Was your response something like, “Gee, we started offering that service six months ago?” Then why didn’t you tell that to this customer? Here’s why: You made the common mistake of assuming that once you have sold a client on your company, the client will stay sold unless something goes seriously wrong.

“Are we a good match?” is every customer’s most important question about your company. You cannot answer it before you have uncovered, understood, and agreed upon the customer’s needs. “Sell yourself” first by demonstrating that you care about those needs. You’ll be amazed at how much more effectively you can then sell your company.

Your competitors are continuously un-selling your company. So you must continuously sell it.

The fact is that your competitors are busy trying to un-sell your company every day. They do it by advertising, by direct mail, by Internet marketing, and by direct sales in their own calls on your clients. That’s why you must make this sales strategy a rule to keep selling your company in every sales call.

Remember: Every year, in every call you make on clients or prospects, they become either more or less sold on your company.

Naturally, you won’t tell your entire “company story” each time you call on a customer who already knows you well. But here is what you should do in every call:

Describe any new products or services you offer that might conceivably interest the client now or a year from now.
Think of something new and exciting to say about your company; something that casts it in a good light. Did you have a good quarter financially? Have you made any acquisitions or acquired any new, high-profile clients? Have you hired any impressive new people?
Present this updated information about your company with the right timing and in the right manner. The right time is immediately after you have asked questions to build rapport and to uncover any new needs that may have arisen since your last visit. The right manner is simple. Just say: “Let me quickly cover some new information about (my company).”

If you don’t sell your company on every call, the competition will un-sell you. You will miss opportunities. And you may hear those awful words, “I didn’t know you did that!”

In The Field:

After attending an Action Selling sales training workshop, Karen Caligiuri of the United States Postal Service returned to work and explained one important insight to her district managers: “At USPS, we’re striving to overcome bad press and past perceptions,” she said. “So every time you visit with a customer, you should take the time to relay a positive note about USPS.”

It isn’t only your competitors who can un-sell you to customers. If your organization suffers from a negative image in the marketplace, whatever the reason, it is especially important to use your sales skills and “sell your company” on every single sales call. Otherwise, the customer’s bad impressions can only continue to fester.

Duane Sparks: founder of Action Selling. Over 300,000 are now top sellers from Action Selling Sales Training – http://www.thesalesboard.com or 1-800-232-3485.

· Prospecting Using the Internet

· Relationship Selling

· Network Selling and

· Investigative Selling. 

Prospecting Using the Internet

Cold calling is dead.  It’s not productive.  It’s demoralizing.  It’s expensive.  Prospecting in the 21st century involves setting the stage for people and companies to find you so that you can solve their problems.  Flaunting advertisements and brochures is also a waste.  Everyone goes to the Internet these days to find solutions to their problems.  Therefore, the successful sales person will have to know how to use the Internet to generate qualified leads.  Corporations should have an Internet program, but territory and product-line sales people should have their own Internet marketing program as well.  And it’s not about having a website, it’s much more.  This is the passive side of prospecting.  This means that sales and business development professionals must set up an aggressive Internet Marketing process for their territory or product so that the people they want to do business with will come to them.

Relationship Selling

The other 21st Century prospecting element is the active side of prospecting.  This is where you use professional relationships to find out about problems or opportunities where you can assist.  There are so many opportunities for a sales person or account manager to discover within their existing and old/lost accounts.  Using professional relationships make this prospecting method effective and easy.

Sales and Business Development people with professional relationships are seen as a resource to protect or enhance buyers’ careers.  These people will be open to give information and coach you for cross-sells into their business unit, associate divisions and/or other product lines.  If you develop professional relationships, these people will give you qualified leads, buy more and more from you, and refer you to others. 

Network Selling

However, one has to learn how to use these relationships to get networked to others.  There are two focuses for successful selling in the 21 Century: 

1. You must spread like a virus in your customers’ organizations.  I use the phrase – move up and out.

2. You must get to the profit-center leaders, C-level executives, and senior staff of the business units you sell into and develop professional relationships with these people to effectively close sales, cross-sell and be seen as the preferred supplier.  Hanging out with the subordinates will never secure your position with your customers.

The only way you’ll move up and out and connect with the leaders is by using your professional relationships to network you to others.  People with whom you’ve developed credibility — your Golden Network as I call it — will help you if asked.  But if they are not asked for a referral and introduction to others, they will rarely offer to connect you with the leaders and others you should be meeting.  So you must ask for their help.

To make the networking process productive, what you ask for, how you ask for it, and where you look for help will make all the difference between getting to the right people and getting to useless people for your initiative.  This process is Network Selling. 

Investigative Selling

Once a sales or business development person connects with a person of value, using his or her network connection, the goal is to convert that individual into his or her Golden Network.  In other words the sales or BD person will have to develop a professional relationship with this new contact. 

People will consider another individual a professional relationship only if there is something in it for them.  So a sales or BD person needs to investigate the critical drivers of their target contact in order to learn what this person values that s/he can deliver.  Everyone is different and without knowing each individual’s triggers, a sales person will flounder or worst yet, become annoying.  But if the sales person can make the connections between the desires and the deliverables, a relationship can be established, and then this new contact will continue networking you up and out until you are connected to the leaders and their staffs.

The process for determining one’s triggers is Investigative Selling.  It requires knowing the questions to ask and how to ask them.  Although this sounds simple, it requires finesse, skill and confidence.  Investigative Selling also requires effective listening, and the ability to expose and entice.  Both of these are advanced skills never taught in schools and rarely taught in product or sales training.  So the successful sales or business development person will have to learn these Investigative Selling skills and be able to take them seamlessly to the street.

The sooner the sales or business development person masters these Internet Marketing, Relationships, Network and Investigative Selling Skills, the sooner sales will close and closing ratios rise.

Bonus Tip: FREE E-Book “Getting Past Gatekeepers and Handling Blockers”. Just click this

C-Level Relationship Selling Link Sam Manfer makes it easy for any sales person to be effective and feel comfortable connecting with and relationship selling C-Level leaders.

In my last article, An Open Letter To : Direct Sales Consultant, Direct Selling Business Owners On How To Triple Home Party Sales we laid the foundation for improving direct selling ratios. Today we are going to focus our minds of increasing and improving home party sales ratios. This will lead to more home party sales and direct sales profit!

There are 5 ratios that will factor into your tracking:

1. Dialing/Contact Ratio : How may dials and/or contacts to do you make a week?

2. The Home Party Booking & Appointment Ratio — Of the people you do connect with or have a conversation with, how many of them book an at home party?

3. The Hosting/At Home Party Show Ratio — Of those who make the appointment to host an in home show party, how many actually showed.

4. The Closing Ratio — Of those who showed, how many of those resulted in home party sales? In other words how many people made a purchase? These sales do not have to be limited to your in home party demonstration. Did you send out catalog to your hostess to hand out to those who are unable to attend home parties?

5. Follow Up & Follow Through Ratio — How often to you follow up with those have expressed an interest but haven’t nailed a time or place? What about those that show up to a home party and don’t purchase? What about catalog sales? The are sales waiting to happen. Don’t drop the ball because you got a no or a not now.

The most powerful direct sales training tips I ever got were from a man name Jeffery Zalweski “the power of 45”.

To get on the right track you must first set some benchmarks. For example, depending on what you are selling and how frequently people buy what you’re selling, set a target amount of people to speak to per day this is what we call a benchmark!

I recommend a 10 a day regimen. Most people will tell you that sales is a numbers game and they are right about that. Problem is what numbers count? Make it about quality not quantity! Make 10 dials/per day or 10 -15 contacts/day

Then, set a benchmark for the number of people you want to make an appointment to host a home party. Finally set a bench mark for the number or amount of home party sales you would like.

Start each day by tabulating/documenting exactly what happens. That will give you a rough idea of what your ratios look like.

The Appointment Ratio – 40% (If you speak to 10 people, 4 people will book home parties)
The Show Ratio – 60% (If you make an appointment with 10 people, 6 will show/attend the in home party)
The Close Ratio 50% – (If you do a home party demo/presentation to 10 people 5 will buy).

Based on these ratios, to get 3 sales per day, you would need to contact 40 people per day. Of those 40, 12 would make an appointment, 6 would show and 3 would buy.

As you put this process in place, you will see what your true ratios are, but it’s at the very least a starting point. As time goes on, you will also begin to figure out how many calls you need to make each day to reach your estimated goals. This right here is the key to home party plan success, knowing that it takes to get you to the next level.

Here is the best news ever, with time you will notice an interesting phenomenon, that once you improve your booking ratio, you will need to speak to less people to make the same amount of money. Or you could speak to the same amount of people and make more money.

In either case, you will be in a better position to be successful in direct sales, once you start learning direct selling ratios and managing your home party business based on real time numbers and not hear-say or upline advice.

Myself, and Ann Sieg, the Renegade Network Marketer, top notch sales people and others who are successful have been using these strategies for years.

Here’s to a more profitable home party business.
Party Plan Pat

Today I would like to offer you the gift of The Little Back Book Of Home Party Marketing Secrets, This book is about increasing home party sales. You will enhance your sales performance by elevating your ability to target, connect and focus on getting these ratios.

It’s pretty simple:

Buy ONE item, get TWO more (of the same or lesser price) absolutely free.

\We’ll even pay the postage on the additional items. (in the US)

Why? I’m not going to BS you…we’ve got lots of these products sitting in our warehouse, and it doesn’t take an MBA or a financial wizard to tell me that they are not earning me any money just sitting there. They are not helping you either. So let’s make them available at a price too ridiculous to pass up.

You can get three of the same items for the price of one (yes, even packages running over $1000), or any multiple thereof (six items for the price of two)…or three different items.

If you want cases of books for all of your sales reps, the same deal applies.

Oh, I forgot to tell you the "labor" part of it: You’ll need to pick the items out of our catalog, which is in this PDF file. Then to order, you can either mail in the order form, fax it, or call us with your order (just like the old days before online ordering). So you are putting in some labor. Small price to pay.

That’s it. But why aren’t they available online, you might ask. Well, since we’re selling these things at such a ridiculously low price we weren’t going to put in the time and expense to change our online ordering system to accommodate it. But really, it is still easy for you: simply look through the catalog and order by phone, mail, or fax.

Hurry, Offer Ends September 6!
Oh, the offer does end on Labor Day, September 6. So, I encourage you to not put it off. Open up and/or download the catalog and order form, go on your shopping spree, and get your order in today. The value of acting quickly is we are anticipating a huge response and will ship orders as they arrive. So to get your materials most quickly, order now.

Continue success,

Art

P.S. Special Bonus Offer: Some of the audio seminars in the catalog are available on our website as an electronic download, which is not part of the promotion. However, as a bonus, if you\see in the catalog that your product is available as a download, we will email you the link, no charge, as an added bonus.

Questions, or to Order, Call

800-326-7721, or
(402)895-9399

View full post on Art Sobczak’s Telesales Blog

Gene Gander, Vice President of Sales for CargoWise® edi, a leading provider of integrated international supply chain logistics management systems, says that while today’s global business environment is replete with dynamic execution technologies and IT initiatives, not all shippers and freight forwarders are realizing the benefits that optimize sales and operational visibility across extended supply chains.

“With so many complex choices available, it’s not unusual for company management to be confused by the choices and uncertainty of the IT solutions that best fit their unique supply chain requirements,” says Gander. “Often this includes just making the decision whether to build an IT platform in-house or outsource the functions to an expert software solution provider. Making these decisions requires proficient leadership skills with the capacity to identify, implement, communicate and manage the objectives necessary to optimize the comprehensive IT operating platform that is put into place within an organization.”

