Do They Need It, Want It, And Are Willing To Get It

Like everyone here I've studied thousands of pages of print/audio/video resources to learn how to sell. In the process of the study like most people I began practicing what I was learning.

Systems systems systems abound as everyone knows and the number of sales coaches, mentors, teachers, trainers, gurus, motivators, and sellers-of-selling stuff has become a huge industry.

What I've found is people end up using one system or combination of systems that makes sales. Regardless of the system a person uses sellers find out if people need, want, and are willing to buy what they sell.

Much of the discussion her is around methodology, theory, and personal experience - the how-to-do-its that include prospecting, presenting, and closing. That's where people disagree as to the best way to sell, the most productive way to sell.

Mike -MitchM

Mike, in your opinion why is that? -Ace Coldiron

Huge market for it, Ace. Right? People are struggling to make a sale, don't feel the training they want is enough, and they are looking for help.

What am I missing, Ace?

MitchM -MitchM

There is more to selling than "Do They Need It, Want It, And Are Willing To Get It" and it doesn't take most salespeople long to find that out and start looking for answers. -Slick

You're right about that. That's exactly what I alluded to, Slick.

Mike -MitchM

I believe that's one of the biggest problems with sales people. They think that's all there is to sales. They forget about the other steps or glaze over them because they don't think there important. Then they go searching for some 'magical' technique that will help them make more sales.

When in fact it comes down to mastering the entire sales process, putting the clients needs ahead of your own and building long term relationships that will pay you year after year.

The sale begins long before the first call is ever made and if you are or ever aspire to be one of the top sales people, never ends. -Jim Klein

"I believe that's one of the biggest problems with sales people. They think that's all there is to sales. They forget about the other steps or glaze over them because they don't think there important. Then they go searching for some 'magical' technique that will help them make more sales.

When in fact it comes down to mastering the entire sales process, putting the clients needs ahead of your own and building long term relationships that will pay you year after year.

The sale begins long before the first call is ever made and if you are or ever aspire to be one of the top sales people, never ends." -- JK

Great insight! All true!

MitchM -MitchM

Ace asked Mitch why he thought the above was happening. Mitch stated demand ... in my opinion, there is another reason.

The Internet is both a solution and part of the problem. Why? Because it is almost free. The cost of starting a business is so low that people get into this business, mostly part time, and spread information that they could not afford to spread if they had to make a serious investment or had to do it full time (giving up their income).

This is the main issue I have pursued on this forum, from various angles. Explaining that not much new has been developed in understanding prospects and making other points, in order to drive home the very prominent negatives of a system of education that is free (except for the time taken to post/upload information).

Look at all the blogs, so many of them are poorly written and even those that are well written are based on opinions that are not proven and researched.

If the Internet did not exist, negative books on sales or various sales practices and NEW AGE selling, like Sales 2.0, would not get traction.

Is there a need? Yes. There are very few good sales professionals relatively speaking (as a percentage of the whole). And, and this part may suprise you, the coaching business is a low pay industry, meaning that the very best are not going to make good money coaching, not as good as they are able in sellig or group training, therefore why do it in a big way?

I love mentoring, that does not mean I want to spend much time doing it. Except of course when it comes to recruitng people to make mme money long term, as is the case in Mitch's business (MLM or Network Marekting).

As for this thread, willingness is a function of satisfaction in the prospect's mind that the product or service provides excellent value to the prospect UNLESS that prospect suffers form a condition that precludes the sale - like not enough money (this is more in the case of B2C selling), or; a significant others that does not want to spend the money (or buy that house, etc), or; a mandate to deal with one provider (Like Xerox in the old days).

I have a condition imposed on mye right now in my personal life. If I do not upgrade our kitchen, spening any mor emoney on canoe and campaing gear or diving equipment prior to the renovation, I am going to either be divorced or get my ball-y-wogs chopped of in the middle of the night. Meaning, all larger purchases are off until we complete the $35,000 investment, which is planned after Christmas.

So, if you had a meeting with me right now, had serious value to offer in my private life, unless that was in terms of a kitchen renovation, the answer is NO (at least "not now").

