Football, Fantasy & Sales Success
Over the last couple of weeks I have been enjoying watching sports on the TV – most notably the football and the start of Wimbledon. After watching England play half-heartedly against the highly motivated US team and then appallingly against Algeria, they showed some flashes of inspiration against the Slovenians but then sat back in the last 10-15 minutes and were lucky to hold onto their win. One of the commentators said that he would forgive them that and I commented to a friend at the time that the Germans wouldn’t have.
Today, against Germany, we saw an English team bereft of team-spirit, energy, commitment or passion. OK, so they got robbed of a goal at 2-1 down but they didn’t deserve to be in the match based on how they had played and now they’re not. On several occasions, when they lost the ball deep in the Germans half, the English defence were so slow to react and so slow to get back, my Mum would have got there faster. I am sure many people will put up many “excuses” for the result and many others will blame anything, everyone and Capello but at the end of the day the least you would expect is players representing their country to chase the ball down in defence as fast as they can even if they had no chance of getting there. It is was the World Cup after all.
On the BBC commentary they mentioned our “world-class” players and that they wouldn’t swop more than a couple for members of the German team. Well, I would, I’d swop the lot, that way we’d be in the running still. And as for “world-class”…
It doesn’t matter how much talent you have, if you cannot make it work on the night, if you cannot get the result, then it’s irrelevant.
By contrast, look at the tennis match between Mahut and Isner. Two tennis players battling on for 183 games over the course of 11 hours and five minutes. The final set alone accounted for eight hours and 11 minutes of that time – 98 minutes more than the previous longest match on record. Now that’s commitment. Two men who wanted to win. Two men determined to succeed. Two men not prepared to give in.
Or what about Federer’s first round match where the defending champion was forced to mount a courageous comeback against Colombia’s Alejandro Falla? Having faced numerous match points in the third set he eventually won 5-7, 4-6, 7-6 (1), 6-4, 6-0. Federer could have slinked off into the night. He could have packed his kit bag and lost three sets to love. He could have claimed “illness” or some imaginary injury after such a bad showing but he hung in there, kept fighting, got a break and eventually came out on top. Likewise, Isner and Mahut, for three days running, went out on court and slogged it out. Giving anything less than 100% was not an option.
I’m not going to try and second-guess the mindsets of the English football team. Nor am I going to try and imagine what was going on in the heads of Mahut, Isner or Federer. I am going to quite simply ask you a question…
What do you want and how much do you want it? What are you prepared to put in to get it? How passionate are you about ensuring that your dreams become reality?
Bert Was Waiting For Motivation To Strike
We all know a Bert. We’ve all met a Bert. And we’ve all worked alongside a Bert. Maybe, secretly, you think someone you work with is a Bert. Maybe they think you are!
Bert is just a normal guy, with normal friends and normal colleagues and he faces the same normal challenges that we all do, every day. If Bert’s antics and adventures amuse, inspire, educate, strike a chord or just make you laugh then Bert will be happy.
But… most of all… Bert wants to be famous! So, if you think he should be, then forward him to your friends, colleagues and clients. And, if you have any great ideas for what you think Bert should do next, let us know…
He might just do it!
How To Mess Up A Cold Call
A cold caller has been trying to get hold of me for a few days with the message, “I would like to invite you to an event?” We finally spoke today and he launched into a series of questions (which weren’t all bad) and then a reasonably well crafted and well presented pitch. This guy should be making a lot of sales but, whether he does or not, I bet that he does a lot of head banging on a daily basis and he could do a lot better…
Why?
Lack of research, planning and preparation. You might ask how I know he wasn’t prepared properly? Well, these two little gems to start with…
- His opening gambit, “I don’t know much about your company”. For that, read, he knows nothing.
- Having the nerve to ask me, “What are the main products and services you sell?”
Seriously, can you believe that? And to a sales motivational speaker too. He needs to attend one of my sales seminars!
Intrigued, I asked him how he got my details. The answer was not clear but it was something like, “Well, I have a list that came from research and my manager recommended you and I had a look and…” Oh, come on. No, you didn’t and no he didn’t and we both know that someone bought a list of numbers from somewhere and you rang it without a second thought. You’ve done nothing.
