I know that the title seems pretty boring, but I want to share a little story about my recent experience buying house paint. I recently had to go to my local paint store to buy some house paint. I had to buy two different colors. The paint store representative mixed the wrong product in one of the gallons of paint. He was very pleasant and apologized and said that he will remix with the correct product/base. I felt kind of bad for him making the mistake and having to make it again. I didn’t mind waiting a few more minutes while he mixed another gallon. I made a little joke that I will ask around to see if I can find anyone to buy the wasted gallon.

 I was the only customer that he had to look after. The issue with making the mistake, I believe, happened because he was rushing.  He prepared the new paint and got it right the second time. He proceeded to check me out me with correct paint, my filler and tape. After I left the store it occurred to me that he did not offer any additional items that I may have needed for the job; i.e. sandpaper, brushes, rollers, etc.

After all the trouble that he went through to make a replacement gallon I would have probably bought new rollers and sandpaper. It never occurred to me while I was there that I could have used some more sandpaper. The service representative missed the opportunity to make some additional profit to help soften the blow for the loss of a gallon and at the same time he would have helped me out.

All he had to do was ask. In my opinion, all service people should offer a related product with their sales. What do they have to lose by offering? Like me, their customers probably need it; and on many occasions when asked will probably say yes. Bingo! Everybody’s happy.

Tracking Needs

Thank you for checking out this edition of the Excel Training Tips and Techniques.  Working through our POSITIVE Sales Process, this edition we will be focusing on Tracking Needs.

I am sure that you are no different than I am; whether you are dealing with a supplier, one of your service providers or simply buying something as a consumer. When you meet a salesperson and express some interest in their product or service the salesperson gets excited and jumps right in to presentation mode. You ask yourself, “When are they going to stop talking and start listening?  How are they going to understand what I really want?”  Tracking Needs is a vital step in being able to close a sale.  We need to know what our customers need in order to sell it to them, and also to recommend appropriate add-ons.

As we teach salespeople in our sales training, this is the time to show your genuine interest through effective questioning and listening skills. This step within the POSITIVE Relationship Building Sales Process is one of the most important steps; and one that salespeople have difficulty applying. Review your skill set and how you are interacting with your customers. Ask yourself, “Can I improve in this area?” See below our free tips.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Norm

Simple Tips that can Help you Track your Prospect’s Needs

1.    Have patience and show interest

2.    Ask questions and actively listen- stop presenting!

3.    Understand their situation – build rapport

4.    Ask permission to take notes and be genuinely interested

5.    Provide guidance and be attentive

6.    Address concerns thoroughly

7.    Listen, avoid distractions and maintain good eye contact

Six Common Questions to Ask to Help Open Dialogue

1. What do you like about…?
2. What do you look for…?
3. What would you like to improve…?
4. What makes you choose… ?
5. What are you trying to achieve?
6. What have you found…?

If you continue to practice and develop this step in the process you will reduce the number of objections that you will receive when it comes to closing time. You will sell people what they need and you are on the road to building a long-lasting relationship.

A Positive attitude is Everything

See yourself succeeding and you will!

Contact Norman Rose, President of Excel Sales Consulting. His company offers sales, customer service training, CSI surveys, coaching programs and special event seminars, specifically designed for any industry. Email Norm at: nrose@excelsalesconsulting.com

Impression

Thank you for checking out this edition of the Excel Training Tips and Techniques.  Working through our POSITIVE Sales Process, this edition we will be focusing on the Impression.

I’d really like to emphasize the importance of a positive impression and how it can make or break what you are trying to achieve: with internal or external customers.  A huge part of creating the right impression is to be really aware of ourselves.  It’s not quite as simple as ‘think before you speak’ but it really does involve visualizing different reactions and choosing what to say, or even not say, based on that visualization.  As consumers ourselves, we prejudge people all the time.  I’m not saying this behavior is right, but it does help us to see how easy it is to form opinions based on the first impression.  We look at the way people dress, walk and talk.  We take note of organizational skills, attitudes and attention to detail.  These impressions are strong ones and it is important to get them right.

