Over the last week I have been making the most of the glorious sunshine and have had trips to the Yorkshire Dales (beautiful weather) and the Lake District (raining as per usual!). I’ve also been out jogging along the canal near my home and although I run along it all year, perhaps the beautiful weather has caused me to pay more attention to my surroundings than normal.

Something I have been watching with interest are the ducks and the geese and their “management” of their young. It’s pretty interesting…

The ducks seem to have lots of ducklings, often into double figures. Being in a family of ducks is a pretty chaotic business. Even when the ducklings are teeny-tiny little balls of fluff, they seem to be expected to fend for themselves. It really is sink or swim. Mum and Dad duck just swim off and do their own thing and the ducklings straggle out all over the canal. For Mum and Dad, the responsibility often seems too much and the ducklings fall by the wayside, get into trouble and get lost.

When a duckling gets lost they cry plaintively and if they work out where Mum and Dad are they have to paddle like crazy to catch up. And if they can’t, tough luck! It’s sad watching their numbers dwindle and wondering what happened to all of those beautiful, hopeful, balls of life and energy? One pair of ducks even left entirely and the whole brood died. But hey, they had another brood so who cares?

Geese on the other hand seem to be pretty devoted parents. They have far fewer goslings and several along the canal only had two or three. When you see them swimming along the canal Mum (well I like to think its Mum anyway) swims at the front with the goslings close up behind her and Dad (?) swims conscientiously behind to check that no-one gets lost, injured or eaten!

When a gosling goes adrift, they are quickly helped back into line with a few squeaky noises which I guess are word of advice, encouragement and mentoring on how to survive and thrive. And this carries on until the goslings are quite big and well capable of looking after themselves.

Now you might be wandering what I am banging on about ducks and geese for and you may even think that I have lost my marbles and had too much sun? Or maybe you already made the connection?

Are you a duck or a goose?

Do you hire sales staff all coming to work hopeful and fresh only to see them fall by the wayside over the coming weeks and months until too few are left? Or do you support your teams, nurture them and help them to succeed?

Do you believe that hiring sales staff is a lottery so there’s no point spending too much time on them until they prove that they’re strong swimmers? Or do you ensure that they are given all of the help, guidance and back-up that they need?

Your approach in this will make a huge difference to your staff, your customers, your business and your success.

Related posts:

1. How Robert Fed The Ducks!
2. Selling Pies Should Be Easy
3. The Sales Apprentice 2009: Sales Training Tips From The Hit TV Show, Week 12, The Final

So, we’ve reached week 7 of The Sales Apprentice and tonight’s task was to create a Freemium (Free Premium Magazine) and then sell as much advertising space as possible. The team selling the most ad space would win the task. Tonight’s team leaders were selected by Lord Alan, Jim leading Venture and Natasha leading Logic, speaking to the teams this week from a balcony way above them and I couldn’t help but think that the ultimate winner of the show might be advised to get used to exactly this sort of “partnership”.

With only a few hours to complete this task the teams quickly got down to discussing the potential markets. Natasha and team decided to plump for a lad’s magazine with a business element to it. This was partly their idea and partly down to a focus group of rugby players saying that they wanted a more intelligent magazine without the nudity. The magazine quickly became called “Covered”.

Over on Jim’s team they decided to go for the over-60’s market and set off, stereotypes at the ready, to talk to a focus group. I guess when you’re 20 something 60 does seem incredibly old but the whole concept of active retirement seemed to have passed the whole of team Venture by. They just couldn’t seem to get their heads around the fact that people of 60 weren’t about to die and thought their concept that people of that age weren’t was a new idea!!

These two decisions about the magazines and the implementation of them would prove to be the critical piece in today’s show. No amount of selling or negotiating can sell the wrong idea. No amount of influence and persuasion can persuade professional buyers who know their markets to buy a dud. No amount of word foreplay or slippery, shouldered, sales talk (Jim!) can polish a turd.

Sales training tip: Know your client. Know your client. Know your client. I was amazed that all of the chat in selecting the magazines was about the concept. It should have been all about the readers and the advertisers…

Who would read this magazine? Why would they read it? What would they be interested in? What product placement would fit in this magazine? Who would want to advertise in it and why? How did this demographic fit in with the clients of the three buyers they were imminently to meet? If they did ask these questions, we never heard them.

