Category Archives: selling

Easy or Difficult?

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Great potential!

Have you ever thought about how easy or difficult it is to do business with your company?

I look at other businesses and items of interest, especially on the internet. Many times I turn away and do not get any information about the company or its products. If before I see the product or service I have to give my contact information or worse, a credit card to see something free — I leave!

Having said that — I started looking at doing business with my company. Is it easy or difficult? My conclusion was that it was difficult. We didn't really make things easy.

So now I am on a quest of making this business easy to get information and do business with us. Not an easy quick task. However, I am continually reviewing our practices and asking — “What makes doing business with us easier?”

Is it easy or difficult to do business with your company? Good luck — !

Make 2017 your best year yet!

I am going to make doing business with us easier – www.Poly-PMF.com

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I have an excuse box!

I try to write down all the sales, work and in many cases life excuses for not moving forward. The box is fun to have to have. I keep it on a shelf near my desk. As soon as the excuses start flying I get it out. Most excuses are now neatly written and in the box. But — Every now and then some new form of excuse making pops up and in the box it goes.

We are all going through the first half ot the first quarter of 2017. Aare sales on track? Are shipments On-Time? Is it easier to do business this year with your company than it was last year? Are continuous improvement habits a part of work and life?

I believe PMF – Polytronix Machining and Fabrication will have a great year 2017. I feel good about our prospects. I know we are doing many, maybe not all, behaviors to create a successful year.

Stay on your game and make this first quarter a great quarter for 2017.

Make 2017 your best year yet!

Goals 2017 — Personal Lifestyle, Business Selling Goals!

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Here we are going into week 4 of the New Year 2017!

First week I was astonished and interested to see the parking lots full at every exercise / workout facility I passed. Now already the parking lots are beginning to not fill. I really hope that the people starting new exercise programs are falling into different time periods and/or finding a cadence that will work and keep them on track.

How many of us have goals, written down and are executing?

I have talked with people starting strong. I have talked with people already running hard toward their written goals. I have talked with people already slowing down on goals. Sadly, I have talked with people making excuses and stopping. Saddest of all, I have talked with people who never even started goals for this year. Soon we will be completing month 1, that's 1/12th of the time alloted for the year.

I believe no matter where you are in the process, now is the time to start, run hard and never stop!

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Excuses are abundant. Success will not listen to excuses — Success will ignore them and end-of-year will come again. What will you accomplish?

If you have started keep going — Never Stop!

It's not too late to begin now — Just start and never Stop!

Make this year 2017 your best year yet!

Mad Customers! — We didn’t even know it!

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Great potential!

Have you ever made customers mad and didn’t even know it.

What is one of the worst things you can do to a customer — Cause opportunity for an RMA – Returned Material Authorization — something is wrong and the customer is not happy!

I started my career of customer service in the world of RMA and Warranty.

It is possible this can be the most frustrating thing you can do to a customer.  The product was bought to use, not send back.  On-time, instant gratification, great product — Gone.

Your company needs a system, procedures, and people to handle returns.  Both Sides are Mad and upset – Customer returning product and the Supplier trying to handle the non-routine work.

From experience of owning my own company, I have witnessed the process of people in the organization knowingly ship product, that was bad.  As I stopped and reflected on what happened, I decided I was part or all of the cause, we needed to make shipment numbers.

The underlying cause was bad operating systems.  We did not have good repeatable processes to ship good product.

So began the journey. (Probably another moment of getting the Lean Journey started and not really being aware of it.)  We did get better and improve.

We then began the real “Lean Journey”.  We were amazed at the rate we lowered RMA’s at our company!

“Lean thinking” started to take over.  We really saw total company improvement.

Make 2017 your best year yet!

Sales, Selling — Follow-up?

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Ask a sales person –

“When is the best time to follow-up with XYZ customer?”

“When is the best time to follow-up on a recent quote?

“When is the best time to follow-up on “Blah, Blah, Blah?”

 All too often we hear, It’s too early, or I am not sure now is the right time, or I don’t want to bug the Buyer/Customer/Etc.

