Beware the dark side.

What has/is post modernism really brought about/bringing about?

The study of this subject is one where no one has all the answers. We don’t know yet what all the effects of a post modernistic society and the information age really are. Though there are many of us who have notched as much of a slide backwards in important areas of development as any true gain in terms of benchmarking the effects of what is oft touted as the most beneficial development of and for mankind.

Postmodern Parables as a concept developed within religion to deal with obvious change is very revealing. There appears to be far more concrete understanding coming from this camp, the ministers of the cloth, than those poorly researched preachers of direct marketing and new-age sales.

And who can argue this change?

In today’s world we can distribute an article in hours, which includes writing it! We can write a book in anyone’s house or coffee shop (by anyone with a computer, which is most of the developed world) and sell it as an e-book within the day of its completion. In other words information can and is being delivered at a scary pace.

And I must say, as I have begun to focus on this subject within the last 3 months, I’ve found it to be truly fascinating.

One need only look at Oprah. Just by adding a publication to her Oprah’s Book Club it is an instant best seller. Or doing a show on “Going Green 101” and suddenly North America is clamoring to buy products from representatives of an MLM company. Yes, can you believe it? One of the world’s most influential women is promoting Shaklee products, not for personal gain but as an environmentally friendly option, how awesome!

The reality is that two things are happening as a result of the affects of the information age, those that are real and those that are imagined. To understand this let us take our first example yet again from Oprah’s Book Club. I believe it was A Million Little Pieces by James Frey, the now infamous author that fictionalized his personal experiences, thereby perpetrating a fraud – one that became a best seller because of Oprah.

Clearly, Oprah usually recommends excellent material/products that fall into the REAL category. Whereas the influence of this post modernistic Diva, TV and the Information Age culminated in many beneficial promotions of great information, whether that in the form of good novels and factual readings that benefit readers or environmentally friendly household cleaning products, but at least once she also got scammed. Having inadvertently promoted something that was IMAGINED, as it was a fraud, though no doubt a well written hoax.

Which category does New Age Sales deserve to be put into? The answer to this question clearly depends on case by case examples. Some are REAL, some are IMAGINED (meaning we imagine it to be real) and some are a combination. The later means some of the information within a source is REAL and some within the same source are also IMAGINED, as with the anomaly that is the Oprah brand, not to be confused with Oprah the person.

Has the world changed? There is no doubt about some of the effects. Take the elderly parishioner of a local ethnic church who reads the paper daily from his Eastern European homeland on the Internet. He may not believe he was changed by the post modernistic society but that is as classic an example as you can get.

My own sister lived in Melbourne Australia for a couple of years. While she was there she listen to a local Toronto radio station from time to time and regularly watched through the Internet a roadside CAM at a business intersection she is familiar with so as not to feel so lonely.

Yes, the world has changed but has it changed to the extent that the folks at Google and WEBEX want us to believe? Are we at a point where our profession is seeing a new sales variety that would compare sales as it used to be as version 1.X, as is 1.1 and 1.4, being replaced by SALES 2.0? A radical suggestion, is it not? But it is getting serious air time!

In other words, the inference is that selling is now developed to a new generation (or level), not to be confused with “for a new generation”. Is this suggestion in a nutshell REAL or IMAGINED?

To see just how far this has come as a post modernistic concept, specifically applied to the market and selling, look no further than an excerpt of an article that was posted online on December 20th, 2007, by Dale Underwood about the prospect asking “How much does your product cost?” …

“Ever get asked that question before you’ve had a chance to deliver your value proposition? It’s becoming more common in B2B sales, but why? The primary reason is that most prospects have already researched your products on the web before you ever step in the door and they don’t want to waste their time if they can’t afford it.”

I ask again, is this REAL or IMAGINED?

The week before Christmas I called a well researched suspected prospect to introduce that person to a service, one which we get orders for over the phone. He heard my value proposition or at least my BENEFIT STATEMENT, as anyone who answers the phone will unless they cut me off, and asked “How much is it?” Then, after hearing the price, he said “I am not interested.”