A lot of people think that cold calling doesn’t work anymore. A lot of people think that cold calling never worked. A lot of people think that cold calling doesn’t and won’t work for them. A lot of speakers are making a lot of money perpetuating this myth (watch out for my forthcoming video series where I set the stall straight on that one!).
The truth is that cold calling does not work for many salespeople. And it doesn’t work for several reasons…
- They’re not in the right state of mind.
- They don’t make enough calls.
- They don’t know enough about their prospects.
- They don’t personalize their calls for every individual.
- They don’t ask enough questions.
- They don’t know how they are most likely to be able to help that prospect.
- They don’t listen.
- They don’t tailor their solutions.
- They don’t offer up enough (any) value.
- They give up too easily.
Cold calling can and does work. I am not going to bore you talking about the clients that I have helped to explode their sales results, nor am I going to drone on about how I have helped individuals to create and sustain the lives they desire by being able to attend more proactive sales meetings and sell more when they get there. Instead, I am going to share with you the success a friend of mine, Clifton, who led a professional services sales team by running powerful sales meetings stemming from professional cold calling techniques…
They grew a division taking 700 meetings a year and turning £7m pa to a team running 1000 meetings a year and turning £25m pa within 2 years. On one specific project they had 250 meetings (gained through cold calling) and won £22m worth of revenues.
Cold calling doesn’t work when coupled with powerful sales strategies? As Bart would say, “Eat my shorts!”
But cold calling has to be coupled with powerful, proven sales strategies and it also has to be professional, purposeful and legitimate and this requires effective planning and preparation to even get off the starting line. If you review my list of the 10 reasons cold calling doesn’t work you will see that at least 8 of them (if not arguably all of them) could be addressed or massively improved by doing the right preparation in the first place.
I hope my cold caller reads this article. It might help him. It probably won’t as I don’t think he will think to check my blog, certainly not now… I’m just the guy who spoiled his morning and said that I wasn’t interested.
What Would You Achieve If You Knew You Couldn’t Fail?
I was meeting with a good friend of mine, Andy Smith (NLP and EI trainer), the other day and, over a tasty Chinese buffet lunch, we were talking about “things that truly make a difference”. Interestingly, and despite all of the training courses that we had both been on, we were in total agreement that you could track back the things that had truly made a difference for us to a handful of techniques and strategies. Perhaps more interesting still was the fact that, even with our very different backgrounds, it was very similar topics that had made the difference for both of us…
And, most interesting of all, the really powerful techniques that really changed our lives were the simplest ones.
Now, I’ve talked before about how sales people and business owners ask for the “advanced” sales training strategies, rushing headlong into studying “advanced sales skills” when they’re not even covering the sales training basics so I’m not going to say again how important nailing important sales principles and reviewing and practising them regularly is…
I am however going to share with you one of my favourite ever questions…
What would you achieve if you knew you couldn’t fail?
A simple question, and one which is easily overlooked. Don’t make this mistaake. Really thinking about this question and your answers to it could well change your sales results, your career prospects and your life.
I was reminded of the power of this important question this week when one of my readers sent me the following passage…
“Let’s imagine that for one day only, you will be guaranteed success on every single new business call that you make, and you absolutely cannot fail……..
What time would you set your alarm in the morning?
What time would you start prospecting?
What time would you finish prospecting?
How many new business calls would you make?
How long would you take for lunch?
How long would you spend socialising?
How long would you spend in the supermarket?
How long would you spend chatting to colleagues?
How long would you spend on ‘admin’?Now, compare your answers to the questions above to what you actually did do today.”
You’ve probably seen a question like this before. You may have even thought, “Good question”. Perhaps you were even slightly motivated by it. But you probably moved on and read something else without really benefitting from the inherent wisdom behind this question.
If you want a great day, stop now and take a break. Get a coffee and consider…
How would you spend your time today if you knew you couldn’t fail? What would you do? Who would you prospect? What would you ask of them? What would you achieve? What would you ask for that you’re currently not asking for? Who would you ring who you are currently avoiding? What price would you aim for? What targets would you set for yourself? What would you stop doing? How would you deal with distractions? How would you protect your valuable time?
You get my point.
What are you going to achieve today?
A Sales Training Tip For Estate Agents… And Everyone Else
I have a hobby, it’s called “door-kicking”. It’s a little like “tyre-kicking” but it doesn’t involve cars, it involves houses. When I’m not following my twin passions of motivational speaking and sales training, I love looking around houses… show-houses, old houses, new houses, penthouse flats, country cottages, farms… anything really. You could say that I am an estate agent’s nightmare but then I have bought every house I have ever owned when I was on a “door-kicking” outing.
