Confident Closing Archives | Page 8 of 8

#TuesdayTips

Most people know what they want, but they are not necessarily so anxious for what they really need. Your job is to discover what they need, and make them want it. Is this evil manipulation? I would say, “No. Not if what they need helps them achieve their real goals. “

I’ve written about the entire 5-Step Selling process in another post [Link] and today I’d like to talk about where that process really takes you. You see, I’m a firm believer in creating win-win situations, and if you are effectively selling solutions to people who don’t really need them, then you’re winning, but your client might not be.

The five key steps to sales success involve:-

Building Rapport; [Link to #20]
Asking Questions; [Link to #21]
Establishing Need & Value-Add; [ Link to #22]
Proposing a Solution; [Link to #23]
Closing the Sale. [Link to #24]

So, you have established rapport and asked many questions (and listened to the answers they gave) and now you are talking to your prospect (or existing client) about a service or product you sell that you can clearly see would add value to their business – therefore it’s something they need.

The first thing you need to remember is that they don’t know your business as well as you do. It is really important never to assume your prospect will grasp the value you could bring to them. Even your existing clients may absolutely understand how valuable the services you already provide are, but might not see why they should purchase more. It is your responsibility to show them how much they could gain by purchasing it.

By the time we get to this step in the sales process I know what the other person’s goals and objectives are. I usually have a pretty good idea of their secondary goals, as well as their primary goals, and I have some insight into the things they value based on their responses to my questions, so it’s easy to stack the value for them.

Wants vs. Needs

Your prospect knows what he wants (a specific outcome) – but sometimes he confuses the outcome with the means of getting it. This might sound condescending, but it’s really just common sense. If I go to the doctor I know what I want – a quick solution to my pain or sickness; but he’s the one who tells me what I need to achieve that outcome. It would be silly for me to go in absolutely set on getting a certain prescription and to reject his suggestion that I try something even more effective.

A doctor can get away with that kind of switch because by-and-large we trust them. As a business owner we need to engender the same sort of confidence in our prospects so that they are convinced we understand their problem, and that our solution will resolve it in the most effective way possible.

At this point, I’m still asking them questions, but by now those questions are about the outcomes they are looking for, and the criteria they have for reaching those outcomes. For example, with my business coaching clients I help them to identify areas of their business where they are leaking resources because I know that once they see that by doing all these tasks without getting paid they are effectively working for less than they are worth. Once they find a way to charge for these things, they’ll be able to work less and earn more. Whether you are plagued by systems that take more time than they save, employees who aren’t delivering the services they ought, or prices that don’t reflect the value you bring to clients, once you can see the need in that area as well as the difference a solution will make, you are likely to find my services attractive – but it’s my job to highlight the value I bring.

If I’ve done a good job at highlighting how I can help you achieve the outcomes you really desire, and demonstrated my ability to deliver that value for others then you are almost certainly going to want to work with me. Then we can move onto establishing a price and concluding the deal. On the other hand, if you are still not sure whether you need my product or service – or whether I’m capable of delivering the service at all then there’s not much point moving forward.

The whole sale really depends on this question of establishing your prospect’s need for your service and demonstrating the value it could bring to them.

Meta Description: As a sales person or business owner it’s your job to find out what your prospects really need so that they achieve the goals they want – and then to help your prospects see that.

Book your complimentary 30-minute Discovery Session with Chandell.

By popular demand we have turned many of our multi-day workshops into multi-week online courses with a live day to kick them off. Learn more at https://businessgrowth.mykajabi.com/masteryoursales

#TuesdayTips

This post is part of a series filling out details on the 5-step sales process [Link to #16]

Building Rapport; [Link to #20]
Asking Questions; [ Link to #21]
Establishing Need & Value-Add; [Link to #22]
Proposing a Solution; [Link to #23]
Closing the Sale. [Link to #24]

I’ve listed them sequentially, but of course you are doing many of these steps simultaneously. While you’re asking questions, you continue to build rapport … and you’ll keep asking questions as you move into establishing their need for your product or service and highlighting the value it brings to them.

Why Ask Questions?

The reason you want to ask questions is to learn about your prospect – to discover the things that are important to them about a product or service, the problems they are trying to solve, their decision-making strategy, and their level of interest. All of this information will help you:

Decide whether your product/service is suitable for them;
Understand which features and benefits are most important to them;
Determine how to present your solution;
See what time-frame you will be working with.