I described this prospect to be of the SUSPECTED type and rightly so. In this case, my research proved not to bring me to a good prospect, he did not QUALIFY as he did not have the money for my service. But this prospect had not been to my website. He had not even researched my style of service. In fact, he had never given it any thought at all. I know, because realizing I could not go further I asked.

I also know because I surprised him, not the other way around. And this is where a clear separation between two kinds of selling can be seen. As with those using the term SALES 2.0 it appears the assumption is that the prospect always comes to you from an Internet search engine.

But … hold on a minute … how is it all these new age writers could be spreading ideas nearly devoid of what we might be used to, we the professionals that sold extremely effectively before the Information Age. This is the confusing part as there is no one prior to me that I can find who is attempting to connect the dots (not that this first attempt is likely to do so in a way that is awesome).

One thing is certain. B2B buyers do not have all day to sit and look at services and products online. Most own businesses and they spend far more time researching how they will make money then how they will spend it. This means that if you have an idea about how to help these people they will not find you. You must be prepared to go to them.

If the buyer researched online and found you then, sure, I agree, he/she likely did read your website. But do decisions get made by reading a website and calling up and asking for a price? Or are they in relation to serious needs?

What is missing here is profound sales knowledge. The kind only truly understood by one who has worked successfully as a B2B sales rep, knows prospecting and knows off-line direct response marketing and online advertising, an individual who has learned all disciplines. Not to worry, I am such a person. I was a sales trainer 24 years ago and I was featured in April ’01 in one newsstand magazine and found my way onto the cover of another in Feb. ‘04 for success online. I know direct response, online advertising and sales from a trainers standpoint.

Therefore, I honestly feel I am one of a rare few that can talk knowledgeably and in depth on this topic as it relates to the selling profession. And, before I go on, by no means are my statements aimed at putting down the author named above but his writings indicate he is an entrepreneur who thinks about sales from a direct response standpoint, not one who is truly as a member of our profession (though this is just a guess).

No question, there are B2B Businesses that buyers search for at Google or Yahoo in numbers significant enough to support growth. However, the fallacy is that every buyer looks for everything they buy online. And, in order to prove that I have to introduce selling to you or, at least, re-introduce it, as you may have to some degree already been indoctrinated in NEW AGE SALES.

Is it best to sell when you are up against competition or when you are not? And what is the best way, other than through referral, to be in a no competition selling situation when you DON’T represent a unique product?

If you don’t understand the answer to this query you are not what we might refer to as an extremely well trained sales person, as it is not a trick question. But don’t worry, you do not have to remain as you are!

Much like Oprah with James Frey, the NEW AGE SELLING and SALES 2.0 authors have not verified the authenticity of the various idea promoters that influenced them. Nor are they usually great sales people themselves, many not being sales people at all. Most have their own self interest to protect and do not know that they are promoting a lot of misleading information. In point of fact, they are the worst kind of deceiver, those who are themselves deceived.

Still, some of this information is valid - again, this can get confusing. Bare with it please, this is important.

To face a buyer without being up against competition, when your product is not unique, you must be a master prospector because, as with the age before the Internet, the World Wide Web and Google or Yahoo, people who answer ads did not just answer yours. And, make no mistake, in terms of generating new B2B business, a website is nothing more than an extension of your advertisement, albeit one with a built in lead capture system.

Surprising the prospect is a skill that is being lost. And, that is sweet music in the ears of real prospecting geniuses, as we know we are facing less and less competition.

This knowledge also verifies a reality that is IMAGINED.

Remembering that to each of us perception is reality, that which we imagine as real is just that and herein lies the confusion as well as the reason why, when information can be promoted at light speed, that bad information is spreading where once it would not have. I mean, can you envision a book publishing company printing a book about sales and distributing it world wide with their own money if it was authored by someone who had never proven themselves in our arena and become a renowned speaker/trainer?