Gander says that without a strong commitment and ongoing follow-up from executive leadership, managing supply chain operations with robust technologies can be a difficult, costly, and often frustrating undertaking. “If a company’s corporate culture does not support the commitment and budget necessary to provide optimal supply chain solutions for its customers, the successful management of IT operations as they relate to sales and operations can be mired in cross-departmental inefficiencies and confusion. Successful IT operations are driven by dynamic company leadership that understands the significant function that optimizing supply chain management and visibility plays in creating long-term sales and ROI.”

CargoWise edi says a company’s cultural alignment and cross-departmental communications capabilities, especially as they relate to today’s software technologies, play a significant role in minimizing the degree of IT risk it absorbs, as well as the impact on its expenditures and the overall maximization of the business process. Key to the companywide administration of the successful total supply chain management process is commitment, communication and departmental integration from the top down at any freight forwarding operation.

“Executive management can best ensure a successful IT-driven sales and management operation by thoroughly examining the status of its existing IT capabilities,” says Gander. “If a company does not have in-house state-of-the-art IT capabilities and optimal cross-departmental/office communications on a global basis, it probably does not have the wherewithal to provide the proper operating platform to meet customers’ supply chain requirements. In this case, the company should outsource its IT functions to an appropriate software provider to remove the risk from IT-related projects and obtain the necessary logistics solutions that drive the business. This is typically more inexpensive and effective than incurring the continual cost and ongoing in-house complexity of trying to revise an outdated legacy system.”

Due to the dynamic nature of today’s global technology, training for IT system users is also of paramount importance. A company may find that the fixed costs of building and maintaining a vibrant IT system in-house and providing training to cross-departmental users is far more costly than outsourcing it to an expert software provider that offers dedicated training programs and flexibility in responding to market dynamics rather than waiting years for a new and more expensive system to be developed internally. Outsourcing the execution software technology can often greatly expedite the supply chain process and produce better results for customers. That is a management decision, the metrics of which that should be monitored carefully for success.

“Unfortunately,” summarizes Gander, “many in positions of company leadership don’t fully understand the metrics of IT administration in a dynamic global economy and vastly underestimate the cost and commitment required for providing vibrant IT execution solutions. Whether upgrading in-house IT functions or outsourcing them, strong company leadership should analyze the true total cost of ownership of a cross-departmental IT operation. Many companies enter into the development of IT systems thinking they can do so inexpensively and enhance them later. Not so. Whatever a freight forwarders’ IT-related start-up costs are, they will increase dramatically from the initial investment as the system is enhanced with newer technologies. The real business focus for most freight forwarders is on the core competency of logistics; and all too often they produce ineffective internal operating platforms and architecture with insufficient client integration between software systems, resulting in a loss of focus, and possibly customers.

“Ultimately, the success of any supply chain process relates back to customer satisfaction and a strong commitment to providing it consistently. Companies should determine how much capital – both human and financial – they can afford to expend to maximize the company’s results and then implement a software enterprise system that provides critical management visibility of the entire freight forwarding process. Company leadership should realize that this strategic decision-making procedure deserves the kind of corporate commitment and dedication necessary to optimize both customer demand and company ROI.”

CargoWise edi provides leading transportation software and supply chain solutions for forwarders, customs brokers and logistics service providers focused on supply chain execution capability in an integrated ERP-like globally capable system. The company maintains offices in the US, Europe and Australasia.

Here are several ideas on how you can improve your sales effectiveness at gaining customer commitments.

Always Have a Commitment Objective!

Our recent research shows that nearly 80% of salespeople do not understand what their primary purpose is. Your principle mission in sales is to Gain Commitment. The confusion stems from the variety of tasks we as salespeople are asked to perform. The end result is that 62% of salespeople make sales calls where there is no attempt at Gaining Commitment. One of the most important reasons why this occurs is most salespeople do not establish what we call a Commitment Objective for every sales call. This is the number one mistake that all salespeople make. Well, it’s time to change that!

Commitment Objective: A sales strategy and goal we set for ourselves to gain agreement from the customer that moves the sales process forward.

No sales call should ever be made without a Commitment Objective. If you do not have a Commitment Objective firmly planted in your mind, you will wind up being one of those 62% that don’t ask for Commitment.

In The Field:

Newly hired salespeople at Melody Inc., a Muzak Franchise, are required to make sales calls with veteran salespeople. Toward the end of one recent call, the prospect asked the veteran if he could keep the company brochure and share it with his partner. The veteran was happy to comply and began to pack up his briefcase.

The newly hired salesperson had recently gone through Action Selling Sales Training and learned about reaching a Commitment Objective. She decided that it would make sense to capitalize on the prospect’s interest and schedule the next logical step – a proposal meeting. So she said, “As a next step I would recommend that we plan another meeting with yourself and your partner. We will prepare a proposal that documents what we have discussed and the solution we recommend. How does that sound?”

You guessed it. They scheduled a proposal meeting for a week later. During the next meeting they Gained Commitment for the business.

Duane Sparks is founder of The Sales Board, a sales training company that has trained 200,000+. Visit http://www.thesalesboard.com or 1-800-232-3485

For many sales managers, communicating one on one with their salespeople takes place either ad hoc, on the run, in the car, at sales meetings or at performance appraisal time. When you think about it, truthfully, how often do you really actually sit down, one on one, with each of your salespeople?

The twenty three words solution demands that you get together with your salespeople, no less than once every fortnight. Ideally you will get together with them WEEKLY. Then, “In detail unpack the week just gone by and in detail plan the week coming up with each one of your sales people”

The “Weekly Debrief”

This regular session becomes your “Weekly Debrief.” When distance is a hindrance, then complete the “Weekly Debrief” with your people via the telephone.

The “Weekly Debrief” is a discipline that both you and your salespeople MUST invest the time in. As the sales leader you need to make sure they happen and continue to happen indefinitely.

These one on one “Weekly Debrief” sessions will become the cornerstone of your sales leadership effort. Applied regularly, the results of this powerful weekly practice will absolutely stagger you. Apply the practice weekly for just one month and you will be sold on the benefits of doing it forever!

“But what about the weekly sales meeting?” I hear you ask.

The weekly sales meeting has become an institution with so many sales managers that many of them are reluctant to let them go. There is a place for the sales meeting…only it shouldn’t be weekly. If you are holding “Weekly Debrief” one on ones with each member of your sales team, then getting your whole sales team together for a meeting once a month is more than sufficient.

Yes, there is still a place for the sales meeting. Your sales meeting should be used to recognize

individual performance and to celebrate team performance. The sales meeting also provides a great platform for corporate communication, guest speakers, group problem solving and brainstorming. Your sales meeting can be a terrific forum for sharing “stories from the trenches”, competitor updates and industry news.

Experience has proven that the more you utilize the “Weekly Debrief” one-on-one coaching sessions, the less you will need and want to use the sales meeting.

To prove my point as to the true lack of value your current weekly sales meetings are providing, I suggest you take a really hard look at the following:

Observe the body language of the participants in your current sales meetings. Are they interested or have they switched off?
When you are debriefing an individual at that meeting, notice the rest of the group. Where are their minds? Are their lights on or off?
Ask yourself… who is the meeting really designed to benefit, you or them? If your sales team were your customers (which they are), would you keep going with your current approach?

Deconstructing the “Week Gone By!”

Meeting with each salesperson one-on-one weekly will allow you to cover off any pressing “corporate” issues first off and then get down to the business unpacking the details of the week just gone by and create detailed plans for the week coming up. Unpacking the salesperson’s week that has just gone by requires that you go through each sales activity, in depth, to understand:

what happened,
what was said,
what was the result,
what worked and…
what needs work,
what could be done next time,
what are the next steps to move the sale forward?

Having listened to what transpired you will be able to determine the following:

Skills and performance gaps
Lost or wasted opportunities
Activity gaps
Remedial actions to get the salesperson back on track

By unpacking the week just gone by in detail, you are now in the greatest position to offer relevant feedback and training using real live examples as required.

Here is a dialogue example of unpacking a sales activity taken from my book Bulletproof your Sales Team – The 5 Strategies Guaranteed to Turbo-Boost your Sales Team’s Results!

Example: un-packing the week gone by!

Sales manager: So your first meeting on Tuesday was with Bob Smith at ABC Co, how did it go?

Salesperson: Alright I guess, not as good as I was hoping for!

Sales manager: Okay, let’s review, what was the goal of the call?

Salesperson: To get the Credit Application agreement signed.

Sales manager: So what happened?

Salesperson: Well as you know I’m still waiting to get it signed. I met with Bill, but he told me that his boss had been out of town last week and for most of this week and as a result he hasn’t been able to get it signed off.

Sales manager: Just refresh my memory, why does Bill need his boss to sign the Credit App?

Salesperson: Well when I met with him last time he told me he wasn’t authorized to sign it off.

Sales manager: Other than his boss, is there anyone else in the group who could authorize the App?

Salesperson: Not that I know of!

Sales manager: Meaning?

Salesperson: I never asked him?

Sales manager: (Silent)

Salesperson: I guess I should have asked him if there was anyone else shouldn’t I?

Sales manager: Let’s just review your last discussion with Bob. Looking at my notes from last week, when I asked you what needs to be done to get the application form signed. Last week you said that Bob had been given authorization to get the job done and all we had to do was to get the paperwork completed. What, if anything, has changed?

Salesperson: Nothing. Bob still wants us to do the job. Unfortunately, according to him, his boss is the only one who can sign the paperwork.

Sales manager: What are we talking about here? Are we talking about signing the order to go ahead or just filling out the Credit Application form?

Salesperson: Both

Sales manager: I understand how come the boss needs to sign the order, but why does he need to sign the Credit Application form?

Salesperson: Cause that’s what Bob told me!

Sales manager: Well let’s just look at this a bit closer for a moment. What is a Credit Application form?

Salesperson: The Credit App. allows us to capture all the details of the customer as well as trade references. Oh, and it also spells out our trading terms.

Sales manager: Correct! Why do we need it?

Salesperson: Because if they are going to open up an account with us they need to be aware of our trading terms, but mainly we need to check that they are a good credit risk.

Sales manager: OK. Do we need an order before we will open up an account for a customer?

Salesperson: (Blank look)

Sales manager: What I mean is, can a customer apply for credit with us without necessarily ordering anything?

Salesperson: I suppose so!

Sales manager: Ok, so let me ask you another question then. On a scale of one to five how sure are you that Bob wants us to do the job?

Salesperson: I would say a four but until I have the order signed by his boss I will have to say maybe three and a half.

Sales manager: So, if the Credit App. is only an Accounts Department thing and a customer can apply for credit with us without even necessarily ordering anything, why do you need Bob’s boss to sign the Credit Application form?

Salesperson: Cause that’s what Bob told me!

Sales manager: Of course that’s what he told you. He doesn’t know how we operate. My question to you is, does Bob know he can go ahead and apply for credit in the mean time whilst we wait for his boss

to come back?

Sales manager: (Without waiting for an answer) In actual fact his Accounts Department could fill in the Credit App. As a company we only need his boss to authorize the purchase. We don’t need his signaturefor the Credit Application form. Do you get what I am saying?

Salesperson: In other words either Bob could have signed the Credit App. or he could have had me take it over to his Accounts Department to get it signed?

Sales manager: Correct! So let’s assume you had gotten Bob to authorize the Credit App, or you had gone to the Accounts Department to get it filled out, how would you rate your chances of them going ahead with the job, on a scale of one to five?

Salesperson: I would feel much more confident, probably a four and half. Maybe even a five!

Sales manager: So having said that then, what’s the where to from here with Bob?

Salesperson: Well, I will give Bob a call today and tell him that you and I have spoken and that he doesn’t need to have his boss sign the Credit App. And that in fact if we can get the App. filled out before his boss gets back, we will be able to expedite his order a whole lot quicker. This will save him in both time and money, because it’s costing them around $750 a day in excess packaging costs the way they are currently running their system.

