Sales Tip Of The Week - SalesTrainingCamp.com

Questions Are Worthless Without This by Art Sobczak

Greetings!

At a party I was talking to a woman who asked five questions in a row. I began answering the first one, and could very well have said, "I believe you look and smell like a sweathog," because she didn't listen to the first, or any of my answers, since she replied, "Interesting," and then began talking about herself.

I watched and listened as she did that with several other people she met. Sure, we all know we should ask questions. But the effort is wasted if they're not asked in the right way, or if you don't listen to the answers.

++++++++KEY SALES POINT+++++++
When a listener hears a question, their mind immediately is conditioned to begin searching for answers. However, when several questions are posed in rapid-fire sequence, you leave the person confused as to which one they should answer first. And, some questions are not answered at all if you don't give them an opportunity.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

For example, read this scenario without stopping to think about each question, as if you were the person hearing the questions:

Caller: “And what do you feel your company needs most regarding boosting morale and enthusiasm? Do you think it would be compensation related... or maybe training? And how does that affect performance in all of the departments?”

Did you feel like a spinning top, rotating around trying to focus on the questions coming from all directions? Same thing happens with prospect and customers.

EFFECTIVE QUESTIONING GUIDELINES
1. Ask one question at a time. If it’s not important enough to stand on its own, don't ask it.

2. After you ask it, be quiet. If they don't answer immediately, resist the urge to answer it for them or follow up with another one. They're likely thinking about what they're going to say.

3. After they apparently have finished, remain quiet for 1-2 more seconds. You might get additional information, and ensures you don't interrupt.

4. Follow-up their answer with a related question. Don't ping-pong around from subject to subject. For example, if they answered with, “I believe the main problem we have right now is a lack of motivation,” a logical next query would be, “Oh, what are some specific situations where you've seen a lack of motivation?”

5. Be confident in your questioning. One reason people ask multiple questions is that they aren't comfortable asking questions. The only way you're going to truly help someone is by finding out about them. You're not intruding. You're assisting.

Fielding multiple questions is confusing for the listener, and counterproductive for you. Ask one at a time, and listen!

Speaking of questions, I interviewed sales strategist, Jim Meisenheimer for my Platinum Member's Audio Seminar a couple of months ago. Jim shared his "12 Best Questions to Ask Customers." Wow! I immediately started using a few of them myself, and one helped land a huge sale for me--and I teach this stuff. You can get the audio CD of this one-hour seminar. Go to http://businessbyphone.com/tss.htm

Go and have your best week ever!

Art

About the author: Art Sobczak, President of Business By Phone Inc., specializes in one area only: working with business-to-business salespeople--both inside and outside--designing and delivering content-rich programs that participants begin showing results from the very next time they get on the phone. Audiences love his "down-to-earth,"entertaining style, and low-pressure, easy-to-use, customer oriented ideas and techniques.

He works with thousands of sales reps each year helping them get more businesses by phone. Art provides real world, how-to ideas and techniques that help salespeople use the phone more effectively to prospect, sell, and service, without morale-killing "rejection."

Using the phone in sales is only difficult for people who use outdated, salesy, manipulative tactics, or for those who aren't quite sure what to do, or aren't confident in their abilities. Art's audiences always comment how he simplifies the telesales process, making it easily adaptable for anyone with the right attitude.

Contact Info
Art Sobczak
Business By Phone Inc.
13254 Stevens St.
Omaha, NE, 68137
402-895-9399
ArtS@BusinessByPhone.com
www.businessbyphone.com

Rapport is the most important process in influencing others. It is vital if you want to maintain relationships. Without it, you are unlikely to achieve willing agreement to what you want. People who have excellent rapport with others create harmonious relationships based on trust and understanding of mutual needs.

Rapport is the cornerstone of all mutually effective relationships. It needs constant vigilance to keep it alive and effective.

Rapport is similar to money – when you are short of it, it increases in importance. Without rapport you will reduce your chances of getting:

The way in which you interact with others has a major bearing on your success as an influencer.

Being in rapport means that you are in agreement with others both verbally and non-verbally.

Mix together as required. Notice changes and be prepared to maintain a flexible approach throughout. Keep communication flowing on all levels.

Telling others how you feel and what you think and believe, as well as telling them about your background, is a kind of currency. Give out information and usually you will receive a lot back in return.

People swarm, flock and group together by type, background, interests, beliefs, gender, work and so on. And one of the most efficient ways to get close to one another is through self-disclosure.

As we begin to experience a powerful common bond, so too does rapport begin. Mutual interests, ideas, values and beliefs are the wrap and weft of social interaction.

It is rare for two human beings to be together very long before seeking to discover similarities about themselves. This biographic matching can be social or economic, achieved through outlook, education or background – common experiences of the world.

When you match, you reduce resistance by playing down differences while building on similarities.

Once you are matching one another, you can continue to maintain the rhythm you have created by agreeing with one another, seeing things from the same point of view. Pacing is a conscious continuation of matching.

Don’t overdo it – you may be accused of mimicry. Be elegant – your skills should remain unnoticed.

One of the goals of matching and pacing others is to be able effortlessly to lead them in another direction. Once you are deeply in sync with the other people, a change of pace from you will usually result in a similar change in others.

Matching and pacing help you share someone else’s experience and you will begin to know intuitively when it is appropriate to make suggestions, to influence, to lead.

You can also influence behaviour in others by mismatching. It is useful to mismatch when:

• You need time to think before acting – use the bathroom, make a telephone call, add up figures on your calculator.

• What you are doing isn’t working – go for a walk, listen to some music, make a phone call.

• Matching is affecting your mood negatively – break off the conversation, change the subject.

Have you noticed how some people seem to be universally liked, trusted and respected? Chances are that they’re also good at networking – developing a wide network of friends, colleagues, allies and useful contacts.

Networking offers you a structured way of making certain that your ideas are effectively exchanged with others.

How can you get to know your team, other managers and clients better? Are there management associations you could join, luncheon clubs, your local Chamber of Commerce?

Org anise team events outside working hours. Be seen at functions, offer to assist whenever you can.

Make yourself known – don’t stand on the edge looking in. Be part of the action.

Jonathan Farrington is a business coach, mentor, author and consultant, who has helped hundreds of companies and thousands of individuals around the world, achieve their full potential and consequently, optimum performance levels, in his capacity as Managing Partner of The jfa Group.

Prior to establishing his own consultancy, Jonathan earned his spurs in some of the most demanding and competitive market sectors i.e. I.T., Telecommunications and Finance. Outstanding achievement at an early stage in his career provided a ‘fast-track’ passage to several general management and director level appointments.

Challenging assignments took him from the Middle East and Africa to Europe and the USA, providing him with the opportunity to work with a number of the largest and most successful international corporations including: - IBM, Wang, Legal and General, Andersen Consulting, Litton Industries and The Bank of Tokyo.

In 1995, Jonathan formed jfa with the primary objective to deliver unique leadership and sales team development programmes to both the corporate and SME sectors.

Since then, he has authored in excess of three hundred skills development programmes, designed a range of unique and innovative process tools and written extensively on organizational and sales team development.

Large budgets are set aside in many organizations for the purpose of designing creative advertising campaigns and exquisite packaging that make enthusiastic and seductive promises of the benefits and value of purchasing the company’s products and/or services. A question, however, rarely addressed is: After the purchase who is responsible and accountable for delivering on those brand promises?

Strong brands are not built in a campaign, they are built over time. Strong brands are built on the attitudes and behaviors of employees who do, or do not, deliver on the implicit promises advertising makes to customers. When a customer writes a letter of complaint, the subject is rarely about the product or service itself. The disappointment is almost always about the way they were treated by an employee or group of employees to whom they took their original problem.

Every interaction between customers and employees makes an impression. A deposit or withdrawal is made to or from the equity of the brand. Brands are about emotional connections. My experience with your company is either that I am highly valued based on the care and commitment demonstrated in solving my problem, or the opposite – no interest was shown by your employees in keeping the promises made in the advertising that convinced me to try your product or service.

Employees play a fundamental and key role in building a company’s brand. Educating them in this fact and then providing training in the art and science of superior customer service should be a key component of any marketing strategy. We need to remember that the ultimate goal of marketing is not just to create brand awareness - it is to establish dedicated consumers of the brand. Only consistent, positive experiences with the brand make that possible.

For employees to have a passion for the brand, however, requires much more than training. This level of motivation, dedication and commitment is a function of belief. This belief is not only in their product or service but also belief in the company. This is where leadership and corporate culture come into play. Leaders establish the values of an organization and values create cultures.

Bill Pulte, chairman of Pulte Homes, the multi-billion dollar home builder never agreed with the adage that customers come first. His philosophy is - employees come first. Bill believes that if employees feel highly valued, respected and appreciated, then they reciprocate by valuing and providing the highest level of service to the customer. Pulte Homes has won more JD Power awards for quality and customer service than any other home builder in the country. Bill’s point, therefore, very well proven.

So, leaders - here are a few questions to consider: How do your employees feel about their company? Do they feel valued, cared for and appreciated? Do their opinions count? Are their contributions recognized? Do they believe they work for an organization that knows where it’s going and what it stands for? In other words, do the culture, environment and management inspire them to be passionate ambassadors of their brand?

