Time to make a call?

I recently got a phone call from an old colleague. In the course of our conversation, he made the statement, “Every sale begins with a phone call.”

Now in my world of NLP, this would make sense that he would say this, because he is what we call an Auditory…his preferred mode of communication and thinking is vocal…auditory, sound, words.

But then I started thinking. One challenge of getting new business or securing a referral is to be able to DIFFERENTIATE yourself. You want to get someone to see you as different. And maybe this guy was on to something.

How many emails do you get a day?

How many calls…not telemarketing calls, but calls from someone to talk…do you get a day?

I think the ratio has tipped enormously in the past five years, especially now that we all have smart phones and can compulsively check constantly. Many of us probably get at least 100 emails a day. But I don’t get many calls.

Maybe a phone call to someone has become a differentiator!

I hate making calls. I am NOT auditory and I am a very fast typist. I like to write emails and I like that I can choose the time when I do it.

But the key to business communication is NOT to do what I like, but to do what makes a difference to someone else.

SO…for the next month, I am going to start making phone calls. I am going to respond to inquiries and referrals with a phone call. I am going to call old clients instead of sending them emails or newsletters. When I meet someone at a networking event, I am going to call them, not send an email. I want to see if it makes a difference.

Remind me to tell you what happens. And maybe you’d like to conduct the same experiment. If you do, CALL ME and tell me about it.

Sales Tip: Partnering vs. Challenging

When you have an opportunity to make a sales pitch, there is a reason you have been invited. The prospect wants some help.

But the situation is not a blank slate. Prospects and customers are already equipped with ideas that they think are great. They know what their problem is, and they have decided what they think they need. At the point in time that you are making your initial sales pitch, they don’t really want your ideas. They want to know if you are the person who can help them with their ideas.

You only have a few minutes to convince someone that you would be a good “partner” in solving their problem. You must demonstrate that you can be trusted. Every prospect is consciously or unconsciously asking, “Do I want to work with this person?” If you forget this fact and initially try to impress your audience with your ideas and your solution, you are likely to fail . You may prove that you are capable and smart, but who cares? Your three minutes are up.

To make a successful sales pitch, you must be prepared to focus on their outcome and their solution, even if you see problems and pitfalls. Forgive the sports metaphor, but sometimes you must be willing to play their game plan, not yours. If you want to demonstrate how smart you are or challenge the prospect in order to “enlighten” or consult, you are going to be in trouble.

Not being the smartest person in the room can be tough for some sellers, because sales professionals are typically knowledge experts. They often think they know the customer's problems better than the customer. They have great ideas, and in a sales presentation, it is temping to jump right into sharing those great ideas. They want to TELL their ideas instead of SELL themselves. It becomes a critical cart/horse scenario. The horse must be in front. And in terms of time, it is a very short race. Sell yourself quickly or you are out of the race.

“Selling” means partnering. You can’t just deliver a great box. It has to fit the space.

Work with the customer to improve service to the customer’s client, help the customer be more successful, cut the customer’s costs, reduce manufacturing delays, or whatever the customer’s issue may be. And frequently, selling means compromising. What you wanted to sell when you walked into the room may not be what the customer wants. The sale will go to the person with the most flexibility.

We often hear about the writer who stuck to her (or his) guns and finally wrote the best-seller she always wanted to write, even though hundreds of publishers turned her down. (For instance, Agatha Christie or J.K. Rowling, to name just a couple.) What you don’t hear about are the thousands of books that were rejected and never published or even completed when the author refused to make some compromises. And you also rarely hear about the books that were published and were better than the original draft due to incorporating some editor’s suggestions.

Stubborn is not smart. It is just stubborn.

If you want to sell something, be prepared to fit your idea into the buyer’s frame. Don’t compete. Be the person who helps the customer get something accomplished that was not possible without your help. And sometimes, you may discover the end product is better than if you had done it exclusively your way.

As a sales professional, be prepared to say, “If that is what you want, let us look at how I can help make that happen for you.” Flexibility is needed. Help find a way to achieve their outcome and incorporate their thinking. You must be prepared to fit into a solution that the prospect already is seeing in his/her mind.

If someone asks me for a team-development workshop, something I am resistant to do, I am likely to help clarify the real desired outcome, talk about the benefits of the proposed approach, some different ways to look at how such a workshop might be implemented in their organization, and I may be able to influence the thinking of the customer to consider different (non-workshop) ways to help the team. But only after I have sold me. Only after they have decided they want to work with me to solve their problem. Only after they trust me. And a workshop will always be an option, because it is the solution they initially wanted. The difference is how we define it and how we implement it. It is still THEIR solution but my refinements as we work together. We. Not me. And if I can’t sell me as someone they can trust, there will be no we to work on ideas together.

Customers want solutions, and they already have some in mind. Listen to those ideas. Look for ways to incorporate your ideas and use your expertise, but remember: Customers already have a solution and are trying to decide if you are the person who can help them achieve their goal. Don’t compete. Don’t quiz about “pain.” Don’t challenge. Don’t think you know best. Be flexible and be helpful. Sell yourself as a good “partner” and you will be invited to help them solve their problem.

Sellers: Stop looking for pain

For decades, sales trainers have told us about the need to find a prospect’s “pain.” What is hurting? What is it costing? What is the cost of ignoring that pain? Who do we see is hurting the most? What is it worth to find a solution to that pain? Follow the long path to “pain”, and you will be successful, they have said.

They are wrong.

It’s time to stop wasting the customer’s time. Stop looking for “pain.” Look for ways to help instead.

Today, people do not have time to invite you to make a presentation and endure a series of “pain” questions. When you get an invitation to sell to a prospect, you should know how the prospect sees the problem before you show up. You don’t need to probe to find what’s causing the pain or whose pain it is or whether it is a financial pain or a personal pain. Clarify the issues and know the desired outcome before you go to the meeting. Learn what you need to know without seeking out “pain.” Stop wasting everyone’s time. Prospects want to focus on their idea and how to solve their problem. And they don’t want the meeting to last very long.

I occasionally get invited to propose a “team-building” workshop. I generally don’t do team-building workshops any more. When someone asks for one because his or her team is not working well, I often shoot myself in the foot by stating that, in my experience, most requests for such action are due to one person being a problem. I ask, “Any chance that might be the case here? If so, why don’t we look at how to help that person and not waste the time of the whole team?” In nearly every case, the prospect appreciates the insight. I hear a response such as, “That’s a really intriguing idea. I think you might be right. Let me think about it for a bit.” And that is the end of it. There is no more discussion with me about team building. Or about coaching the problem person. I didn’t fit THEIR solution. Shame on me.

Prospects are not interested in being “challenged”or probed about their “pain.”

In most cases, prospects have a good idea as to what they want. They are not interested in being “challenged” or probed about their “pain.” They simply don’t have the time or the patience. They are interested, instead, in learning if they feel they can work with you and get their desired outcome. They want to see if you are a good fit and can work with them.

Sell YOU as someone who can help implement their solution

This leads to a major adjustment in how sellers must sell. First, remember you have been invited to allow the prospects to decide if they want to work with you. Can there be a relationship? In short, the presentation must sell YOU as someone with whom they can partner and help implement a solution, a solution that is may or may not be well defined. If you try to sell YOUR solution before you sell YOU, you will fail. Connect on both a conscious and unconscious level. Become someone the prospect will trust before you even talk about what you want to sell. (If you don’t know how to do this, read “The Unfair Advantage: Sell with NLP!”)

Can you avoid focusing on your solution and focus, instead, on theirs? How quickly can you stop presenting and actually engage your prospect? If you did your homework, you will know what the prospect is trying to accomplish. Get him/her to talk about that. Listen for what is wanted and look for how you can help. Talk about outcomes rather than pain.

Duane Lakin, Ph.D., is the author of “The Unfair Advantage: Sell with NLP!” and a new book, “Ten Ways Top Sales Reps are Different.”