Now, at this stage in the article, I have to clarify. It is without doubt that my comments above SALES 2.0 and NEW AGE SALES being IMAGINED are valid. And, as with the example given about Oprah’s Book Club, it is also just as valid that some of what is being said by these authors is also valid, meaning in some cases my comment is INVALID!

Again, as stated already, this is the confusing part.

If I say sales has not changed I am referring to B2B selling. Specifically the kind that you cannot sell easily online and is not searched online frequently.

If you got a lead from the Yellow Pages in 1985 or your Website 2007, more often than not, the buyer in both cases has checked out the competition too, this has not changed. The difference is the 2007 prospect may know more about your organization and product than the prospect in 1985 did.

The operative word in the last sentence is MAY. Not all of us spend time reading websites, many prefer to ask questions or simply find websites so vast that they cannot locate what they want easily and would rather save time by calling and asking, which also causes frustration because they get voice mail instead of help!

The point is, statements about buyers being better informed should not be made as if they are all encompassing. They are not necessarily valid and, again, each case must be looked at individually.

The ministers of the cloth are now talking about the effect of the Information Age not being better educated people, not at all. In general people do not sit down and read books any longer, therefore they have a lower command of language. This results in not being able to think certain thoughts and overall, we expect to see a real change in patience, specifically lack there of!

“Some buyers are better informed” is valid. Inferring instead that “all buyers are better informed” is not, this is imagined and that is the way it always will be.

But who cares? In the end, if you have to sit across a desk from a buyer to get a sale rather than something that can be sold online or over a telephone, what difference does it make what the prospective buyer has done in terms of research? It is still going to come down to you, the relationship you build and how well you are able to find out what they want and showing them you can provide that to them.

If the buyer in this case asks the price before a visit then that is good, who wants to waste time visiting a buyer that has not the budget to acquire what you sell? However, it is my strong assertion in this article that buyers do not seek to buy when they have no budget, not if they are successful people. Because they have better things to do, namely making money.

The SALES 2.0 concept has been born out of a couple of beliefs. First, that the salesman does not surprise the prospect. And this is fed by businesses where there is no prospecting to speak of, where prospects find you rather than the other way around. The writers therefore really have a skewed view of selling as a profession and usually are not able to prospect themselves, they do not get it.

In a business where the industry is searched online regularly it is easy to understand how this ‘Google Society’ concept takes root in anyone’s mind. The reality is that many mundane products are just not thought about by business people. And consumer type products that are searched online at a much higher degree.

In the thread I wrote a couple of nights ago and posted at salespractice.com I took some time to make the point about the lousy information that is being spread. I would recommend you read that forum thread, thus saving me time redoing some of the same ideas here in this article.

Cold calling doesn't work anymore!

I want to leave you with a reminder; consider the source. Please, whatever it is that you do in the future, before you allow your thoughts to be limited consider whether or not the information you are receiving is written or recorded by a true master. Odds are, if it shows you an easy way out or, put another way, a quick cure for pain, it is not well researched and written by someone who has not been there and done that.

The focus on the importance of CUSTOMER SERVICE in NEW AGE SALES sometimes makes me laugh. Here we are with voice mail systems that are hard to negotiate to get a live body, is that good customer service? No, it costs businesses money. And, great customer service is far from new.

The information age is new. And, it is causing shorter attention spans. Other than that the way we sold in our profession, the kind that requires a sit down meeting to do the deal, that has not changed. It is not an act of a sales dinosaur, it is the most professional method of communicating there is.

I have used WEBEX hundreds of times to demo and do presentations. And, in fact, the first presentation that led to one of the largest software sales made to the auto industry in the last 5 years began with a webinar. But only after the phone call that prospected them to have a look … and I will leave you with that.

I may add to this Beware the dark side thread later on, as I continue my research into NEW AGE SALES. For now I hop you can trust in me to tell you that you are never likely to be replaced by a computer or a website, no matter how much Google might wish it so!