What Kind of Questions Do You Want to Ask?

Your questions should be directly related to the business of the person you are interviewing and phrased in the the language they use, so you’ll need to tweak the following questions for each prospect:-

What do you do? What are you interested in?
For what purpose do you want this?
What would be a successful outcome if we went ahead with this?
Who will make the decision on this matter?
How will you know if this product/service is right for you?
What is important to you about this?
When will you make a decision on this?

– these questions will help you learn about why the person is talking to you, and how seriously they are considering your product/service. In a business context, it is much better to disqualify a prospect quickly than to spend a lot of time talking to someone who is just getting information from you. Of course, you don’t want to be too abrupt about this because people move around, their circumstances change, and they may recommend you to others, but if you discover that they have no intention of buying at this time, you will modify your process appropriately. This is actually very beneficial, because you get the information you need, and you don’t force them into a situation where they are uncomfortable.

One key thing you need to uncover during this process is whether the person you are talking to is a key decision-maker or not. If they don’t have the power to sign off on the deal then you know that you’re dealing with either a gate-keeper, or simply an ideas-person. If you are dealing with someone who is just bringing ideas to the table then you don’t want to spend too much time or energy on them. If it’s a gate-keeper, then your goal has to be to get their attention and interest so that they can introduce you to the decision-makers.

Whatever the situation, asking questions brings clarity and help you get the outcomes you are looking for.

Meta Description: The quality of your life may be determined by the quality of the questions you ask, but the value of your sales certainly will be.

#TuesdayTips

The other day I was saddened to hear a parent say to their Scout leader, “I don’t want my child involved in selling items to raise money. My child is no sales person, he’s a good boy.”

I was even more startled to hear the Scout leader respond, “It’s OK. This year we aren’t selling chocolates, we’re just asking for donations.”

The parent was happy, but I was filled with a deep uneasiness. I understand the reluctance to have our children knock on neighbours doors and offer to do chores in return for pay, and I don’t necessarily think we want to be pushing chocolate on people, but do we really want our children to grow up thinking selling is ‘bad’, and sales people are some kind of pariah? I don’t think so! And I really hate the idea that it’s better to ask for a donation than to sell something that has value.

We Are All Sales People - and Always Have Been

The reality is that we are all in sales. We can call it ‘negotiation’, we can call it ‘sharing ideas’, or a million other euphemisms but when push comes to shove every one of us will spend a lot of our lives selling. We sell when we apply for a job, when we communicate and idea or suggest a project at work, when we go on holidays, persuade our kids to do their homework, decide which restaurant to eat at, and a million other times each day.

The real questions are, how well do we do that selling and how effectively do we attract support and co-operation from others? In my opinion, the better your skills and ideas, the greater your responsibility to gain the skills needed to sell them. It’s doing your colleagues, your employer, and your clients an injustice when you can’t communicate your powerful solutions effectively so that others can appreciate them.

Selling Effective Solutions

If you have an effective solution to someone’s real problem, then you should be embarrassed if you withhold the solution. Maybe you don’t think their problem is important. Perhaps you think they should keep suffering with that problem. Or perhaps you are just more concerned that they won’t realise how easily and effectively your produce or service can remove their problem.

Whatever is going through your brain when you decide this person isn’t worth helping, I’d like to challenge you to change it. Maybe your solution costs more than they are willing to pay – but that is their decision to make, not yours.

In my Confident Closing Workshops [Link here] I invariably have students who are worried about the price of their product or service. When we discuss this as a group and draw out the value any given product or service brings to its owners the consensus is usually that it is worth more, not less, than the price it is being sold for. Did you get that? I don’t recall ever having other people say, “That is way too much for anyone to pay!”

How much is your product or service worth? That depends on the size and severity of the problem it solves. Whether it’s solving logistics problems for a large company, helping small business owners become more profitable, or helping obese people lose weight to avoid insulin-dependence, the price people will pay for your solution depends on how painful their problem is.

Price and value are not fixed – they are relative. Your job as a sales person is to stack the value of the solution you are selling so high that your prospect says, (even as he sits down in shock when he hears the figure you set), “Is that all?”

If you are selling a real solution to a genuine problem then you are helping make your prospects’ lives better, not taking money from them.