About the David McNally, International Business Speaker
David McNally, an internationally acclaimed speaker and recipient of the prestigious Speaker Hall of Fame Award of Excellence by the National Speakers Association, leverages his knowledge of what motivates and inspires people to provide them with the knowledge, skills and inspiration to perform at their best. David McNally is the author of two best selling books, EVEN EAGLES NEED A PUSH – Learning to Soar in a Changing World and THE EAGLE’S SECRET – Success Strategies for Thriving at Work and in Life. His latest co-authored book, BE YOUR OWN BRAND provides fresh new insights into how great brands are built by great people. Companies such as Ameriprise Financial Services, Merrill Lynch, Pulte Homes, Gartner Group and Abbott Laboratories are but a few of the many distinguished organizations that have embraced David’s work as a key component of preparing their employees for an ever increasing competitive and complex future.

For more information contact David McNally, www.davidmcnally.com, info@davidmcnally.com, 1.800.228.1218 or 952.835.0300, 9717 Colorado Road, Bloomington, MN 55438, USA.

If you are like most of the people I encounter in my sales training programs, you likely have some type of fear relating to the sales process. When I pose this question to people in my workshops, the fear of rejection is usually the top concern participants express.

For me, it is cold calling. Prospecting via the telephone has never been a big part of my lead-generation process and it's not something I do with much consistency. As a result, I experience a fair bit of anxiety when I think about cold calling. In fact, on most days, I'd rather take a trip to the dentist than make these types of calls.

What I find intriguing is how debilitating this fear factor can be. Far too many people in sales don't reach their goals or quotas because they allow their personal hesitations to influence their behaviour even when they know it makes good business sense to ignore the fear and push forward. I know from experience that once I pick up the telephone and begin making my calls my anxiety quickly dissipates. Yet, that initial fear and hesitation, often stalls my efforts.

The other interesting insight is that very few people have ever actually encountered a negative experience relating to their fear. For example, when I work with specialty retailers, many people don't suggest accessories or add-on items because they are afraid they will lose the sale. Yet, it is extremely rare that someone in the group has actually lost a sale because they suggested an additional item to a customer.

Another issue that pops up regularly in my programs is asking questions. Most people who sell a product or service know that effective question-asking will help them overcome objections and move the sales process forward. However, many people don't ask good questions because they feel that their prospect or customer will feel like they, the salesperson, is prying.

Unfortunately, there is no quick fix, easy answer to this issue. And that's because everyone is unique and the underlying cause of the fear or hesitation is different with each person. However, here are few suggestions for you.

The most effective solution is push your fear or concern aside and simply do what you need to do. Although this is much easier said than done, it is important to recognize that engaging in the activity that causes you the most concern will help you develop your skill and improve your results. The key is to recognize that it will likely take several attempts before you begin to master your proficiency. However, if you discipline yourself to stay at it, your results will improve and your fear will gradually disappear.

Enlist the support of a coworker or peer. I'm not suggesting that you get that person to do the task for you! However, by working with a partner, you can role- play and practice the scenario that causes you the most grief. When I first started cold-calling, I rehearsed my opening line and voice mail message with a friend to get his reaction. My goal was to sound genuine and conversational and to keep my message short and to the point. After listening, he gave me a few pointers that improved my message.

Another approach is to think of a positive outcome. I remember my first sales call many years ago. My prospect showed interest in the training program I was offering, and not knowing what else to say, simply asked, "Would you like to book a date for it?" My heart leapt into my throat as I said those words. I felt my heart rate increase. And I was sure my prospect would feel like I was being pushy. Imagine my surprise when she reviewed her calendar and enquired about a specific date. Even though I was nervous and scared about asking for her business, it was a natural extension of our conversation and she was not offended by my question. I know from this experience that asking for the sale often yields results.

Most buyers experience some form of fear or hesitation when making a final buying decision or considering a new product or vendor. These concerns may prevent them from making a decision and may stall the sales process. That's why it is important to uncover their concerns during the sales conversation. I know some sales people avoid this question because they don't want anything negative to come up during the sale process. However, it is much better finding out what may prevent your customer from moving forward early in the sales process rather than discovering it after you have spend a lot of time with that person.

Kelley Robertson, author of The Secrets of Power Selling, helps sales professionals improve their results. Receive a FREE copy of "100 Ways to Increase Your Sales" by subscribing to his free newsletter available at his website, www.kelleyrobertson.com. He conducts workshops and speaks regularly at sales meetings and conferences. For information on his programs contact him at 905-633- 7750 or Kelley@RobertsonTrainingGroup.com.