	#1
Gold Calling "Top Sales Expert"	Beware the dark side. What has/is post modernism really brought about/bringing about? The study of this subject is one where no one has all the answers. We don’t know yet what all the effects of a post modernistic society and the information age really are. Though there are many of us who have notched as much of a slide backwards in important areas of development as any true gain in terms of benchmarking the effects of what is oft touted as the most beneficial development of and for mankind. Postmodern Parables as a concept developed within religion to deal with obvious change is very revealing. There appears to be far more concrete understanding coming from this camp, the ministers of the cloth, than those poorly researched preachers of direct marketing and new-age sales. And who can argue this change? In today’s world we can distribute an article in hours, which includes writing it! We can write a book in anyone’s house or coffee shop (by anyone with a computer, which is most of the developed world) and sell it as an e-book within the day of its completion. In other words information can and is being delivered at a scary pace. And I must say, as I have begun to focus on this subject within the last 3 months, I’ve found it to be truly fascinating. One need only look at Oprah. Just by adding a publication to her Oprah’s Book Club it is an instant best seller. Or doing a show on “Going Green 101” and suddenly North America is clamoring to buy products from representatives of an MLM company. Yes, can you believe it? One of the world’s most influential women is promoting Shaklee products, not for personal gain but as an environmentally friendly option, how awesome! The reality is that two things are happening as a result of the affects of the information age, those that are real and those that are imagined. To understand this let us take our first example yet again from Oprah’s Book Club. I believe it was A Million Little Pieces by James Frey, the now infamous author that fictionalized his personal experiences, thereby perpetrating a fraud – one that became a best seller because of Oprah. Clearly, Oprah usually recommends excellent material/products that fall into the REAL category. Whereas the influence of this post modernistic Diva, TV and the Information Age culminated in many beneficial promotions of great information, whether that in the form of good novels and factual readings that benefit readers or environmentally friendly household cleaning products, but at least once she also got scammed. Having inadvertently promoted something that was IMAGINED, as it was a fraud, though no doubt a well written hoax. Which category does New Age Sales deserve to be put into? The answer to this question clearly depends on case by case examples. Some are REAL, some are IMAGINED (meaning we imagine it to be real) and some are a combination. The later means some of the information within a source is REAL and some within the same source are also IMAGINED, as with the anomaly that is the Oprah brand, not to be confused with Oprah the person. Has the world changed? There is no doubt about some of the effects. Take the elderly parishioner of a local ethnic church who reads the paper daily from his Eastern European homeland on the Internet. He may not believe he was changed by the post modernistic society but that is as classic an example as you can get. My own sister lived in Melbourne Australia for a couple of years. While she was there she listen to a local Toronto radio station from time to time and regularly watched through the Internet a roadside CAM at a business intersection she is familiar with so as not to feel so lonely. Yes, the world has changed but has it changed to the extent that the folks at Google and WEBEX want us to believe? Are we at a point where our profession is seeing a new sales variety that would compare sales as it used to be as version 1.X, as is 1.1 and 1.4, being replaced by SALES 2.0? A radical suggestion, is it not? But it is getting serious air time! In other words, the inference is that selling is now developed to a new generation (or level), not to be confused with “for a new generation”. Is this suggestion in a nutshell REAL or IMAGINED? To see just how far this has come as a post modernistic concept, specifically applied to the market and selling, look no further than an excerpt of an article that was posted online on December 20th, 2007, by Dale Underwood about the prospect asking “How much does your product cost?” … “Ever get asked that question before you’ve had a chance to deliver your value proposition? It’s becoming more common in B2B sales, but why? The primary reason is that most prospects have already researched your products on the web before you ever step in the door and they don’t want to waste their time if they can’t afford it.” I ask again, is this REAL or IMAGINED? The week before Christmas I called a well researched suspected prospect to introduce that person to a service, one which we get orders for over the phone. He heard my value proposition or at least my BENEFIT STATEMENT, as anyone who answers the phone will unless they cut me off, and asked “How much is it?” Then, after hearing the price, he said “I am not interested.” I described this prospect to be of the SUSPECTED type and rightly so. In this case, my research proved not to bring me to a good prospect, he did not QUALIFY as he did not have the money for my service. But this prospect had not been to my website. He had not even researched my style of service. In fact, he had never given it any thought at all. I know, because realizing I could not go further I asked. I also know because I surprised him, not the other way around. And this is where a clear separation between two kinds of selling can be seen. As with those using the term SALES 2.0 it appears the assumption is that the prospect always comes to you from an Internet search engine. But … hold on a minute … how is it all these new age writers could be spreading ideas nearly devoid of what we might be used to, we the professionals that sold extremely effectively before the Information Age. This is the confusing part as there is no one prior to me that I can find who is attempting to connect the dots (not that this first attempt is likely to do so in a way that is awesome). One thing is certain. B2B buyers do not have all day to sit and look at services and products online. Most own businesses and they spend far more time researching how they will make money then how they will spend it. This means that if you have an idea about how to help these people they will not find you. You must be prepared to go to them. If the buyer researched online and found you then, sure, I agree, he/she likely did read your website. But do decisions get made by reading a website and calling up and asking for a price? Or are they in relation to serious needs? What is missing here is profound sales knowledge. The kind only truly understood by one who has worked successfully as a B2B sales rep, knows prospecting and knows off-line direct response marketing and online advertising, an individual who has learned all disciplines. Not to worry, I am such a person. I was a sales trainer 24 years ago and I was featured in April ’01 in one newsstand magazine and found my way onto the cover of another in Feb. ‘04 for success online. I know direct response, online advertising and sales from a trainers standpoint. Therefore, I honestly feel I am one of a rare few that can talk knowledgeably and in depth on this topic as it relates to the selling profession. And, before I go on, by no means are my statements aimed at putting down the author named above but his writings indicate he is an entrepreneur who thinks about sales from a direct response standpoint, not one who is truly as a member of our profession (though this is just a guess). No question, there are B2B Businesses that buyers search for at Google or Yahoo in numbers significant enough to support growth. However, the fallacy is that every buyer looks for everything they buy online. And, in order to prove that I have to introduce selling to you or, at least, re-introduce it, as you may have to some degree already been indoctrinated in NEW AGE SALES. Is it best to sell when you are up against competition or when you are not? And what is the best way, other than through referral, to be in a no competition selling situation when you DON’T represent a unique product? If you don’t understand the answer to this query you are not what we might refer to as an extremely well trained sales person, as it is not a trick question. But don’t worry, you do not have to remain as you are! Much like Oprah with James Frey, the NEW AGE SELLING and SALES 2.0 authors have not verified the authenticity of the various idea promoters that influenced them. Nor are they usually great sales people themselves, many not being sales people at all. Most have their own self interest to protect and do not know that they are promoting a lot of misleading information. In point of fact, they are the worst kind of deceiver, those who are themselves deceived. Still, some of this information is valid - again, this can get confusing. Bare with it please, this is important. To face a buyer without being up against competition, when your product is not unique, you must be a master prospector because, as with the age before the Internet, the World Wide Web and Google or Yahoo, people who answer ads did not just answer yours. And, make no mistake, in terms of generating new B2B business, a website is nothing more than an extension of your advertisement, albeit one with a built in lead capture system. Surprising the prospect is a skill that is being lost. And, that is sweet music in the ears of real prospecting geniuses, as we know we are facing less and less competition. This knowledge also verifies a reality that is IMAGINED. Remembering that to each of us perception is reality, that which we imagine as real is just that and herein lies the confusion as well as the reason why, when information can be promoted at light speed, that bad information is spreading where once it would not have. I mean, can you envision a book publishing company printing a book about sales and distributing it world wide with their own money if it was authored by someone who had never proven themselves in our arena and become a renowned speaker/trainer? Now, at this stage in the article, I have to clarify. It is without doubt that my comments above SALES 2.0 and NEW AGE SALES being IMAGINED are valid. And, as with the example given about Oprah’s Book Club, it