Anyway, last month I was looking around a house without any serious intention and I loved it. Infact, I loved it so much that I negotiated with the seller then and there and put an offer in. She accepted and my Sunday afternoon jolly had just become a house buying trip! Next day, I contacted one of the well-known national estate agencies and asked them to come around to value my house which they did. The estate agent was polite, efficient and courteous. He valued the house at what I thought was a realistic price in the current market and told me how they operate. It sounded fine so I asked what the market was like at the moment in the local area. He said that it was picking up, that houses were moving again and that he should have no problem selling my house.
Based on this, I agreed to put the house on the market with ABC Estate Agency and they took over the process of selling my house. This, from what I have seen so far, seems to consist of…
- Take some measurements and some photos.
- Write up a description.
- Upload house onto RightMove and ABC’s company website.
- Sit back and wait for the proverbial chicken to fly into open mouth.
Are you joking me? These are the same estate agents who have been moaning about how quiet things are, right?
So, as you do, I checked out RightMove to look at my house only to see that…
- The house does not come up when you search my village.
- One of the rooms has been missed off the description of the property description altogether.
- Several of the measurements are wrong.
- The pictures are poor lousy.
- The room descriptions are non-existent.
- I could go on but I won’t because it is too depressing that anyone could be so inept.
If I ran an estate agency and the most junior person on my sales team had been responsible for this description I would have been kicking ass. Let alone, the most senior consultant in charge of the branch!
But hey, no-one is perfect and everyone can make mistakes…
So I emailed them… but they did not respond.
So I repeated the email… no response.
So I rang them and got their voicemail, “Sorry we are not in the office…” (well, I know you’re not showing anyone around my house, that’s for sure!) and decided to get into my car and drive down to their offices. With my (growing) annoyance kept well under check I explained to the one agent in the office the importance of 1) getting things right, 2) making a strong first impression through the advertisement and 3) the power of words like “mature, landscaped garden”, “stylish, open plan living” and “exclusive, residential area” (not just “garden”!”).
He looked bemused so I left a message for the sales manager to call me.
Surprise, surprise, 4 hours later and no call. These guys clearly need a motivational speaker and some sales training! So let’s fill in the gaps and put this into context…
Over the last few weeks I have visited with at least 8 estate agents. Out of all 8 only 1 took my name and contact details. The others knew that I was looking for a house but never asked for my details. Why not? I can only conclude laziness and having had it so good for so long that they do not even know how to do the job properly anymore. Our estate agent’s brain should have been whirring with people he could call the moment I listed my property… apparently not. So here we are, several days weeks on the market, no update calls from the sales agent and no viewings.
Now I accept my fault in this. I am a sales training expert and I should have made the time to see several estate agencies to “interview” them as potential salespeople just like I would for a client. After all, they are going to sell my house for me and interviewing salespeople is something that I am good at!
So about now you could be forgiven for thinking, “Well this is fine Gavin, but what does it have to do with me? I’m not an estate agent!” Good question… and the answer is… “Well, quite a lot … potentially.”
Estate agents are not alone in having had it too easy for the last few years. Estate agents are not alone in cutting corners when they get the chance. Estate agents are not alone when it comes to taking the easy route. Estate agents are not alone when it comes to doing the all important “sales” bit pretty badly.
As a sales motivational speaker I spend a lot of time working with, talking to and consulting with salespeople, sales managers, sales directors and business owners from a multitude of different industries. A rare few do everything they can to succeed but a far larger majority fail to achieve their full potential due to a lack of application in even the most simple of areas.
Simply put – many salespeople fall at the first hurdle because they just don’t apply themselves consistently enough.
As a motivational speaker I always strive to raise my game and challenge myself to push for the next level. I am constantly astounded by how even the slightest increase in your game can increase results dramatically. Raising your game by even 10% can make a huge difference to the sales results and successes that you achieve – both in your job and in your life.
So this weeks’ challenge is to raise your game. What area can you seek to improve to get a leap in your sales results?
Sales Training Tips: It’s Not All About You You Know!