The quetion that deals with any unwillingness you encounter when you have made sure to deal with all concerns along the way is very revealing (and usually not delivered quite this bluntly); "Why not?"

Why not will either uncover an objection or need you had not been aware of yet, which you can deal with, or a condition that stops you from doing business. And there is only one real type of prospect where you have really no chance of having known what the concern was prior to closing - the low reactor or extremely indifferent prospects.

Having stated that, there are times where you think you have done enough to find out you have not. After all, we are not mind readers, if we are not told what they need, then we cannot (and should not) guess.

Needs have to be stated by the prospect. Even if that is only you confirming the need with a closed probe that the prospects answers affirmatively ...

I love selling, I really do. There is nothing like getting inside the head of another human being and finding out what they need. It is a rush ... adn workign through misunderstandings, so the prospect can make a decision, these things are very satifying indeed. -Gold Calling

Nice post, Steve, Tell me why you have spoken against Selling 2.0. I just picked up a copy out of curiosity. -Ace Coldiron

I would prefer not to go into a complete list of reasons as to why Sales 2.0, which is new age selling information, is not exactly acceptable to seasoned sales professionals like yourself.

I will say this;

It was begun by one of the search engines.

Now, as you well know Ace, most sales people cannot sell any where close to real producers. In fact, most really should not call themselves professionals within our great profession at all.

And, if the above is true, why would we listen to information that comes from non sales professionals about selling?

If I have been able to put up a fair argument on the phone with the executives of Huthwaite (SPIN), who have done real research into professional salesmanship, then - as you no doubt can imagine - I can poke serious wholes into their dogma.

Much of the premise of Sales 2.0 is the buyer knows more today - it is a change/adapt or die mantra. And it belies a 79 year old who still gets terrific results from doing exactly what he did 40 years ago!

I can and would go on except I wish to put most of this effort into a BLOG article. Since I have been committing a great deal
of time here, writing long posts, it would get me more benefit in a blog (I read yours by the way!).

Look at their recent posts;

(1) "As the Market Drops, Don't be a Closer"

The premise being as sales professionals that we put too much pressure on our clients when we are under pressure ourselves. As if, as a great closer and complete professional, I have not learned how to sell in hard times.

Worst advice I have possibly ever heard about selling.

(2) ...

"Calling Don Diggerman was always painful. Much as I wanted to do business with his company, I dreaded talking to him. I'd sit at my desk, staring at the phone, trying to figure out how I could avoid dealing with that man.

But it was just wishful thinking. The decision rested on Don's shoulders and unless I won him over, one of my competitors would get the order.

When I couldn't delay any longer, I'd close my eyes, take a long deep breath, and then slowly exhale."

This is a professional sales website. As an editor, if you turned in an article that started with the above three paragraphs I would laugh you out of my office or worse ("You're fired!".

Do you see what I am saying?

I don't love cold calling, even though my company is all about it. But I would not try to encourage others by talking about having to "close my eyes" then taking "a long breath" before calling one prospect!

(3) Cold Calling Academy: Shift from Gatekeeper to Concierge

This is actually positive, the only one on the whole first page at their site right now!

Someone came up with a term, after the term Web 2.0 got traction, then the thing stuck, as it was a bunch of really bog corporations behind it, like Google, and those people writing for this website sales2.com are sudenly those that we would folow into battle?

I am sorry, but the very premise is outrageous, as seen in this quote (from solutionselling.com);

"The boundaries of what is “Web 2.0″, and what is not, are fuzzy at best. Suffice it to say that there are a growing number of new Internet capabilities that change how people can interact and work together. We recognized the value of this trend, and have incorporated Web 2.0 capabilities in sales performance improvement projects, where appropriate."

"Fuzzy at best" is what this writer said.

In other words, are we not talkign mostly about advertising and direct marketing and not sales at all? And, are there not many types of services and products - not just new and unique - that people do not loook for online? Yes and yes.

Here is what they define it as .....
We think that “Sales 2.0″ applications will improve:

• How sales organizations share information, so that they can develop better situational fluency
• How salespeople use information in other sales-related systems, such as CRM
• How sales managers communicate with, supervise and coach their sales team, whether they be direct sales employees or indirect sales channel partners or a combination
• How marketing aligns with and supports the sales organization
• How finance, administration, executive management, and customer support interact with the sales team
• How sales professionals interact with customers — using collaboration to improve the quality of the sales-customer interface

Nothing to do with selling, see what I mean?

Yes, indeed, if you do not change you will die ... umm, change what?


What is it I am supposed to do? Use a web based contact manager/CRM like Salesforce.com? Run pay-per-click ads? Blog?

I have been doing all of that since I wrote the ground breaking article "How to control the Internet" in 2002 (sorry, I was not wise enough to leave it online!).

Well, usually - and I say usually - when I study sales dogma something benefitical comes out of it. It makes me think of some technique - some small thing is picked up. With this, there is no redeeming quality I am yet to find and it is mor ethan a little annoying.

If you can prove me wrong I am all ears.

From my position, Google, Yahoo and Salesforce.com all want you to pay attention. So do the modem manufacturers because it is all about consuming bandwith.


One of the companies, Genius.com, they are all about you workign better with another rep, who opens your email and who went to your website. Yah? What about my ability to generate clients? I am damn good at it, so why do I have to worry about a client opening my email???


Dougie is rollign in his grave. Hope this helps ...






-Gold Calling

Steven, that gives me further insight. Thank you. -Ace Coldiron

That was more a rant than an insight in my opinion Ace.

It is difficult to stand by and see amateurs involved in training sales people. And the bunch of writers I read at that site neither wrote particularly well nor know sales in the kind of profound way that any greater sales speaker and author should in order to gain traction.

If it was not this underlying thought that sales is bad, born through the value system of our previous generations, passed on to us, due to the fact that many are bad sales people, then the following statements would not ring true;

Sales today is different. The buyer knows more about you and your company so the old ways don't work. You have to adpat or you will suffer.

What did that actually say about salesmanship? How about nothing. And yet a whole room full of so-called sales professionals all nodded their heads in unison. But to what?

RESOLVE;

Most sales people and the average layman - even the average non-sales-type BUSINESS EXECUTIVE - do not understand our profession and therefore cannot judge what is professional behavior.

Sure, we all know about honesty and other values people need to have to be proud of themselves and have others like them. But what is the right way and what is the to be despised?

J. Douglas Edwards would say in his live sessions; "Are you good enough for this one?" That was prior to roll playing a technique.

Well, are you?

If you think that "I would not want to be like that" in regards to selling it more than likely means you have thought that the sales profession was taught to be pushy. Statements like "that doesn't work any more" are really ridiculous, as such behavior never worked well, is not professional and is displayed by those who are not properly trained, which is the overwhelming majority of our profession.


Furthermore, it was not taught by the greats, Carnegie, Nightingale, Edwards, Burke, Hopkins ... none eof them taught the way that is described as not workign any more. And these speakers/authors date back to the Twenties, Fifities, Sixties and Seventies.



In my estimation, the sales training industry has not gone forward but backwards since these men made their marks.

Each of us creates our value system, formed first by our parents, who implanted such thoughts in us. And these 'borrowed values' are from a generation that said;

“Don’t worry, if all else fails you can always become a salesman!”

Is there any wonder why our profession is frowned upon?

To directly quote Edwards again, he said; “Is there any wonder why there are so many peons in our industry?” {Note; a ‘peon’ is “a laborer with little control over their employment conditions!”}

With that I announce my retirement from this forum.

There are too many so-called sales trainers hanging out here offering services as coaches that have no right to coach. And some who do, both thinking coaching pays as well as selling. It doesn't.

Many of the forum readers here really think that selling has changed, that people have changed - rather than thinking selling is and always was the world's greatest profession, containing amongst the highest earners in history, all of whom knew how to do it right and always will.

If you are a great trainer my advice is keep your sales job and on the side start an MLM downline, then teach those people right. You will earn far more than trading time for money teaching one amateur with a sales job at a time!