Sales manager: Do you foresee any issues he may have with that?

Salesperson: No I am pretty sure he will go for it!

Sales manager: What if he doesn’t?

Salesperson: Then I guess maybe I have read the whole thing wrong. Maybe he is not as sold on us doing the work as he has made out.

Sales manager: Which means what?

Salesperson: Which basically means I have more selling to do

Sales manager: What are the chances of us meeting with his boss?

Salesperson: If he turns me down on the credit app, I will make a plan to get in and speak to his boss.

Sales manager: Is there anything I can do at this point to help you further with this?

Salesperson: No thanks. If I can’t get into meet with Geoff, his boss, I will ask you for some help. I really think Bob signing off on the Credit App. will bring this one home.

Sales manager: Before we move on, what exactly is the action step from here?

Salesperson: As I said, I will call Bob today and see if I can get over there on Wednesday when I am in the area to get the Credit App signed off.

Sales manager: Alright then, (Making a note on the coaching log) lets move on to S.A.F. Company, what’s happening with them?

Note: Go back and review the dialogue above and make a note of the following:

• How much “telling what to do” was there from the sales manager?

• How many questions did the sales manager?

• What was the end result of the discussion?

• How did the sales manager finish up the discussion?

As one of Australia’s leading authorities and coaches in sales management, Ian Segail has been involved in the coaching, training and development of sales managers and salespeople for over two decades. Drawing on 25 years of experience in sales, sales management and leading an HR and training team, Ian brings a strong dose of fiscal reality and practicality to his works as a Sales Performance Coach. Engaging directly with business owners and both novice and experienced sales managers alike, across a wide variety of industries and selling disciplines, the focus of Ian’s work is to transform sales results for companies by improving sales management practices. Ian is the author of “Bulletproof Your Sales Team ‐ The 5 Keys To Turbo‐Boosting Your Sales Team’s Results” and a number of business articles, business reports and white papers including “The fish stinks from the head!” and “Why Sales Training Doesn’t Work.” Ian has an insatiable hunger for studying selling and people management and has passionately pursued answers to the question “How come some people can sell and most can’t?” Ian blogs at

www.salestutor.com.au

 

By just creating yourself at a Jita station performing continial buy and sell trading of diverse items you can billions of ISK in quick time. In this article we’re going to discuss some tips and strategie that will bump up your ISK profits by trying some easy buy selling trading tips.

Buy and Sell at the Right time!

Timing is of the essense, this applies epecially to getting ISK. The trick here is to indentify busy times of trading and being able to capitilise on buy items and selling it on for a fast profit. After you master this ability you’ll be able to jump on the best deals that may make some serious ISK profits.

Know What Items to Sell!

Look for items that are popular and sell reguarly, this stuff can be sold in mass quantities and make you miilions everytime you enroll to sell. Items that sell well in enormous orders are hold expanders or implants.

Throroughly Research the Market!

Researching the markets is the best way to get more ISK profit from your purchasing and selling in Eve Online, spend some time looking at the market and trying to select the things that sell quick and the items you can still make a healthly profit on. Even on days where I don’t plan to play I continue to check the markets twice a day at least, This is to see firstly if there are any deals to grab and secondly to take a look at what is selling at what prices.

Be certain to scan the market daily for hot deals to jump in on and to see what items selling prices are? Some folks tend to neglect this method and regularly just sell anything they can muster! But if you use the some of the techniques mentioned above and master knowing when the buy and sell on at the right times then you will make some amazing ISK profits.

These are some tips on how to buy & sell on EVE for ISK, to get the edge over your mates and make billions of ISk fast you need an ISK guide that teach you step-by-step how to make tons of ISK fast!

To learn more on ways to make ISK billions visit – Eve Online ISK guide

Learn how to make more ISK on EVE http://eve-online-mining-guide.blogspot.com/

It’s almost impossible to find and recruit top sales professionals, those in the 20 percent bracket, because most employers do everything in their power to keep their top sales producers happy. Turnover rates in Pareto’s 20 percent bracket are extremely low and nonexistent for the top 20 percent of representatives in the top 20 percent. Even if you find a “top gun” who is looking for a position, many organizations really can’t afford to bring one of these high priced professionals on board.

If finding one or two top sales producers is difficult, think how hard it is to recruit an entire team of super stars. Therefore, you need to change your mindset to find candidates that have the potential to move into the top producer or rainmaker category and then train, coach and manage them until they produce at the level of the super stars in your industry or profession.

To learn how to build a successful sales team, where you no longer carry 80 percent of your team members, you need to obtain a copy of The $elling Edge®, Inc.’s 101 Sales Myths self-directed learning manual at: http://TheSellingEdge.com/myths3.htm and then teach and coach the proven selling techniques and systems outlined in its pages, to those staff members who have the potential to become a top producer. Also, use the methods in this learning guide to hire the right people and then turn them into super stars.

Where is it written that your company or professional service organization must live with Pareto’s 80/20 Principle anyway?

Virden J. Thornton Was the founder of The $elling Edge®, Inc. an international sales training and personal coaching firm, specializing in the areas of sales presentations, closing skills, prospecting (business development), and sales management techniques. For the past 26 years Virden trained, coached and advised literally thousands of employees in hundreds of client firms, including Sears Optical, Eastman Kodak, Deloitte & Touché, Smith Barney, First National Bank of Arizona, City Laundering, Co, ShopKo, Electronic Sales, Inc.and Wal«Mart, to name a few.

Today Virden continues to train sales and service industry professionals through a unique and powerful telephone/e-book coaching program. Sales Success Strategies is a field-tested and proven coaching system-that gives Virden’s clients what can only be described as a $elling Edge!

Virden is the author of over 20 books and manuals including the “best sellers” Closing; A Process, Not A Problem and 101 Sales Myths.

Virden and his wife Barbara are the parents of nine children.
 

 

Where do most Florida investors turn when they seek opportunities in buying foreclosures?  Sure, they might work with a realtor to find bank owned foreclosures. When a property is lost via foreclosure it goes back to the bank and then becomes one of the now thousands of bank owned foreclosures (or REO properties) on the market today. This side of the business is highly lucrative in today’s market.

Another option that is also very relevant to Florida is the short sales, where investors negotiate discounts on properties before they are foreclosed. This can also be highly lucrative and the key to success here is Florida foreclosure short sales training from a qualified professional. Every state is unique and so too should be your training in learning how to successfully complete short sales.

Despite the leads you can generate from foreclosure listings and the opportunities that exist with short sales, I think buying foreclosures can be risky for the investor because, without the proper foreclosure short sales training, you run the risk of not really knowing what you are doing. Profits can be lost and so too can opportunities from buying foreclosures when you lack the proper Florida specific short sale training.

In today’s market, there are indeed unlimited deals to be found within the realm of buying foreclosures. Whether you’re just curious how to make a little extra money with buying foreclosures or really want to pursue a serious business, you owe it to yourself to seize the current opportunity and pursue it.

In today’s Florida real estate market, buying foreclosures is as much as part of investing as any other part of the business. Make sure you have Florida foreclosure short sales training backing you when you invest because the deals are out there. 

Get advice from a professional about foreclosure short sales training.

In “Stop Hiring Poor-Performing Salespeople,”  Brian Jeffrey wrote about 3 specific pitfalls of hiring sales reps you should look out for, and that one way to avoid them and improve your odds of hiring a winner is to use a sales assessment tool.   I think assessment tools are a great idea.  I usually recommend to my clients that they perform personality assessments on their top-performing sales reps to use as a benchmark for potential hires.  Combining that with similarities in background, education, training, and so on gives you a better shot at finding someone who will fit in and do well on your team. 

I’d like to explore the pitfalls he mentions, and add to the discussion:

#1 – Can’t Sell

Essentially, some people talk a good game, but they can’t provide results.  Everybody likes them–you were excited about hiring them, and you like them so much you sometimes can’t bring yourself to let them go, even though they cost your company time and money.  Benchmark comparisons with your current team, like I described above, make a much better guide to hiring than how well the candidate aced the interview. 

#2 –  Wrong Sales Environment

Just because someone was good at selling in one environment, doesn’t mean he can sell successfully in a new one.  Background is important.  It is true that not everybody can sell everything, and it’s true in medical sales,too, where there’s such a difference in products and services.  Pharmaceutical sales reps often can’t switch to, say, clinical diagnostics sales, or medical device sales reps might have a hard time switching to biotechnology sales.  Not always, but often enough.  However, if the sales process is the same–maybe they both involve a long sales cycle where you have to build a relationship with your customers, or maybe it’s mostly a cold-calling situation–well then, your chances are good.

#3 – Won’t sell

These are the people who should never be in sales, but get hired by a manager desperate to fill a position.  No matter how much potential you think they have, or how much time they take for training, or how many sales meetings you call, they’ll never be good.  Brian says, “Any hiring tool that will help you identify these people before you hire them is worth exploring.”  That’s where I come in.

A medical sales recruiter with 10 years of experience placing top sales force talent into the most prominent healthcare companies in the country is the way to (legally) load your dice.  Why use a recruiter?  A good recruiter will save you and your company time and money by sending you quality candidates hand-picked to improve your sales-force effectivness and benefit your bottom line.  All of a sudden, hiring new sales reps for any area of healthcare sales becomes less of a gamble and more of a sure thing.

Click here to see what we can do for you.

Peggy McKee has been recruiting and placing top sales talent (in the medical industry) for over 10 years. Her firm, PHC Consulting, is one of the nations leading medical sales recruiting firms. Check out her blog and site to learn powerful tips that will set you apart in the job search!

http://www.phcconsulting.com/

http://www.phcconsulting.com/WordPress

All commercial relationships require specific advice. This briefing note distills the issues for structuring the commercial relationship between the direct marketing agency and the brand promoted.

Direct Marketing Agency

The key issues to address are:

for the cost plus model: agree mark up on cost of sales.

Include TUPE costs.

The direct marketing agency should specify the size of the team with right to vary to avoid drain on resources if customer response to client marketing campaign is poor.

Agree which data fields are compulsory in order to get paid. Certainty is crucial as with any claim for payment. If a fulfillment process is required to convert the data once collected, take it in house or otherwise ensure direct marketing agency controls the conversion process.

Payment on delivery of customer data – not on conversion. If not agreed, obtain the customer data turnaround obligation or final payment date from the client.

If payment on delivery of data is not agreed, agree liability for agency fraud or misrepresentation, exclude liability for “gone aways” or other holes in data where that data was provided by the client (as opposed to the customer), distance selling drop outs, customer transfer process issues outside agency control (particularly utilities and financial services clients), failure to convert as a result of any act or omission of the client.

Do not pay staff until direct marketing agency itself has been paid, or agree overdraft charges with client as part of amortised set up cost.

Amortise set up cost, factor in RPI. Take security.

Use technology to support the sign up process. For instance, use customer credit card to populate database fields in the sign up form. This will reduce risk of fraud and lowers customer identification validation costs. Use payer /payee banks that permit paperless direct debit sign ups. Research fully the business process of the client to find out the extent to which paperless customer transfer can be used.

Warranties from client regarding data, where supplied by client.

Client bears suppression and validation costs.

Client service level agreement on a frequency with which and volume of data is supplied.

Exclude liability for poor redemption rates, cost per contact, market place effectiveness of campaigns.

Only agree those service level agreement provisions that you know you can comply with.

Client

Issues for the client to consider are:

Client control conversion process.

Payment when customer comes online.

Reserve right of set off.

Exclude liability for data supplied.

Payment By Results only (PBR). Open book on costs.

All TUPE or other set up costs solely for the account of the DM agency.

Client reserves right to vary size of team.

Reserve right to reject incomplete applications.

Data clean up costs borne by DM Agency.

Reserve right to terminate for bringing brand into disrepute.

Reserve right to mystery shop and audit performance of direct marketing agency.