Over on team Natasha things were not running smoothly. All of the team seemed to be behind the concept of business without the nudity however Natasha seemed obsessed with boobs, stating at one point that, “Porn sells.” True, but not your concept, Natasha. Photographing girls in their lingerie under Tom’s (?) suit jacket and glasses and touting a potential title, “How do you blow your load?” (translated as, “How do you spend your cash?”) the implementation was more Stringfellow than Jobs and the cover wouldn’t have looked out of place next to Nuts magazine…

And you know, it may well have been that the magazine needed the smut but the fault here was with the lack of clarity of purpose of the team…

Sales leadership tip: If you want to be a great leader and you want to inspire and lead your staff you need a clarity of vision. That doesn’t mean that you know what you’re doing! It means that you AND your team know what you’re doing and that you’re all pulling in the same direction.

On Natasha’s team, this most definitely was not the case with Natasha and her team having very different visions of what they were trying to achieve…

But the problems on Natasha’s team were far overshadowed by those on Jim’s team where they could not even get their title or concept right. This was in the main part because the team clearly thought that 60 was really old and that any 60 year old owning a mobile phone that did more than make a call was seriously hip, hop and happening. The titles they suggested for the magazine were not only unimaginative, they were also laughable. And that’s exactly what the focus group did!

Desperately seeking a new title Zoe suggested “Coffin Dodgers.” A silver-handled affair made of teak narrowly missed Nick’s head as he spat out another wasp he’d been chewing. “Everyone thinks you die at 60,” volunteered Zoe suggesting that the concept of people over 60 having a life was something new. Do these Apprentices not have grandparents? Who the heck thinks that anyone dies at 60?

Deciding to go down the route that once you have eliminated any sensible alternatives you need to pick the first daft thing that comes into your head, Venture decided to call their magazine “Hip Replacement.”

What?

Yep! You heard it right… “Hip Replacement.” Seriously! Task lost. End of.

From this point on, I could see little hope for Jim and team. This title made “Coffin Dodgers” look inspired. Jim, who I am rapidly deciding needs to get fired (more later…), set about roping the team into this decision, something he is very good at. On the face of it, he makes it look like he is getting their agreement and input, but in reality he is purely covering his ass! The only member of the team to not agree was Suzy but, even after being told to stand up for herself in the boardroom last week, she said that she would go along with it. She needs to be careful. Having the right idea and not sticking up for it could well prove to be far more fateful in Lord Alan’s eyes than cocking it up but having the cahones to stand up for your ideas…

Ideas completed, articles sourced and magazine printed, the teams put their heads together to craft their sales pitches. Jim beseeched his team to volunteer to make the pitch and threw his hands up when no-one volunteered. He really does have the slipperiest shoulders. If he was a pirate his parrot would need crampons and pick axes…

Sales Pitch 1:

Picture this… Leon standing next to a huge picture of a semi-naked girl with the title “Covered” and saying that their magazine was a lad’s magazine with business and without the pictures of naked girls! Hmmm…

Next up, Jim pitched “Hip Replacement”. The buyers looked bemused and asked about favourable rates. Jim said that it was full rates or no ratesl. The buyers looked even more bemused but not half as bemused as the rest of Jim’s team.

Sales training tip: Negotiation is an important part of selling. Most salespeople make poor negotiators. They give away too much, too easily and fail to create win win solutions. Many salespeople need to stand their ground more. But there are times when you need to negotiate, times when you need to strike a deal, times when the buyer needs to know that you have done something for them, times when the particular client, etiquette and/or custom dictate that you negotiate. This was one of them and Jim failing to do so was arrogant (stupid).

Sales Pitch 2:

With a budget of £1 billion client spend Natasha couldn’t stop herself interrupting Leon and the whole pitch lacked professionalism and coherence.

Sales training tip: Don’t undermine your team. When making sales presentations work together, work with each other, support each other. Behaving in front of your prospects in a way that suggests that you do not trust your colleagues to say the right thing (e.g. interrupting them mid flow) will do little for your client’s confidence in you.

Jim’s team did little to shine in their presentation either and it was on to…

Sales Pitch 3:

With team Jim failing to shine (again) it was all down to what team Natasha could do with “Covered” and Natasha having lost faith in Leon decided to step up herself to make the sales presentation… and this proved to be a double-edged sword…

On the one hand, her presentation was awful, yeah? I mean it was really not good, yeah? And not slick at all, yeah? And if she said yeah again yeah, I would have turned the TV off. And it was also crass, “Let’s face it. A lot of guys like to get a bit of dollar in their pocket, yeah, to impress the ladies.”

I have many great clients in recruitment and know many impressive individuals in recruitment and I was not impressed…

BUT…

Her pitch was closer to the ACTUAL magazine they had produced. Not the one they had said they were going to produce, nor the one that the rest of the team wanted to produce BUT THE ONE that she did actually produce. More of a magazine for LADS who want to THINK they like business rather than people who actually are in business. More X-Factor wannabe than proven business mogul.

In the Boardroom…

“Tell me who you think the potential advertisers are?” Asked Lord Alan. FINALLY! Someone asking the right question!

The results were in…

Pitch 1: Logic £9k, Venture £12k.
Pitch 2: Logic £7.5k, Venture £16,850.
So, two wins but still anybody’s game… until…
Pitch 3: Logic £0, Venture £60k for the whole magazine.

Slam dunk and team Natasha headed off to poke each other with sticks (fencing) yeah and to celebrate their business prowess… yeah!

Back in the Boardroom…

Jim was quick to blame Zoe for one of the main mistakes, the name of the magazine. He admitted that they all agreed it but insisted that it was her idea. I wanted to reach down the TV and tell Teflon Jim that this was really rather similar to him being blamed for coming up with a name in a previous task and that he had said that it was only brainstorming and that it was down to the team leader who approved it. But I’ll have to settle for writing it here…

Jim might be good at building rapport, doing cheeky deals and using language to deflect potential objections but he needs to step up and take responsibility.

He elected to bring back Suzy and Glenn…. Suzy because she’s only 21 and Glenn because he’s an engineer. Jim criticized both Suzy and Glenn but had his sights fixed firmly on Suzy. Glenn wavered in his support of Jim until Jim caught him broadside in a slight of Suzy, “You’re just marginally worse than Glenn,” he said and then got it both barrels from Suzy and Glenn.

But Lord Alan had had enough, “Jim, you’ve got slippery shoulders but despite what I said about you the other week son I can’t sack you yet ‘cause there are other idiots to sack first. Suzy, you’re young and all that but I hate engineers ‘cause they ‘aint business peeps so Glenn son you is sacked.”

If you’re an engineer and you’ve done well in business send your complaints to Lord Sugar… and if you’re thinking about applying for The Apprentice, think again… Lord Alan has already made his mind up, “I’ve never yet met an engineer who can turn his head to business.”

Line of the week from Lord Alan to Glenn, “I was wondering if you’re one of those people who think that “Only Fools & Horses” was a business documentary?”

Related posts:

1. The Sales Apprentice 2011: Sales Training & Business Development Tips From The Hit TV Show, Week 3
2. The Sales Apprentice 2011: Sales Training & Business Development Tips From The Hit TV Show, Week 6
3. The Sales Apprentice 2011: Sales Training & Business Development Tips From The Hit TV Show, Week 5

Have you checked out the Talking Sales Success Summit yet? Over two days I will be interviewing 10 experts on what separates sales superstars from sales dreamers and sales rockstars from sales losers. During 10 hours of pure sales training gold I will be seeking to discover secret sales strategies, little known selling tactics and proven techniques that you can use right away to make more sales.

And you’ll be pleased to know that I have hand-picked these experts not because of the books they’ve written (although many of them have) nor because of what the press says about them (although they do get great PR!)… No, I have selected them because of what they have to say about specific areas of the sale. You might recognize some of them, you might not recognize some of them but they all have one thing in common… I have tracked them down because they can help you to unlock sales strategies and tactics that will help you to make more sales. In the rest of this post I am going to introduce you to the experts, their backgrounds and some of their tips and strategies. Enjoy…

Philip Hesketh author of “How to Persuade & Influence People” talks about the Psychology of Persuasion.

Philip is a professional speaker on ‘The Psychology of Persuasion’. He combines a powerful mix of thought provoking, well researched, persuasive techniques with a unique brand of humour. He inspires, entertains and informs on how buying, selling, persuading and influencing work.  His book, ‘How to Persuade and Influence People’ is an Amazon number one best seller.

Phil says…

• Ask more questions.
• Ask supplementary questions when you get the answers.
• Establish the compelling emotional reason(s) to buy.
• Always talk value not price.
• Establish the buyer’s expectations.
• Manage those expectations.

Simon Hazeldine author of “Bare Knuckle Selling”, “Bare Knuckle Negotiating”, “Bare Knuckle Customer Service”, “The Inner Winner” and, “The 7 Inner Secrets of Highly Persuasive People” talks about The Bare Knuckle Selling & Negotiation Process.

Simon works internationally as a Professional Speaker, Performance Consultant, Corporate Trainer and Executive Coach in the areas of sales and negotiation, persuasion, influence and leadership. He has a Masters Degree in the Psychology of Performance, is Certified as a Master Practitioner and Trainer of NLP, and is a Fellow of the of Sales & Marketing Management. He is the bestselling author of several business books that have been endorsed by business leaders including Duncan Bannatyne from “Dragon’s Den” and multi‐billionaire business legend Michael Dell.

On negotiation Simon says…

• Set your objectives – aim high!
• Be firm and flexible – be persistent in pursuing your objectives but not rigid in pursuing any particular solution.
• Know your LIM Know your BATNA.
• Give them a good listening to!
• Ask lots of direct questions and listen the answer.
• Listen more than you speak.
• Seek information – Give information.
• Focus on underlying needs rather than positions.
• Understand their motives and what they want.
• Acknowledge and express emotions (rather than be emotional).
• Reward signals, encourage flexibility.
• Summarise regularly.
• STOP! Step back , think, organise your thoughts, proceed.
• Give To Get If You… Then I…
• There is no such thing as a free lunch!
• Be flexible, be creative.
• Can you meet their needs in a way that benefits you too?
• Nothing is agreed until it’s all agreed.
• Trade low cost for high value (and vice versa).
• The real work starts after the negotiation stops – make the deal work.

Ari Galper Founder & CEO of Unlock the Game® talks about How to ELIMINATE Personal Sales Rejection Forever…And Make More Sales.

Founder & CEO of Unlock The Game® Ari Galper is the Creator of Unlock The Game®, a new sales mindset and approach that has revolutionized the world of selling. With a Masters degree in Instructional Design, which strongly analyzes the way people learn, and supplying nearly two decades of experience in direct selling in a variety of industries, Ari has pioneered a breakthrough sales system – Unlock The Game – through his experience working with iconic companies such as UPS and QUALCOMM over the past twenty years. Built on the concept of authentic communication and trust, his visionary approach to selling relieves the pressure for both the seller and buyer, producing profound results.

He has shared the stage with fellow entrepreneurs, including Joan Rivers, Mark Victor Hansen, Dan Kennedy, Harry S. Dent, Christopher Howard, Bill Glazer, Alexandria Brown and many others. His strategies have been used by countless global organizations throughout the world. Ari’s mission is to help business owners, entrepreneurs and sales professionals, break through their fears of selling as well as create a better lives for themselves, their families and, of course, their clients. Unlock The Game is quickly becoming a standard for how to create genuine trust for anyone who sells a product or service.

Ari says…

• Diffuse Pressure.
• Get to the Truth, Not the sale.
• Be a problem-solver and trusted advisor.

Andy Smith author of  “55 Ways To Increase Your Emotional Intelligence” talks about How to Create the Life You Want.

Andy Smith is an Emotional Intelligence coach, Appreciative Inquiry facilitator and NLP trainer. He specialises in the practical application of leading-edge approaches to the personal development of leaders and key professionals. Andy’s work ranges from executive coaching (using the Hay Group’s Emotional Competence Inventory 360º assessment as a starting point) to the design and delivery of coaching skills training for managers and coaches. He has developed a number of coaching models which incorporate appreciative and solution-focused tools in practical and jargon-free formats and has written two books.

Will Kintish talks about The Secrets of Great Networkers.

Will Kintish was a practicing accountant for nearly 30 years. During most of those years selling, marketing and business development generally were not activities associated with his profession. It is only now, in today’s modern and competitive world are the professionals expected, not only to be great technicians but to be able to help bring business in. This is often uncomfortable for most people. In the last 9 years since leaving the profession he has presented to over 50,000 professionals and business people across Europe.

Will shares 10 strategies for when networking works…

• when the right attitude is in  place.
• when comfort zones are stretched.
• when patience and persistence is in evidence.
• when the right clients are exchanged for the wrong clients.
• when the first move is made.
• when the right impression is made from the start.
• when an interesting introduction is used.
• when  listening occurs far  more than talking.
• when there is an active  follow up.
• when being generous  is seen as the key to networking.

David Shepherd author of Presenting Magically talks about “How To Double Your Sales By Asking 3 More Questions“.

David Shephard is the Managing Director and Head of Training and Research for The Performance Partnership. The Performance Partnership was founded in 1993 and has become one of the fastest growing NLP training and consulting companies in the UK, attracting clients from all over the world. It is dedicated to providing them with the very latest developments in advanced human communication and change technologies.

Rob Brown talks about “How to Build Your Reputation“.

Jill Konrath author of “Snap Selling” talks about “Selling to Crazy-Busy People“.

Jill Konrath’s career is defined by her relentless search for fresh sales strategies that actually work in today’s business environment. She’s the author of two bestselling sales books and is a popular speaker who helps sellers crack into new accounts, speed up sales cycles and win more business. She likes to work on:

Tough Challenges. When Jill recognized that the crazy-busy work environment was wreaking havoc with sellers, she immersed herself in the issue till she discovered new strategies that worked. The result? SNAP Selling, her highly acclaimed new book that jumped to #1 on Amazon within hours of its release — and continues to be a top seller.

Big Issues. Jill’s initial book, Selling to Big Companies, addressed a major sales problem that continues today-how to set up meetings with prospects who’d rather avoid salespeople all together.

Unsolvable Problems. When the economy tanked in 2008, Jill realized that most job seekers had no idea how to “sell” themselves. Instead, they were commoditized by their look-alike resumes and using reactionary job-hunting skills. So she wrote Get Back to Work Faster, a game-changing career book at the same time she launched a free monthly webinar series.

Alan Fendrich talks about How to Stop Hiring Salespeople By “Gut Feel.”

Alan Fendrich is married for 34 years and a career entrepreneur. In 1993 Alan founded a company, Radio Profits Corporation, that through luck and good fortune was wildly successful. The company’s success caused him to have to hire 300 salespeople a year who generated more than 60,000 individual sales a year, and until he sold it in 2000, more than $84,000,000 in sales. In the process of hiring all those salespeople, he developed the Advanced Hiring strategy which cut the sales turnover in half and doubled the number of top sales performer hires.

When he sold that company in 1999 he retired for a half year, realized he was not cut out for retirement and founded Advanced Hiring System so that he could continue to work with businesspeople. He spreads the word wherever he can that sales hiring can be a lot more successful than most managers are experiencing.

Jim Rees author of “Maximise Your Mind Power” talks about how We are all Built for Greatness and asks What mark are you going to leave?

Having completed 3 consecutive solo finishes in what is considered to be one of the toughest races on the planet – The Race Across America in 2007, 2008 & 2009 and going faster each year – Jim Rees has a deep understanding of what it takes to push beyond what most people think is possible. Jim is no stranger to  endurance races. He’s competed in 10 Ironman triathlons around the world including the famous Hawaii Ironman and has represented GB in his age group in 2 world long course championships. Jim also set a new world record for 24 hours of non stop cycling on a static Watt bike at last year’s London Cycle Show – cycling 448 miles.

Drawing from his personal, sporting and professional career, Jim has seen and experienced perceived impossibilities turn into reality. From this, he absolutely knows that the majority of us are barely scratching the surface of our potential, whether that’s on the tennis court or in the boardroom. For the past 8 years Jim has been running Ripple Leadership which focuses on individual, team and organisational potential.

Jim says…

• Be aware of the patterns of behaviours and the finger print they leave in every interaction.
• Discover the beliefs that you hold about yourself, the company, the product, the economic environment, your boss etc.
• Commit to seeing it through to completion.
• Learn how to perform under pressure.
• Learn to be present – totally there for someone.
• Take 100% personal responsibility for everything that is showing up in your life.
• Success and failure are learnt behaviours and are not permanent. They are all part of conditioning.

If you want to check out the 10 hours of sales expert interviews then say yes by clicking on Talking Sales Success now.

Related posts:

1. The Sales Apprentice 2009: Sales Training Tips From The Hit TV Show, Week 12, The Final
2. Repetition Is The Mother Of All Skill If You Want Sales Success
3. The Business Supremacy Summit, 2010 With Doug Richard…

Week 7 of the Sales Apprentice… a week defined by sales decisions, sales strategies and sales mistakes. And one in which there were many sales lessons to learn…

This week’s task was to sell a blue-screen, video experience to the public so that they could star in their own reality video experience. Sir Alan was obviously keen to test out some of the weaker links in the group and, after a quick mix up of team members, appointed Stuart to go head to head with Sandeesh. As usual, the team who made the most profit would be the winner.

Stuart “I am the brand” Baggs, who probably makes good TV but you just want to punch in the nose, was quick to shoot his mouth off, “The only place I fit in a team naturally is as leader,” he bragged. In the brainstorming sessions to decide which backdrops they should use for their videos we saw these amazing leadership skills in practise when he silenced Stella and the others. Nick, who has obviously taken up chewing acidic cockroaches to help to get him through this series, grimaced and spat, “Who does he think he is?”

Sales Leadership Tip: I’ve said it nearly every week this year but sales leadership really is about inclusion and involvement. Great teams are open teams where communication and collusion are natural. Silencing team members because you are the boss is a guaranteed way to ensure that they won’t step up or take any initiative in the future…

Both teams set about discussing what types of video backgrounds they should use and who they should be targeting. Sandeesh’s team quickly agreed that in the Westfield Shopping Centre the primary market would be kids tugging on their parents’ arms to have a go. Despite his team not agreeing with him Stuart steam rolled them (again) and decided upon adults as his core market. With the option of using two stock backgrounds and shooting one for themselves, Sandeesh and team opted for a main video background of a ski run that they would film themselves at a snow dome. Stuart meanwhile was down at Brand’s Hatch shooting a racing background in an M3… I have one of those, no really I do, I do, I do he boasted to Laura and anyone who would listen. After finishing the video he rang the rest of the team to say that he had changed his mind and that now they would be going for kids too… wise decision.

Video backdrops made, team Stuart sat down to watch their racing video and the girls were not impressed. Joanna asked him, “Would you be happy charging someone £15 for that?” and pointed out that she wanted to get things clear. Stuart, who clearly does not like being questioned, responded in the most breathtakingly arrogant way, “I’ll tell you why (you need to get things clear)… ‘Cause I’ve got where I am (err, where?) being (repulsive?) impulsive cause I’m an entrepreneur. So I make decisions based on judgements and the reason why I’m successful (???) is ‘cause I make those judgements correctly whereas other people, who don’t, generally are unsuccessful. So you probably can’t share my vision.” Stella, in a classical moment of understated WTF looked sideways at Joanna. Words were not required. Nick gobbled down another cockroach. “Any other issues, niggling things?” asked Stuart, voice pitching up at the end of the sentence. Stella squinted, clearly wondering what Stuart would look like with a machete buried in his skull.

SalesTraining Tip: Be open to feedback. Whatever Stuart has or hasn’t achieved in his life he is a young man and has lots to learn. The only way he is going to gain the success and the rewards that he so (repulsively) desires is to grow and develop. The quickest way to learn is from the experience and expertise of others. Many of the sales lessons, sales tips and sales strategies that I have learnt over the years have been from others. Even if Stuart thinks he is superior to others it does not mean that he cannot learn from them… Geez! We’re learning from them and could they make more mistakes?!

Next day at Westfield, Stuart has asked Laura to be in the back room looking after CD production. Laura asked to be on the front line selling. Stuart in one of the most slippery-shouldered, pass-the-buck attempts to create a built in excuse for if he lost dumped all responsibility for a potential sales failure at her doorstep. “If you go on the front line then our sales are entirely dependent on you and… err Jo… You understand, without a shadow of a doubt, that if you go out there onto the sales floor then we lose this task because of insufficient sales then you and Joanna will bear the brunt of that.”

Nick, now chewing on a packet of sugar coated scorpions, grimaced. Stuart had a tendency to do that to him. The bear-faced gall of this Stuart chap was breath-taking. But even this was secondary to his total hypocrisy when he finished off by saying, “No arse covering… I hate that,” having just attempted to cover his in you-can’t-lay-the-blame-at-my-door-grease.

Sales leadership Tip. Sales leaders (and all leaders) need to take responsibility. If you want your teams to take action, if you want your teams to get involved, if you want your teams to step up and “go for it” then you need to take responsibility. Great leaders take action AND take responsibility for their actions. If your people expect to get the blame for everything and the credit for nothing they are unlikely to behave in the way that you want them to.

Laura, to her credit, ignored him and told him to send her out there. Attempted arse covering completed, Stuart and team sprang into action selling their DVDs for £10. Their little red plastic car quickly attracted the attention of some kids and parents and the cash started to motor in. Nick smiled. He obviously likes children… even if he doesn’t like people who behave like them.