If you think this is weird advice, buy Tom Hopkins CD Back to the Future in Sales (with J. Douglas Edwards), you will see it was modified to appeal to those in home based businesses. And that style of busies leverages time with little or no investment.

Leveraging, you can't beat it, so join it!

Check out http://www.mommyimissyou.com as an example of what a real pro is up to. Copy it or join me, I don't care. why? Because I am the real deal - I simply do not need this forum to have an extraordinaire life.

Sincerely,
Steven Burke

PS Hey Ace, you won't learn anything significant from Sales 2.0 accept how to pander to those who simply have the wrong impression of what we do in our amazing profession. Good luck. -Gold Calling

Steven, I implore you to reconsider. Your exit would be a serious loss to this forum. Stay and challenge the so-called experts. Challenge me. Most of all, challenge the rookies here to THINK. Your passion is more important that any premise--even yours.

I say that as one real deal to another. -Ace Coldiron

You were on a different website, didn't like what you saw and chose to no longer participate at this website? -Bulldog

No one will think any less of you Gold Calling for choosing to move on. It is not easy nor profitable to stay and uphold the values of this great profession or inspire and guide the impressionable minds of those who will become the next generation of salespeople. Rest assured that these privileges will not be abandoned by all and that the great profession of sales does not have its best days behind it. Best to you in all your endeavors! -SalesCoach

"Most sales people and the average layman - even the average non-sales-type BUSINESS EXECUTIVE - do not understand our profession and therefore cannot judge what is professional behavior." -- Gold Calling

Amen to that too, GC.

That's been one of my mantras in a subtle way - that people do not understand what is at the heart in the art of making a sale and therefore do not understand what constitutes "professional" behavior or "amateur" behavior in this arena taking the word in it's most fundamental and historically pure sense: connoisseur, devotee - rather than it's contradictory, pejorative opposite.

Your contributions always input the meeting of the minds here, GC, in important and revealing ways.

MitchM -MitchM

Yes, the sales training industry has grown tremendously. The reason it has grown is simple: people are dissatisfied with the 'sales results they are closing' and the training that they are getting from their current source (employer, industry product manufacturers, their own 'do it yourself training', etc), isn't really helping them -- long term, reach their sales goals.

So people look elsewhere, IF they are really committed to DO better; not just complain about it and say 'oh nothing will change no matter what I try'. But then they have to make an investment. Investment of time (to learn the new selling strategy), money (it doesn't come free) and genuine effort to 'change'.

Unfortunately, as a client of mine just remarked to me....she got another unsolicited book in the mail that morning, by some 'sales trainer', hawking his personal style (system of selling). Just because he wrote a book, she said, doesn't mean he has credibility.

The selling systems that have been around and are still working have lists of clients. Just like my selling strategy, we have clients that are on the Fortune 500 list to very small companies, whose owner is the 'chief,cook and bottle washer'.

I say to prospective clients all the time, if you haven't heard something from me, that gives you the belief/conviction that I can help you with your 'sales challenges' keep looking. But if you have heard something that will 'differentiate yourself from your competitors, and help your company grow profitable revenue from new sales growth' we can figure out what to do next.

The marketplace is full of prospects and solutions. The good sales trainers make a good living, because they have a 'product that will always have a marketplace' and a selling system that has proven it works. -Paulette Halpern

A rose by any other name is still a rose. ;bg -Iceman

Of course, you must do what you must do. I've barely started to get a feel for this place. I'm just starting to get an fuzzy idea on personalities and developing overall gut feelings on posters.

I've had a favorable impression of you. I was hoping I could learn a bit more from you. I hope you stay here awhile longer but I also understand life takes you where it takes you. Best wishes. -Cowman

"Most sales people and the average layman - even the average non-sales-type BUSINESS EXECUTIVE - do not understand our profession and therefore cannot judge what is professional behavior." -- Gold Calling

After reading this thread, I can't help but ask: what can I do to excel? If a majority of the training available is sub-par, what are better resources?

I'm still fresh in sales but would like to develop into a real pro. Any advice would be helpful.
-Danomyte