Do You Still Hate Selling?

Maybe you’re not convinced yet. Try this exercise.

Make a list of all the problems your product or service solves.

List the time and money prospects spend on other solutions that are less effective.

How does your solution stack up? If you can’t find enough value in it, then dig a bit deeper. If you still can’t find the value in it then maybe it’s time to sell something else. But if you’ve come up with a substantial list in support of your product’s benefits (which I hope you have), then it’s time to hold your head high, get out there, and sell it for all you’re worth because of the value it will bring to users.

Meta Description: Selling is part of our everyday life whether we like it or not. The best way to deal with that reality is to become comfortable with your need to sell and develop skills that allow you to sell more effectively.

#TuesdayTips

We all have patterns of communication that are shaped by our experience, our upbringing, and our personality. Sometimes we make excuses for ourselves: “That’s just the way I am.” “It always comes out like that.” “If people want to get upset, that’s their problem.” Sometimes we worry about the number of broken relationships that are strewn behind us, but mostly we just shrug and move on.

The reality is that you can change the way you communicate – or at least broaden your skills, and as a result you will find more satisfaction in your relationships (both business and social), and a smoother path to your goals.

Can YOU Communicate Well With EVERYONE You Meet?

When I was in my teens, I was bullied. It was so traumatic that my parents moved me to a new school. From that time onward my perception about women, and my communications with them were pretty messed up and my ability to understand and communicate with them was fairly limited. I boxed myself into a certain way of talking to them – if it worked out well, then we got on with each other, if they had a different style of communication it didn’t.

As I said to myself, “There are plenty of men around to work with, and enough women whom I do get on with, so who cares?” and I was really OK with that attitude most of the time. As I matured I realised that it wasn’t just women I had difficulty communicating with – there were certain men as well, but that was OK because I knew lots of other people had the same sort of issues.

It still wasn’t a real problem, because I did just fine with most people, and could cobble things together, but one day I had a client who was a real challenge. I had this fantastic sponsorship opportunity handed to me through this woman’s boss and it was great, except that I had to work with Cynthia – and we just did not get on. We finished the project and it was a success, but working with Cynthia was an incredibly stressful experience for me – and for her, I imagine.

It was then I started to realise how important communication was if I wanted to make my life easy and fun, and I started to look for tools to make communication easier.

Resourceful Communication Leads to Positive Relationships

Do You Want to Make Your Life Easier and More Fun? Most people I know do, and it sounds good to me! As I mentioned above, for a long time I thought I was an ‘OK’ communicator (which I was), and that that was the best I could expect – but then I stumbled across Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). Apart from being fascinated by the neurology side of things, and the processes that changed my thinking and my life, I was also excited by the possibilities for expanding my communication toolkit.

I realised that I (and most of my friends, family, and colleagues) were singularly unresourceful when it came to communicating with people who were not like us. However, I also discovered that there was something I could do about it.

Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) teaches a variety of techniques to help you communicate better. Many of them are just common sense, and great communicators through the ages have used them to win agreement and sway crowds, as well as to smooth the path of their private interactions. The problem is, they’re not commonly taught and most of the world doesn’t learn how to communicate effectively to a variety of people.

Imagine Your Life Without Misunderstanding!

Play a game with me for a minute. What would happen if you could pick the perfect way to speak and interact with everyone you met, so that they would immediately feel attracted to you, and desire to please you? Would that make life easier when you checked in at the airport? When you talked to the car sales man? When you disagreed with a colleague? When you were meeting with a client or prospect?

I know it makes an enormous difference when I make the effort to develop rapport using the tools Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) provides. When I am able to manage my communications so that the other person really hears my words no matter how different we are then life becomes much easier. When I can sift through the words they speak, and hear what another person is really saying, then suddenly a lot of misunderstandings simply vanish – both in business and in your personal life.

We Are ResourceFUL When We Have Resources

What communication resources do you have at your disposal? Many people have only one style of communication, and sometimes you’ll hear them say, “That’s just me. I can’t help it if others get upset.” Look, I get that. But what if expanding your communication repertoire builds your circle of friends, or your work opportunities … You’d be willing to flex a little bit, wouldn’t you?

