As I have progressed through my selling career watched and taught many salespeople, I can attest that many of us, including me, do not always know when to stop and listen during the selling process. Many times, I have watched the entire sale unfold favorably and unfavorably, due to not listening. I spent many years trying to train myself to SCRL – slow down, stay calm, relax, and listen as the sale unfolds.

Here is an example:

Immediately after purchasing my first company in July 1997, Photo Etch Company, I found myself in my first big sale, watching and learning from the quotes department and salespeople on how they thought sales worked.

We had secured a large quote from a company about a hundred miles from us in Waco, Texas. Our estimators worked on it and trying extremely hard to be accurate and show me they knew their job. It was discussed that this would be an extremely competitive quote and we needed to go in with aggressive pricing, which to me meant low margins. It was determined that we need to go in at $23K and we would have a good chance to win.

The lead salesman and I drove down to Waco to present our quote.  After introductions and telling everyone I was the new owner of the company and assuring them of our continuation and future growth, we settled into the particulars of the quote. 

There were two of us and four people from the customer company. We had not discussed price but one of the engineers did want to know if we had really dug in and understood the requirements of the job. We asked what this meant and what were they exactly looking for. One engineer said in the past people quoting similar jobs, missed some critical aspects and he was sure this would be over their budget and would cost in excess of $85,000. 

I then told them we could probably do the job at a lower price because we are a small business with lower overhead. We told them we needed to go back and review the quote to make sure we did not miss anything. I asked if we could come in around $45,000 could we have the job. They in unison said yes. We took them to lunch. We drove home and submitted a winning bid the next day for twice the price we had taken with us.

This provided our sales department a good lesson in selling. Both companies were happy. We did produce on time and continued doing business with this company for many years.

SCRL — Slowdown, calm, relax, and listen. Good selling!

As always give me your thoughts. 

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Here is a review of sales calls needed before a prospect buys.  I have watched this and experienced this a lot. A majority of sales people cannot take the rejection and really do give up after the first contact.  As the president of a company I experienced the one call and never call back syndrome over and over again.

Successful sales people get past this:

Prospect — (Qualified to need and buy your products)

Contact # 1   50% of sales people have given up

Contact # 2   65% of sales people have given up

Contact # 3   79% of sales people have given up

Contact # 4   89% of sales people have given up

Contact # 5   Just now you are becoming a factor in your prospects mind

Contact # 6   Nurturing slowly, your prospect is getting to know you

Contact # 7   You can harvest low hanging fruit

Contact # 8   You are probably the only person to make 8 contacts with this person

Contact # 9   At this point when your prospect is ready to buy you have a 90% chance of being called

Contact # 10

Contact # 11

Contact # 12 Customer

Ready for habit change? 

Maybe thinking about revisiting resolutions and desired change for 2020?

I have read about people making changes in life that were great. I have applied the following to myself and achieved good results. 

However, changing a habit is not an easy task. Changing habits requires a lot of attention and requires replacement of the old habit. Just changing a habit does not always work, it needs to be replaced

Make changes that help you move forward in your life’s work, goals, and ambitions.

Here are 4 items needed to make habit changes:

1.     You must first decide a change is needed. Sounds like a basic no-brainer, but you need first decide it is needed. Admit change is required and stop denying a problem exists. Take responsibility for making the change. Ask yourself – Is this activity moving me forward toward my goals and desires in life?

2.     You cannot break old or bad habits. You can only replace them. The process is not necessarily fast. It may require a year or more. Commit to the long haul and you will eventually be glad you did.

3.     Get up and get going on the new habit every day. Daily routine will eventually become second nature. Make a list of the benefits your new habit will bring. Review the list often to stay motivated.

4.     Having changed the habit — stay away from the old habit. If you do slide back into the old habit, do not allow yourself off easily.  Say “I’ll start over now and I’ll be strong enough to get it right”. Keep moving forward toward your goal.

Do not let the past control the future. Keep reminding yourself that learning and repeating new behaviors can change your habits for life.

Make changes for your personal growth!

Let me know your thoughts.

Halfway through third quarter of 2020. 

Many, including myself, still working from home.  This may be a “real” new normal for a lot of us.  It has taken a while for my wife to get used to me being home, especially having me home most days for lunch.

Resetting the way work is done and meeting on platforms like Zoom is getting easier every day.  I have reconfigured my daily work process and seemingly getting faster and better.

Here are five tips on working from home:

1. Maintain Regular Hours. Set a schedule and stay with it.
2. Create a Morning Routine. Get ready for the day.
3. Set Ground Rules with People around you.
4. Schedule Breaks and take breaks.
5. Leave Home from time to time.  Take a walk or a drive.

Do these things and when normal is back you will be ahead of the game.

Stay Safe!