Over on Sandeesh’s sales pitch tumbleweed was blowing through… for the whole of the first hour of selling time… as one part of the team trained the other. What? What? What? Unbelievable. This could (and probably did) cost her the task. Any recruiter (Sandeesh) should know that this was the worst decision ever…

Sales Training Tip. Protect core selling hours. If you want to make sales then you need to dedicate time to selling. You need to allocate core selling hours, times when you are committed to doing good honest sales activities. If you pay for a pitch and there are customers in it then you should be on it selling. On my travels, I see sales and business people finding multifarious ways to avoid selling. I call them SATs or Sales Avoidance Tactics. This is not good business.

And, as a recruiter who would be fully aware of the concept of core selling hours, Sandeesh had no excuse for making this task losing mistake. Back on Stuart’s team the car was proving to be a hit. And someone had the idea of handing a medal to every child when they “won” the race which of course they always did. Like it! Over on Sandeesh’s team however things were not going so well. Having wandered out onto the sales floor late and seemingly low on sales enthusiasm they were beginning to question their product. Their answer? Drop the price. What? Yep, drop the price to £8.

Oh come on! Get a grip!

Sales Training Tip and fundamental tenet of sales and business success. If you want to achieve anything worth achieving in this career we call sales….drum roll… If you win your business on price, then you will lose your business on price. Most salespeople are far too quick to moan and groan and blame price for their failings. Most businesses are far too quick to reduce prices… particularly in recent years.

People buy what they want. People buy what they need. People buy based on the perceived value of what they are buying. People buy based on their desire to own the product.

Did it not occur to anyone on Sandeesh’s team that they just weren’t selling well enough? Or that their product was just not sexy enough?

Apparently not.

Over on team Stuart however, Stuart and Laura (and probably the others) were showing their true colours. They had realized that they had undersold their videos and were telling people when they returned to collect them that they were £15 and not £10…

Now look. I don’t even know where to start with this one. This is not sharp. This is not clever. This is not good business. And this is not right. This is THEFT! It’s tricks like this that give sales a bad name. It’s people like this who give entrepreneurs a bad name. It’s scams like this that give business a bad name. Seriously now, if you have your pricing wrong up the prices on new sales but do not compromise your integrity on old sales. I’d have sacked anyone involved with this piece of total dishonesty.

Sales Training And Business Tip. Integrity is everything. Honesty is everything. Your reputation is your best salesperson. Your integrity is your key to your future value. In today’s complex, competitive and challenging markets your integrity and your honesty need to be your guiding light. If you want your clients to see value in what you do, work in partnership with you, refer you and your business, give you glowing recommendations and become repeat customers then this is not optional. Period.

On the check out desk, Stuart’s DVDs were starting to build up. Shoppers were not returning to collect the “sold” DVDs. Apparently, no-one had considered the possibility that customers might enjoy the experience but decide not to return with their cash. Ooops! Money up front might have been a good idea here team!!!

Sandeesh and co, meanwhile, had realized that skiing was just not that sexy for kids and after a bit of industrial espionage (spying) from Stella they had invested in a kiddie car of their own and business had picked up… but apparently not prices as they were still selling at £8!

In the Boardroom…

Apollo and Stuart had sold £347.50, spent £85 and made profit of £262.50.
Synergy and Sandeesh had sold £372.97, spent £150 and made profit of £222.97.

Had she not wasted money on too many DVDs and unneeded advertising and had she not lost the first hour of selling time and had they sold the “experience” better and not dropped their prices then Sandeesh would have hammered Stuart and we could have ditched the fool. But we don’t live in a world of might-have-been and Stuart’s ego took another boost as we saw that arrogant, everyone-in-the-UK-wants-to-wipe-it-off-your-face smirk again. He was the winner so it was Sandeesh who would have to face up to the likelihood of an early bath.

Back in the Boardroom…

Sandeesh elected to bring back Chris and Liz making it an extraordinary battle of the eyes…  Sandeesh and her big green cat’s eyes, Liz and her deep, dark brown pools and Chris (and as someone once said on a CV) and his steely blue eyes.

Sir Alan was struggling to decide who had the nicest eyes, “Chris you have me caught in your stare but I don’t like boys. Liz I am drowning in your eyes and I think I want to continue to stare into them for a few weeks yet. Sandeesh, I am not sure that I haven’t seen far too much of yours and, to be honest, they scare me just a little.”