Here are just a few of the resources you can use to expand your repertoire: –

Observation – could you make the other person comfortable by varying your speed and style of delivery?
Eye Patterns – are you using the right metaphors and language to appeal to this person?
Language – are you appealing to their preferred internal representation system?
Mannerisms – could you attract their attention by using bigger gestures, or smaller ones?

Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) teaches all of these and more. We cover them at one level in our 2-day Confident Closing Workshop, and our NLP Practitioner and Master Practitioner Trainings delve deeper into them, equipping you to communicate successfully with individuals and groups in any context.

The primary reason for building your communication repertoire is simply that it will make your life smoother and more fun if you don’t keep coming up against prickly personalities who drive you crazy – you’ll still meet them, but you’ll be able to deal with them productively and pleasantly.

Meta Description: How often do you sabotage a relationship because you are intent on doing things ‘your way’ or not at all? Being resourceful in the way you communicate with others can change your life.

#TuesdayTips

I was about 14 when I started selling Nutrimetics to my friends at school. They were polite and sort of interested but I didn’t get many sales during lunch hour. A couple of them thought their Mums might be interested and held parties at home – and that was when my business really took off. I won sales awards, medals, and you name, it … but I also learned an important lesson – it’s much easier to sell to people who are thirsting for a solution, than to people who are just showing polite interest.

I took that lesson to heart and it helped me in all my later sales experiences – whether I was actually selling products or services, or sharing ideas. Polite interest just wastes your time, and the other person’s time as well. If you’re in a social situation then you can move on to other topics of interest. If you are in a business situation then polite interest just wastes your time, and robs you of other opportunities.

Don’t Be Afraid of ‘No’! - It Might Even Be Your Best Friend

It is far better to spend your time talking to people who have the problem your service solves and the money to spend on your solution, rather than with people who are just being polite – because after all, business is about sales, not just interest. That’s why it is always good to elicit a ’no’ response sooner rather than later if the person you are talking to is really not a good candidate for your product.

So, I don’t want to make people’s decisions for them, and I really want to give them the information they need – but how do I open the door so they are willing to listen.

5-Steps Sales Process That Works.

Establish Rapport. The easiest way to do this is to match and mirror their behaviour, or identify their preferred internal representation system and use that to communicate with your prospect. Without rapport, it’s harder to elicit the information you need to determine whether you and the prospect are actually a good fit, and if you don’t seem to be getting anywhere in establishing try to work out why.
Ask Questions. You can use questions to continue to build rapport but you are really listening carefully so that you learn about your prospect’s problems and concerns. You’ll be asking questions throughout the interview so that you can discover what they value, and what their decision-making process is, and trying to uncover their objections so that you’ve answered them effectively before you come to the point of closing the deal. These questions will help your prospect feel that they were heard, and they will help you know whether the person is actually a real candidate for your product.
Establish Value and Need. Your questions will have shown you whether this person actually need your product or service. At this point you are making some decisions on their behalf. If you realise that you can’t add enough value to this particular business for it to be worthwhile that’s okay – you can tell the other person how you feel and end the conversation. You never want to go into a deal so hungry that you need to get it at any cost. If you can’t add enough value to make it worthwhile for the prospect then you’re better off walking away. If you do make a deal under those circumstances neither of you will be happy with the outcome.
Propose Solution. Hopefully you’ve taken all the time you need to ask questions and listen to their answers, because by the time you get to this fourth step in the sales process you should be ready to propose your tailored solution succinctly and clearly. Your prospect should be nodding agreement at this point and demonstrating that they can see the value you are offering to them specifically. As you outline your solution the prospect should feel confident that it will solve their specific problem, not just be the package you happen to have in your cart ready to unload on them.
Seal the Deal. This is the final step in the process – whether it involves signing a contract or a verbal agreement. If you’ve done your job well, the outcome won’t be a surprise to either party because your will be offering your prospect a custom solution that will truly fit their needs.

I’ve taught this 5-step Sales Process to hundreds of people in corporate sales trainings and through my Confident Closing Workshops [LINK HERE] and I usually receive this kind of feedback: “By the time I actually proposed a solution I had all the information I needed to offer a tailored solution using my prospect’s terminology. Their ‘yes’ was almost instant and price became a non-issue.”

This 5-Step Sales Process is one of the easiest ways to move your closing rate from average (or below average), so astronomical – and it also takes the sting out of rejection. Most of the time, you’ve already determined that this person is not a good fit before they get as far as saying ’no’.

Meta Description: How to move your sale closing rate from average to astronomical with a simple 5-step process that doesn’t rely on scripts or programming

#TuesdayTips

Pricing – Value – Money … this is always one of the hardest things to determine. How do you set a value on your service? Most of my life as an employee there wasn’t much room for negotiation. In corporate sales, I was always paid a decent base salary plus commission that were pretty much set by the company I worked for. In one position, I was paid a very generous salary and achieved a great deal more than the target outcome, but then my employer decided I was too expensive.

In my own business, I come across people who will debate the price, then experience the value and tell me I’m worth more. I come across other people who walk away as soon as they hear the price – and never even think about the value. I know I’m not alone in this, because just about every business owner I talk to faces the same struggle.

Mindset is important because business is 80% psychology and only 20% strategy. Most of the business owners I work with have their strategy pretty well under control, but the psychology is where they get bogged down. I hear a lot of people saying things like, ‘I’m just not sure that I’m worth what it is that I’m asking,’ or ‘I always feel the need to discount,’ or ‘I feel the need to actually give more than I’ve agreed to’. Others use statements like, ‘I don’t know how to sell my product – I’m really good at telling them about it, but when it comes to asking for the money, I really struggle with that’.

The problem is not the product or service they deliver, it’s their understanding of the value they bring to the table. Mastering the mind-set of the confident closer gets rid of that procrastination, get rid of that overwhelm, and gets rid of that doubt about your value so you project confidence – and are received with confidence.

Your Perception IS the Reality You Project

When you present your business it’s really like a performance – and the purpose of a performance is to influence the audience and move them. The thing is that we don’t think about business presentations that way, we think about them as a means to an end, or more income, or reaching a target. You know, I’ve got this appointment today, I’m meeting this person and I’ll try to convince them to buy. We don’t usually see it as reaching out to influence people and they pick that up.

You see, the vital fact that you need to understand is that perception is projection. You may have heard that before, but I want you to really slow down and think about it. Perception is projection. … But you are unable to perceive behaviour in someone else if you are not capable of it yourself.

You’ll have heard the comment that when you point your finger at someone and call them names, there are three fingers pointing back at yourself. That’s because the faults we’re most aware of in others are the ones we are prone to, and it’s often the reason why parents are so hard on their kids – they’re projecting their own traits and so they’re hyper-sensitive to them in others.

What About Josie?

Remember Josie, the hairdresser I wrote about the other day [Link to Part 1] – she had fallen into the vicious cycle of discounting her services to attract clients. The problem was that this meant that she needed to see more clients to make the same money and every time she did this her perception of the value of her service plunged lower. I could see that before long Josie would have discounted her Salon out of existence.

I have to admit that I staged a scene to help her understand the value of her work. You see, Josie really was a great hairdresser, and she ran a great Salon but she was seeing her work as something people chose because of price. I sent a friend in who really needed to see a great hairdresser who would help her find a hairstyle that looked great and fit her lifestyle. I knew that Josie could help her, and I asked this friend to be really enthusiastic and pay more than she was asked IF (and only if) she was genuinely happy with the outcome.

Well, Sarah was delighted with her appearance once Josie had finished with her hair and shown her how to style it easily. She raved about Josie’s efforts, she admired herself in the mirror, and when Josie told her how much the service cost Sarah was (genuinely) outraged. “You can’t charge that little! It’s impossible!” she said. “You’re an artist and you should charge like one.” Sarah paid twice the price that Josie asked and as she walked out, she told a client who was just walking in, “I have just had the amazing service and the best value haircut I’ve ever imagined!” – and she meant it.

What Happened Next?

We’d already worked out what Josie needed to charge in our coaching sessions. The problem was that Josie was convinced that no-one would pay that much. Sarah’s comment gave Josie the courage to quote the price we’d agreed on to the client who had walked in as Sarah left. Her response gave her the courage to do it again … and again … and it wasn’t long before she really did discover the joy of owning a business.

The point of telling this story is simply that Josie is like many business owners – they can’t charge the prices they need to, because they don’t value themselves as they ought and Perception IS Projection!

Meta Description: Pricing-Value-Money – how your understanding of these can lead to success or failure and how they can turn your business around.