Conclusion

“You get what you pay for” applies in direct marketing as with any other industry. Increased fraud, incomplete applications, erroneous brand uptake indicators, poorly trained or unmotivated staff, and brand degeneration can all be consequences of PBR. Similarly, the brand can find itself having paid out so much to keep the direct marketing agency engaged that an unfeasibly high conversion rate is required to justify the marketing spend. Provided both parties are willing to work together, a working commercial relationship is possible.

http://www.kaltons.co.uk

Kaltons Solicitors

Discover how to protect and capitalize on your most important investment.

It is common knowledge your Melkbosstrand, Big Bay or Atlantic Beach Real Estate may perhaps be your biggest asset, so selling it is without a doubt one of the most critical decisions you will make in your life.

To better appreciate the home selling process, we have prepared a video guide, insider information gleaned from current industry experts. As a result of these 10 tips, you will discover how to guard and take advantage of your most important investment, reduce stress, be in control of your situation, and make the most profit possible.

Tip #2: Remember to Keep the Reasons Why You are Selling Your Property to Yourself

You do not want to give ammunition to a prospective buyer, knowing that you need to sell your house quickly.

There is no reason for anyone to know why you are selling your property.

If you are asked, just say that your housing needs have changed.

Tip #3: Before Setting a Price, Do Your Homework

Remember, when you set a price, that indicates to a buyer the absolute maximum that he will pay for your Big Bay, Atlantic Beach or Melkbosstrand property.

If you set your price too high, you run the risk of letting your home sit on the market and take too long to sell and it runs the risk of becoming stale.

If your price is too low, you might not achieve the true value of your home.

So, choose a good estate agent that knows the area to advise you on the correct selling price of your property.

Tip #4: Deciding on an Estate Agent

All estate agents are not the same.

So when choosing an estate agent, choose somebody that knows the Melkbosstrand, Atlantic Beach and Big Bay areas, has a track record on the areas and can supply you with all the relevant information you deserve.

That means he needs to give you information on past property sales and their prices, as well as the current properties that are on the market.

He should be able to give you a comprehensive marketing plan and, preferably, try to get some referrals on the estate agent as well. Then you will know if you are in good hands or not.

For further information, please contact Clive on 083 410 7898 or Anna on 083 406 8001.

Clive and Anna Broekhuizen are property experts in the Atlantic Beach area where they live and work. they have years of experience in real estate and have a wealth of good information and results to share…

Reaching an agreement or “clinching the deal”, tying up all the loose ends, and getting to a yes decision is a critical selling capability in the sales process. As a salesperson, even getting a “No” decision is preferable to holding onto a “China egg” (an egg that will never hatch!). However, there is more to “Wrapping Up the Sale” than meets the eye.

The 6 Key Elements of Wrapping up the Sale

Assuming you have laid a firm foundation to the sale by qualifying your prospect, effectively discovering and helping the customer to self-discover their needs, and clearly demonstrating how your product/service meets the needs of all parties concerned with the decision, then there are 6 key elements involved in “Wrapping Up the Sale”. These include:

1. Resolving concerns

2. Negotiating

3. Reaching an agreement

4. Implementation Plan

5. Follow up

6. Repeat business & referral strategy

Resolving Concerns

Prospects and customers present concerns and objections when they don’t understand or agree with the claims you are making about your products and services. Many salespeople disengage from selling at this point and concede the victory to the prospect. Top salespeople, on the other hand, consider concerns and objections raised by the customer merely as a roadblock and an opportunity to question the prospect further and gather more data about their issue, with a view to further educating them on how they can help to solve their problem or dilemma.

Some concerns and objections may simply be intended to disarm you. However, if you panic in response to a concern that is a sincere obstacle, you may lose the prospect’s confidence. The key is to:

First, concentrate on identifying the foundation of the prospect’s or customer’s concern. Is it a fear of buying something new? A pricing issue? A lack of technical knowledge? A lack of credibility or capability?

Second, because many customer concerns and objections are either covert or unspoken, or based on unclear requirements, further probing can reveal what you need to learn to satisfy their needs and wants. Objections are simply data requests – neither good, nor bad!

Third, when you allow the prospect to express the negative and unfavourable aspects of your offer, it brings the issues out into the open and allows you the opportunity understand the customer’s uncertainty and provide the pertinent information to resolve it.

To help resolve issues, a great strategy is to include the customer in the solution process, as they’re likely to prefer a solution in which they were involved. When you stop trying to overcome objections and instead work and partner with your prospect as a consultant or coach, you will be far more effective (and less fearful).

Negotiating

How you handle your selling negotiations will determine two key things:

Whether you bring home the sale and
At what margin you bring home the sale

Many salespeople mistakenly believe that negotiating is something you do at or near the end of the sale. Being an effective sales negotiator begins with your first contact with your customer or prospect. Your prospect is evaluating you; your company and the value of your product/service, right from the moment you make first make contact. Your goal is to be able to clearly demonstrate the value your solution will provide and negotiate a profitable agreement with the customer. There are a number of factors from your customer’s perspective that have an influence on the outcome of your sales negotiation:

What is the extent of your customer’s problem or pain?
How much do they want your solution?
How do they perceive the value of your expertise?
How specialised or unique is your solution?
How urgent is their need?
How much would they be willing to pay to solve their problem?
How much do they perceive your solution as merely a commodity with you as just another vendor?
How large is their risk quotient?
How much do they like you and/or your company?
What is their timing need?
How much do they need to WIN?
Can they approve the sale?

When you consider the above points, you see that your role as a negotiator proceeds all the way through the sales process. Your role is to constantly probe and seek out information that may be invaluable later should issues like price, terms, quality, delivery, etc. have to be negotiated. Don’t wait until you’re in the last round to begin negotiating! Remember that as a sales negotiator it is very important for both you and the customer to come away feeling positive about the experience. At the end of the day, the chances are very good that you will want, or need, to do business together in the future.

Reaching an Agreement

Assuming you have laid the groundwork correctly by uncovering and answering the prospect’s needs and concerns during the diagnosis and capability presentation phase of the sales process, then “closing the sale” becomes a mere formality as opposed to an overworked and stressful affair for both buyer and seller. If you are struggling to close sales, you will need to examine your current methods for discovering your customer’s needs and requirements and the way you demonstrate the value of your product or service.

Before you attempt to “close” the sale ask yourself “Do I know…”

The problems the customer wishes to solve
The objectives/goals the customer wishes to achieve
Company issues that will be impacted by the decision
Personal issues that will be impacted by the decision
Financial issues – What funding is available to solve these issues? What or who else is being considered?
Time frames
Buying influences – Who makes and impacts on the decision?
Decision Criteria – How are decisions made? What are the Next Steps? and
Have I clearly demonstrated my and my company’s capability to meet the needs and specifications of the customer?

Implementation Plan – Sell back from the date they need it

When salespeople and their managers get together and discuss where the “sale is at” within the sales cycle, they tend to focus on what the next steps are to bring the sale to a conclusion. Their focus is on the “close date”. However, to the customer, what is most important is the implementation or use date. It is vitally important that you work with end users and buyers in a collaborative effort to identify and work towards their implementation date. In other words, find out when your customer needs the product or service you are selling and then work back from that date to make a case for why closing now is important.

“Salespeople sell forward – but buyers buy backward” Skip Miller

The professional salesperson:

Works with the customer’s buying schedule, which begins from the implementation date.
Identifies the activities and actions the customer must accomplish prior to the implementation date.
Gains agreement from the customer on the actions they must accomplish prior to the implementation date.
Sets their selling plans, scheduling them to align with the steps in the customer’s timeline, working backwards from the date of implementation.
Uses the implementation date as a means of accessing senior managers and users (to clearly understand their implementation and other core issues).
Selling to the customer’s implementation date allows you to accurately set your sales milestones and forecasts. It is also a great tool for bringing your proposals to life because it will include implementation considerations when many organisations only consider implementation after the purchase

Follow Up

Much of your success in selling can be attributed to what you do after you’ve made the sales call or the sale. Constant and persistent follow up is the key.

We work and live at a very hectic pace and the prospect or customer who hasn’t called you back might well be interested in your product/service, but they just haven’t gotten back to you yet. There is a great quote from Patricia Fripp, which says, “It is not your customer’s responsibility to remember you, but your responsibility to ensure they never forget you.”

The frequency and amount of follow up required is very dependent on the complexity of what you sell and the lifetime value of a customer in your industry. Research demonstrates that most potential customers or prospects won’t buy the first time they meet with you. On average, they have to encounter a marketing or sales message on at least 5-7 occasions before making a purchasing decision. This makes follow-up an essential ingredient in the selling process.

Mark Victor Hansen said, “Don’t think it, ink it”. When you rely on your memory you are very likely to forget. Imagine for a minute that your brain was like a PC. What happens if you open too many windows on your PC? Eventually the system gets clogged and clunky and in some cases will just freeze! Something as critical to your sales success as follow up, should not be left to your memory; it simply doesn’t work. The best and most effective sales and business people have developed their own follow up system to ensure that nothing falls through the cracks.

Follow-up isn’t just about selling; it’s about developing relationships.

Efficient follow-up demonstrates that both you and your company have your acts together and really care about ensuring customer satisfaction. However, a large percentage of salespeople don’t conduct sales follow-up. Afraid of what they might hear, they avoid the follow-up, often blaming their busy schedules for not getting to it.

During follow-up, it’s important to ask open-ended questions and then listen. Asking open-ended questions gives you an opportunity to gather more information from the prospect to pinpoint his or her needs accurately. Ask questions that begin with; who, what, when or how many. Ask something that will engage the prospect and get them talking. Ask “How did you feel about what was included?” as opposed to “Did you get my proposal?” Or “Did it all make sense?”

Your follow-up should convey:

I am still interested in you and your current concerns and opportunities.
I have something specific and valuable to contribute that would benefit you and or your company.
I look forward to hearing from you soon.

A consistent, well-executed follow-up system that keeps past clients and customers close is the most effective method of ensuring a steady flow of referrals and repeat business. Whatever follow-up system you adopt, make sure it’s easy to use or implement. All too often, when the system becomes too complicated or unwieldy it gets sidelined and placed in the “too hard” basket. A good follow-up system is essential for building a healthy pipeline. Take the onus off yourself as far as trying to remember things and build a system to do it. If your company already has an effective CRM system, use it. If not, develop your own. It is up to you as a responsible salesperson to drive the sales process; therefore, you must drive your own follow-up system.

Repeat Business and Referral Strategy

Today the best salespeople, selling to both Business-to-Business and individuals, are constantly looking to increase their focus and effort on attracting repeat and referral business. Most astute business people understand that customer loyalty is the most vital aspect of their business because their organisations will live or die from repeat business. No company can exist without customer loyalty and retention.

Customer retention is well known to be much cheaper than customer acquisition. As a result, top salespeople place a big focus on their customer retention and customer relationship management strategies. They constantly look at improving the share of business coming from their existing customer base.

Information technology helps both companies and their salespeople to achieve customer loyalty by providing tools for analysing customer data. This assists with making informed decisions, as well as managing the customer relationships from the sales process all the way through to fulfilment and ongoing follow-up support.

A customer’s repeat business is earned by the salesperson that continually provides their customers with what they want. Without effective strategies or processes for consistently offering customers more of what they want, repeat business is earned less frequently. When you communicate news and offers frequently to both past and present customers via telephone, mail or email, it generally increases the frequency of repurchase and is a powerful step salespeople must take to grow their business.

Effective referral strategies

Referral marketing is a vital part of your sales strategy that you cannot afford to do without. Every salesperson knows that one of the most effective ways to grow their business is through referrals, yet most salespeople do not have a means of generating an ongoing source of referrals.

Referrals work because they come from a trusted source that has already benefited from your product/service and yet has no vested interest in your business. The recommendation is independent and unsolicited. In sales terms this means a rapid conversion rate. The sales process is rapidly accelerated because the service or product has already been tried and tested by a reputable third party.

As a salesperson asking for, and getting, referrals is a powerful and low-cost way of building or developing your career. It is a simple approach, which feeds on its own success, but has to be built on secure foundations. Most salespeople don’t get enough referrals because of one obstacle – they don’t ask for them! An effective referral generation program will take care of this problem by creating a system that generates a steady stream of referrals from your network.

Referral marketing is simple: if you provide excellent products or services that people need, they tell others of their experience. Those others will trust you and want to do business with you because of the recommendation of the original, satisfied customer.

As one of Australia’s leading authorities and coaches in sales management, Ian Segail has been involved in the coaching, training and development of sales managers and salespeople for over two decades. Drawing on 25 years of experience in sales, sales management and leading an HR and training team, Ian brings a strong dose of fiscal reality and practicality to his works as a Sales Performance Coach. Engaging directly with business owners and both novice and experienced sales managers alike, across a wide variety of industries and selling disciplines, the focus of Ian’s work is to transform sales results for companies by improving sales management practices. Ian is the author of “Bulletproof Your Sales Team ‐ The 5 Keys To Turbo‐Boosting Your Sales Team’s Results” and a number of business articles, business reports and white papers including “The fish stinks from the head!” and “Why Sales Training Doesn’t Work.” Ian has an insatiable hunger for studying selling and people management and has passionately pursued answers to the question “How come some people can sell and most can’t?” Ian blogs about sales team coaching and performance management at

www.salestutor.com.au

 

You see up until recently there has never been much regulation on mortgage sales techniques, and this has led to some pretty unethical dealings with new and existing agents. Some of which have been pretty scary and indecent to say the least.

Only recently, the mortgage industry has begun to be cleaned up by governing bodies where mortgage companies can join, to show they are indeed ethical and don’t use any sort of shady tactics to pressure prospects into a sale they otherwise wouldn’t have made.

And this is rather sad, because there is a mortgage sales training programs out there, that is actually based on being your authentic self, the truth and low-pressure conversation.

What this actually does is allow the mortgage agent to connect with their client in a very useful way. A way that will more than likely ensure a long term working relationship with their clients becuase they “trust” their existing mortgage broker. And as it’s been stated in the past, people buy from people they like and trust.

Because I’ve been a sales coach for 3 years in this area, I’ve observed how mortgage sales agents have turned their lead generation around by using this certain programs and using live one-on-one coaching.

The flaws that are inherent in the existing mortgage sales training approach in many industries don’t have to exist for salespeople. But it’s becuase of the study of some old school sales tactics which are very destructive for any sales process.

And now there is a way for salespeople to learn these new techniques and mindset. Some online sources you can even enter your sales challenge and have a live coach discuss that with you on the phone, and that’s unheard of in this industry because most sales programs just want you to buy.

But should you discover an integrity based program, and one where they really do care about your success, and it shows right from the very first time you visit their site.

All I can say is, have a look at integrity based programs and “dare” to be different and sway away from some of the rubbish that the industry is currently teaching to new starters.

It’s not the techniques or tactics that will build rapport with your propects, it’s the way you think and live your life on a trust level that really allows you to be yourself and connect your personality back into the sales process. I’m sure you’ll love it once you finally understand it!

Adam Price is a professional sales training coach, internet marketing strategist and author around selling and business networking. Learn how tap into the powerful world of connecting, selling and gaining trust online by visiting: http://www.Law-Of-Attraction-And-Success.com/SalesSuccess.html

Assistance.Net is a comprehensive management system with high flexibility which allows its use in different companies of various types and all sizes.
Its main features are in fact:

Functional completeness: it represents a useful analytical tool will give you the ability to monitor constantly the economic performance of your company;
Easy to use: there’s  in particular a really user-friendly graphical interface;
Online Usability: you can have the best data quality and you can save time and money, but you can also take advantage of Assistance.Web for  calls and technical assistance management.

The software has 15 useful and specialized modules, giving you the assurance of working with a truly innovative tool which to coordinate all parts of your business with.

You’ll have several management options: you can coordinate the management of contracts from simple data entry definition (such as start date and expiry date) until the creation of billing plans for general or single item, but you can also organize management and copies of counters, hour, prepaid package, integrated billing and many other aspects to carry out technical assistance and post-sale, all in one software!

The functionality and efficiency of the system Assistance.Net are truly innovative in the universe of management software: discover the secrets and curiosities of this module on the new website www.assistancenet.it!

SIT is a software company specializing in the creation and customization of software programs, Web and traditional: indeed we evaluate every need your company to provide solutions designed specifically to make your business highly competitive and efficient.

But the question is: Just where do you start?

Your first instinct, is of course to try searching locally. And there’s nothing wrong with that. By all means look around for a mastiff in your own area.But don’t let the fact that a breeder is closer to you be the deciding factor in adopting your new friend. believe me a little traveling to get a good dog is well worthwhile.

I would go along to some of the dog shows, before you even look in the local paper. Those that are showing dogs may know of good breeders or indeed be breeders themselves. Take the time to chat. These “dog folk” will be only to happy to usher you in the right direction of a quality breeder, whilst chewing the fat about the “mastiff”.

Why would they be so helpful? Well,to start with, they are dog lovers and without a doubt mastiffs in particular, also they show their mastiff and as a result would not want to see a substandard breeder perpetuating inferior dogs. You can count on these guys to be pretty up front about who and what is good or bad in the world of breeding. As you natter with these people, you’ll for sure acquire several business cards of different breeders. Make sure you follow up on these leads. Telephone them. talk with them for a while. This casual chat does not commit you to even viewing a litter.

What should you be getting from this conversation? You’re aquiring a feel for the breeder’s “dog ethics” together with their commitment to the mastiff as a breed. Don’t worry that you may not be exactly clear what answers you’re looking for or even what questions you need to ask. At this point you will have to trust your intuition, and in most of us this is better than we realise.

If the breeder is too worried about the monetary value of the dog, it’s possible his/her love and commiment to the breed is not as it should be. But if there’s no way you can stop the breeder from boasting about the bloodline, or how “adorable” or clever or “picture perfect” his puppies are . . . well, you could well have hit upon a good-quality breeder. ypu will also have a feeling for his reputation, by the way in which he calms your worries or doubts about your new venture.

Make as many telephone calls as is necessary. This is not a decision to be made casually. When you finally locate a breeder that you’re comfortable with, who either has a litter available or whose dog is expecting, make an appointment with him. But be prepared for them to ask you at least as many questions as you plan to ask them, this may seem a bit intimidating, but take my word for it, this is a good sign- it means they love and care for the dogs they breed.

Here though are a few tips in the way you may want to steer the conversation. Of course you’ll want to ask how long he’s been a breeder. Ask why he owns them. Are his mastiffs show dogs or house pets? Also don’t shy away from asking if there are any health issues that might be associated with the breed. All breeds have some distinguishing health concerns, it goes with the territory but you should know beforehand what they are.. Ask the breeder what the mastiff’s most important single characteristic is. This question alone gives you a good bit of insight into his reputation and his thinking.

As you whittle down your maybe’s. don’t leave yourself only one option. Make a list of several based on your initial preferences. It’s possible you may have to wait for other potential owners to make their adoption selections . After all, it’s a first-come, first-serve in the world of dog breeding. Once you’ve found the breeder and the “mother dog” that you are happy with, you will probably be put on a waiting list for the pups. Although this can be a little irritating, you should view this as a good thing, it’s a great signal that you’ve chosen a good breeder. If you think that the wait involved is to much and only you can decide that you can always decide to adopt from your second choice of mastiff breeders

At last, you get that call you’ve been waiting for. The babies are ready for viewing. By the time you get a chance to view your potential new baby, he’ll probably be eight to ten weeks old. At this age, the pups will easily display their various personalities. You’ll also be able to see how these little guys (relatively speaking) interact with you and your family.

Oh, yes, by all means take the entire family to this viewing session. It’s without a doubt essential right from the very start that each member of your family has a chance to participate in this decision.

The pup you eventually choose reflects, by the way, why precisely you want a mastiff to start with. If you plan to show the dog at events or maybe plan on breeding yourself, then you need a dog that meets all the phsyical requirements of the breed.

On the other hand, if it’s a loyal family pet that you’re looking for, then its not as important that the dog meets all the physical conditions of the breed. You are just looking for the most lovable pup in the litter.

Ok, you’ve chosen your dog, the only things left to do now are make the final arrangements on price, and take him home. Be aware that depending on your pup’s age, you may not be able to take him home on that visit. No, don’t be too disappointed. After all, you’ve waited this long, haven’t you? Besides, the delay gives you time to get the house prepared for him.

Oh, by the way have a fantastic time with your new “baby”!

Do you know how to find the best Mastiff Puppies for Sale. you should grab our extensive ten part must have course, filled to the brim with mastiff tips and secrets, go to www.mastiffmaster.net

Greatly increase profits Lower food costs Streamline staff scheduling Improve customer managing and table serving Improve reservations system Control inventory Design menus

Cost out your recipes

Accurate recipe costing can put you on the fast track to success. With the right figures, you can easily identify your most profitable menu items as well as items that aren’t performing well. A right POS software program eliminates human error in this vital area.

Proper table and reservations management

A restaurant reservation software can help reduce no-shows, take reservations from your website, cancelled reservations, differentiate VIPs from regulars, take customer information and more. It can also help you maximize table management and improve your guest management.

Managing inventory

In order to minimize waste and to avoid running out of necessary ingredients, restaurant owners need need to have full control over his inventory management and keeping track of goods.

I recommend:

The best contacts and resources to help you make the right choice for your restaurant point of sale (POS) systems are available at POS-For-Restaurants

Proper ordering and purchsing of goods

Look for software that streamlines the ordering and purchasing process so you can concentrate on revenue-generating activities.

I recommend:

The best contacts and resources to help you make the right choice for your restaurant Point of Sale software are available at POS-For-Restaurants

Designing menus

If you frequently change menus or you simply don’t want the costly expense of hiring a graphic designer, use software that helps you create designer-quality menus.
Staff scheduling

Every retail establishment owner knows that staff scheduling can be a real headache. When performed manually, the task is time-consuming and often results in mistakes, such as understaffing or overstaffing.

I recommend:

The best contacts and resources to help you make the right choice for your restaurant point of sale system are available at POS-For-Restaurants

A few helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

When operating on more than one restaurant, it’s alway a wise decision to test-drive your software first on one before implementing it to all. Learn and grow your knowledge using your restaurant POS software programs! These software programs have powerful reporting features which you can review and learn your sales, customers and menus. By this, you can easily plan for changes that will surely help increase profits.

With over 20 years of experience in restaurant point of sale the author of this article is the Customer Relations Vice-President at POS-for-Restaurants.com — helping you use your Restaurant POS technology to be more more efficient and more profitable.

Discover how to protect and capitalize on your most important investment.

It is common knowledge that your Atlantic Beach Real Estate may perhaps be your biggest asset, so selling it is without a doubt one of the most critical decisions you will make in your life.

To better appreciate the home selling process, we have prepared a video guide, insider information gleaned from current industry experts. As a result of these 10 tips, you will discover how to guard and take advantage of your most important investment, reduce stress, be in control of your situation, and make the most profit possible.

Tip no.1 Understand Why You Are Selling Your Home

Your motivation for selling can be the determining factor as to how you will approach the process.

It affects everything from what you set your asking price at, to how much time, money and effort you are willing to invest in order prepare your home for sale, this is a vital factor and we will discus it in more detail later.

For example, if your goal is a quick sale, this would determine one approach.

But if you were to want to maximize your profits, then the sales process might take longer thus requiring a different approach.

