081 – The Language of Sales and Selling PART 2
Sales professionals learn how to Optimize and Maximize their – Golden Hours of Selling
And there is some language that needs to be defined.
There is Sales Language around the Activity of Selling
Last week covered the first five:
- The Golden hours of selling
- Lead conversion
- Sales funnel
- Prospecting
- Selling the appointment
- Discovery and Rapport
- Proposals
- Presentation
- Close
- Follow Up
6. Discovery and Rapport
You have a very specific agenda for your Discovery and Rapport appointment.
YOU are the Driver!
This is exactly what you are doing: Discovering needs and building Rapport
Rapport begins the second you great the prospect.
Rapport includes your grooming
Your clothes
Your countenance
Your energy
Your sales materials
Your greeting
The first words out of your mouth
Then you ask, “is there someplace we can sit down”. That was a game changer.
Get to know the prospect – Rapport, AND find out how you can best serve them – Discovery.
How do you find out how to best serve them? ASK them.
We call it the key question.
This is the most important part of Discovery because they will tell you how to sell them.
“There are many different benefits of a live plant program – From YOUR perspective as a Country Club GM, what’s the most important benefit to YOU?”
Then when you begin to create your proposal, you make sure you are including that answer
7. Proposals
Begin with the end in mind when creating your proposal – You have to Present this to the prospect. How to make sure the presentation is a win
There are two big problems with creating proposals – and they are opposites ends of the same stick
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- You spend too much time
- You spend too little time.
The second one first:
Many salespeople treat the proposal as a Generic activity and quickly put any thing together.
A winning proposal has considered the unique needs and desires of THIS prospect and When they present it – the prospect knows it. The language of the presentation is obviously connected to your Discovery process.
Spend the time customizing and tailoring it.
You are responding to their answer to the key question
The other problem is spending too much time – comes from not having a Process for creating proposals.
There are a lot of elements in the proposal writing activity that can become a process.
Pricing charts
Proposal templates
Design recipes
Standardized take offs
Not only these, but even more – the Realization that you only have so many quarters today – how many quarters are you going to spend creating a proposal?
If you’re spending too much time creating proposals – ask yourself, “am I doing this bc I don’t want to do the other work of prospecting and phone calls?”
And, “Am I busy being busy?”
8. Presentation
The presentation is the time you are pitching your big ideas – with the Expectation you are going to get a Yes!
Zig Ziglar – “you have to plan to win, prepare to win and expect to win.”
If you go into the presentation and expecting them to say, “well… let me think about it”
Here are the key words I think of for presentation:
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- Enthusiasm – you have to be excited. Not fake enthusiasm, but based on your personality and your genuine desire to help your prospect
- Energy – enthusiasm and energy are contagious. Don’t be sleepy – be alive.
- Engaged – even if this is the 1000th time you have presented this product or service – keep the passion high!
- Communication Skills – some of it memorized.
Those are the Soft Skills of presentation
The hard skills are the order and neatness of your sales materials
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- You have your iPad loaded
- You have all your documents in order
- You have a pen – So that they can sign
- All the little details of looking like a pro
9. Most sales don’t close bc the salesperson does not ask for it
You have to have some type of closing question – or questions
The close happens smoothly when you have done all the other sales activities
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- All the way back to prospecting
10. Follow Up
Not every sale will close on the first attempt.
You have to have a follow up process.
Follow up also applies to the First sale – selling the appointment
“do not underestimate the amount of effort it takes to close a sale”
The appointment OR the sale.
It is phone calls
And emails
And voicemails
And creative ways to get in front of them again
It is a lot of phone calls – attempts and dials
There is a balance: You are a welcomed Guest – Not an annoying pest.
With this Language and this kind of approach to your Selling Activities – all of your prospects will be in one of those stages – and the Best part – you’ll know which one