Great Quote____________________________________________________________

“You Don’t Have to Be Great to Start, But You Have to Start to Be Great.” – Zig Ziglar

_______________________________________________________________________

I have been practicing banjo and relearning guitar during the pandemic.  I am posting on YouTube check out the progress.  http://bit.ly/RFryYT75  

I have written and talked about daily sales behaviors for many years. 

In my view continuous training and reinforcement there is a basic requirement of doing daily behaviors, tracking them, and being held accountable to perform. 

Easy!

As Zig Ziglar said “People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing, that’s why we recommend it daily.”  In my view this same philosophy applies to continuous sales training and reinforcement.

In the point system I use there is a daily regimen of Sales and prospecting calls, face-to-face selling, and other contacts (email, letters, brochures, etc.). 

I have constructed and require salespeople working with me to use a tracking system consisting of 7,500 points per year. I know that if a sales person does the behaviors consistent with Prospecting, Telephone, Email, and Face-to-Face customer contact at a rate of about 36 points on average for 230 working days per year, can bring in $3,000,000+ in sales bookings for the company. It is a proven process, that works.

Many salespeople will not do daily behaviors. Doing and tracking is hard. 

A lot of salespeople get little or no training in selling behaviors. I have met, hired, and fired salespeople who are afraid of the accountability a system creates. 

The system can be set up for the entire year. Think about that. Set up your sales schedule for the next twelve months, do the daily behaviors and watch your income go to where you want it to go and no excuses.

POWERFUL STUFF!

Contact me for a free coaching session “Grow your business now!”  

I will also direct you to some good sales training to go with it.

How many emails do you get starting —? “I know you are busy, could I have 10 to 15 minutes of time to explain how our company can help you?” 

These types of emails come in over and over. Always assuming I want to give the time without having heard anything about who they are or what they do. Then, maybe a few days later or a week, I get a follow-up email asking if I saw the first one and would I give them my time. 

This type of selling effort never has worked but has been used forever. We need to change this type of sales canvassing and learn to approach the new realities of selling. We need especially to understand the new realities of selling that CORONAVIRUS has presented to us. We are going to need to learn new methods and procedures. 

We are not going to be able to have as many face-to-face meetings. We need be better at remote presentations and offering true value to our products.

I am learning new presentations and follow-up techniques. I am getting ready to start video emails. I will let you know my early results.

Feedback is welcome. What are you seeing?  

As a Salesperson, Marketing manager, Sales manager, President and CEO of various companies during my career, I am finding an unusual and disturbing phenomenon happening in sales.

There seems to be an unusual emphasis on salespeople demanding attention, without providing a reason. 

Widespread use of Email marketing is causing an assumption of readership and expected response.  I get more or less belligerent, sometimes even harsh emails telling me I need respond or give them another person’s name in my company.  Many incoming emails state that I must have missed the last email sent – respond to this new one. — BUT — They fail to give me information why I should respond. 

Salespeople are using the faceless system of email to demand action.  I find this sad. 

I would respond to emails that give me useful information or have a compelling body of information and a call to action, if I see a need for the products or services.

Many, many emails start with – “I know you are busy, could I have 10 to 15 minutes of time to explain how our company can help you.”  From my perspective they have not told me what they do and they assume I am waiting by the inbound email just hoping to have someone help me.

We are not teaching good selling. 

I have spent many years trying to get away from the mentality that selling is “Trickery” and worse selling is looked at as “The slick used car salesman” ready to do anything to get a sale and commission. 

What are you seeing?  I welcome feedback. 

We are certainly in some interesting times.  Your sales may be and are probably down.  You may be laying off employees or you may have been laid off.  You may be figuring out how to work effectively from home, etc., etc.  I hope for the best for us all. 

Now is the time to Think, Plan, Act and Do.  Make time to see where you were in the economy, where you are now and where will you position yourself for the future.

The following two lists, not totally all-inclusive, present the Symptomatic mindset of how bad it is and the symptomatic mindset of staying the course and making things happen.  Where are you?

Do you have the following thoughts or symptoms for your current state of affairs? 

1. Do you blame the economy?
2. Do you have a well defined marketing plan?
3. Did you experience fluctuations in sales even before this economic situation?
4. Do you know who your top customers are?
5. Do you regularly communicate with customers?
6. Are you looking for and introducing new products and regularly?
7. Are you actively pursuing referral program?

Salespeople and companies thriving and surviving are doing the following:

1. Looking for new markets to expand their product line.
2. Reviewing changing as needed and updating marketing plans all the time.
3. Building customer loyalty through good on-time consistent service.
4. Forming strategic alliances with other companies and competitors.
5. Know their customers and have regular communications with them.
6. Communicate and work on a referral network all the time.

Get going and make the remainder of this year go really well. 

There always have been big ups and big downs and there will be more to come. 

Where do you plan to be when this economy turns the other way?

Good Luck!