He was deeply unimpressed that price was dropped prior to ideas about how to sell better, “It seems to me that someone somewhere… has capitulated too easily and has dropped the price.” Liz (who had lost a little of her sheen tonight and must take some responsibility for overspending on this task) was quick to agree. Chris blamed Sandeesh despite not making enough sales himself. I’d probably let him AND Sandeesh go tonight as surely she cannot exit the boardroom unscathed week after week after week. Sir Alan will sack her tonight just for a change of scenery. Too many questions, not enough answers…

But the decision was in, “Liz, I like your eyes, they look classy, I want to drown in them a little more. Chris, your eyes are blue and you should have been able to charm people better than wot you did but I think you’ve done ok so far. Sandeesh, you have good eyes too but it’s fair to say that you are up against two very strong contenders here. I’m going to have to let you go. You’re fired.”

A proximity killing. Too close to the fire, too often. In the cab Sandeesh was close to tears, humbled but defiant, “I think he has made a mistake in letting me go but what is there to say he has made his decision? Whatever else I do I know I’ll be successful so…” And she tailed off, thoughts drifting away.

Quote of the week…

Seriously…

“I have to rein in my own extreme masculinity.”

That was Stuart… obviously.

Related posts:

1. The Sales Apprentice 2010: Sales Training Tips From The Hit TV Show, Week 6
2. The Sales Apprentice 2010: Sales Training Tips From The Hit TV Show, Week 1
3. The Sales Apprentice 2010: Sales Training Tips From The Hit TV Show, Week 3

“Repetition is the mother of all skill.”
~ Tony Robbins, author of Unlimited Power

In sales seminars and sales training programmes I often talk about the difference between sales skills and sales techniques…

Sales techniques are something external to you, they are something that you hear or that you know. Sales skills are something that you own, they are yours through hard work and practise. And, what’s more,  they won’t abandon you in even the toughest of markets.

When I speak at sales conferences many salespeople sit back, cross their arms and ask for “the advanced stuff”. They tell their boss that they don’t need sales training because they already know it, they’ve heard it all before…

Take open questions as an example. Any salesperson with more than about 5 minutes selling experience knows what an open question is – a question that requires more than a “yes” or “no” answer. We all know that open questions start with the words what, where, when, why, how, who which. But how many salespeople put undue sales pressure onto their clients by asking (self-centred) closed questions when they should be asking (well constructed) open questions?

“Most salespeople” is the correct answer.

The ability to ask great questions is one of the critical skills for being a sales superstar yet most salespeople fair badly at best in this area.
Think back to the first time you were taught about open questions. Did you understand it? I’m guessing that you did. Let’s face it, it really isn’t that complicated is it? Most salespeople hear it, think that it makes sense and move on. They hear it, they acknowledge it but they never practise it. They get it intellectually but because they never practised it, it never becomes a skill for them. It never becomes something that they own.

Put under pressure in a sales meeting or in a cold call, and with the adrenaline flowing, they revert to type asking controlling closed questions and “forgetting” to ask carefully constructed open ones.

As Robbins says, “Repetition is the mother of all skill.”

• If you want to be a great golfer you need to practise your swing, over and over.
• If you want to be a great pianist you need to practise your scales, over and over.
• If you want to be a great at anything you need to practise it, over and over.
• If you want to be a great salesperson you need to practise your sales skills, over and over.

If you are a salesperson and you want to outsell your competition and win more clients fast, you need to create an ongoing sales development programme for yourself that includes regular practise of all of the sales training basics.

Don’t wait for your boss to put you on a sales training programme. Don’t wait for your sales results to fall off a cliff. Don’t wait until it’s nearly too late to start. Start now and make regular sales training practise of your selling skills  part of your daily habits. You’ll be amazed what you can achieve from a mere 15 minutes a day practising your basic sales skills.

If you’re a sales manager, sales leader or business owner then you need to think about how you can help your sales team to practise their core sales skills regularly. One-off training is not enough by itself. You need to create ongoing sessions and exercises for them to participate in, both individually and as a team. One company I know bought several copies of my Objection handling book Objections! Objections! Objections! and then “drilled” the answers in sales meetings. They added £1 million to their bottom line.

Not convinced it’s worth the effort? Not convinced you can get the same results? not convinced that you buy into this whole practise argument? What would Tiger Woods, David Beckham and Johnny Wilkinson tell you to do?

I rest my case.

Related posts:

1. Why Repetition Is The Key To Improving Your Sales Performance And Your Sales Results
2. The Sales Apprentice 2009: Sales Training Tips From The Hit TV Show, Week 12, The Final
3. How To Destroy Sales Loser Beliefs & Catapult Yourself To Sales Success