Colleen’s Blog

What's the easiest way to lose control of the sales process? I'm sure you've noticed, many salespeople hold off on presenting their price to a prospective client until the final written proposal. They don’t bring up pricing in person or before a written proposal is sent because they’re afraid to scare away their potential client. Ironically, by following this methodology, they end up scaring away the prospect anyway. If you avoid discussing pricing options until the very last moment, you make it too easy for the prospect to ignore you. They may love everything about you and what you have to offer, but if the amount they see in writing is not something they’re comfortable with, chances are they will simply avoid discussion rather than initiating it and trying to come to a solution. In their mind, it’s much easier to ignore you than to reach out to you for a chance at a better price. Your buyer fears rejection too! When this scenario unfolds, you lose complete control over the sales process and you make it very difficult for yourself to recover from it.

You can discuss sales strategies, ideas, tips and methods to no end. You can set sales targets for your team to hit, implement a promising new strategy and motivate your sales reps with morning huddles. But, when the day starts, it's up to your team to do the work and create the results. Salespeople don't always struggle due to weak strategy, at times poor productivity habits will seriously hinder their progress as well. Let’s cut to the chase. The best way for your team to achieve true productivity in their work day is to ask them to cut off all inbound access. Now, before your jaw drops too low, let me clarify that you should only ask that they do so temporarily, ideally an hour or two each day. Consider asking them to turn their phone to silent or completely turning it off. They will also benefit from logging out of their email inbox while they work through important tasks. When your team is focusing on outbound business development prospecting, they should not have to deal with distracting, time-consuming tasks which take the focus out of their work day. It's great to be able to multitask, but your team will always be able to accomplish more by laser focusing on the task at hand. Want a perfect example of how this simple tweak in productivity can benefit your team?

You offer a great service and haven't received any complaints. Yet, you still feel a void between yourself and your client. Emails and calls are short and to the point, and you may even feel anxious about your client ending the business relationship unexpectedly. You never really know where you stand with your client, professionally and personally. Have you felt like this before? Many salespeople and business owners have. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. What truly defines a great salesperson isn't what happens during the sales process, but what happens afterwards.

When Postal Workers at Canada Post (CPC) strike, their customers are forced to find alternative couriers for their packages. Strikes, and the threat of strikes, drive customers to the competition. Some never return to CPC when the strike ends. In addition, during the strike, consumers are encouraged (and some forced) to receive more and more of their mail electronically. I, for one, have move all my statements and bills to electronic delivery this week in anticipation of another strike. Again, this is permanently lost business to CPC.

When was the last time you examined your manager's behaviour and how it affects sales performance? Over the last 16 years I have facilitated thousands of sales workshops. The vast majority have been effective with a high ROI and a few have been a waste of time and money. When I examine the workshops that were not a success, I find that they all had at least one of the elements below:

Get creative. That's my advice for any business owner or sales leader about to embark on a new phase of recruiting. Far too many leaders stick to the same old, same old when it comes to their recruitment process and trying to find top sales talent to join their team. It's surprising to see how many organizations stick with ads in the paper, online postings and even using the same recruiters they've used in the past. They don't switch things up! The result? The same tired and boring resumes that keeping flocking in. Sure - you may find a great hire in that pile of resumes. But, generally speaking, if you want to find a "stand out" candidate, don't use a worn out process to try and attract them. Here's how you can add a little creativity to your hiring process: