Category: Sales

We’ve all received the emails
that are sell, sell, sell,
with little content.
We’ve received them.
We’ve unsubscribed
or blocked them.

On the flipside,
there are the emails from
the ‘nice’ businesses.
Emails will all content
and nothing to buy.
We read, we learn,
but we don’t take any action.

The best sales emails
are a combination of
content and offers.

But what combination?

Rick Jensen
Chief Sales and Marketing Officer of
Constant Contact
recommends

“Each message should consist of
three parts of valuable content
and one part offer.
When you take this approach,
customers are more likely
to remember your tips,
pass them along,
look forward to your messages
and redeem your offers.”

Three parts content,
one part offer,
that’s the recommended mix.

Unless your product is free
(and often, even then),
you’ll receive complaints
about the price being too high.

You’ll never receive comments
about the price being too low.
You’ll rarely receive comments
about the price being exactly right.

So what do you do about these complaints?

If the prospect says
your product should be free
and doesn’t give a reason why,
ignore the complaint.
You can’t build a business
on giving away product.

If the prospect says
your competitor is offering
a similar product at a lower price,
you investigate.

If you receive a flood
of general “your price is too high” complaints,
examine what has changed.
Perhaps your marketing is targeting
the wrong prospects.
Perhaps something in your industry
has significantly changed
and your company must change
with it.

Receiving a complaint
that your price is too high
is NOT a reason to immediately lower your prices.
Think before you slash prices.

In Open Forum’s article
titled
5 Things Women Should Never Say
When Negotiating,
Victoria Pynchon,
co-founder of
She Negotiates Sales and Training,
advises to never give
the other party
an outright no.

Why?

Because saying no
stops negotiations dead.
There’s no wiggle room.
It is a signal
that the conversation is over.

Instead,
counter a disappointing offer
with a question.
“What would you pay more for?”
“Why is that your top offer?”
Delve into what points
the other party
WOULD be willing to move on.

Saying no outright
stops the conversation.
Don’t use it as a negotiation tactic.

Sales 101:
When possible,
have the prospect hold
the product.

We all know this “rule”
but WHY does it work?

As Martin Lindstrom explains

“A recent study conducted
by Bangor University together
with the United Kingdom’s Royal Mail service
also revealed the power of touch,
in this case when it came to snail mail.

A deeper and longer-lasting impression
of a message was formed
when delivered in a letter,
as opposed to receiving
the same message online.

FMRIs showed that,
on touching the paper,
the emotional center of the brain
was activated,
thus forming a stronger bond.

The study also indicated that
once touch becomes part of the process,
it could translate
into a sense of possession.

In other words,
we simply feel more committed to possess
and thus buy an item
when we’ve first touched it.”

Once we touch an object,
it becomes ours.

Have your prospect
hold your product.

Wal-Mart has announced a new contest
aimed at Entrepreneurs and Small Businesses
called Get on the shelf.

This is an American Idol type competition.
If you already have a Wal-mart appropriate product,
it requires nothing more
(no entry fee)
than a video.

Why is Wal-Mart doing this?

As per Chris Bolte,
vice president of @WalmartLabs,
“At the end of the day,
we’re hoping to uncover products
that we haven’t been looking at
and give consumers a voice
about what Wal-Mart carries.”

This is a GREAT opportunity
if Wal-Mart is part of your world domination plan.
No guts, no glory!
Make that video and enter today!

Today, if you’re in retail,
you’ll see last minute shoppers.
These shoppers
are often procrastinators.

Why do people procrastinate?

According to Dr. Pamela Wiegartz,
there are three main reasons

– they fear failure
– they fear success
or
– they’re perfectionists.

A few years ago,
I went to the mall on Christmas Eve.
Every time I looked at something,
that item would be swamped
with other shoppers.
I had shoppers ask me
“Would I like this?”
or
“What would I buy?”

These shoppers didn’t want
to make the buying decision.
They wanted me to make it for them.

So how do you market to the procrastinator?
You use recommendations.
You market the product as the “hot” gift.
(you should be able to share with shoppers
what your hottest selling item is)
You have staff say “This is what I would buy.”
You take the buying decision,
the blame for wrong or right or imperfect purchases,
out of the shopper’s hands.

Seth Godin has a wonderful article
on the appeal of the hot toy.

Sales and Marketing
have always been closely related.
Promotion should drive awareness.
Awareness should drive sales.

Today, however, the lines
have truly blurred.

3Forward has an excellent post
on how more and more customers
are researching purchases on their own.

“Proof of how pervasive
this has become was published
by the Marketing Leadership Council
earlier this year.
Their survey of 1,900 companies
found that B2B buyers across multiple industries
accomplish up to 60%
of the “buying process” on their own
– before ever needing
or wishing to speak to a sales representative.”

Buyers do this, of course,
by Googling the information.

Which means
salespeople should be consulted
when websites are designed,
a task that marketing normally leads.

Yep, where marketing ends
and sales begins
(or vice versa)
is even fuzzier.

Your sales department
HAS to work with your marketing department.
This is not a nice-to-do.
This is a has-to-happen.

There’s an unwritten rule in romance writing.
If an author gives a character a name,
the character is important.
Readers should care about the character.
They take note of
what the character is doing.

It works in romance writing
because it mirrors real life.
If we know someone’s name,
that someone becomes more important to us.

Recently,
tellers at a local bank
started addressing customers
by their names.
Complaints magically decreased.

As Scott Ginsberg shares
“If your customers wore nametags,
would you give them better service?
Sure you would.
Names reduce the distance between people.”

Your customer’s name is a powerful tool
and surprisingly,
it is not used that often.
I’m always impressed
when a salesperson uses my name.

Find out your customer’s name
and then use it.

Most of us work well with targets.
Salespeople are no different.

So how many sales calls
should we be making
to achieve our goals?

According to Michael Pedone,
“If you want to make
or even break your sales goals,
60 sales calls per day
(including callbacks from prospects)
and or 3 hours of talk time
(to prospects, not your mom)
has been the best winning formula
I’ve found to help me outsell
my co-workers
and outwork my competition.”

Make those 60 calls
quality calls.
Do your research.
Know how your product adds value.
Make those meaningful, sales winning calls.

In November’s Cineplex Magazine
(yes, I DO take time off
to go to the movies
once or twice a year),
rising actor Henry Caville,
often dubbed
the “Unluckiest Man in Hollywood”
due to the roles he has lost,
talks about his work schedule.

“On Tudors
I had to start training [for Immortals]
even though I had heard nothing
from the producers.
I was getting up at
around four in the morning,
training for two hours
before Tudors started shooting,
shooting a 14-hour day on Tudors,
going to bed
and repeating five days a week.
That was tricky.”

Henry Cavill was working 2 hours a day
on top of a full time job
for the chance, the CHANCE,
he might be given a role.

How many hours a day
are you putting in
to secure your future sales?