By popular demand we have turned many of our multi-day workshops into multi-week online courses with a live day to kick them off. Learn more at https://businessgrowth.mykajabi.com/masteryoursales

#TuesdayTips

It’s a pretty consistent fact around the world that approximately 50% of small businesses fail within the first two years of operation and only about 8% of them make it to 10 years. Michael Gerber discusses the reasons for this at length in “The E-Myth Revisited”, but I’d like to discuss it briefly here and tell you a story to illustrate it.

Are You A Technician?

A lot of small businesses are started by ‘technicians’ who are very good at what they do, and angered when they think that their employer doesn’t value them enough. The accountant who leaves a big firm to start his own practice because he knows he’s being charged at $180 per hour, but only receiving $90, the chiropractor or physiotherapist who knows what each patient is being charged, but only receives a percentage of that fee, or my friend Josie, who is a hairdresser.

Josie worked in Angie’s Salon and she was paid $15 an hour. At the end of every week Josie saw that her income is far less than the total takings that Angie has in revenue. She worked out what each client paid for her services and compared that with her weekly wage and said to herself, “How come Angie gets paid this much and I’m only getting $15 an hour and I work much harder than her. I’m a much better hairdresser than she is and I see more clients!”

After a while Josie decided to start her own Salon. She knew that she is a really great hairdresser, in fact, she loves hairdressing so much she told herself that this would not be work! She worked really hard, put in long hours (all that administration as well as hairdressing!) and to encourage people to come in she started discounting her services. Josie was now working much harder now than when she was employed by Angie. When we sat down together and looked at Josie’s numbers in a Business Coaching session, we worked out that her new pay rate as a business owner was $1.20 an hour.

You see, what Josie didn’t understand were all the other tasks that Angie did behind the scenes. Things like rent, utility bills, doing the payroll, looking at how she’s actually going to get business walking in through the door, (Angie’s clients didn’t just show up with their money on the day she opened the Salon!), and managing stock levels. Josie only saw the big picture with all the zeros at the end of the week’s takings, she didn’t even consider the rest of the picture.

In this classic example of the standard Small Business Owner Josie went from scoffing over $15 per hour as an employee to buying herself a very stressful job for the bargain price of $1.20 per hour! Wasn’t that a great move?

Josie was down – but she was not out! She had signed up for a 2-day Confident Closing workshop that I ran because she was determined not to go back to being an employee. She was going to make this work!

We started by laying out all the bad news … the tasks she had to do, the bills she had to pay, etc – and then the good news … the clients she already had, the staff she had working for her and so on. The picture was pretty ugly, but with all the facts in front of her, Josie could see clearly why she was feeling so stressed and she could make a plan to get out of it.

Find out what happened next … Part 2

Meta Description: What many small businesses owners don’t consider before they start their business and how this leads to despair and failure.

By popular demand we have turned many of our multi-day workshops into multi-week online courses with a live day to kick them off. Learn more at https://businessgrowth.mykajabi.com/masteryoursales

#TuesdayTips

I firmly believe that each of us have all the resources we need to make a success of both our business and our personal lives – it’s just that sometimes we get caught up in ways of thinking and behaving that mess us up over and over again. I’ve seen it a lot in teams I’ve worked with, and individuals and corporate groups I’ve trained.

In my book, “Confident Closing: Sales Secrets That Grew A Business by 400% in 6 Months And How They Can Work For You!” I talk about the transformation Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) brought to my own life, and how quickly I was able to teach others so that they had similar transformations in their own areas of particular need.

Our Roadblocks May Look Different, But They Have The Same Root Cause

In a way, we hate to hear this because we like to think that our problems are unique and that’s why we can’t move past them, but if you think about it differently, this reality is quite comforting: – If others have found a tool that helps them change, then I can too. I don’t need to stay ‘stuck’ in my problem!

The root cause of all our problems is our unconscious mind, and the beliefs and behaviours that we store there. The real problem here is that they are unconscious so it’s very hard to pinpoint them and change them. When I attended my first Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) training I’d been seeing a psychologist to help with depression for months and going over the same pile of misery every week. It’s hard for me to believe even now, what a transformation a few days made in my outlook, but I’ve seen the same thing happen over and over again in other people.

The key is that while Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) doesn’t teach that your past isn’t important, it does teach that you are not bound by your past and it delivers the tools you need to release the chains that are holding you to your old ways. It is almost like magic!