Understanding Top Sellers: Observation 4..They have "Curiosity"

T op Sellers approach a sales call in a manner different from average sellers. The Top Seller is thinking about what he/she wants to learn in this call to help accomplish the goal. The Top Seller is curious. The goal is well-defined, and the pre-call thoughts are about what questions to ask and what information to look for to move the process forward. The average seller is thinking about what questions the prospect may ask of them! This is a critical difference between Top Sellers and average sellers. Top Sellers are thinking about what they need to learn, and average sellers are thinking about what they need to say. It is, therefore, not surprising that a Top Seller does far more listening in a sales call than an average seller. Top Sellers know the power of knowledge. Information gives them confidence and an increased sense of the control they seek. As a result, they are always looking to see what they can learn that will help them achieve their goals. They ask questions and they listen. A food ingredient company had been working with a major food processor for several years. The sales people worked closely with the R&D lab where new formulations were being tested. One day, while leaving the lab and walking through the main production floor, a new sales person on the team asked, “Isn’t that tomato soup?” “Yes, of course,” he was told. “That is our biggest seller.” It turns out that tomato soup needs a key ingredient that was one of the primary products sold by the food ingredient company. But for two years or more, no one had ever asked what else the customer made and would there be other opportunities to sell them additional products. They had simply gone to the lab and sold small orders of their products. Until a new sales person, a potential “Top Seller”, joined the team, no one was curious enough to look around and ask about other applications. Unlike the sales team above, Top Sellers are curious. They ask questions. They truly want to know. They are interested in what is around them and what they can learn from others to help them have an advantage. This curiosity can sometimes take the form of competitive intelligence gathering, such as reading a competitors invoice that was accidentally left on someone’s desk. Just as often, it is an active and conscious effort to ask questions and learn more about a customer as well as a market. It is not surprising, perhaps, that there is a program called “Question-Based Selling.” Top Sellers ask questions. But these questions cannot be canned. They can’t learn “Five Questions to Ask Your Prospect.” True curiosity is not just an attitude. It is a behavior.  Top Sellers are not looking for answers. They are looking for insights and information.  They ask questions and listen to the answers. Top Sellers want to know what the prospect worries about and wants to achieve. What problems does the prospect have? What help does the customer need? How does the prospect want to be sold? The questions that are important to a Top Seller are not “qualifying questions”. They are not part of “consultative selling”, a process that can test the patience of some buyers. The typical sales process where a sales person asks about needs or current vendors or similar “questionnaire” questions does not provide what Top Sellers want to know. In fact, such questions can seem like an interrogation and can be off-putting to prospects.  Top Sellers want to know who the prospect is, what is important to that person, and how is the best way to influence and make a difference to this individual. What is the business and where is the pain? Who are my competitors? Who is influential in making decisions in the business? What is your wish-list? These are more broad-based than “How many pounds of nitric acid do you use in a month?” These are things she can learn by listening and observing, not by following a checklist of questions. These are not answers to questions she has to ask because her sales manager requires them. These are answers she wants to discover to satisfy her curiosity and to give her an advantage. It may be because of their curiosity that Top Sellers are good listeners and, often, good conversationalists. They often have a broader knowledge of topics and issues, and because they are always learning, they can talk intelligently about many different topics. Still, it is their ability to listen that most correlates with their success in sales. It is hard to sell value if you do not want to listen and learn. Curiosity also fits well with the competitive drive of Top Sellers. Simply put, they want to know more than the next person. They want to know how someone else can sell or make a change, and they use that information to make themselves more competitive and successful. Another key correlate of curiosity is the Top Sellers’ relative comfort with ambiguity. Few average sellers are comfortable outside the lines of what they expect and know and are accustomed to seeing. Top Sellers are not afraid of ambiguity, because they are curious. They want to know more. They want to understand and find clarity. Average sellers (and politicians) want to get back “on message” and talk about what they planned to talk about. In a similar manner, Top Sellers leave a sales call re-playing the interaction in their head. They are thinking about what was said and what they could have said in a different manner. They are learning from their experience, even if they failed to achieve their goal. Every interaction becomes a learning experience. Average sellers typically are thinking about what they need to do next or where they need to go now that the sales call is concluded. Curiosity does not typically equate to wanting to participate in “sales training”, however. Top Sellers are curious about ways to reduce their fear and the risk of failing with useful knowledge and information. While curious and motivated to learn what will give them better control and influence, they are not eager to participate in formal learning situations. They are skeptical. They are also fearful of looking foolish or stupid in front of their peers. Typical training programs are painful to most Top Sellers. Still, they will be curious and learn enough to use a new skill when they need it to win their goal. The President of a small manufacturing company was a participant in a workshop on psychological selling skills. He was largely unimpressed with the program, because he believed he was a very successful seller and did not need to do the work needed to learn some new skills. In the participant survey, he did not rate the program very high. The next week, he was making a sales presentation. Unfortunately, it was not going well, and he knew it. As he described it later, “I didn’t know what to do, so I tried one of the crazy things Lakin was talking about last week. All of a sudden, the room changed, and I got my price without any real pushback or negotiation. I would like to change my rating that I gave that presentation last week. It was definitely a ‘10’.” Top Sellers, like most people, do not want to work hard enough to change how they do things. However, Top Sellers have the courage to notice when something is not working and the curiosity to ask themselves, “What else might work?”  Others see what they want to see and hear what they want to hear. How often has a sales person told her manager, “Oh, I think it went very well” when, in fact, it did not go well at all. This is not a lie. This is simply failure to have the courage to notice when things are not going well. Top Sellers expect to win, and they know when they are not winning. They have the determination to stay engaged and involved until they are successful (if possible). As a result, if they are aware of a new option or a new way to make a proposal, they will often be one of the first of their peers to try it. While not showing a lot of enthusiasm for the training per se, they will draw from that training when they need it.   Trainers should not expect Top Sellers to be enthusiastic participants in a training session, unless they can incorporate competitive games into the learning process. Yet Top Sellers are often the first to test a skill in the field and report results back to the others. But they will only use the skill when existing skills are not working for them and they ask themselves, “What else might work here?” Learning for the sake of learning will not motivate them. Learning must contribute to their sense of control over a situation when failure is suddenly a real possibility. When there is a chance they might fail, they will learn and use anything that is seen as a useful way to give them a competitive advantage.