Our current and potential customers are looking for a good attitude in a friendly, upbeat consultative sales person.  It’s not about your age or level of attractiveness, but about being well-groomed, dressed appropriately and having the right attitude.  Never underestimate the power of confidence!  Everyone has what it takes to create the right impression.  Attached are ten easy ways to create a positive impression every time.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Norm

Top 10 Ways to Create Positive First Impressions

1. Smile, show a desire to help, be friendly, polite and courteous.
2. Be appreciative and considerate of people’s time.
3. Explain the purpose of your call, have an agenda and objectives ready.
4. Be aware of your body language.
5. Apply effective listening skills.
6. Be organized.
7. Dress, walk and talk professionally.
8. Upbeat friendly greetings!
9. Conduct yourself well with everyone in your path.
10. Visualize a positive outcome; you are well prepared and planned.

Remember to create the best impression you can every time; both in your personal and your professional lives.  Being in the practice of maintaining a good impression ensures you will always make one.

Remember, you are a Professional Solution Provider (PSP)!

See yourself succeeding and you will!

Contact Norman Rose, President of Excel Sales Consulting. His company offers sales, customer service training, CSI surveys, coaching programs and special event seminars, specifically designed for any industry. Email Norm at: nrose@excelsalesconsulting.com

Selecting Target Accounts

Thank you for checking out this edition of the Excel Training Tips and Techniques.  Working through our POSITIVE Sales Process, this edition we will be focusing on Selecting Target Accounts.

In the many years that I have been a sales consultant, I have learned that long term relationships is the key to success in any business, as well as selecting target accounts for future business opportunities.  I’d like to encourage you to keep a healthy and focused sales funnel.  It is important to manage your funnel with a realistic number of targets. By narrowing your focus, you will be able to get to the right person with the right approach, helping you to earn new business and build long term relationships.

If you continue to just manage your existing book of business and do not develop new targets, your business can become extremely stressful.  If you build your funnel, you are guaranteeing yourself future growth.  You will also mitigate the ‘hard hit’ if you do lose any business because or your market is slow. If you are continually working on your funnel, you will reduce your stress levels and increase your success levels.

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Norm

EXCEL SALES CONSULTING

10 Tips to Help You Grow Your Business

1. Avoid time traps of not prospecting, block out time in your calendar.
2. Define your business targets.
3. One of the best techniques to build your prospects is by asking for referrals from your best customers.
4. Develop the right approach – phone, e-mail, direct contact.
5. Do your research – get to the right person; getting the decision makers involved.
6. Identifying weak points in your sales process, continuing to assess your process
7. Do you feel that you are making the right amount of effort in this area?
8. Remember when prospecting that it’s all about building new business and relationships.
9. Have confidence!
10. Be proactive.  Knowing where you are going and how you plan to get there will give you an added confidence that your prospects will notice and make them want to do business with you!

Remember, you are a Professional Solution Provider (PSP)!

See yourself succeeding and you will!

Contact Norman Rose, President of Excel Sales Consulting. His company offers sales, customer service training, CSI surveys, coaching programs and special event seminars, specifically designed for any industry. Email Norm at: nrose@excelsalesconsulting.com

P.S. Visit www.excelsalesconsulting.com to learn about special offers, updated training programs and seminar updates.
© Excel Sales Consulting November 2010

P.O.S.I.T.I.V.E Sales and Customer Relationship Building Process!

P - LANNING
O – PPORTUNITIES
S – ELECT TARGET ACCOUNTS
I - MPRESSION
T - RACK THEIR NEEDS
I - NTRODUCE THE RIGHT SOLUTION
V – ICTORY
E – NGAGE IN A LONG LASTING RELATIONSHIP

Thank you for checking out this edition of Excel’s Training Tips and Techniques. This edition, our focus is on making the most of our OPPORTUNITIES. What are your current opportunities? Are you embracing these and seizing new opportunities as they become available to you? Are you continually working on improving in directions that allow you to grow both personally and professionally? We all know that continued self-improvement is critical for success.  By working on improving weaker areas in our lives, we are building a foundation for life-long success: both personally and professionally.  I also believe that we need to capitalize on our individual strengths. As we become more adept in our own skills, a natural passion and sincerity will develop, allowing us to create even more opportunities. At the same time, it is important to recognize that we need to keep moving forward; strategies that may have worked in the past will not necessarily create success in the future. If we want to generate successful opportunities for our future, we need to focus on behaviors and techniques that can help us continue to create more opportunities.  To that end, I have seven important tips for you.

