Seems strange when someone comes along and says - can I have one of your products to respond with the question ‘Why?’ - Actually I ask ‘What is motivating you to want this? or what motivated you to email me?’ or something like that……but in effect you are asking Why?

By discovering the other person’s motivation to buy or enquire you will get the full picture. In the case of the guy who turned a £5 sale into £500 the person told him what he was looking to do and he made some honest recommendations which were accepted and there will probably be follow on work too.

The wonderful thing is that this person was struggling to convert interest into a sale let alone upsell!! It was not as big as one client that turned a £75 order into a £8,000 the day after learning about it…..but for this guy it was just as exciting to see it’s effect.

Of course when you ask ‘Why?’ you could find that you cannot help your prospect which may save you wasted time going through the whole sales process only to discover it later after you have invested loads of time in the sale.

It just goes to show you do not have to be pushy or manipulative in order to sell with confidence..

So next time someone asks you about your services remember to thank them for the enquiry and then ask them why they enquired!

Best wishes and happy selling!

Richard

Starting up in business can be an exciting time but also a daunting time too and in the excitement of getting things going, people often overlook the obvious. Profitable sales are the lifeblood of any business and selling is a skill. Without sales there is no business and for most starting a new business there is not the funds to employ a sales person. So that said, where do you start? Accidental Salesman Richard White looks at the journey of ‘Tim’ and how he went from zero confidence in his sales ability to feeling totally in control with the confidence and excitement that he was moving closer to making his dreams a reality.

Tim had always wanted to set up his own business. He felt his IT manager job was going nowhere and when the opportunity for a redundancy package came up he jumped at it. This was his big chance to go it alone. He had been dreaming of setting up an IT support services business. This was his big chance to break free and regain the control over his life and the financial security of his family.

Fast forward a year and things were not quite working out. Tim was struggling to find enough customers to pay himself a salary. The debts were mounting up and his confidence was at an all time low. He was beginning to fear what might happen if things continued.

In every town and village throughout the country there are people like Tim struggling to keep their head above water and for many, their dream has now turned into a nightmare. What unites these people is that they would not take a sales job if it was the last on the planet and yet their livelihood is dependent on their ability to sell their services. The following 5 key areas helped Tim make a significant breakthrough and turn things around for his business and regain that lost confidence and excitement, so maybe they can help you too.

1. Gain Clarity

For many people the source of their lack of confidence is confusion over what they do. They have something valuable to offer that people need and yet everything they have tried just does not seem to work.

Often, it is simply that they are not being clear enough about who their target market is and the problems that their products and services solve. Finding one or two groups of people with specific unresolved problems that they want to fix is essential. Trying to be all things to all people makes selling incredibly hard. You will rarely see top sales people just selling their products and services to all and sundry and they know who is likely to buy and they consider selling to anyone else a total waste of time. The solution is normally quite simple and can come very quickly, but it requires the business owner to take a step back and take a totally dispassionate view about the business. It’s best to do it with someone who can play devil’s advocate and see things from the customer’s perspective. Gaining clarity in this area does give a massive boost of confidence, especially when the person tries it out for real and gets a positive response very quickly.

Tim discovered that many of his existing clients lived within a 20 mile radius and they were busy professionals who relied on the internet to do business. They liked the fact that Tim was just down the road and if they needed to drop off the equipment they could or they could pay Tim to come over and fix it. These clients were much smaller in size than Tim had been looking for and yet they were very profitable and there were lots where he lived. He created some specific packages and found his existing clients happy to move to those packages. Tim’s confidence shot up! He knew he was onto something.

2. Learn the skills

It seems ridiculous to think that someone would buy a car without first learning to drive. The natural assumption is that you would invest in some lessons. So many people start a business with no background in sales. Tim had tried to read a couple of books that guaranteed that he would ‘close that sale!’ every time. As he read the pages his heart would get heavier and heavier thinking that the only way to win customers was to manipulate people. He was sure there must be a better way. There was also such a dazzling array of information around on the internet but where should he start?

Tim read one day that finding a mentor might be a good idea – someone who is already succeeding. The suggestion was to take them to lunch and pick their brains! He tried that with a friend who he had always looked up to. His friend suggested the classic books to read and suggested that he should invest in some sales training, especially around generating leads. Rather than try and learn it all at once his friend suggested learning a little bit at a time and then applying it. Treat it like a distance learning course and gradually build the skills. Tim’s confidence again was boosted because he felt he was moving in the right direction.

3. Get Practice

Like learning any new skill, selling is a little uncomfortable at first. Most people can remember learning to drive. At first there is a lot to think about but the more practice you do the more it becomes automatic and you feel in control. The issue with sales is that people who are reluctant to sell shy away and just do not get enough practice. They do not make the mistakes that others make on the road to building up their skill level.

Emboldened by his new improved focus and what he was reading Tim started to speak to a lot more people that were interested in solving their problems. He won some and lost some but with every deal his ability increased and so did his confidence in being able to sell.

4. Expect Success

One of the books Tim was advised to read was nothing about selling at all. It was to do with the power of the mind and how what we focus on is what we get. Tim realised that previously all he had been thinking about was what would happen if he failed. This was sapping his energy. Now he started to imagine and visualise what success for him would look like. He set some goals and imagined achieving them and how that would feel. He started to do the same thing with every appointment he attended. He would imagine the meeting being successful and he felt emboldened with confidence during the meeting. He did not necessarily win every deal, no one does, but he felt great anyway!

5. Invest in yourself

This new discovery got Tim thinking that perhaps there were other things he did not know about himself and both his own mind and other people’s minds work. He developed a thirst for knowledge and the strange thing is that not only did his sales start improving as he worked on his own personal development he also found that his family life got better too. This turned out to be the best investment he ever made.

Tim took the bold decision of getting a sales coach. He had once used a fitness coach when he needed to get fit but hated to go to the gym. The coach kept him motivated and focused his attention on what he needed to do. The coach also held him accountable and got under his skin when he started shirking off. Tim could see that for him selling was like going to the gym. He wisely selected someone who was used to working with people like him and had a track record of success. He spoke to some of the coach’s clients similar to him to get a sense of what the experience was like and whether it was worth it. This was the final piece and Tim now felt like he was definitely going somewhere and he was doing what the real professionals do. It was not cheap but he quickly recovered the money in increased sales.

For many people who start in business for themselves, selling is a very emotive subject and sometimes people can feel totally in the deep end. You do not need to be a ‘born salesman’ to succeed in developing enough sales in your business and if you approach it in the same way as learning to play the piano or driving a car it becomes much more of an achievable task – only the pay is better!!

Would you like to join the next Lead Generation Masterclass, 6 July 2009 Turning Leads into Sales

Sales is the lifeblood of any business and profitable sales is the starting point towards cash in the bank. No cash means No business. For many businesses in the recession sales provide them with their regular source of cash. Most business owners understand this intellectually and yet at some level many people who start a business for themselves hate the idea of having to sell.

Many people think they are OK with sales, but you just have to look at the consistency of their sales activity to see if there is a problem. The classic symptom is the ‘feast or famine’ cycle. The business owner realises they do not have enough sales coming in and something must be done about it. They do a whole burst of activity that eventually leads to some work coming in. Soon even more work comes in and it’s normally at this point the sales activity slows down and eventually returns to a complete standstill.

In my experience many business owners will admit to some form of sales reluctance. There are so many causes but the only thing that really matters is whether the reluctance is causing activity levels to be lower than you know they should be. Here are some ways to overcome sales reluctance and boost sales activity.

1. Increase self motivation

Having highly motivating goals and a plan to obtain them can often overpower any sales reluctance and drive forward activity. The problem is that many business owners do not understand how to keep their motivation levels consistently high. ‘Feast and Famine’ is driven by fear and that is not a good form of long term motivation. I prefer to help people to learn how to motivate themselves.
Our Self motivation is driven by our values, or in other words, what is really important to us. For some people it is family. For others it may be things like success, or a sense of purpose, or fun. Whatever it is for you, make sure you build your goals around these. So if the number one value is family then build goals around your family. For example, rather than focus on sales goals, set your goals around what you will be able to do with your family once you have reached your sales targets.

2. Increase clarity

You can be highly motivated but if you are unsure about what you should be doing or where you should be focusing your efforts then the uncertainty can lead to reluctance. Your energy will be sapped and you will not know why. It’s because you are confused and need more clarity. Clarity comes from asking better questions of yourself that get you thinking in new ways. I find that people often complicate matters and the best answers are so simple that a five year old child would be able to understand them.

When working with people to help them gain clarity around sales I ask these 5 questions:

• Who is your target audience?
• Where is their pain (i.e. what problems do they have that are hurting badly)?
• How do you take the pain away?
• Why should they do business with you specifically?
• How can you prove you can take their pain away?

You could write these questions down on a piece of paper and then write down the answers until they make sense. Alternatively get a friend to ask them of you. Ideally someone who will challenge your answers if they do not make sense.

In answering these questions it is normally the understanding of the target audience and the degree of specialisation that is the issue. Once they are able to answer all of these questions together the clarity is there and it almost always leads to both confidence and excitement.