Understanding Top Sellers: Observation 3..They have "Grit"

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It takes energy to sell. Any good seller is motivated to get up and go to battle. But for the Top Sellers, it is different. They have more than energy. They have more than “motivation.” They have “grit.”

Angela Duckworth is an assistant professor at Penn. She has been studying “grit” for many years. She defines it as “sticking with things over the very long term until you master them.” A person with grit has more than energy. He or she has stamina and determination.

A Top Seller with “grit”  wants a goal badly enough that working toward that goal is not work but just part of the process. An average seller, for instance, is willing to make cold calls but may complain about it and find other things to fill the day when possible. A Top Seller who needs to make cold calls to sell will look upon the activity as just another thing that has to be done. It is not separate from the goal of being a good seller and meeting sales goals. It is one and the same.

A recent candidate told me about getting a job with one of the largest chemical companies in the world. He said his first two months were spent in what they called Sales Boot Camp. About a third of the people left before the training was completed. either of their own choice or because they were asked to leave. He said it never occurred to him that he might not finish. (Optimism) It was hard, but it was what was necessary to get the job and excel.

Many people have goals. But how many never let go of them? As Duckworth points out, graduating from a two year school is a challenge, but it is nothing like graduating from a four-year college. It usually takes “grit” to hang in and go through all the academic hurdles, pay the price, and forego other activities to get the four-year degree.