What are your goals? What are your aims? How many sales do you need to make this month? What is your annual sales target? What does your product or service do? How much sales activity do you need to do every month? How many cold calls do you need to make to close enough sales? How many networking meetings do you need to attend? How many client sales meetings do you need to run? How many sales presentations do you need to make? What does your sales conversion ratio need to be? What price do you need to sell at? What do you need to achieve in sales negotiations? What do you want to achieve in your sales role? What do you want to achieve in your life? What do you want your legacy to be?
All great questions, what do they have in common?Attend a typical sales meeting and you may hear the following questions thrown around…
What are our sales targets? What sales activity do we need to undertake? What are our sales KPIs? What do we need to do this month to hit our targets?
All great questions, what do they have in common? Have you got it yet?
They’re all about you and what you want. They’re all about your company and what your company needs to achieve and do. Most people live their lives on “Me! Me! Me!” but that’s not good enough when your clients live their lives on “Me! Me! Me!” too. To be a truly great salesperson you need the “Me! Me! Me!” drive and ambition but when you get in front of prospects and clients you need to be “You! You! You!”. We are, after all, supposed to be servicing our clients.
When did you last ask, “How can I help my clients this week?”
Targets, KPIs, activity reports, conversion ratios, sales skills – they are all very important and they are all things which I help clients with when helping with sales force development and sales training but in the midst of this important stuff we must not forget about our clients, their needs and their agendas. To achieve uncommon sales success in today’s challenging markets you need to demonstrate to your clients and your prospects that you really, truly believe and care about them and the only way that you can do this consistently is by genuinely, really, truly caring about them.
Sales training and sales seminar delegates often tell me that they cannot get their clients to open up to them fully. Many think that either a) this is not possible much of the time or that b) they are missing some magical technique that will enable them to achieve this in their sales meetings. Both thoughts are wrong.
Clients do not open up to salespeople because they know that they do not really care about them, because they know that they are not really interested in them, because they do not trust them to enough to share with them fully and because they know that they only want to make a sale.
They worry that anything they share with the salesperson will be taken down and used in evidence to sell against them.
You may think that this is harsh but if you take a deep breath, go inside and get honest with yourself, brutally honest, you know that it is true… at least some of the time! Even if not for you, for some of your peers and sales colleagues in any case!
Learning to truly care about your clients, to embrace this new paradigm of selling and to make your sales calls about your clients and not all about you is something that I cover in my sales training and sales development programmes. It’s incredibly powerful and effective to use and this non-pressurized and client-centric approach makes selling easy for even the most sales shy. For experienced salespeople, making your sales calls more client-centric will help you to build stronger relationships with your clients, sell on value not price, shortening sales cycles and close more deals.
Sales training question of the week: What can you do today to make every sales call you conduct all about your clients rather than all about you?
Check Out This Loser!
Check out this loser…
- 1831 – Lost his job
- 1832 – Defeated in run for Illinois State Legislature
- 1833 – Failed in business
- 1835 – Sweetheart died
- 1836 – Had nervous breakdown
- 1838 – Defeated in run for Illinois House Speaker
- 1843 – Defeated in run for nomination for U.S. Congress
- 1848 – Lost re-nomination
- 1849 – Rejected for land officer position
- 1854 – Defeated in run for U.S. Senate
- 1856 – Defeated in run for nomination for Vice President
- 1858 – Again defeated in run for U.S. Senate
Sorry! Did I say loser?
Meet Abraham Lincoln, elected President of the United States of America 1860.
Success in sales, in business and in life means playing the long game and that means cultivating two powerful attributes – tenacity and persistence. If you keep going after everyone else gives up and goes home then you are going to be very successful.
To be successful in 2009 you need more than your fair share of tenacity and persistence. In my role as a sales motivational speaker, sales training expert and sales consultant I meet a lot of successful and inspirational people and they all say the same thing…
There are only three ways to outsell the market,
1. Out work it
2. Out live it, or
3. Out smart it.
Why not all three?
The Sales Apprentice 2009: Sales Training Tips From The Hit TV Show, Part X
If you spent tonight watching Manchester United play Barcelona in the Champions League then the good news is that you didn’t miss a lot in the way of sales training and business tips on tonight’s Apprentice. What you did miss however was Sir Alan sacking someone that, based upon your emails to me, many of you had thought would make the final. I agreed with Sir Alan’s decision but more of that later…
Tonight’s task was to select products to sell live on a TV shopping channel. The team that sold the most would win. A task like this is all about picking the right products for your target audience and then selling them effectively. How would they fare?