3. Work on your selling skills

I find that when people get more practice in sales, their confidence increases. Its a little like a ‘chicken and egg’ situation. Increased activity will give you more practice and improve confidence. As you become more confident you will increase activity.

Confidence will not come from just reading or listening about it but by doing it and reviewing the activity. Sales training that focuses on role play is very effective in boosting confidence. Self coaching can be effective too.

Ask yourself these questions after doing the activity:

• What did I do well?
• What else did I do well?
• What would I do differently next time?

It is hard to believe that many business owners with no sales background have had little or no sales training or coaching. I ask people if they felt like they knew how to drive the first time they had a driving lesson! A few would say they did but most will have experienced the awkwardness of having to do lots of new things at the same time. If feels uncomfortable until you do it enough times and then you do not even think about it. Yet so many business owners never think to invest in sales lessons!

I find that when business owners take charge of learning sales skills and understand sales processes they feel more in control of their sales.

Five areas of education vital to sales, in addition to sales techniques are:

• People skills
• Questioning and Listening skills
• Self motivation
• Communication skills
• Time management and prioritising

4. Managing emotions

Many people do not realise that we can directly affect our emotional state. Many do this without realising by using stimulants like coffee and cigarettes but we can quickly change our state of mind just by changing our posture, breathing, and our thoughts.

Remember a time when you felt really confident. What was your body posture like? What position was your head in? Was your back straight or slouched? How were you breathing? Were you still or moving? In what part of the body were you breathing? What were you thinking? All these things will have a big impact on you feel. If you are cold calling you should get your state right for each call rather than just at the beginning of the session so that no matter what happened on the previous call you are fresh and ready to go! If you have a bad call, just stand up, move around , change your posture and change your breathing.

For most people, they can quickly feel calm and confident by simply straightening their back lifting their head and breathing from their abdomen. Breathing in through the nose for four counts and out for eight counts can add a quick boost of energy too.

5. Removing emotional baggage

Business owners that feel dread or fear aspects of selling are likely to have some kind of emotional baggage. Its like trying to run a marathon with a heavy sack of rocks on ones back. Removing the sack of rocks results in a massive boost in activity as everything seems so much lighter.

For example, if you believe something like ‘All sales people are dishonest’ and honesty is important to you then this may cause you to resist sales activity in some way. Many people that start lifestyle businesses like coaching seem to have issues with money that cause them to undercharge or feel uncomfortable talking about money. In sales that is definitely a drawback!

Beliefs can be either empowering or limiting. The trick is to replace limiting beliefs with more empowering beliefs. If you are someone who likes to be liked and yet believes ‘People do not like sales people, would you be motivated to sell?

Write down on a piece of paper and complete the following:

• All sales people are….
• Selling is….
• To succeed in selling you need to….
• I don’t like selling because…….

Add any other statements that come to mind that you think may limit you.

In order to change these you need to first be open to doubting them. Then you need to seek counter examples and a different expression. For example, one of my limiting beliefs when I was first introduced to sales was ‘To succeed in selling you need to be pushy’. I have now replaced this with a belief ‘To succeed in selling you need to be good at relationships’. This was done by speaking to people very successful in sales.
Some very deep beliefs may be hard to change. For example, beliefs about ones self-worth or beliefs about one’s abilities in certain areas. In such cases you may want to take a course in NLP or you may find it quicker and less expensive to seek out a Master Practitioner in NLP that focuses on business breakthroughs.
Whether you use one of the above tips or find your own way of boosting your sales activity, I hope that you will make the extra effort in the weeks and months ahead. The businesses that survive and thrive in this economic downturn will be the ones that keep sales activity levels high.

Richard White

Need help why not join one of my Lead Generation Masterclasses.

22 June 2009 Generating Leads from Networking
6 July 2009 Turning leads into sales

Read more

How will your customers find you?

You may have the best products and services in the world but unless your target audience knows that you can take away their pain then you are unlikely to sell much!

Once you have got #1 -5 answered correctly then you need to promote your business in as many different ways as possible bearing in mind the cost of generating leads.

Typically you should be looking at around 10 different methods. Networking is just one way.

Here are just some of the many possible ways

Alliances
Competitors
Own PR Online Marketing eg Twitter, Ecademy, Facebook etc
Referrals from existing Clients
Referrals from Advocates
Networking Seminars - offline and online
Direct Mail Leaflets
Email marketing
Google Adwords
SEO
Cold Calling

Many lead generation sources can be in expensive in monetary terms but take your personal time. You need to look at the cost of sale and return on investment.