is also just as valid that some of what is being said by these authors is also valid, meaning in some cases my comment is INVALID! Again, as stated already, this is the confusing part. If I say sales has not changed I am referring to B2B selling. Specifically the kind that you cannot sell easily online and is not searched online frequently. If you got a lead from the Yellow Pages in 1985 or your Website 2007, more often than not, the buyer in both cases has checked out the competition too, this has not changed. The difference is the 2007 prospect may know more about your organization and product than the prospect in 1985 did. The operative word in the last sentence is MAY. Not all of us spend time reading websites, many prefer to ask questions or simply find websites so vast that they cannot locate what they want easily and would rather save time by calling and asking, which also causes frustration because they get voice mail instead of help! The point is, statements about buyers being better informed should not be made as if they are all encompassing. They are not necessarily valid and, again, each case must be looked at individually. The ministers of the cloth are now talking about the effect of the Information Age not being better educated people, not at all. In general people do not sit down and read books any longer, therefore they have a lower command of language. This results in not being able to think certain thoughts and overall, we expect to see a real change in patience, specifically lack there of! “Some buyers are better informed” is valid. Inferring instead that “all buyers are better informed” is not, this is imagined and that is the way it always will be. But who cares? In the end, if you have to sit across a desk from a buyer to get a sale rather than something that can be sold online or over a telephone, what difference does it make what the prospective buyer has done in terms of research? It is still going to come down to you, the relationship you build and how well you are able to find out what they want and showing them you can provide that to them. If the buyer in this case asks the price before a visit then that is good, who wants to waste time visiting a buyer that has not the budget to acquire what you sell? However, it is my strong assertion in this article that buyers do not seek to buy when they have no budget, not if they are successful people. Because they have better things to do, namely making money. The SALES 2.0 concept has been born out of a couple of beliefs. First, that the salesman does not surprise the prospect. And this is fed by businesses where there is no prospecting to speak of, where prospects find you rather than the other way around. The writers therefore really have a skewed view of selling as a profession and usually are not able to prospect themselves, they do not get it. In a business where the industry is searched online regularly it is easy to understand how this ‘Google Society’ concept takes root in anyone’s mind. The reality is that many mundane products are just not thought about by business people. And consumer type products that are searched online at a much higher degree. In the thread I wrote a couple of nights ago and posted at salespractice.com I took some time to make the point about the lousy information that is being spread. I would recommend you read that forum thread, thus saving me time redoing some of the same ideas here in this article. Cold calling doesn't work anymore! I want to leave you with a reminder; consider the source. Please, whatever it is that you do in the future, before you allow your thoughts to be limited consider whether or not the information you are receiving is written or recorded by a true master. Odds are, if it shows you an easy way out or, put another way, a quick cure for pain, it is not well researched and written by someone who has not been there and done that. The focus on the importance of CUSTOMER SERVICE in NEW AGE SALES sometimes makes me laugh. Here we are with voice mail systems that are hard to negotiate to get a live body, is that good customer service? No, it costs businesses money. And, great customer service is far from new. The information age is new. And, it is causing shorter attention spans. Other than that the way we sold in our profession, the kind that requires a sit down meeting to do the deal, that has not changed. It is not an act of a sales dinosaur, it is the most professional method of communicating there is. I have used WEBEX hundreds of times to demo and do presentations. And, in fact, the first presentation that led to one of the largest software sales made to the auto industry in the last 5 years began with a webinar. But only after the phone call that prospected them to have a look … and I will leave you with that. I may add to this Beware the dark side thread later on, as I continue my research into NEW AGE SALES. For now I hop you can trust in me to tell you that you are never likely to be replaced by a computer or a website, no matter how much Google might wish it so! __________________ Hunger for Profit System© want to make more commissions or more profit, then you need to stop wasting time now! http://hungerforprofit.com - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Beware the dark side.

General Sales Articles