Tip #2: Remember to Keep the Reasons Why You are Selling Your Property to Yourself

You do not want to give ammunition to a prospective buyer, knowing that you need to sell your Atlantic Beach, Melkbosstrand or Big Bay house quickly.

There is no reason for anyone to know why you are selling your property.
If you are asked, just say that your housing needs have changed.

Tip #3: Before Setting a Price, Do Your Homework

Remember, when setting a price, that indicates to a buyer the absolute maximum that he will pay for properties.

If you set your price too high, you run the risk of letting your home sit on the market and take too long to sell and it runs the risk of becoming stale.

If your price is too low, you might not achieve the true value of your home.
So, choose a good estate agent that knows the area to advise you on the correct selling price of your property.

For further information, please contact Clive on 083 410 7898 or Anna on 083 406 8001.

Clive and Anna Broekhuizen are property experts in the Atlantic Beach area where they live and work. they have years of experience in real estate and have a wealth of good information and results to share…

How can you close a transaction with a dissatisfied customer? Dissatisfied customers can result from:

the way the customer felt they were treated during the sales process that you’ve learned as a result of your insurance sales training,
the customer feeling misunderstood,
and/or from the way you handled the transaction itself.

Dissatisfied customers aren’t happy with their experience, they tend to complain about everything, it’s unlikely they will ever do repeat business with you, they won’t ever refer anyone to you no matter how much pressure you try to exert, and they will replace you at their earliest convenience.

Hooray, you have a satisfied customer. Wrong, a satisfied customer is just as happy to do business with anyone else as they are to do business with you. A satisfied customer will do business with the person who is more convenient or has the lowest price. A satisfied customer won’t give you qualified referrals and will be reluctant to refer you to anyone.

The gold ring you are after is the loyal customer. Insurance sales training that helps you to obtain loyal customers provides a system for both current and future success. Here’s why loyal customers are so critical to your future success. A loyal customer will gladly do repeat business with you, they almost never complain and are quick to sing your praises, they will refer highly qualified prospects to you voluntarily and will have them call you, and they will tell others about you. You have to earn loyal customers, but they are definitely worth the effort.

Bottom line there are 3 ways a customer can exit your sales funnel and only one really benefits you. You want every customer to exit your sales funnel as a loyal customer. You may think that’s a really hard thing to do, but it isn’t. You should be learning through your insurance sales training that the best way to gain loyal customers is through understanding and giving the customer exactly what they want exactly the way they want it.

Would you like to learn more about your sales skills? Try this Sales Skills Analysis and find out where your opportunities for improvement are.

Do you have $1 to invest in your future? Give Coaching a Try.

Management of Price Fluctuation
Prices of some of the products keep on fluctuating on daily basis and thus, it might become difficult to manually manage them. A point of sale software can be used in this situation, as the manager will be only required to feed the new prices and all other adjustments are made by the software.

For instance, hotel POS Software can be used to manage the prices of various ingredients in the recipes offered by the menu card. At the time of billing, the manager doesn’t have to check the records to make calculations on the basis of prices per ingredient. Once the prices are fed to the software, accurate and fast billing can be achieved to reduce the operation time.

Expensive but Useful in Long Run
Most of the small businesses find these software systems to be expensive initially. However, as they start recognizing the long-term benefits of these tools, it sounds a practical decision to purchase them. Here are some of the benefits offered by POS tools:

Accurate results based upon scanning of individual prices. Inventory management is made easy with these tools. Evaluation of sale pattern can be easily done with the outputs provided by these software programs. Off-site access is possible with web-based POS systems. Finally, the business can enjoy improved sale as well as enhanced customer service with the help of these tools.

The article is contributed by a professional content writer, having experiences of working in different industries. For further information on POS Software, Point Of Sale Software and Restaurant point of sale software to improve your sales, please visit www.anandsystems.com

They were paid 30% commission on our bookings, and also charged the visitors a lump sum on top for a booking fee. They did not know anything about us, or our property, just what we told them.

The visitors got a raw deal – sometimes they had not even been put in touch with us so we could not tell them what they wanted to know.

We sacked the agency within three months and then took it over ouselves. Since then we have sold over forty weeks a year.

If you are trying to find a self catering, vacation rental property on the web it can be confusing.

When you enter a search term such as Vacation rental Self Catering France, you’ll get a mass of Directories of properties covering the whole of Europe and and they will crowd out the first pages. You’ll have to go to page 6 or more to begin to find owners properties.

One kind of Directory is an agency, and it is difficult to tell which one. These are the warning signs.

Be careful when the agency takes the booking on line, that’s the first clue. Next there will be no access allowed to the owners website. After that there will be no owners telephone number, nor address.

You’ll be paying absolutely top prices if you use the agencies and most owners will charge you less if you can find their own sites. Sometimes a lot less and the relationship will be very much warmer.

Yet not all directories are agencies. The other kind of directories are fine to use, ones where they put you through to the owner direct. No problem there, and they also have more properties on their books.

Don’t use an agency. The only exception to this, might be the local Tourist Board site. Their sites will be over every search term you can think of. They carpet bomb the web with their sites.

Usually they are an agency but very expensive for owners to use. While their commission rates are only 10% or so, quite affordable, they make heavy fixed charges for inspections. These also are controversial in that they usually only measure physical features, such as the amount of wool content in the carpets (I kid you not) and not the view or the location or the warmth of reception. Their sales people on the telephone do not know the properties themselves, they are separate from the inspectors.

But they are the people giving the official grades, of one star to five star. Owners with these grades then use them to get up their prices in line with other graded properties. Here is a typical directory which allows you access to owners web sites and addresses.

Properties in Scotland for late bookings

So take care when using an agency to find your vacation rental property.

John Winkler and his wife own a holiday cottage near Glencoe in Scotland.

You try to set appointments with the wrong people.
You use a presentation during the appointment.
You are too eager to make the sale.
You talk about products and features.
You don’t know how to ask for referrals in a way that helps people to give them to you.
You think you can sell to everyone.
You don’t build relationships.
There isn’t anything about you that makes people specifically want to contact you.
You seek to persuade rather than to understand.
You’re thinking about you and your needs rather than the customer and their needs.

Your insurance sales training places you on the offensive and your customer on the defensive. With this positioning a win-win isn’t possible, but you can change that. You need to position yourself as the expert partnering with them to find the solution to the problem or challenge they don’t want to live with anymore.

The best insurance sales training will help you to position yourself as a trusted advisor. A trusted advisor is someone your customers know, like, and trust to help them make decisions resulting in the best outcome for them. When you’re focused on selling a product so you can get a paycheck you can’t possibly be acting as your customer’s trusted advisor, and they can sense that without anyone ever having to tell them.

The best insurance sales training will help you to see that it’s to your benefit to seek first to understand than it is to persuade. Persuasion backfires on you because no one likes to be talked into or sold anything, but everyone loves to be understood. When your customers believe that you understand them and their needs they will trust your advice, they will do repeat business with you, and they will refer people just like them to you.

Would you like to learn more about your sales skills? Try this Sales Skills Analysis and find out where your opportunities for improvement are.

Do you have $1 to invest in your future? Give Coaching a Try.

Obviously if you’re trying to sell a car online at eBay Motors you’re probably looking for the best possible price. Here are a few tips that you can use to get the best price when selling your car online. First and foremost, you must clean and fully detail your car so that it appears as close to perfect as possible depending on its overall condition and you should never try to conceal any minor flaws. When people are depending on pictures to buy a car they don’t want to guess what’s under the dirt or try to figure out how bad a flaw really is. Being brutally honest might net you a little less but it will prevent any headaches later on in the dealing process.

Never try and skimp on your auction description and pictures. As mentioned earlier, people are buying a car and potentially spending a bunch of cash so if they see anything they don’t like they will pass your auction or listing in a heartbeat. It is much better to take as many pictures as possible, a good rule of thumb is to provide as many pictures as you would like to see if you were the buyer. Also post them up as a slideshow or a collage and cover all the angles, don’t put up one picture and say email me for more, many people will not go through the trouble of requesting more photos for any mainstream model car.

I recommend that you take pictures of the following angles to help the potential car buyer understand what kind of shape your car is in. Keep your pictures flowing around the car to ensure you don’t miss anything and it will help the buyer realize that you’ve covered everything they’re looking for?

Start at the driver’s side and take a shot at an angle shooting toward the headlight but showing the entire driver’s side in the photo then move around the vehicle taking the side, rear, passenger, and then straight on front. Taking the long angles is very helpful to show that your car body is true and doesn’t have waves from a bad body job. Be sure to take close ups of any damage or flaws and point them out in your auction or listing description as well. Once you’ve covered the exterior of the vehicle take clear pictures of the interior including each of the seats, floor mats and under the floor mats, the headliner, and the dashboard. When you take a picture of the dashboard make sure you take a solo shot of the odometer to verify the mileage.

Moving on you want to take pictures of the engine compartment which is why it is crucial that it has been detailed nicely. One trick my friend uses that not many people think of is to take the dipstick out and take a close up of the oil to show that is fresh and clean. This might or might not help but the more you show the less hassle you’ll get in the selling process.

Now that you have the exterior, interior and engine covered you will want to add some pictures of the under carriage of your car. This is becoming the more and more the norm when people are looking at used vehicles online, they want to ensure they aren’t missing anything. To take away all their fears of damage and rust issues you should capture images of the front portion, mid portion and the back portion and make sure you include the muffler, catalytic converter and the wheel wells and any other areas that you feel should be covered. A lot of car enthusiasts will take shots with their wheels off to show the brake rotors or take shots of the shocks and so on but that’s up to you. You’ll usually see this if the seller is showing that they just changed or upgraded to new parts.

The last tip I will recommend is something I think is extremely important for any sale but especially if you’re selling a classic or vintage car and that is the cars documents. That is the original owner’s documents and manual with any repairs and regular maintenance. Also include any preventative maintenance documents like rust proofing or any improvements that you’ve made since buying the car.

Provide your phone number and email so people can call or contact you with questions. If you make sure you answer any email or phone requests promptly and courteously and include what’s been outlined above, I’m positive you’ll get the best deal possible for your car without any major problems during the whole car selling process.

Get valuable tips and links for car buying online and buy cars online including online car loans, online car insurance, online car auctions, car buying mistakes and car dealer scams to avoid and so much more at Car Buying Online

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Get a Complete View of Customer Information

Your sales reps can view all interactions for accounts, contacts, and leads in an easy-to learn and use interface so they have access to the information they need to be successful in their role. All customer interactions, including notes, opportunities, activities, purchased products, marketing campaign information, tickets, and more can be viewed and shared—so your sales reps can better sell to and service customers.

Manage Sales Opportunities for Maximum Effectiveness

Access vital opportunity data to forecast revenue, make adjustments in territories, and drive more deals to a close. Opportunity Management enables you to view and interact with key opportunity data through dashboards, robust reports, and advanced business analytics tool that integrates with the CRM solution. You can track the stages of a sales cycle, gauge the likelihood of closing sales, forecast revenue, understand win/loss data, and more so you can take corrective action or make more strategic decisions, such as territory realignment.

Boost Your Sales Team’s Productivity

Automate sales processes to maximize team productivity and shorten the sales cycle. CRM solution enables you to customize and automate sales processes—driving sales to a close faster. Implement proven standardized sales methodologies, such as Solution Selling or create custom sales processes based on criteria you define. Sales team members are prompted to complete tasks such as making phone calls, scheduling meetings and more—increasing their productivity and ensuring all steps are followed in a proven sales technique. You can also automate lead distribution to individuals or teams so hot leads can be acted on fast!

Provide Your Mobile Workforce with Access

CRM solution uniquely enables you to deploy access methods that are best for your sales organization. With Windows, Web, and mobile client deployment options on popular devices such as BlackBerry® and Windows Mobile® (Pocket PC and Smartphone), your sales force has access to complete Sage CRM solution information, whether connected or disconnected, without sacrificing functionality, usability, or robust customizations.