I hope you have found these 6 questions useful and will go through and apply them to your business.

Richard White
The Accidental Salesman

Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/Richard_White

Book now on the lead generation masterclass workshop. Seats are limited, http://lgmc.eventbrite.com

Where is your credibility?

How can you prove that you are able to take away their pain?

The best proof is having previous experience AND for them to be able to talk to existing customers.

* Ask some of your customers to write you a testimonial.
* Ask them if they would mind if they can be used as a reference.

Always focus your first sale on an area of your maximum credibility. This will be a competitive advantage (i.e. the why you) I personally would seek to win customers in an area I have maximum credibility and then cross sell/upsell the product/service with lower credibility.

If you do not have any credibility then you either need to create some, borrow some, buy some or focus on a different area.

Create some

Start off with existing clients or friends of friends. Offer a cut price or free in return for a testimonial or case study. That is worth more to you than the price.

Borrow some

Ideal if you work in a franchise or associated with people who do have credibility. You need to be careful here that you can deliver, get the associate to deliver and shadow them.

Buy some

Can buy a franchise, license a brand with credibility.
There are many ways to start shining and increase your credibility. It is how you promote yourself and how you make visual what you do. For example, my virtual assistant was recently recommended by some people who find her services very helpful and as someone who responds very quickly, she recently received these messages in her Twitter account.

@directassist @CharlieTheCoach recommended I speak to you as I’m looking for a VA to help me.@directassist you are most welcome. Happy to recommend you after testimonials from people I trust like Richard White and Marieme Jamme

Romany also has a message that if someone follows her, she asks the question, “I would love to know why you decided to follow me?” and Linnet responded with this message:

Linnet Woods: I’m embarrassed to say that I don’t remember whose glowing recommendation of you caught my attention! Interested in all!

The secret is to get people talking about you, word of mouth is the most powerful form of advertising.

Tomorrow is our last day of this series, I hope you have enjoyed it so far. Tomorrow we will cover, how will your customers find you?

Richard White
The Accidental Salesman ®

Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/Richard_White

Lead Generation Masterclass: Generating leads from Networking. Half day workshop, sign up today for our special offer. http://lgmc.eventbrite.com

Why you? (and not your competitors)

So far we have covered who your target audience is, where their pain is and how to take their pain away.

So Who Why You?

The more of a specialist you become the easier it is to become the ideal choice. What makes you a specialist? Write down all the reasons you can think of that makes you a specialist in your field.
This could be the years of experience you have in the industry which means you understand their problems. It could be because you provide a certain service that no one else offers. It could also be because you have studied in this field.

Understanding your archetype and their likes and dislikes makes it easier to find a reason…. or realise that you are focusing on the wrong achetype!

Tomorrow we will look at your credibility.

Richard White
The Accidental Salesman ®

Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/Richard__White

Lead Generation Masterclass: Generating leads from Networking. Half day workshop, sign up today for the special offer of £97. http://lgmc.eventbrite.com

So far we have covered, who your target audience is? Where their pain is and today we are going to cover, how do you take their pain away?
So, how do you take their pain away?

* How specifically do your products or services solve the archetypes’ problems?
* What packages or deals could you create specifically for a particular archetype?

For example,

David came along to the Lead Generation Masterclass. He runs a design business that focuses on branding. In analysing his target audience he identified a key archetype called ‘The Professionals’. These are people who run a service based business and take it seriously. He called them the ‘Professionals’ because they like to do things properly and do not need to be convinced of the need to project a good image’. They had already made a good start but it was still not working for them. The Pain is that they want to create a scalable business but are struggling (pain) to stand out from the crowd. They had tried regular graphic designers but all they had got was ‘pretty pictures’ and not a brand that communicated a strong message visually.

The way David’s business takes the pain away is that he helps his clients stand out from the crowd and project a professional image. He does that via a range of services aimed at co-creating an image and then applying that image creatively to client touch points such as website, marketing materials, proposal documents etc.

Packaging services helps prospects to understand what they are getting for their money and how much it will cost. David went on to create a number of service products and gave each of them names. For example, the basic package was just creating a brand image. Then there were others, each including more and more things like stationary, business cards and a website for a specific amount. The package is not the answer to the question but it is a natural conclusion gained from answering the question.

Tomorrow we will be thinking about Why you? (and not your competitors).

Richard White
The Accidental Salesman ®
Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/Richard_White

Lead Generation Masterclass: Generating leads from Networking. Half day workshop, sign up today for the special offer of £97. http://lgmc.eventbrite.com

Where is their pain?