 Have you ever taken the time to think about “Follow-Up” in selling?

Some sales people follow-up too often and disturb/disrupt the potential customer.  It is estimated that you need 7 contacts with potential clients/customers before a transaction happens.

I am self-taught in selling and when I found a really good system I latched on to it.  I have been using the Sandler Selling system for over ten years. (I would be happy to provide my contacts to anyone interested.)

A great technique that I learned and use is the Sandler Technique of using an Up-Front Contract with potential customers.

 Simply ask the prospect/Client for the next time contact would be appropriate.  Set an exact date and time if possible or get at least a time frame for contact — Then do what was agreed upon!

Too many times I have had sales people working for me or trying to sell to me stop — after the very first call.

 Never get caught in this trap —

It’s too soon to call — Now it’s too late the order was let to someone else.

Make 2017 your best year yet!

Price, Quality, Delivery!

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RF

I was fortunate to purchase a company in 1997. I am a Mechanical Engineer and completed an MBA in business, ran corporate divisions, etc.

When I first purchased the company I felt qualified to run and operate the enterprise. After all I have been educated, had a lot of experience and should know or be able to figure out the right thing to do and be successful. I soon found my element — I was not even close to fully understanding and growing the business.

My first few visits by major customers brought the reality of being in charge. I tried very hard to discuss the three keys to running a business, Price, Quality and Delivery! I believed you could have two of the three but not all three. In other words people were told they could have quality and delivery but not most favored pricing. Or, best pricing and quality but delivery may suffer. I did this in meetings and pretty much ran the company to this standard.

Years later I learned about Lean Manufacturing and the possibilities of eliminating waste in the organization. Without even thinking about it or acknowledging it I began to understand that if you want to be in and stay in the market you need really good pricing, quality and delivery. Almost like magic I found all three were achievable.

It wasn't until years later that I was called out in front of several hundred people at a major supplier conference, in a Q&A session. One of the attendees was in my plant and knew me back in the beginning when I purchased the company. He raised the question “Mr. Fry — years ago you said we could only have two of the three Price, Quality or Delivery.”. What do you say now?

Needles to say I had not thought of that question in many years. however, my answer changed — “Sir, — after getting really into Lean Manufacturing I can say and I fully believe that we now can and do and provide best in class on all three points. Our costs are lower and we are more competitive. Quality, especially to stay in the aerospace industry, has and will continue to improve. Deliveries are very much improved on-time and our lead times are becoming lowest in the industry. My story has changed and I can back it up.”

Get into “Lean Manufacturing” — And see what can happen!

Remember “Lean” works only if all involved “believe” from top of the organization down.

Make 2016 your best year yet!

Goals – 5 tips to keep your goals moving for 2016!

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I read that some people already have stopped working on their Goals for year 2016.  Hopefully you have made it easy to see your goals and review them for progress frequently.

Here are 5 tips to keep your goals moving for 2016:

Make sure you have goals written down and easy to find.

  1. Look at your goals daily.
  2. Make time to work on your goals daily, even if you spend a few minutes.
  3. If a goal seems to hard, revise it.  Look at smaller parts of each goal to work on.
  4. Never give up — Make 2016 your best year yet!

 

95%??

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After much reading, discussing and watching I am convinced that over 95% of people going into a new year don't have written measurable goals for the year.  Many of you have heard this bit of goal setting “Wisdom” and still don't have written goals.

If you are a sales person and say “Wow! I need more sales to make my year!” — you may be out of luck.  If your sales cycle takes longer than 9 weeks from start to close to shipment, you are out of time.

Now is the time to begin looking toward the New Year 2016.  Begin by setting an appointment with yourself for 30 – 60 minutes.  Get blank paper or a blank computer screen and begin writing your thoughts and ideas for accomplishment next year.  This first cut at goal setting doesn't have to be neat — just take time to think about and write your ideas and thoughts down.  My beginning session is usually quite messy and unorganized.

Put this information away in a place you absolutely won't forget where it is so that you can retrieve it next month early December.   Then set an appointment with yourself for 30 – 60 minutes early December and get your list out.