CRM Solutions providers like Sage India have various CRM solutions for SME and SMB’s based on requirements and size of organizations. You can visit http://www.sagesoftware.co.in to know more.

Content Writer for Sage India on different software products

Tip #1 Have your day planned out before you start.

As simple as this sounds, this is by far the biggest key. If you start your day without a plan, you are guaranteed to have an inefficient day. Don’t wait until the morning of to make your “To Do” list. Make it the day before, and when you get to the office or start your day, you will have already mapped out in your mind how you will go about accomplishing your list. Not doing so opens you up to all of the distractions the day can offer. Knowing exactly what you have planned to do for the day allows you to stay focused on the project at hand, and once you accomplish your individual task, you can then move on to the next one and power through an amazing list of productive activities. At the end of the day, you like all goal setters and schedule planners will be shocked at how much more you can get accomplished by planning your day in advance. Likewise, all time management gurus suggest that you plan your week before you start it, plan your month before you start it, and play your year before you start it. Without goals and plans, you are like a rudderless ship that will be unable to maintain its course over any definite period of time once distractions come your way. However, if you have long range goals and all of your activities point toward accomplishing them, you will shocked at how quickly you reach your goals. Start you day, week, month and year with a plan, and watch your productivity skyrocket.

Tip #2 Know your weaknesses, and find ways to limit their impact.

Are you the type that just HAS to respond to emails the moment they come in even if it takes you away from the project you are working on? Do you HAVE to take every call, even if it is interrupting your proposal time, cold calling time, or presentation time? Are you an IM fiend? Are you a cell phone junky? Does your desk need to be in perfect order before you feel you can start you day? Are you entirely too conversational and need to limit the length of your appointment times or “lunch dates”? Do you do too much random surfing on the net when you should be working? Day after day, professional salespeople let minor things get in the way of major objectives. The first step to solving this problem is to identify your weaknesses, and then find ways to limit their impact.

For example, if your email is a distraction, close the program while you work through your “must finish” projects. If you need to finish proposals or have some dedicated cold calling time, perhaps you need to turn off your cell phone, email, and IM for a couple of hours. Contrary to popular belief, the world will continue to operate even if you are not “ever-present” at a moment’s notice. Your emails will still be waiting for you, and so will your messages.

How can you possibly concentrate with the focus you need to accomplish your major sales objectives with constant interruptions? You CAN control the amount of interruptions you receive in many cases, but it takes discipline and will power to keep your weaknesses from running your schedule. Not taking control of interruptions in your daily schedule will cause your day to be chopped up with insignificant “emergencies” that can be dealt with at pre-determined periods. Identify your weaknesses, and make plans ahead of time to limit their effect on your day.

Tip #3 You set your schedule, not your clients.

On a daily basis there are typically a few major activities that must be performed in order to achieve success in sales. They may include a few of the following and more:

• Prospecting

• Appointment

• Call backs

• Proposal Generation

• Follow-up to orders

How will you fit all of these in during your limited work hours, and in which amounts? If you do not know when you want or need to perform these activities, you leave your schedule open to the whims of each and every potential prospect you deal with. Top salespeople dictate their schedule. Not their clients. What does this mean exactly?

It is a huge temptation for salespeople to jump at the first opportunity to meet with a client no matter the time or place in the pursuit of the almighty “quota”. But does this make any sense at all? Over time you will have executives ask you to come in at 7 AM or 7 PM, so we come in early or leave late all in the name of duty and service. Do these opportunities work out? Are they worth your time, or are they more likely to be a greater interruption to the bigger goals you have in mind?

When you dictate your schedule, you will find your productivity will increase immensely. Try adding the following changes to your scheduling.

• Write pre-determined appointment times on your calendar, and fill them. Keep your clients on or around those appointment times so that you can set aside the time you need for other activities. Depending on your area and industry, you may want to schedule appointments for 10:00 AM, 11:30 AM, 1:00 PM, and 2:30 PM. The times do not matter as much as the reasons for setting predetermined time frames. Do you live in a metro area? Does traffic get horrific at certain times early and late in the day? Is sitting in traffic a valuable use of your time? Probably not. Set your appointment times at intervals you can run consistently and still be able to maintain a reasonable schedule. Doing so will allow you to “lock out” other time frames for your additional essential activities such as prospecting, returning calls, returning emails, etc…

• Block out prospecting times, and do not let them be interrupted. Perhaps the biggest challenge for professional salespeople is successfully blocking out dedicated prospecting time. We can get so caught up in taking care of “processes” that we can be distracted from our major function. That is selling! Who cares if your email is in perfect order and your desk is spotless if you haven’t sold anything? Exactly. Once you have blocked out appointment times, you should be able to plan specifically when you will be doing your prospecting. Block those times out, and do not schedule anything else. Turn off the cell phone, turn off IM, send calls to voice mail, and do whatever it takes to get your dedicated time to prospect. Your quantity and quality prospecting time that you set aside may very well dictate your success. By setting aside the time it deserves, you can insure your future success.

• Set aside time for communications. This may include all of the types aforementioned and more. Even though it is difficult for us to believe, it is acceptable to return emails, calls, IM’s, etc by the end of the day. We may live in a microwave society that expects instant reaction to requests, but we also live in a society that appreciates dedicated attention to details and problems when they are dealt with. By setting aside dedicated time to communicate, you can be completely focused on your client’s needs without the feelings of guilt that can be associated with being unable to concentrate of the important things of the hour. The best times for communications are the first thing in the morning, lunch hours, and at the end of the day. By dedicating time specifically to this activity, you will not be as tempted to let it interrupt your valuable appointment and prospecting times.

Implementing these three basic time management strategies of planning your days before they start, knowing your weaknesses and limiting their impact, and dictating your own schedule can potentially free up hours of your day, increase your dedicated selling time, as well as make your schedule more predictable and productive. The great world of selling is full of daily and hourly distractions, and it is up to the professional salesperson to limit their effect upon peak performance.

Steve Norris is a Texas based telecommunications professional that provides Business Telephone Systems and telecom services from over 80 carriers nationwide. He specializes in hardware solution for multi-location business with advanced infrastructure needs. Over 90% of his clients are able to implement a new Dallas Business Phone Systems without increasing their budget with TeleTAP.

Online mortgage training programs include important subjects like loan processing, loan originating and its process in your syllabus which are extremely important from the point of view of a mortgage official. They also provide you with a license of the post that you have studied for, with a validity of 12 months. These 12 months are the period that the student revises his or her studies and takes some first hand experiences on hoe to mange everything. Once this period is over, the candidate becomes eligible for an original license from the government.

The online mortgage training course inculcates in you values like operating procedures efficiently, avoiding mistakes, handling problems properly, getting customers and retaining them, increasing financial performance and many more values that are important from the point of view of an mortgage official. The training course is divided into a number of small sections thus making it easy for the user to access the part he or she wants to and avoid opening the others. There are time limits given to the users to complete doing specific parts of their work thus teaching them time management. To give the user a revision of the topics he or she has covered, there are quizzes available in between. These quizzes not just make the user efficient in his work but also avoid the course from becoming a bit monotonous.

The online mortgage training course can also be used by trained individuals to increase their productivity and also to increase their income. Reviews about these online mortgage training courses state that they are extremely to the point and efficient. It also says that they provide us with more practical knowledge than live classes do. The duration of these online courses is not fixed and thus they can be available for you as soon as you sign in on the respective site.

These online mortgage training courses offer you an option of completing the course in as much time as you want thus putting no pressure on you. Thus, these online courses can be the best option for people unable to attend live classes to complete their education up to the level they desire while they are still working.

Short Sale Training

In today’s real estate market, the once lucrative opportunity of being a loan officer or mortgage broker originating loans and refinancing homeowners is no longer so lucrative. The sub prime mortgage meltdown and the mortgage credit crunch has really put a damper on that traditional business model.

What all of the mortgage news sources don’t tell you is that the short sale mortgage business is doing fantastic right now. There are more defaulted mortgages in the marketplace right now than we have ever seen before. The transition from a residential mortgage broker business to a short sale mortgage business is very easy. The mortgage brokers and loan officers that use my short sale mortgage system are making ten times more now per file than they used to make by only originating loans. The opportunity to make big money in real estate short sales is now.

A mortgage loan officer has to know everything about short sales, defaulted mortgages and foreclosure investing. The short sale mortgage business is the best mortgage business opportunity right now in the mortgage market. The traditional mortgage business is not nearly as lucrative as it used to be. The big money in the mortgage business is being made with defaulted mortgages.

You can get started in the Short Sale Business Today with no cash, no credit and no previous experience. Also, there are no licenses needed like there is with a traditional mortgage business. This allows you to get started immediately because you don’t have to prepare for a test or anything like that. You can start making money now and continue learning along the way.

To get a Free Online Mortgage Lending Training Course in Short Sales, Go here:

Mortgage Lending Training in Short Sales

For more info, go to: www.realestateforeclosuresinvesting.com

The author is a business building coach to The Foreclosure Industry. Real Estate Foreclosure Investing is professional business of Real Estate Foreclosure Investing. For more information visit: http://www.realestateforeclosuresinvesting.com.

The purpose of the Dashboard is to enable executive managers to effectively communicate strategy and objectives to area managers who then reinterpret the strategy into actions for each store manager. Ultimately it is the Salespeople on the shop floor who carry out the activities that satisfy the objectives of the company.

Sophisticated Dashboards allow executives to produce ‘what if’ scenarios, save them, and send them down the line to their area managers. But mostly, there is an upward reporting of numbers and a downward communicating of strategy – meaning that the statistics are lost at the individual Salesperson level.

For example, an executive dashboard may show each store’s ‘sales per hour’ KPI (Key Performance Indicator) compared to each other store but it does not show each Salesperson’s ‘sales per hour’ compared to each other Salesperson within the store. Therefore it is impossible for the executive to know – at the individual Salesperson level – how to improve sales performance.

Particular to the retail industry sales are made on the shop floor. Not by telephone or meetings, or online purchase. While branded merchandise and store design attracts customers to the shop it is almost always the Salesperson who makes the sale. But in almost all cases Salespeople have no individual daily sales target because there is no system in place to generate objectives, goals, targets at the individual sales level.

This represents a problem because area managers, who have been tasked by executive managers to improve sales performance, have no further information about the KPI activities within that store.

Once the merchandise and store displays have been checked by the area manager, the next logical step is to look at the POS (Point of Sale) reports to identify poor areas of performance. And here comes the surprise! – Not a single POS system is able to tell managers which Salespeople performed better than others. Why, simply they do not have a time sheet (roster) attached to Sales Targets so have no way of calculating predicted or actual individual sales goals.

Some attempts use spreadsheets to figure out individual sales goals but spreadsheets fall over. They inaccurately produce goals as they do not weight fast and slow periods of the day. They are not connected to a dynamic time sheet – meaning if the roster changes the goals do not, but should. Spreadsheets take time to copy, past, edit, modify, and correct mistakes. And there is no feedback system for comparing actual performance – compared to everyone on the shift.

While an executive manager can see that a particular store is underperforming, because a KPI is lower than the other stores, they cannot determine who in the store is underperforming on the same KPI.

So what’s the big deal? If you cannot determine low KPI’s at the individual Salesperson level in retail then you cannot improve individual sales performance based on statistics – and dashboards are pretty pictures about statistics – which we interpret as instructions for changing behaviors. Dashboards cause executive mangers to want to change behaviors across the organisation but, as you can see, they do not help front line store managers change behaviors at the individual staff level.

