Definition of a Sales Professional

In my recently published book, PROFITS – Your Seven Letters to Success, I use the following definition of a Sales Professional as the books foundation. This week, I am not posting a blog, just this definition to see what you think about it.

Feel free to comment below or email me directly if you have anything to add or dispute. I have been in the sales profession for over 30-years, and this is what I owe to my success.

A Sales Professional:

• Is a PEAK PERFORMER who has the abilities and understands the importance to PLAN and PREPARE
• Understands and acknowledges their RESPONSIBILITIES to their organization and customers,  and can RETAIN their business, while maintaining RESPECT with their clients, companies, and most importantly themselves
• Takes OWNERSHIP and are ORGANIZED
• Maintains a FOCUS on their duties and goals
• Has a character built on INTEGRITY and they have personal INITIATIVE
• Has the ability and TRUST to work in a TEAM environment
• Provides all this to their internal and external customers with the utmost SINCERITY

5 P’s … it really is that simple

The 5 P’s … why can’t people realize this?

             I am going to rant a little bit in this week’s blog folks. For those of you that have followed me for a while, you know I usually try to keep it cool and find the learning or coaching opportunity from any event. This week though, I want to just let it all out there and hopefully come out with lesson.

The title of this week’s article is the 5 P’s … For those of you that have read my book, you know what those are. And for those that haven’t got their copy (available at Amazon.com) the 5 P’s stand for – Proper – Planning – Prevents – Poor – Performance. The question that goes along with this week’s article is; Why can’t people understand this basic concept? Why do some people, and some even in management, just think things will happen because they are supposed to? Yes, in principle a lot of things happen because they are supposed to, but for a request to become an action and for that action to be executed, some type of planning must take place.

I have gone through my career with these 5 p’s in mind every day. I want to perform at a high level, and even if it’s not the ‘highest’ level, I want to avoid poor performance at all costs. When given a request for any task, before I accept and confirm that task, I look at what other things I have promised already. What are the priorities? Who is affected if I move or change these priorities? And so on down the line. Sometimes we accept tasks knowing that someone else is going to be disappointed with the decision we made. However, if that is the case, it is your responsibility to notify the other person that something is going to be late or not completed at all. When you accept a task knowing that other things are going to suffer, you shouldn’t just wait until the day after a task was due to let people know it’s late. You need to make the call when you know it’s not going to happen.

Yes, that is a huge run-on rant, and my 9^th grade teacher English teacher will be upset with the sentence structure. But, the point of the 5 P’s is that we plan, we review, we look at consequences of our actions and decisions and take the most appropriate steps.

As sales professionals, we know we have one thing in the end … it’s our credibility. We need to ‘say what we will do, then do what we say’. It’s a pretty simple concept. We also know to under promise and over deliver. Unfortunately for us in some cases, we have support staff or management, which never really feel the heat of the customer, and therefore don’t quite follow this line of thinking. Promise dates for executed actions are mere suggestions or generalities to them. What difference does it make in the grand scheme of things if they delivery on Friday, what was promised for Tuesday? Our credibility, that’s what!

For those of you in sales that are reading this, I’m sure you all have examples of your own when dealing with support groups that don’t follow through on plans. Or that they change priorities without you knowing. I’m here to say that we need to prepare for this behavior in our planning. If micromanaging those individuals are necessary, then do it. If you trust them to meet the timing, then do that. But before you convey a promise date for an action that you are not handling directly on your own, make sure you understand where you are getting that information, and how reliable it really is.

In the end, we are ultimately responsible for those promises. In other words, and I hate to even say it, plan for other people not planning!

If you are having trouble working with teams and getting planning done properly, our group at Pinnacle Sales can help your team with that. Please give us a call or send us a mail. We offer “Service Above the Rest”.

Pinnacle Sales, LLC

418 Main Street, Suite 6

Belleville, MI  48111

mkole@pinnaclesales-llc.com

(734) 516-0221

 

Pinnacle Sales is an agency that offers support to clients in any part of the sales & marketing process. From planning to implementation,

business development to training.

 

The end of the year is near .. are you frustrated yet?

Feeling Frustrated?
Maybe it’s your Goal Setting …

 

I heard a great quote today that lead to this blog: “the task of setting unrealistic goals, are the seeds of frustration and depression” … Zig Ziglar

If you are frustrated, you might be doing it to yourself! Are your goals set TOO HIGH? Are they achievable? I’ve heard a lot of theories on goal setting, and the only thing consistent among these theories is that we NEED to set goals.

I’ve heard sales people say that if they set goals they know they can meet, they aren’t really goals. Getting close is what really matters. These sales people tend to set goals that are leaps and bounds beyond what they know they can achieve, but achieve much less. When they look back most are frustrated that they aren’t where they said they wanted to be.

I’ve heard other theories, the ones that I prescribe to by the way, that believe that if a goal is unachievable it might be a hope or dream, but it is not a goal!  If you can’t put together a plan to achieve something, it’s not a goal.

Now, if you are a professional you know not to take your frustrations home with you. You never have heard a death bed confession that was “I should have spent more time at the office”? have you?

We all have personal goals & aspirations that have nothing to do with business. These are our hopes, dreams, wishes, and wants that probably frustrate us more for not achieving them than our business goals. Frustration at home can definitely hurt your work performance, so let’s try to reduce that!

I hear people say that, they want to learn how to do this, and want to travel to here, and read 3 books a year, spend 2 hours a day at the gym, pay more attention to their wife and kids …. and so on. These people sound ambitious, but are often never happy because they have set their expectations too high.

 

Here is a tip on goal setting that may help reduce your frustration level:

 

• Write down all your expectations for the year
• These are the things you want to achieve
• When you are done writing them all down, wait awhile and then ask yourself why you want to do that?
• If you can’t answer why, then cross it off the list
• Take that list and those answers and assign the amount of time it will take ( example: 1 hour a day x 5 days x 52 weeks = 260 hours)
• Add up the real hours that are necessary to achieve those things you want to do
• Now, you have a total amount of hours necessary to you’re your goals, compare it to the 8,760 hours that are in a year – Remember, you have to sleep, eat, work and other things that remove a lot of that time – you just realized there isn’t enough time in the year
• Next thing to do is …. prioritize these wishes and wants, remove from the list anything that can’t physically be done in the time you have set
• Get the high priority things in a list and try to achieve them, don’t try to do everything just because you said it was a goal

Goal setting isn’t an art or science; it is trying to use practical thinking and decision making skills to set priorities. If you are frustrated because you aren’t meeting your goals, give us a call at Pinnacle Sales. We can help you and your teams reduce their levels of frustration!

 

Pinnacle Sales, LLC

418 Main Street, Suite 6

Belleville, MI  48111

mkole@pinnaclesales-llc.com

(734) 516-0221

 

Pinnacle Sales is an agency that offers support to clients in any part of the sales & marketing process. From planning to implementation,

business development to training.

Pinnacle Sales offers Service Above the Rest

Are you in control?

Control …

One of the main things we learn in being a sales person is that we must ‘control’ the customer. As a sales person, we need to steer a buyer into making the proper decision. Of course that decision is to buy our product, or agree to a certain point in negotiations.

Staying in control is important

Too often though, our management believes that this control means that our customers need to work within our company’s guidelines. Our management teams believe that this ‘control’ we get as sales people also means that our customers have to wait until ‘we’ are ready to provide information. As a professional sales person, whether the information you are requesting is a quotation or order delivery, do you feel that you have control if you force your customers to live within your rules?

All too often, our management teams believe that our customers need us more than we need them. I have been associated with many companies that have turned a blind eye to reality, and truly believe they were one of a kind. That is true only until a company pushes the customer to finding and/or developing alternatives.

So, how do we play this out? How can we keep our customers in control, but let them believe they are leading? How can we keep our management happy and believing that the customer is playing within their stated rules?

The blog this week is one with more questions than answers. However, I try to boil things down to the least common denominator. What is most important to your customer? And what is truly most important to the company you are representing. These two items have to match, all the other incidentals are just policy & procedure, and can be negotiated away. Keeping this in mind, is how we keep control of the situation. Keep these important things visible to both parties, and get through the process anyway you can in order to win. What do you tell a customer when they ask why they have to wait for 2-weeks, when our competition can get it done in 1-week? Find out how to relate it to what matters to them most.  Remember that the old saying of “sell the sizzle” works in more places than in just the product demonstration.

If you also think of the company you represent as your customer, this can help. You need to control them as well as the buyer. You need to keep the key things visible to them at all times. Whether its payment terms for cash flow purposes, or utilization of a machine that has been idle for a long period of time, find the key points and keep them visible.

From the beginning of any relationship, find out what matters most. Try to match these so that there are no compatibility issues, and keep the parties focused on these priorities.  When you control the process, you can control your customers and principals.

If you are having issues with control and keeping your eye on the prize, coaching can be a great benefit. Pinnacle Sales offers one to one coaching that will help you increase your sales, credibility and control!

Gives us a call!

Pinnacle Sales, LLC

418 Main Street, Suite 6

Belleville, MI  48111

mkole@pinnaclesales-llc.com

(734) 516-0221

Pinnacle Sales is an agency that offers support to clients in any part of the sales & marketing process. From planning to implementation,

business development to training.

Pinnacle Sales offers Service Above the Rest

Are we confusing our sales teams?

“Get more immediate sales!”

“Why aren’t you visiting that prospect?”

“What have you done for me lately?”

“Why haven’t you followed up on that trade show lead?”

 

I think it is fair to say that sales people are the easiest people to both motivate and frustrate. We give them a task and point them in the direction we want them to go. We may offer an incentive or just the challenge, and let them go. They get all geared up, focused, and hit the road or phones ready to take on the world.

Then, we go to our staff meetings, find out that the indicators just aren’t indicating, and we call an immediate sales meeting to set a new course. This simple action creates confusion and frustration to your sales team.

As a manager, you know that there are company goals & objectives that must be met. As the manager of a department that is responsible for increasing the top line, you need to understand that marching orders handed to the sales team should be in line with the needs of the organization.

This is the time of year we see a lot of these confusing messages. The 6-month results are in, and either your sales numbers aren’t there or something happened in operations that need to be made up in more sales. The easiest things to handle are when it’s your team that isn’t making the numbers. They are expecting a course change or new marching orders, or they have already tried to do it themselves.

The hardest things to overcome are when it’s not the team’s fault. They easily get frustrated when they have invested months in working on what they believed were the targets of the company, only to find that time might have been wasted and they need to do something else.

As sales managers, we need to better communicate upwards within our organizations. Does the management team understand the sales process and what needs to be done to meet goals and objectives? The management teams that we report to must have a good understanding of the process that our teams must go through. With that communication and understanding, they are less likely to have radical changes in the markets, products, targets, or just anything.

A lot of sales people are put through training in organizations where they have to work in every department. From incoming inspection, through manufacturing, assembly, etc all the way through accounting and collections. With this understanding of the production and business process, they can better defend the organizations prices and/or policies.

What “we” need to do with other professionals in the organization, is put them through a similar training to understand our business process. Your accounts receivable clerks need to understand what your customer service and sales teams are already going through to win and keep business. Your production supervisors need to understand where their products are used and how long of a decision making process is required to win business.

With better understanding of the whole business and process, we can keep confusion to a minimum within our teams. If your team seems to be unfocused or confused, give us a call at Pinnacle Sales to see if we can help clarify the real situation. Maybe it’s your team, maybe it’s the organization. Let’s find out together!

Pinnacle Sales, LLC

418 Main Street, Suite 6

Belleville, MI  48111

mkole@pinnaclesales-llc.com

(734) 516-0221

 

Pinnacle Sales is an agency that offers support to clients in any part of the sales & marketing process. From planning to implementation,

business development to training.

Pinnacle Sales offers Service Above the Rest

When is it time to FIRE a customer?

When is it time to fire a customer?

 

We all have been faced with a situation where we are dealing with a customer that we want to get rid of. Yes, I am talking about deliberately firing a customer for various reasons. Either they are slow pay (or no pay), have unreasonable service requests, just over demanding, or a myriad of other reasons. Your management teams sometimes help you in creating arbitrary lines of disengagement such as; sales at or below this target, profitability below this target and so on.

 

Then there is always that one customer you don’t want, but your company can’t make a decision about firing them. They might be in your target market, or a high level of sales and profit might be visible on paper. Your management team is scared to let them go, even though they know that this customer could be unethical (share your secrets), or they put unreasonable requests on your products (which just adds company overhead and costs). It’s generally the hidden costs of doing business with these customers that we, the sales and service teams see, that management turns a blind eye to.

 

As professional sales people, we ask ourselves … “what can we do better to make this relationship better?” … “what am I missing?” … We are fairly sure that it must be partially our own company’s or principal’s fault, right? We put on our suit & tie, and go out year after year to try and improve this relationship and make it better for all, a win-win!

 

Sometimes though, just like there are bad people in the World, there are bad customers! Yes folks, we have to accept the fact that we can’t help everyone. We need to realize that our time, effort, and our company’s assets can be better utilized with other customers. We have to ask ourselves if our time can be better spent cultivating other customers and prospecting for a better match.

 

There isn’t a formula for this decision. Usually an objective analysis is needed for both the sales and management teams to see what is obvious to outsiders. Pinnacle Sales can offer you and your group this type of objective analysis and coaching expertise. If you have a problem, let us take a look …

 

We might give you the advice to fire em’ or firem’ up!

 

Pinnacle Sales, LLC

418 Main Street, Suite 6

Belleville, MI  48111

mkole@pinnaclesales-llc.com

(734) 516-0221

 

Pinnacle Sales is an agency that offers support to clients in any part of the sales & marketing process. From planning to implementation,

business development to training.

Pinnacle Sales offers Service Above the Rest

What are you looking for in a sales meeting?

What do you do after a sales meeting?

I am just coming back from a sales conference in Europe, and I find myself wondering what is really different each time I come back from a sales meeting? Sometimes I change my way of working, sometimes I don’t. What I do realize from both sides of the spectrum, as a manager it is hard to develop a good meeting, and expectations from your team are always higher than what is delivered.

 

My question in this week’s blog, is what do you believe makes a successful sales meeting? As professionals we all have certain positive aspects and certain parts of our DNA that need work on. It’s not the same with each and every one of us, which is sure. So, if you are a sales manager, how do you take all of this into consideration when you have a sales meeting? As a sales person, what are you expecting from management during these meetings and conferences?

 

My list is simple, as a sales person, I want the following:

–         Any news & information that I can use to help create a better image to my customers back in the territory

• For example, in one of my previous positions, we used to invite the operations managers from the various factories do a 30-minute presentation on what they have done to improve, and why we should be selling parts they will manufacture for us

–         Product knowledge improvements

–         Sales technique training

• From role playing to negotiations, a session should be included

–         Case studies of both big wins & big losses

• Discuss as a group what can or could have been done to avoid or repeat!

 

As a sales manager, my list is similar, but additional things

–         Create excitement

–         Get beyond the business, and try to learn more about the individual

–         Time to assess each team member

• From product knowledge to sales skills, something should be assessed at each meeting

–         Scheduled 1:1 time (if sales team is small)

–         Discuss what the company is going to do to help the sales person perform better, and why this is still the best company they should be working for and representing

–         Determine if there are similar roadblocks to sales that can be removed

–         Monitor progress on budgeting and forecasting (meeting the numbers)

 

As you can see, the lists are different, however properly defined activities can help meet the needs of a sales manager as well as the sales person. If you need help in developing a sales meeting, and a long-term plan to improve your team, give us a call at Pinnacle Sales!

 

 

Pinnacle Sales, LLC

418 Main Street, Suite 6

Belleville, MI  48111

mkole@pinnaclesales-llc.com

(734) 516-0221

 

Pinnacle Sales is an agency that offers support to clients in any part of the sales & marketing process. From planning to implementation,

business development to training.

Pinnacle Sales offer Service Above the Rest.

 

To Compromise – is to lose!

To compromise is to lose …

            When Steven Covey spoke of seeking a Win-Win solution, did he mention compromising on principals? No, he spoke about showing your adversary how we both benefit by implementing a solution.

            If you are certain that a RED solution is the right one, and you are negotiating with someone that firmly believes that a BLUE solution is the best, one of you has to admit they are wrong. Compromising to a PURPLE product or answer only reduces the quality of the finished product – neither you nor the other person is truly happy.

            I recently heard a podcast interviewing Ricky Gervais, comedian and creator of the hit television show, “The Office”. He made a pretty profound statement when during the interview he stated that he would rather throw an idea out that he and his creative partner didn’t agree on 100% than to put something into the program that is less than perfect. By putting something together that is less than perfect, he was doing himself and the audience a disservice.

         Before you all start shouting that you need to negotiate or compromise for us to do our jobs, I don’t disagree. But the point of this statement goes beyond this. He went on to say that if every part of each show is 100% agreed upon between him and his partner, he knows for sure that it is a great show. He knows for sure that if the joke they both agreed was funny makes the show, more than likely the audience will too.

            So, your body of work that you want to promote and negotiate with your strategic partner should include the things you both believe are perfect. You need to begin the process of negotiations by identifying what is truly a throw away, and what is truly a principle. You never compromise on principles; it reduces the value of the deal substantially, and also reduces your own credibility.

        You can hear this podcast on the Harvard Business Reviews weekly idea cast, it’s formal title is; “Ricky Gervais on not having a real job” …

         Having trouble identifying what your own core beliefs and principles are? Give Pinnacle Sales trainers a call. They can coach you and help determine what those are, and how best to negotiate without compromise!

Pinnacle Sales, LLC

418 Main Street, Suite 6

Belleville, MI  48111

(734) 516-0221

mkole@pinnaclesales-llc.com

Communication – Don’t Overkill!



Don’t say in blah, blah, blah … what you can say in blah!

A good friend of mine gave me this line when we were reviewing an upcoming presentation we were going to make. We had an hour to give the presentation, so I laid out almost an hour of presentation materials, data, slides, and all the bells and whistles. Talk about overkill!

He reviewed the first draft, and stated it … “Mike you have WAY TOO MUCH in this presentation, how many times do you want to tell him the same thing? Don’t say in blah, blah, what you can say in blah!”

He proceeded to edit the presentation and took out nearly 2/3^rd’s of it, and we went to the appointment with a solid 20-minute slide show.

I recently had a home improvement sales person at the house, and he was very good. We got beyond the ‘selling’ process, and while he was writing up the contract we were just chatting. He noticed a copy of my book on the coffee table, and started paging through it. Of course, he took the opportunity for some free coaching and advice and asked what I thought of his presentation. I gave him 8 out of 10, and he argued that because I bought the product, he should be getting a higher rating. I told him the sale was over an hour ago, it just took him the extra time to realize it. He had missed a lot of cues I had given, but I was okay with it, and my general criticism of him was the above – keep it simple, don’t overstate, don’t over talk your position, and don’t say it too many times. If I had been an impatient buyer, he might have lost the sale, thankfully for his commission I wasn’t.

As sales people we have to communicate clearly, and make sure we are being thorough without inundating the buyer with too much information. The key to this is to build in questions in you sales presentation to ensure that

1)                         The customer can hear their own voice once in a while (the sweetest sound for anyone, is the sound of their own voice)

2)                         That you can get a feedback to see if the customer has grasped the concept, and if it’s time to move on.

 

It’s communication 101 to make sure there is a feedback system so we can gauge if the other party understands and comprehends what we are saying. A good sales person is not one that can talk a lot, but one that can listen and understand what else needs to be said, or when enough has been said.

Pinnacle Sales offers coaching in these types of topics, which best work in a one on one environment with your sales team. There is no ‘canned’ approach that can fit 100% of your team, so think about having some good quality coaching on presentation and listening skills.

 

 

Pinnacle Sales, LLC

418 Main Street, Suite 6

Belleville, MI  48111

(734) 516-0221

mkole@pinnaclesales-llc.com

 

For a reference on Pinnacle Sales, check out the publication:

PROFITS, Your Seven Letters to Success … available at amazon.com and several other online retailers.

 

 

Why won’t people call anymore?

I’m sitting in my office and “ding”, the email icon appears, and for one time in my life it’s my only unread email in my inbox, so I quickly scan it and see it’s from a buyer asking something pretty simple. Knowing she had just sent this, I picked up the phone and called her… straight to voicemail.

I answered the mail with my one line answer turned my attention again to the spreadsheet I had been working on.  Again … “ding” I hear another email come in. It’s from her again, so I again dial the phone and straight to voicemail. Answering the 2^nd mail and again I hear “ding” … she’s sitting at her desk but won’t answer the phone, I say to myself. So, my 3^rd answer is a statement, “I’ll answer your question if you pick-up the phone!”

Before there was email, and unlimited nationwide calling, I cherished the moments we could actually have conversations with our clients. The general discussions, not negotiations, but finding out what really makes this buyer tick, or what the objectives of these projects really were. You can’t get that information in email, it’s only safe to talk freely, when you … well … talk!

Before you write your next email, pick up the phone instead. Try the direct approach and strike up a dialogue. Before you start the next long email chain of empty dialogue, find out what you really need to put in writing the old fashioned way – PICK UP THE PHONE. It is always my first inclination of how to contact people.

Why do we have cell phones, if we are only going to use them to write mails? As sales people, we are looking to build relationships with our customers and clients. You can better do this via phone or in person, than email. We should be looking for information that can’t really be put in writing, not stuff that is public knowledge. Are you really going to ask your client the target pricing in email? This way his boss has a record of what the response was! How can you find out what the competition is ‘really’ doing? Think about the value of the unwritten word, it is often priceless.

The impact of each type of communication, or touch is pretty straightforward

• Personal visits – number one and always will be
• Phone call
• Email
• Form letter

 

If you need some coaching on this, give us a call at PINNACLE SALES, LLC, we can work with you and help you through this issues in the overall sales process.

PINNACLE SALES, LLC

418 Main Street, Suite 6

Belleville, MI  48111

Email; mkole@pinnaclesales-llc.com

(734) 516-0221

 

Check out the latest publication by Pinnacle Sales, called PROFITS, Your Seven Letters to Success available at Amazon.com

 

http://www.amazon.com/dp/1432767798

 

PROFITS is available in paperback and the Kindle version for immediate delivery. Or, call me direct, arrange a training session for your team, and get a free copy for each team member in the training.