In spite of Duckworth’s example, a college degree…or the absence of a college degree…does not, by itself, lend any clues about “grit.”  Does getting a degree online require as much “grit” as getting a degree in a conventional academic setting? It depends. It is not the degree; it is what it took to get it. That is how you find out about “grit.” The candidate who told me recently that he is thinking about getting his college degree does not have “grit”, at least in the area of academic achievement. Thinking is not all that tough. But the person may have “grit” in other areas of his/her life. Academic “grit” is not a pre-requisite to being an achiever in the work world and in sales. But the successful candidate must show some “grit” somewhere in life that is meaningful and relevant to the position in question.

A Top Seller must have “grit” to meet quotas and excel. It helps to be smart and driven, but it is focus and persistence that characterize “grit.”

Athletes often have “grit”, and their stories give a hint about what to listen for when interviewing in search of a Top Seller. “ You gotta want it so bad you are willing to be exhausted” was how one football player described college pre-season.  Vladimir Horowitz, the esteemed piano player, hated practicing, but he practiced four hours a day, because that was what it took to be great. A pro-bowler in the NFL said, “Sure it hurt, but I knew it was worth it” when describing the exercises and drills he endured every year of his playing career.  A Navy SEAL described his experience in this way: “It was the toughest training I ever experienced but I knew it was necessary.”

“Worth it”? “Necessary?” These words only make sense when paired with a clear focus, even obsession, toward an end goal.  To someone with “grit”, the end goal is so important that whatever it takes to get there is worth it. Necessary. No complaints. No skimping. No sneaking out of practice or finding excuses to not make calls. The goal is clear and the steps to get there are simply part of the process.

When interviewing sales candidates, ask “grit” questions.

            "What have you wanted so badly that you gave up other

             things to achieve?”

“Was there ever anything so important to you that you suffered through things others might have called boring or hard or even impossible? Describe what you endured. Why did you do that? (Listen for the goal.) Why was that so important to you?”

“What was the most difficult learning experience you ever had?”

“What was the toughest challenge you ever faced? How did you overcome it? Why did you go to so much trouble?”

“Tell me about something you wanted to master but had to really struggle to reach that level.”

“Grit” is character. Character differentiates good sellers from Top Sellers. People with “grit” do not give up. Nor do they complain. They do the “reps” and run the steps and study the financial reports and hit balls out of the sand and play scales. They do what they must to reach their goal of being excellent. Some say it takes 10,000 hours to excel at something. Those with “grit” are not keeping track of the time.

Understanding Your Top Sellers: Observation 2...They need to control

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UNDERSTANDING TOP SELLERS

OBSERVATION TWO:  Need to control

A Chicago company that processed residential mortgages routinely hired new college graduates for their training program. Once trained, these young people would be assigned to field offices to sell their services to residential brokers. Part of their sales pitch was a commitment to processing loans quickly to enable the realtor to get a closing date quickly.

The training program was in the home office, and all trainees were immediately assigned to processors who handled the paper sent from the field. It would only take about three days to know who was going to be a top seller. By the third day, at least one new hire would realize that his/her future success depended on these office people. If the process was to be controlled after the papers were sent to the office, the processing team needed to be responsive to the person submitting the papers. Future top sellers saw this immediately, and they began bringing donuts and coffee or taking the processors to lunch on a regular basis throughout the training program. 

Top sellers fear they will fail. To manage that fear, they develop a strong drive to control. They believe that if they control enough factors in the sales process, they decrease their risk of failing. They are able to tell themselves that they are preventing the problems that will hurt them.

Anyone who has worked with a top seller has seen this need to control. As soon as an order is submitted, the top seller will be calling to see the progress on the order. He/she will be checking with production or the warehouse to ensure that the product will be available as promised. Although sales managers want their sellers in the field talking with customers, top sellers often spend much of their time trying to control the internal sales ordering process. It is not unusual for a sales manager to suddenly see a top seller wandering the halls of the office or filling emails with questions and follow-up requests for status reports.

When you ask a top seller what he/she wants in sales manager, you will often hear this control issue.  As a recent candidate told me, “I want a manager who can be a resource to work with finance or production to be sure that things get done.”  