7 Important Tips to Help you Create Future Opportunities

1. Maintain an optimistic attitude. Every day there a number of events that can easily deter us from being optimistic.  It is not the events that we should focus on, however, but how we react to them.
2. Be sincere, friendly, polite and courteous. When these behaviors become habit, you’ll find that opportunities present themselves unexpectedly.
3. Focus on key tasks every day. Putting the most effort into key tasks will help you to see your progress and be confident that you are continually moving forward.
4. Create a better working relationship with team members. Through better communication and understanding of each others’ expectations you can open up the lines for clear communication, allowing for yet more opportunities to be recognized.
5. Appreciate what you already have. Complaints that you make affect your attitude and demeanor. Focus on the positives at work and you will notice that your respect and your opportunities grow.
6. Be committed. I am convinced that if professionals commit to increasing their service levels they will reap huge rewards. Better service leads to increased customer loyalty, resulting in long-term relationships and referrals, which increases individual self-esteem, giving way to successful teamwork, resulting in overall company growth.
7. Improve a little each day. In this way you can constantly be improving.  Remember to prioritize and set your goals.

Some people say there are no guarantees in life. I disagree with that statement. More opportunities will show up in your personal and professional lives if you practice the above suggestions. I guarantee it!

If you have any questions regarding our training programs or if you are looking for a speaker to attend any upcoming conferences or sales meetings please do not hesitate to contact me.

Thank you,

Norman Rose

A Positive Sales Process for Professional Salespeople!
P lanning
O pportunities
S electing your target accounts
I mpression
T racking their needs
I ntroducing the right solution
V ictory; earning the business
E ngaging in long lasting relationships

Thank you for checking out this edition of the Excel Training Tips and Techniques. We would like to continue you sending you valuable training tips, developed from personal experience. We are confident that these proven techniques will have a huge impact on your continued success, should you put them into practice.

We will be sharing excerpts/tips from the new P.O.S.I.T.I.V.E Sales Process from our professional sales training program. Anyone in sales is sure to benefit from these tips. Some of the tips that you read may make you say “Norm I already know that.” My response would be “Great, now how well are you doing it?” Sometimes we just need to be reminded of what we already know!

This edition, our focus is on Planning. There is just no way around it these days. If we want to be successful in anything that we do, we need to be prepared. I hope that you agree. Just like a professional athlete or any professional, we as salespeople need to prepare for our success. If we truly want to create a competitive advantage with new and existing customers we must be prepared every time. Sure, there is something to being in the right place at the right time, and of course, sometimes opportunities just show up. However, if we are not planning for our future opportunities it is not that likely that our current situation will change.

Here are some planning tips that I personally recommend.  I guarantee you that if you implement these tips to refine your current process you will see positive results!

PLANNING

Daily planning:Write out a daily plan; not rocket science I know! However, I am consistently amazed with the vast number of salespeople I meet and train who are not managing and prioritizing through a daily plan. I would venture to say that approximately only 40% of people are working with a daily plan.

Tip: Update your current planning system: begin writing down your daily tasks and cross them off as you complete them. You will increase your efficiency, you will reduce your stress levels and you will be more successful.  This is because when you have a list of tasks that need to get done you can more easily focus on key priorities allowing you more time to invest in the areas that you need to concentrate on.  By focusing on your priorities and checking off accomplishments, you can literally see yourself moving forward.

Plan time to prospect everyday:Today’s preparation is tomorrow’s success. Develop your phone script, know your prospects. Be prepared to contact past prospects whose business you didn’t get; our marketplace changes daily and we need to keep up!
Ask yourself these questions:

1.    Are you assessing where you are now?
2.    Are you making time to build your list of prospects and developing your plan?
3.    Where are you going? And how are you planning to get where you are going?
4.    Will your same behaviors and planning processes get you where you want to go?
5.    Do you need to reassess your planning process?
6.    Are you making time to create your action plan?

I hope that you make the time to print off these tips and implement some positive changes in your daily planning. Please feel free to contact me if you want to learn more about our new sales process, or if you have any questions, at 403-230-2330 or nrose@excelsalesconsulting.com.

Thank you,

Norman Rose