Good salespeople are caring, ask great questions, follow a system and are persistent
The snow in 1979 was record-breaking, and it was still piled high in our yard late into the spring. My brother Rob was so anxious to see the green grass that he decided to sell the snow. He drafted a sign and put it in the front snowbank. He was determined to sell it all!
Last weekend, I was sitting around with a couple of other families after a day of skiing when the conversation turned to sales. One of our friends had a schoolmate who had become one of the top commercial realtors in the country.
He was asked if he had any indication in his early years that his friend would be so accomplished. And then this: “Do you think he was manipulative when he was younger?”
Then the conversation turned to me: “Dave, what do you think? Are really good salespeople manipulative?”
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I was surprised by the question. Having dealt with supplier salesmen for 30 years in retail and having trained people in sales for 30 years, none of the great salespeople I ever knew were manipulative. Award-winning salespeople I’ve known have dedicated their lives to helping others. The staff I had never won any sales awards but worked daily selling things to make a difference in people’s lives.
That’s not to say that I haven’t met salespeople who have tried to be manipulative and deceptive or sell me things for their benefit, not mine.
However, the best salespeople, the ones who are truly successful, who win awards and achieve lifetime recognition in sales, are those who have a number of the following traits:
They care
In his book The Greatest Salesman in the World, Og Mandino suggests that the greatest attribute any salesman can have is love. This isn’t taught in any sales courses or ever discussed in the boardrooms of companies that have sales forces.
Award-winning salespeople like people and care about them. They’re relational and sincerely interested in helping their customer achieve their goals.
Far from being manipulative, great salespeople want their customers to be happy with their purchases.
They ask great questions
People who are great at sales ask questions to discover the needs of their prospective customers, soliciting information to move the sale along.
They ask questions to ensure that each person purchases the product best suited to their needs.
They follow a system
Whether they’ve been trained in sales or not, really good salespeople follow a system of developing relationships, uncovering needs, determining budgets, presenting a solution and asking for the sale in a way that ensures the continuing loyalty of their customers.
They have persistence
In sales, it takes a long time to be successful, to understand the business of sales, to face the daily rejections, to build up a sustainable customer base, and to develop meaningful and valuable relationships.
It takes training to know your products or services. It takes persistence to understand what your customers are going through when you’re selling something to them.
It takes persistence to deal with the loneliness that salespeople feel when they’re travelling away from the families they love. Sometimes closing a sale might take days, weeks, months or even years, and persistence is key to ongoing success.
The next time you deal with a salesperson, remember that being in sales is tough. There are targets, deadlines, and demanding sales managers and bosses. There are objections, recessions, budgets, and even weather to deal with that can punch a hole in the best-made sales plans.
If you run into a salesperson who is manipulative or deceptive, move on; ask the company you’re dealing with to let you work with someone else.
My brother Rob never sold any snow that winter due to an overabundance of supply and lack of demand. However, he went on to sell millions of dollars in software services because, like the best salespeople, he was persistent and cared about people and gave them value.
Dave Fuller, MBA, is an award-winning business coach and a partner with Pivotleader Inc.
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