Let me tell you about a couple of the transformations I’ve seen as people overcame the personal and professional roadblocks that had been keeping them stuck for years (I’ve changed names, but the stories are real):

Samantha is an effervescent extrovert

she is so bubbly that she scares some people. In a sales team this is great because it doesn’t matter how many rejections she gets, she’s always ready to get up and go again – on the other hand, she scares off some really great prospects. She was in one of my group trainings and we looked at ways to develop rapport and relationships. As she learned to read her prospect over the phone or in person she was able to tone down her effervescence and close more sales.

Samantha never felt as though this was ‘putting on an act’ because she was simply thinking more about what would make the other person comfortable than herself. She was excited about the fact that she was able to close nearly twice the number of sales, but she was even more excited by the fact that she was able to build a closer relationship with both her sister and her own son – both of whom were introverts. They’d always got on fairly well, but now they were actually enjoying being together.

Maybe you know someone like Clive

Clive has been moving ‘away from’ things his whole life. He didn’t want to be fat, or unfit, or poor. In the business context he didn’t want to fail – so every month he reached the acceptable target that he set for himself. The problem with this is that you end up on a see-saw. If you feel fat at 60kg (or 80kg or whatever) then you start to work on losing weight – but your only real goal is to be lighter than that point. So you lose a bit of weight, feel better about yourself, relax … and next thing you know your weight is right back up there (or even higher) – and that was Clive’s problem – he just got heavier and heavier incrementally.

It was the same with finances – he wanted to be ‘not poor’, so he’d make some good money, feel much better, relax and his financial situation would sink back to where it was. Fitness … Sales Targets … same story. When we uncovered the unconscious beliefs which were driving his behaviour and dealt with them, things started to slowly change for Clive. He learned to move toward genuine goals that he was passionate about, rather than ‘away from’ states which he didn’t like.

I could keep telling you stories about others who have been able to overcome their roadblocks, and achieve their personal and professional goals after years of frustration. But I’d like to invite you to experience it for yourself. Come along to my next Confident Closing workshop CONCLO and learn more.

Meta Description: Most people have roadblock – barriers they keep coming up against no matter which route they try. The good news is that NLP is a powerful tool that can help you overcome them and live resourcefully.

By popular demand we have turned many of our multi-day workshops into multi-week online courses with a live day to kick them off. Learn more at https://businessgrowth.mykajabi.com/masteryoursales

#TuesdayTips

I am one of those weird people that sort of enjoys cold calling – within limits. My results have always been good, and that has given me the confidence keep going when I am rejected. But there’s a reason why my results have usually been so good, and that’s what I’d like to tell you about.

One of my early sales positions was in a highly competitive industry with very thin margins. Our performance was judged on the number of calls we made, not on the number of appointments or sales we got. I always thought that was a mistake because it put the emphasis on the action, rather than the outcome and it seems to me that if you expect really poor outcomes you’ll probably get them. Anyway, my outcomes were excellent and I ended up booked out for weeks ahead because I used this system.

People often said, “It’s all very well for you Chandell, you’re a natural salesman so it’s easy for you to get these results.” And I’d kind of smile and think, “Well, if you knew how hard I worked before I ever picked up the phone you’d probably realise that there’s not much natural about it!”

When I became sales manager I started to teach my teams the system I was using, and you know what? Most of them became ‘natural salesmen’ too!

So here’s my 7-Step Sales System – it works for cold calling, and helps you close sales in other contexts as well because it gives you confidence in what you’re selling. The one thing that makes it even more powerful – which I talk about in another post – is principles of observing your prospect and understanding what’s going through their mind. I learned those through neuro-linguistic programming (NLP) and they supercharged my results because they also helped me identify prospects who were not a good fit for the product or service I was selling and to offer them an alternative (or suggest they just keep what they had).

A 7-Step Sales System That Really Gives Results

Become familiar with the core literature for your product or service;
List all the reasons it would be worthwhile purchasing it;
Uncover all the questions prospects might ask;
Find meaningful answers to those questions;
Create a script you can use to explain your product or service;
Make a recording of the script to help you learn it and listen it it often;
Practice the script and keep adding questions.

You’ll notice this is not an effortless process – it takes real work and thought. It is fantastic when you have a team of people who can brainstorm features, benefits, and objections way beyond the ones in the handbook, but it works almost as well when you do the process alone and then practice it on friends or relatives to refine your script.

