Colleen’s Blog

You know what needs to be done to achieve success. You know that it takes hard work and effort. In fact, I’ve never met a SUCCESSFUL salesperson who did not put in the time and did not take the action required in order to generate positive sales results Unfortunately, it is often easier to choose the safe, easy, and familiar route. I’ve seen entirely too many salespeople convince themselves that they will not be successful no matter what instead of working hard to prove that they truly can be. In fact, here are just a few of the common excuses I hear from salespeople and business owners who are asked to implement a new plan:

Did you just do a double take? Stop trying to close sales...isn't that counter-productive to our sales success? You heard me right. Salespeople should not be attempting to “close” sales with clients. It’s all in the definition. Closing is something you do to a person. While it may be just a term, the language is completely one-sided. It implies that you are going entirely for the win regardless of what’s right for the customer. Salespeople who approach prospects with this kind of self benefiting mentality are almost never successful in their long term endeavors. Depending on their abilities and experience, they may in fact convince the prospect to do business with them, but long term, mutually beneficial relationships are rarely ever fostered. This breed of selling creates the "pushy" and "aggressive" stigma that clouds our entire industry. It puts everyone, including well-wishing, value focused salespeople at a clear disadvantage with prospects. Do your fellow salespeople a great service and avoid ever approaching a prospect with only your own interests in mind. Sales closing techniques that have amusing terms or names are often methods that you should not be using. For example:

Price discounts can be a touchy subject for people. Some sales leaders will never give a price discount, and others will go as far offering a discount to the client before it is even requested. It's true, if you MUST give a discount, you should always be asking for something in return. However, before you even think about providing a client with a discount, try and come up with an alternative solution instead. Consider the following alternatives you can offer the client before automatically handing them a price discount.