If Mark can sell, so can you?

Let me introduce you to Mark. He was the Sales Director of my previous organization. A 5 – minute chat with him and you are sold. That’s the kind of effect he has on people. He can convince you to see and believe his side of the story so effortlessly. Always! You can call him the chief convincing officer. Here’s what I have learnt from him.

 

Sales is not about what you are selling, but about making friends and about getting someone to see the world the way you do. If you are doing that right, everything else will follow and will be taken care. Selling is the art of convincing someone to believe and buy into your concept, whether by buying your product or service or by investing in your company or by working for your company.

 

Be convinced: If you are not sold on the product or service, it will be very difficult to sell someone else. Your lack of conviction will show.

 

Be direct: The biggest problem in sales is client confusion. Confusion does not lead to a Yes. Be quick, clear and simple while explaining your concepts.

 

Creating Pressure is important: Creating doubt, fear and uncertainty in your customer’s mind can be a great thing because it will lead to serious consideration of your concept.

 

Know your customer: You need to make sure that you research your potential customers, knowing their needs and challenges. The “one size fits all” barely holds true and it’s certainly smarter if you care about your client’s business.

 

At the end, it only boils down to presentation: Building an awesome presentation is critical to the sales process. It’s important to practice, memorize and be prepared to shift ones emphasis based on how the tone changes during the presentation. Even better, have conversations instead of presentations.

 

Be passionate and exciting: Creating a show and make it exciting is the trick. Excitement is contagious and creates a lasting impact.

 

Do not guess the answer: Most people have this habit of asking tough questions and you may not always know the answer. It’s hard to build credibility if you guess the answer.

 

Answer questions clearly: Your credibility will be questioned and you will possibly lose chances of securing the deal if you sound politically correct instead of giving the right answer when asked a question, in an event when you don’t know the answer.

 

Humor is an ice breaker: Funny stories always break the ice.

 

There’s always a room for improvement: Sales is an art, not a science. It’s never perfect and there’s always a room for improvement.

 

Does this write-up make sense? If it does, then I bet you are sold.