Sales Calls

Whether it is in person or on the phone, the initial sales call is critical. Salespeople start building a relationship from the opening words and begin the discovery process that will tell them if this person is a potential customer. These posts can help.

Listen up: These two costly mistakes can end your selling career

by Ken Dooley

The single biggest complaint of professional purchasers is that salespeople talk too much and don’t listen enough.

That’s according to the Purchasing Manager’s Association of America’s annual survey.

Poor-performing salespeople dominate the talking, while top salespeople dominate the listening. It’s possible for a salesperson to talk too much, but it’s rarely possible to listen too much. When salespeople are excellent listeners, prospects and customers feel comfortable and secure with them. They then buy more readily and more often.

The second biggest mistake made by salespeople is their failure to ask enough good questions or phrase them properly. The key to understanding customers has more to do with questions salespeople ask rather than the answers they provide.

Beware! 3 worries that drive C-level purchase decisions

by Ken Dooley

The big three worries expressed by top executives in a recent survey are: Customer satisfaction — 73% Operational excellence — 70%, and Finding and retaining the right employees — 64%. While they may vary by business or industry, they’re the concerns that drive most executives’ purchasing decisions — in fact, almost all of their decisions….

Can your salespeople answer the 5 questions prospects will ask?

by Ken Dooley

Prospects want to see that your performance matches your promises. They look for salespeople who follow through without continuous badgering. This shows reliability. They also want salespeople who know products and policies thoroughly.

How salespeople accidentally delay buying decisions

by Ken Dooley

Salespeople who turn a complex issue into a simple one for their customers can be rewarded with more sales. By getting back to the basics and speaking in simple language, they can differentiate themselves in the minds of customers. Yet some salespeople confuse prospects and customers by providing them with too much information, causing them to get stuck in a bog of facts and figures. They favor complex solutions over simpler and more effective approaches, and bury prospects and customers with too much unnecessary language and data.

Help salespeople get past the gatekeeper: 4 top tactics

by Ken Dooley

A person performing the role of a gatekeeper has one purpose: to protect the decision-maker’s time. And it’s the salesperson’s job to help the gatekeeper realize he or she’s important enough to earn a meeting with the boss.

A recent survey asked 50 telephone gatekeepers how they determined who gets through to a decisions-maker. The top answer was “People I like.” So treating whoever answers the phone with respect is in the salesperson’s best interest. This person is very close to the decision-maker and has a lot of valuable information. So work with him or her to establish a friendly rapport.

Four tactics to pass along to your sales reps:

2 major traits of effective sales calls

by Ken Dooley

Successful salespeople exhibit these two behaviors when opening sales calls effectively:

The biggest pitfalls your sales pros encounter when cold calling

by Ken Dooley

Here are four huge pitfalls associated with cold calling – along with tips on how to avoid them:

How fear flatlines sales calls

by Ken Dooley

A sales training video opened with a sales manager saying, “Sales is all about fear. The salespeople are afraid the customers won’t buy, and the customers are afraid they will buy.” Sadly, the sentiment rings true for some salespeople.

Overcoming call reluctance: What sales pros need to know

by Ken Dooley

For some salespeople, prospecting is the weakest link in the selling chain because they suffer from call reluctance. But whether they’re experienced sales pros or new to the field, they need to quickly overcome it to survive.

3 ways to turn objections into sales

by Ken Dooley

Because prospects are pressed to do more with less, they’re more determined than ever to get good value for their purchases. And to make the best purchasing decisions, they may ask more questions and raise more objections. When that happens, salespeople can turn the situation to their advantage.

Here are three reactions that will help your salespeople turn objections into selling opportunities, courtesy of Stephan Schiffman, author of The Career Salesperson:

Sales Calls

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