Category Archives: Messaging
High vs. Low Pressure
I wonder how many sales people who employ high pressure tactics realize when high pressure exists, it blocks out everything else. Take for example a natural phenomenon: Thousands of people visit Yellowstone National Park every year—and witness the majesty and … Continue reading
Wouldn’t you agree?
“Wouldn’t you agree?” This is verbiage that sales people often use when talking to customers and prospects. In my opinion, this represents an overused phrase that does not bring about the desired results—neither more sales nor active engagement of your … Continue reading
Customers Reveal Only 20%
The other day I read a statistic about selling—that customers reveal only 20% of what they are thinking. So how do you get them to share that other 80%? It would probably help to figure out why people don’t share all their thoughts. After all, Thinking Like a Customer is our mantra. There are probably several reasons customers want to keep certain thoughts to themselves:
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Difference Between Messages and Messaging
Many sales reps (and managers) aren’t perfectly clear making the distinction between the sales message and messaging. Yet one is mostly passive (the sales message) and one is active (messaging). An easy way to visualize this is using a sales … Continue reading
Being Influenced By Others
How easily are we swayed by others? In sales, we try to influence or persuade our customers to use our products. Yet we often encounter misperceptions and misunderstandings, either about our products or our competition in the mind of our … Continue reading
Your Product Story and Imagery
“There is a big difference between a green sofa and an overstuffed chair with arms that come up to your ears when you sink into it with a child in your lap.” [Dave Lakhani. Persuasion: The Art of Getting What … Continue reading
The Role of Emotions in Selling
Emotions play a huge role in how we make decisions and this is particularly true when we are evaluating what to buy. Therefore, it behooves us as sales people to be skilled at evoking emotions as part of the selling process. The way we accomplish this is through the words and phrases that we use, for words are the tools that have the power to create feelings, both positive and negative. If we are able to tap into those feelings in a meaningful and effective way, we are more likely to make the sale. Continue reading
3 Ways to Create Interest
“Nobody ever sold anything to anybody by boring them to death.” What David Ogilvy (advertising guru) said is so true—it’s hard to talk to someone that you find boring. That’s why being interesting is how we can get our customers want to talk to us and as importantly, pay attention to what we say.
Think about the people you know who are interesting. Odds are that you can probably separate them into two groups. Continue reading
Handling Objections Effectively
Objections are often the major reason that customers hesitate before they buy or don’t buy at all. They are always an obstacle to a final sale unless you know the correct way to respond to each of them. But before uttering a standard response to an objection, it makes sense to take a step back and determine exactly why the objection was raised.
I’ve learned that there are basically four main reasons that our customers throw obstacles in our path (known as objections): Continue reading
You Don’t Need to Build a Faster Horse—the Art of Selling
I recently read a quote from Henry Ford, “If I’d have asked customers what they wanted, they would have told me, ‘A faster horse!’” Ford is right that customers will often tell you they want one thing when in reality, they don’t have a clue. They are missing the in-depth knowledge and understanding about what is available or how something different could help them. You’ve probably encountered similar circumstances when you are selling.
The reality is that if you ask your customers what they want, in most cases, they really can’t answer that question accurately. Continue reading