When interviewing a sales candidate, one of the first things to look for is how effectively the candidate tries to control the interview. Top sellers are able to stay “on message” in spite of attempts to distract the candidate. They are polite but focused. They may refer back to an earlier question by saying, “You were asking earlier about…”, for instance. 

The top seller candidate also may not be eager to engage in small talk. The stereotype of the sales candidate who references the fish on the wall or the photo of the family skiing is misleading. The top sales candidate will stay focused and want to talk about his/her sales successes in the past as well as why he/she would be a great fit for the company doing the hiring.

A recent sales model referred to as The Challenger Model describes a seller as someone who wants to debate and push the customer. While this is not wholly inaccurate, it seems to miss the real point of the behavior. The top seller will push and advise only when he/she sees a need to step in and control. As long as a top seller feels in control, he/she will not push. There is no need, and the risk of being seen as pushy is too great. Knowledge that can be shared and the ability to lead the customer to trust the seller’s judgment result in the control a top seller needs. He/she does not have to be entertaining, assertive, or pushy.

Top sellers know it is not the customer who needs to be controlled. The top seller learns how to control the sales process, which includes influencing the decision to make the purchase by knowing what to talk about and how to make themselves valuable. Top sellers do not worry about “closing techniques.” They see ways to control the process long before the traditional close.

Understanding Your Top Sellers: Observation One...They fear failure

INTRODUCTION

Are you trying to hire top sellers? Do you understand what makes them tick?

An interesting challenge in any industry: how do you identify who would be a top seller?

Test manufacturers would have you believe that you can “profile” top sellers as a guide to hiring practices. They take the top producers, give them a test, and then use the combined averages as a guide to whom you should select and whom you should ignore.  

Unfortunately, such a practice does not work. It only sells tests.

It does not work, because no test can sample how a seller thinks. It is the thinking process that differentiates top sellers from the rest of the pack.

Try this: Take your top sales producers and put them in a room. Do they look alike? Do they dress in a similar way? Do they sound alike? Do they have similar interests? Are they all extroverts? Are they all verbal?

Probably not!

Any group of top sellers is more likely to include more individual differences then similarities on the surface. It is only beneath the surface that you can begin to understand and see that a top seller thinks in a unique way when compared with an average producer. 

In my 35 years of interviewing and watching the development of sales professionals, I have identified what really differentiates the elite sales force. I hope my observations are helpful.

OBSERVATION ONE:  Top sellers are driven by fear and anxiety

When working with Dean Witter many years ago, I was once told the story of a senior manager who took his top two producers to breakfast one day. He said, “You both make well over a million dollars a year. Yet you are both the first ones in each morning and the last to leave at night. Why? I want you to write as simple an answer as you can on the back of this piece of paper.” He gave them a moment and then took the papers from them. Both had written the same word: FEAR

Top sellers act confident. They can even appear arrogant and superior at times. But beneath the surface, their driving force is fear. They are anxious that their string of successes will run out. As a result, they must work harder each day to prevent such failure.

The top seller from the food distributor John Sexton & Co. had come within $50 of breaking the all-time record sales for a fiscal year.  I stopped by his desk to congratulate him. I mentioned how close he had come to breaking the record. He just laughed and opened his bottom desk drawer. In the drawer, he had thrown a stack of papers. I indicated that I did not understand. He said, “Those are orders I did not turn in this month.  I was afraid I was just getting a lot of end-of-year orders, and I would have no sales at all in January. So I tossed the orders in here until after January 1.” In his drawer were at least $500 worth of sales orders.

Most top sellers will not admit to fear. But listen to their words. They often talk about being “lucky.” When asked to explain what they do that is different from others, they will grasp at concepts that only sound good but reflect little of what they do. “Lucky” means they believe it could all end tomorrow. They rarely can tell you why they are successful.

“Lucky” also means “I’m not sure I can do it again.” As a result, it is often the top sellers who yell loudest about having their quotas increased. A larger target for the next year, based on their performance for this year, only increases their fear. They typically sandbag their forecasts, not just to ensure that they will get their bonuses, but as a way of dealing with their fear about their future.