In December you will be amazed at the progress you will have already made toward thinking about and planning your goals for next year.  Your fist list may be messy, but you will be ready to define and refine the list.  You will be subtracting, adding and modifying the original set of goals.  Make the list a little neater and resolve to begin your goals and measure your goals.

Why do I believe in doing this?  It's because I use this method every year and then I set a tracking system and measure progress.  This works!

Try for yourself and get into the 5% group of people who actually write and strive to achieve their goals.  Remember a lot of “Luck” goes along with a lot of preparation.  Look out 2016 here we come! 

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Do customers come back?

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When I bought my first company in 1997, I had a 30+ year old going concern, manufacturing in the aerospace arena.  Sales were made in spite of themselves.  Sales were made if the phone rang and someone actually answered it.  In reality the customer had to convince them to take the order and deliver product somewhat close to their needs.

Sounds absurd and contrary to what we all think about today when talking about good and exceptional customer service.

Today I am involved with another business, working in the aerospace arena.  We manufacture needed precision and sheet metal parts, and can provide engineered fabrication and assembly.  The company has been around for over 25+ years.  I don’t see much difference than when I bought my first company.

Today management talks about exceptional customer service, but I find little evidence of actually doing customer service.  During my career I have had opportunity to view and review many companies from supply and supplier side of manufacturing and in many cases I have observed only rhetoric and published mission statements of concern for customers and many times have not seen “Customer Service” in practice.

Rules of engagement say we should have only the customer and customer’s satisfaction in mind.

Reading about and visiting companies I seldom find someone saying “Wow – I can’t wait to give this company my next order!”  Don’t get me wrong — there are companies out there that are concerned about customers and making the buying experience good and/or great!

So, think about your customers and how they view your company.  Here is the process I am undertaking to get more customers and create an atmosphere in the company to keep the customers coming back.

Ask the following and then act on what you find:

  1. Do customers believe it is easy to do business with us?
  2. Do we provide fast accurate quotes or response to pricing requests?
  3. Do we have reasonable delivery times?
  4. Do we work on reasons why if our pricing is out of line?
  5. Do we respond quickly to RMA’s/customer returns?
  6. Do we really care about customers and their experience doing business with us?

Certainly not an exhaustive list of questions.  However, if you are in business and sell to others these questions need be reviewed and acted upon.

I want customers to come back!

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Good Selling or Bad Selling?

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This week I had a scripted telephone sales call come through.  It was a service I am interested in and I listened.

The caller was a lady obviously not used to making telephone sales calls.  She was very nervous and would not deviate from her script.  This could have been mandated, but there was no friendliness or emotion — only monotone, nervous reading.  The script was written to have the caller periodically ask if there were any questions on the material just covered.  I could only imagine her relief when I answered “No questions at this time”.

After about 1-1/2 minutes she concluded with a final — Do you have any questions?  I had none.  However, had I not been taking notes as she quickly delivered the presentation I would not have had any data as to what she was telling and selling.  I may continue and purchase this service.  However, I will go on-line and do my research.

I listened to this particular presentation because I am interested in the service, and I am very interested in how people are taught and trained in selling.  This instance was not a good showing for the company trying to get me to buy.

I'll bet she was relived that I had no questions  and I also believe she will not be in the selling game long, or worse she will get fired.Many companies don't train or send sales people to sales training.  Most get the same training I had —  Here are your business cards, here are the brochures, there is the door — Go forth and sell!

When I was thrust into sales many years ago, I was so nervous I had to have my opening script with my name included so I would remember who I am.  I learned very quickly that a perfectly written presentation given in a monotone rote delivery was ineffective.

— But —

We all say “That is an absurd obvious statement!”.  We all know that you can't sell that way.  Listen next time a telephone sales person calls — The calls are the same and generally you can pick out the sales “Pitch” and decide to get off the call.

Is this how you sell?  Many good potential sales and/or referrals are lost, just because the basics are not provided and utilized for sales success.

Good Selling or Bad selling! — You decide.

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