On team Ignite, Howard volunteered to project manage Lorraine and Kate whilst over on team Empire, Yasmina volunteered to project manage James and Debra. Debra also wanted to be project manager and agreed to Yasmina leading the team somewhat ungraciously, “For me, I am happy to be project manager every week,” she stated. Err, yes Debra, but that’s really not what it’s about though is it?
Both teams split in two to select products which the other members of their team would have to sell on TV the next day. All were treated to “sales presentations” on various products which they could choose from. They may have asked but, if they did, we never heard one question or one comment on target markets and audiences…
Sales training tip: Much as knowing what the products do is important, so is knowing who the audience are and what they buy. Me, I would have spent rather more time asking questions. Who are the audience? What do they like? What do they normally buy? How many did this product sell last time? When was it last on the channel? What have they bought that’s similar? How did they sell? How do the prices compare? How price conscious are they? What compels them to buy now? Etc etc.
Choices were made. Kate selected a hideous leather jacket with silver or gold leaves on and a healthy chip pan for Howard and Lorraine to sell. Howard and Lorraine selected a rather bizarre pet craft kit and a mini electronic, air guitar for Kate to sell.
Over on the other team, James and Yasmina selected a leaf grabbing contraption and a polo-neck, scarf type piece of clothing for Debra to sell and she in turn selected a cheap remote control car and a pack of elasticated hairclips for them.
Notably, James, Yasmina and Debra did not have a product priced over £29.99 whilst Kate, Lorraine and Howard had two approaching £150. Would this make winning hard for Yasmina and her team or would their cheap “pile them high, sell them cheap” approach work?
On the TV…
James was cheesy, “If you’re not first with this, you’ll be last with this”, he quipped, “Stop spying and start buying.” Debra meanwhile looked slick but did claim the line of the week, “This is the answer to the scarf,” she stated confidently. What was the question again Debra?
Over on the other team, Howard and Lorraine looked uncomfortable working together. Selling the chip pan they waxed lyrical about the chips but said little about how to buy the product. Kate looked like she was enjoying herself selling the air guitar, perhaps a little too much.
Sales training tip: Every sales message needs a call to action. People need an incentive and encouragement to buy now. They need to know when to call, why they should call now, the number to call, the numbers that are selling, the number of people hanging on the line etc etc.
In the board room…
Empire had sold £1541.88. Ignite £1376.73.
A win for Yasmina and her team. Apparently Debra had been “exceptional” according to the TV channel representatives. Howard and his team had failed to win despite their higher priced products. Neither the leather jacket nor the fryer had sold to the expectation levels of the channel.
During the conversations that followed it became clear that both Howard and Kate blamed Lorraine. Lorraine thought Howard should go due to being over cautious. In private, Nick vociferously stood up for Lorraine to Sir Alan, “She is so often right.”
In their defence…
Howard said that he is a great communicator and works well in teams. Nick told him that he lacked ambition and is not brave. Lorraine said she has natural business acumen. Sir Alan asked why she wanted to work for him then? Kate said she has been a strong team player. Sir Alan said that one of them is “not going to be very happy.”
“Kate. I think you stepped back in my eyes in this last week. You say you’re not a one trick pony… but you might be… Howard you’re a steady Eddie… Lorraine you speak a good game, your age has got nothing to do with it… I’ve noticed a couple of times that you seem to make your mind up afterwards and I ‘aint got time for people like that either… This is a very difficult decision because you three people have come a long way in this process… Howard, you’re fired.”
An interesting decision and one I agreed with. Howard has never really stepped up. We are one week from the final and he is still a figure in the background. Worse, he has twice been present when bad decisions have been made and has seemingly done and said nothing to contradict the bad decisions being made. But he is a nice guy and eminently enmployable…
Howard in the cab, “I’m gutted. Really gutted…. If Sir Alan thinks I am risk adverse then ok I will take on board the feedback.”
So…
Kate, Lorraine, Debra, Yasmina and James remain to face the wrath of the interviewers from hell next week. Who will survive the ridiculous, unrealistic, un-PC, verbal attacks of Sir Alan’s attack dogs? Who do you want to see in the final?
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