I once heard a sales manager complaining about the lack of urgency in a seller. She had been a top seller before being promoted. Her complaint: “This may be the only time we have such a window of opportunity with this customer.” Logically, this is not likely to be true. However, she is a top seller by nature, and her fear is that such an opportunity could disappear.  It is not “We have an opportunity and let’s move on it.” Instead, it is “We have an opportunity and may lose it.”

Top sellers could be classified in psychological terms as “Away-from” personalities rather than “Toward.” They want to prevent or avoid failure. That is why, as Daniel Pink has observed in a recent book, incentives do not really work with top performers. Top sellers are motivated to prevent failure, and a quota with bonus is nice but not a driver. Their drive is internal and comes from their need to avoid that which they fear the most—failure. If they do not get their bonus, they are disappointed and even angry, but the real reason is that missing their target suggests that failure may be lurking ahead. If they achieve their bonus, it is enjoyed, but it does not motivate them to do anything different the next year.  It is also why some top sellers, when they get in a slump, have more difficulty than most crawling out of it. A slump may be seen as temporary by average sellers. Top sellers assume it is their worst nightmare coming true.

The fear I see in top sellers is what I call a “healthy neurosis.” It is the reason they answer the phone quickly, yell about orders being slow to get through the office, or complain that customer service is not being responsive to a customer need. When a neurosis becomes so bad that a person is afraid to act, then it is no longer a motivator but a liability. But a healthy neurosis is seen as an excellent source of motivation. It drives the top seller to work hard the next day rather than relax after a big sale. After all, today may have been the result of luck, and tomorrow may begin a long drought of no-sales. Therefore, they get up early and tackle the job that needs to be done.

Why is "sales" a dirty word?

In looking at a recent article in a psychology journal, I found a study on "faking" psychological tests. In the study, the authors said, "...there may be some jobs where it is useful to adapt to situational demands to the point of distorting the truth (e.g., sales)..." (Italics are mine.)

Since when does sales equate with distortion of the truth? This is the same unfortunate view of sales that leads so many young men and women to avoid considering sales as a worthy profession. Why do so many competent people say, "I don't want to be a salesperson" or "I can't sell"? (Incidentally, these two phrases usually mean the same thing: I don't want to sell.)

Many companies try to get around this perception by playing  name games. They call their sales people "Territory Managers" or "Account Representatives." Why not call someone a "Sales Professional"?

Selling is teaching. Selling is guiding and helping. A good teacher makes you want to learn. A good seller makes you want to buy. This requires trust, not distortion.

A good sales call is one in which the prospect or buyer learns something. Rather than distort truth, the seller is trying to help people confront reality and see where something might be improved. Today's seller is faced with helping people overcome denial and talk about where real pain or opportunity exist. Selling is as much a helping profession as social work or psychology when done well.

We professionals need to help the public realize that sales is not the Hollywood version of used car dealers or aluminum siding hawkers. In fact, anyone who makes a living in sales will tell you that a sales person who tries to distort the truth will quickly fail.

In short, a successful seller today must create trust and not distort truth.  A good seller must be the guide who can help someone else make the right decision. Let's help the next generation of professionals see that sales is not a dirty word. Be proud when you say, "I'm a sales professional."

Example of the power of the unconscious

I recently was reminded of the power of the unconscious thinking process to make us blind to facts.

I was told about a sales rep who is consistently near or at the top of sales results every year for his company. His style of selling is consistent with The Unfair Advantage in that he sells himself and then becomes an "adviser" to his prospect*. He tells the prospect that he wants to help him/her find a way to make an order that will "satisfy the guys at corporate" or something to that effect. He advises on pricing and order mix to "help" the prospect become a customer. With prospects, he figuratively sits on their side of the table and seemingly puts together an order from their perspective. Only by effectively selling himself and controlling the selling process does this work. And a quick look at his results suggest he is quite a master at it.