Yesterday we covered, who your target audience is. We separated your target audience into categories. Today we are going to focus on their pain. If we can establish their pain it will make it easier for you to sell to them.

People generally buy to solve problems and unless they can FEEL some kind of emotion to deal with their problem, then selling will be hard work. Imagine you were them in their situation.
Now you made a list of archetypes you want to focus on. Each one should have a different pain or the same pain but to a greater or lesser degree. Ask these questions when you go through your list.

* What is keeping you up at night?
* What are your primary frustrations?
* What do you fear?

Point to add is that Motivation drives all behaviour including buying behaviour. There are only 2 motivational forces - pain and pleasure. Generally people will pay more to remove a pain than to gain pleasure. Sometimes people buy pleasure items because it is actually dealing with an underlying pain. For example, a day at a spa can be considered pleasure but the reason so many people flock to spas these days is as a break from their day-to-day stresses (pain).

The saying I love is, ‘No Pain, No Gain’ - If your target audience does not FEEL the pain then there is no gain. It is often hard work educating a market that SHOULD feel a pain. It’s much better and more satisfying to find a group of people who already feel pain and then provide them with a cure

Be clear that if you cannot find a pain it’s either because there is not one or that you have not got your target audience defined well enough - go back to day 1 and redo.

Tomorrow we will cover, How do you take their pain away.

Richard White
The Accidental Salesman ®

Follow me on Twitter

Lead Generation Masterclass: Generating leads from Networking. Half day workshop, sign up today for the special offer of £97. http://lgmc.eventbrite.com

There are 6 questions that I use to turnaround the sales fortunes of my clients.

Over the next 6 days I am going to share these questions with you to help you with lead generation. Follow each blog and I will help you to understand how to approach answering the questions.

Day 1: Who is your target audience?
Day 2: Where is their pain?
Day 3: How do you take their pain away?
Day 4: Why you? (and not your competitors).
Day 5: Where is your credibility?
Day 6: How will they find you?

Get these questions right and suddenly the way forward with lead generation becomes crystal clear.

If you can answer the questions easily then either you are not looking in enough detail or you have been on my Lead Generation Masterclass!!
Who is your target audience?

When I work with people struggling with sales the first thing I always ask is ‘Who is your target audience?’ They say things like ‘Anyone who needs a…….’ or ‘Anyone who can afford me…’ or the biggie ‘SMEs’

In order to generate interest you need to be appealing to people’s problems and different people have different problems. An SME is not a person – it’s a category of company. We need to break your target audience into groups of people. Give them funny names and they will come alive. The more we can identify differences the easier it gets to find a profitable niche where you have a lot of credibility.

Once you have split them into groups then a good test is to list your current clients in each group. If you are not sure which group clients should go into then you need to do some more work on your archetypes.

If you want help with getting clarity around these 6 questions then make sure you book yourself on my next Lead Generation Masterclass on 22nd June, 2009. Places are limited so make sure you book early to avoid disappointment. http://lgmc.eventbrite.com

Richard White
The Accidental Salesman (R)

I have to admit I do not get a lot of time these days to watch TV. I do make the exception for good comedy and one of my favourite shows at the moment is ‘Live at the Apollo’. I especially like the earlier ones presented by Jack Dee. The basic format is that Jack Dee starts of the show with some great humour, introduces fantastic comedians who put on a great show and then Jack Dee closes with more humour often picking up on the main acts line.

I have been doing free online sales trainings for a while on this platform. As well as doing my own stuff I interview top sales and marketing experts about something specific that would help accidental sales people move forward with their sales - most of them I have met through Ecademy connections. The recordings of the interviews are edited and available for free download. We have had the likes of Mike Southon, Frank Furness, Craig Goldblatt and may more…

So….back to the TV thing….I wanted to do a live event in Central London on a ‘nearly free’ basis - something special and different and ‘Live at the Apollo’ became my inspiration. The Accidental Salesman® Live! Was born.

Although characteristically light hearted, it will be unashamably about helping non-sales people learn something about sales and marketing that they can take away and apply to their business immediately. I will be opening and also reviewing the trainers message and weaving in additional lessons. I have got two trainers with something valuable to say and who also put on a good show. Its going to be an inspiring event at a top London hotel for the 50 plus people who attend. There will be networking but the main focus of the evening is learning about sales and marketing for experts.

OK….so you have mentioned the event…whats the point of this blog?….The point is that we can get inspiration from anywhere - talking to networking contacts, watching a movie - even watching TV. All I did was ask myself a question…..’How could I apply that to my business?’

Maybe I should start watching TV a bit more to get some more good ideas for my business….mmmm…now where is that remote control!!

Best wishes

Richard