Most Objections Fall Into 3 Categories

Handling objections is usually the hardest part of sales, but it’s much easier once your realise that no matter how complex an objection seems, it usually has roots in one of 3 categories:-

I don’t have enough money;
I don’t have enough time;
I don’t have enough resources.

Once you practice mentally identifying which of these 3 categories you’re facing, you’ll be able to answer almost any objection that comes your way, without much difficulty and that will give you added confidence in any sales situation.

It’s amazing how much difference this level of preparation gives to both your outcomes and your attitude. Several times each year I run a sales training workshop called Confident Closing – it has that title because I’m passionate about sales and I believe that everyone can learn to close more sales, but the ‘Confident’ part is just as important as the closing in my mind. It’s rather like going into an exam knowing you’re well-prepared – it doesn’t matter what the questions are, you are confident you’ll be able to deal with them – and as a result your answers demonstrate that confidence.

If you’d like to learn more about my Confident Closing Sales Training go to CONCLO.

Meta Description: A 7-Step Sales System that gives results even when you use if for cold calling – and which will help you close more sales than you ever imagined was possible.

By popular demand we have turned many of our multi-day workshops into multi-week online courses with a live day to kick them off. Learn more at https://businessgrowth.mykajabi.com/masteryoursales

#TuesdayTips

How can you take advantage of NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) to set off your sales in an upward trajectory?

In a sales meeting, you have to listen really well to your client. Not the distracted kind of listening that you do as you think of the right things to say next. You must give your full attention to the client. You must be attuned to him through matching and mirroring — words, tonality and physiology.

And you must find out what his frame of reference is. In NLP, a frame of reference is defined as how a person judges the results of his actions. This could also mean his standards. You can ask a client how they know they are doing a good job and you can immediately identify whether he has an internal or external frame of reference.

When the client answers, “I instinctively know I am doing a good job, I don’t need anybody to tell me so”, then you have someone who has an internal frame of reference. These people make good entrepreneurs. They don’t need a lot of validation from outside to go on with their work.

But when he says, “I seek other people’s opinion about my work”, then he has an external frame of reference. This kind of people is perfect for service-oriented businesses like salons. They would seek client’s opinion for them to find out if they did their work well.

A person with an internal frame of reference with an external check looks inside then outside. A person with an external frame of reference looks outside then inside.

Frames of reference have been used in the past for personality profiling and you can use this too in closing sales. Be sure to follow the 5-step selling process discussed in a previous article – 5 Steps Sales Process Works.

For clients with external frame of reference, you can use testimonials from satisfied clients/customers for your product or service. Tell them the great things other people have to say about your product or service. You can build your presentation around these testimonials. These will definitely catch their attention.

For clients with an internal frame of reference, you can emphasize the benefits your product can bring to them. You must do a good job of stacking up your product’s value. You must ask questions to find out if your solution suits his unique needs and problems. When you have done this, it would be like feeding salt to the horses and they would thirst for your product.

Selling based on a client’s orientation would then be natural and would require less effort.

To find out how you can harness the power of NLP in closing sales, come and join our 7-Day NLP Training!

By popular demand we have turned many of our multi-day workshops into multi-week online courses with a live day to kick them off. Learn more at https://businessgrowth.mykajabi.com/masteryoursales

#TuesdayTips

Wants vs. Needs

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Why Ask Questions?

What Kind of Questions Do You Want to Ask?

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We Are All Sales People - and Always Have Been

Selling Effective Solutions

Do You Still Hate Selling?

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Can YOU Communicate Well With EVERYONE You Meet?

Resourceful Communication Leads to Positive Relationships

Imagine Your Life Without Misunderstanding!

We Are ResourceFUL When We Have Resources

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Don’t Be Afraid of ‘No’! - It Might Even Be Your Best Friend

5-Steps Sales Process That Works.

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Your Perception IS the Reality You Project

What About Josie?

What Happened Next?

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Are You A Technician?

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Our Roadblocks May Look Different, But They Have The Same Root Cause

Samantha is an effervescent extrovert

Maybe you know someone like Clive

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A 7-Step Sales System That Really Gives Results

Most Objections Fall Into 3 Categories

#TuesdayTips

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