Unfortunately, his corporate sales leaders say they do not like his style and, therefore, fail to promote his approach as a "best practice" for future training purposes. Instead they label his approach as being "us vs. them" and inconsistent with the culture of the organization. By labeling his selling approach in such a negative manner, it makes logical sense to them to avoid encouraging other sales reps to adapt such an disloyal or anti-company style of selling.

Perhaps, if they could change the label---use different words to describe what he does---they might see things in a different light. Labels are powerful influencers of the unconscious mind and vice-versa.

The unconscious mind influences about 95% of all decisions. As a seller, this can be a huge advantage if you know how to sell to that unconscious. As a manager, care must be taken to avoid letting our own unconscious mind create attitudes that get in the way of our success or the success of others. Looking at facts and trying to avoid letting our unconscious attitudes color those facts is a difficult but worthwhile undertaking from time to time. Sometimes we need to hear things with a different voice. Sometimes we need to step outside of our own skin or sit in a different chair to see more clearly what is happening around us.


*This is a style very similar to a colleague of mine who is a hugely successful commercial real estate seller. In his case, he becomes the adviser to help his client find a property that will fit the client's need and also helps the customer put together a proposal that will be accepted by the seller. Again, the "sale" is the art of selling himself and becoming the adviser.

The “away-from” personality and 2012 goals

Lots of people set goals. But did you know that not all goals are things someone is trying to achieve? Some people talk about goals that are things they want to AVOID!

Instead of a goal to “achieve a 30% profit margin”, it might be a goal to “avoid slipping below the 32% margin we had last year”. A purchasing agent might focus more on reducing costs instead of giving her attention to on-time delivery of parts even though both are important.

People who think like this have a mindset called an “away-from” personality. They focus on avoiding things. They want to stay “away-from” problems or undesirable outcomes rather than pursue or run toward desirable outcomes. In brainstorming sessions, these are the people who talk about problems that may need to be avoided or negative consequences that must be anticipated. They will say, “We certainly don’t want that to happen. We need to plan how to prevent that from happening.” These are also people who are energized by finding problems to solve rather than celebrating goals that are achieved.

To influence such a person, it is important to state your value in terms of what problems are avoided or solved. Instead of saying, “we can increase your sales”, say, “we can shorten your sales cycle”. Instead of “We can help you hire people who fit your organization,” you need to say, “We can help reduce your bad hires and surprises.”

Look at your goals for 2012. Are they “away-from” or “toward”? This might help you better understand your natural orientation and give you some ideas for how you may need to adjust your approach to some people to increase your effectiveness and reduce the times you fail to have an impact.

Think about how you present your value to a customer or prospect or even an employee. State your value in two ways. First, look at what your value adds to someone. Second, say what your value helps someone avoid or prevent or solve. In this way, you can appeal to both the “away-from” people as well as the “toward” people who are moving toward a desirable goal.

Sales success traits

Like the holy grail, interviewers are always looking for the characteristics in a candidate that will tell if the person can sell. Two that I particularly look for are 1) Social monitoring and 2) Control.

Social monitoring is much like empathy. It means the person has a good radar for how others are feeling and acting. When done well, it fits the definition of emotional intelligence. But for sales people, it primarily means that the seller is noticing his/her impact on the prospect and can make adjustments as needed. In NLP terms, it is the ability to take a 2nd position and see the interaction through the prospect's eyes by noticing what the person is doing or saying.

Control is seen in two ways. First, the individual tries to control the interview, whether it is with you or with a customer. Conversations are forced back on track and toward the seller's purpose. Second, once an order is received, the seller controls the process inside. He/she rides that order and sees that people process it quickly and accurately. Often, the seller is seen as an irritant by inside people due to this control, but most good sellers show this trait.

Attention Allstate Insurance Agents

I don't typically promote my services quite this blatantly. But I just saw that Allstate Insurance agents are worrying about new sales expectations being forced on them. I can help! Call me and we will schedule a series of workshops just for you to teach you The Unfair Advantage: Sell with NLP! that will give you the tools to meet those new quotas. SellWithNLP.com is the website, if you want to check it out.