Effectively increasing sales in retail – by focusing on the sales skills and behaviors of each individual salesperson, requires a sophisticated, easy to use, web-enabled system, that communicates the objectives of the organisation to each individual salesperson – on a level playing field. Such a system will report both up and down the organisation so that staff at every level can understand the objectives of the organisation clearly, statistically, and fairly.

Steven Lipschitz has a 12 year track record in Internet enabled applications and today specializes in Retail Software. He is the developer of Retail Performer – software that translates Retail Sales Objectives into Individual daily Sales Targets.

• Creativity is the key in successfully selling off your house even in a struggling real estate market. Keep in mind that there are thousand of other homes in the market out there. Even if your home is a Carlsbad real estate property which offers charming sandy beaches and is a prime location, you still need to think of a way to separate yourself from the competition. Be innovative in putting up signage and remember that advertising is very important. Make use of noticeable color signs in which buyers will be able to take interest in buying your property.

• You must also understand the true worth of your home. Although you love your home, this does not mean you can sell it for a much higher price than what it is truly worth.

• To increase the appeal of your home, do cost-effective preparations. Make sure that everything inside your home is fixed and every room is cleaned.

• As economic times are hard, it is a good idea to change certain terminologies that might sometimes scare potential buyers. For instance, instead of putting up a sign for a sale, change it to the word auction. In this way, your buyers will be building up images in their mind of a home with an economical price and flexibility rather than one with a high price tag.

• It is significant that you also determine who your potential buyers are. As soon as you resolve this issue, you and your agent can now establish the advertising strategy you have to work on. For example, if you have a Carlsbad real estate property and decided upon targeting families who wants vacation houses, you should advertise your home with features that appeal to them.

• Traditional methodology has often recommended listing your house higher than the true rate to prepare for a lower price later on. However, this is no longer a good strategy because it can definitely discourage a future client. People have a tendency of going for a much lower price because of the economic crisis and this will be a disadvantage for you. List your house in its true worth and start the negotiations from there.

• Be confident in negotiating with the sales terms. Tell the buyer exactly what the terms are in an authoritative manner without being demanding. In this way, the client will reassured that he is really receiving a great deal.

There are still numerous ways that can help you sell off your house, these are only some of them. Price your property right and you will definitely be on your way of selling your house in a great price and a fast sale.

For more tips and information about Carlsbad Real Estate, check out http://www.mysandiegohomebuying.com/pages/carlsbad-real-estate-9-simple-tips-on-how-to-take-care-of-your-carlsbad-homes-to-avoid-easy-wear-and-tear.htm.

View full post on Art Sobczak’s Telesales Blog

Did you know that many online businesses don’t offer any means to speak with a live person?

It’s true. Their customers can’t even reach a real person to find out more about a product or service, or even to address an issue. If you’re not reaching out and inviting prospects to speak with a live person, you’re leaving a lot of money on the table.

The thing is, your customers want to know they can trust you-and their mistrust could cost you untold tens of thousands of dollars a year! But these days, not only do your clients want to contact you via telephone, they want to make sure they can reach you on a live chat application or video consultation software!

If you’re ready to take that step towards securing customer trust, I will illustrate some great ways to help you maintain a great rapport with your clients using the following methods…

Get Your Number Out There!

Extend yourself for your customers…get your number out there, and let them know that their calls are important! Place your company’s telephone number at the top of each page of your website. Your phone number shouldn’t be elusive, or appear to be a well-kept secret.

It is also worth mentioning that you should have voicemail set up, and check the messages frequently throughout the day. The sooner you respond to a customer call, the more loyalty you earn!

Set up a Live Chat application!

As you know, most clients are hesitant to purchase a product or service if they have any questions about it. Live chat offers your customers real-time answers to their questions on the spot, which is a great boost to their confidence! In fact, a live chat button placed prominently on your site, your prospects will know they can always contact a real person-even if the phone line is busy!

Live chat is also a great alternative to an expensive toll-free customer support hotline. This way, international clients can reach you, and your staff can handle more than one at a time! Here are some great Live Chat applications you can use:

http://www.liveperson.com (LivePerson Pro: Free Trial!)

http://www.velaro.com (30-day Free Trial!)

http://www.providechat.com (Sign Up For Beta…3 Months Free!)

Go Beyond Live Chat…Go Video!

This is truly the closest it gets to meeting your customer face to face! Of course, the most popular option for this is Skype. Many, many people are using Skype or similar applications these days, plenty of which are your potential customers! Show them that you are so confident in your product or service that you’ll tell them all about it face-to-face. They will pick up on that, and in turn, you’ll earn their trust!

If you don’t have the time…make the time!

If you find yourself bogged down with busywork, you can give it to someone else! You need to be free to forge that trust with your clients. Why not look into hiring a virtual assistant?

No, that doesn’t mean you should delegate your customer service tasks to them, because that information is vital to your business! Instead, if you have a few tasks that can be given to someone else to do, don’t hire someone to pick up the slack…outsource it!

If you want to hire a virtual assistant, look here first…they are actually certified to take on your work!

http://www.ivaa.org/

Superior Customer Service = Trust = Sales!

How you handle yourself on the phone, live chat, or email support will determine how well you can win new customers, and develop positive and ongoing rapport with existing customers. Most importantly, by earning the trust of your clients…you will also boost your sales!

About The Author: Nicki Flouton is the Customer Service Manager for Multiple Stream Media, an online advertising network helping small businesses gain visitors to their websites, and acquire new clients the inexpensive way. For your free and non-obligatory consultation please visit – http://www.rent-a-list.com

About The Author: Nicki Flouton is the Customer Service Manager for Multiple Stream Media, an online advertising network helping small businesses gain visitors to their websites, and acquire new clients the inexpensive way. For your free and non-obligatory consultation please visit – http://www.rent-a-list.com

One of the biggest mistakes that sales people make when speaking to clients is talking too fast. We all speak faster when we are under pressure, and there is normally an element of pressure on sales people when they are talking to clients. So it just makes sense that as a professional sales person, you would want to be perpetually aware of the speed that you are speaking at.

However, I very rarely meet a salesperson that is aware of their own W.P.M. (words per minute) rate. I have found that the most exceptional speech rate needs to be around 180 W.P.M. and this is really a very comfortable rate of speech to listen to and to also talk at. I find that most people selling on the telephone utilise a rate of about 220 to 250 W.P.M. This is too fast for you prospect to comfortably process everything that you are saying. Also, when you are talking quite fast you have a tendency not to listen too well to what your prospect is saying.  

In order to ascertain what your W.P.M. rate is you will need to time yourself reading. If you have your regular telephone sales pitch to hand that would be ideal, but you can just use a book or a newspaper article. All you need to do is time yourself reading aloud. It really is essential that you do this in the same style and speed that you would use when selling to a client over the phone.

Read aloud and time yourself for just 60 seconds. Once you have read for 1 minute stop and count how many words you read aloud at that will give you your W.P.M. rate. So for example, if you read 218 words in 60 seconds, your W.P.M. rate will be 218 W.P.M.

To perfect your 180 W.P.M. rate you need to find yourself, or write yourself a paragraph that is 180 words in length and just practice reading it and completing it in 60 seconds. Once you can nail talking to clients under pressure at the rate of 180 W.P.M. then you will find that your sales closing ratio will sky rocket.

Let me warn you that this is not an easy thing to do as our natural default setting is to speed up when stressed. You must practise this skill and also monitor it regularly. But once you get the hang of it, you’ll never lose it and it will make you a better salesperson, conversationalist and all rounder nicer person because will enjoy talking to you more.

 

I have almost 20 years experience in the sales arena. I now own and run a company called Fat Cat Ideas which provides Telesales Training, Copywriting and Lead Generation advice.
www.fatcatideas.com

One of the biggest mistakes that sales people make when speaking to clients is talking too fast. We all speak faster when we are under pressure, and there is normally an element of pressure on sales people when they are talking to clients. So it just makes sense that as a professional sales person, you would want to be perpetually aware of the speed that you are speaking at.

However, I very rarely meet a salesperson that is aware of their own W.P.M. (words per minute) rate. I have found that the most exceptional speech rate needs to be around 180 W.P.M. and this is really a very comfortable rate of speech to listen to and to also talk at. I find that most people selling on the telephone utilise a rate of about 220 to 250 W.P.M. This is too fast for you prospect to comfortably process everything that you are saying. Also, when you are talking quite fast you have a tendency not to listen too well to what your prospect is saying.  

In order to ascertain what your W.P.M. rate is you will need to time yourself reading. If you have your regular telephone sales pitch to hand that would be ideal, but you can just use a book or a newspaper article. All you need to do is time yourself reading aloud. It really is essential that you do this in the same style and speed that you would use when selling to a client over the phone.

Read aloud and time yourself for just 60 seconds. Once you have read for 1 minute stop and count how many words you read aloud at that will give you your W.P.M. rate. So for example, if you read 218 words in 60 seconds, your W.P.M. rate will be 218 W.P.M.

To perfect your 180 W.P.M. rate you need to find yourself, or write yourself a paragraph that is 180 words in length and just practice reading it and completing it in 60 seconds. Once you can nail talking to clients under pressure at the rate of 180 W.P.M. then you will find that your sales closing ratio will sky rocket.

Let me warn you that this is not an easy thing to do as our natural default setting is to speed up when stressed. You must practise this skill and also monitor it regularly. But once you get the hang of it, you’ll never lose it and it will make you a better salesperson, conversationalist and all rounder nicer person because will enjoy talking to you more.

 

I have almost 20 years experience in the sales arena. I now own and run a company called Fat Cat Ideas which provides Telesales Training, Copywriting and Lead Generation advice.
www.fatcatideas.com

View full post on Ann Barr» Ann Barr : Teaching You How To Outsell Your Competition : Sales Coach

I first learned the secrets to building precision sales organizations while working for billionaire businessman, Charlie Munger. I doubled the sales of the first company given to me in just 15 months. The second company I doubled in just 12 months. Several of the companies I took over, I doubled two and three years in a row. Here’s how…

How to Increase Productivity & Double Your Sales

In most sales organizations, the sales are ad-hoc. Everyone’s running around doing what they think is best. Management sets very little standards of performance.

If you want to achieve maximum productivity and double your sales in less than 12 to 15 months, you must think like a scientist. You must plan of every aspect of your sales process down to the smallest detail.

Here Are My Top Ideas to Help You Create Your Step-By-Step Battle Plan for Sales Success:

1. Prospecting Stage

Do you have minimum standards for the types of accounts your salespeople should go after? Does every rep have some “dream clients” they chase constantly and relentlessly? What is the minimal size accounts should your reps be going after?

Did you establish the minimum number of accounts your team will go after (per rep)? How much time each day is going to be dedicated to this effort? Did you set a minimum amount of rejections your team will face per client? Make sure you include in your battle plan what your sales reps should do after each rejection and how this process is going to be monitored? If you don’t set standards here, 52% of all salespeople will give up after a single rejection. Yet studies show it takes 8.4 rejections today to get the client to at least meet you.

What will be your sales reps first approach? The second? The Third? What do you say if you get the prospect on the phone right away? What are your procedures for getting around gatekeepers and assistants?

2. The sales call.

What are your sales reps going to present? What are the top five strategic objectives you want to achieve from every interaction with every buyer? What and how many questions are they going to ask? How will your reps own personal credibility?

The sales call is a terrific strategy 99.9% o companies never address on purpose. Have you seriously sat down and talked about the sales call and planned out each aspect? Did you practice it, role-play it and polish it to a fine luster? Are you leaving nothing to chance?

For every company I work with, I make them plan every inch of the sales call. I tell my clients to think of sales like a war. Marketing with direct mail, advertising, trade shows and Internet Marketing are like your long range bombing. They soften the market and make it more receptive.

Your salespeople are your foot soldiers. When they get into hand-do-hand combat, how well do you want them trained? How many scenarios do you want to address in advance? By perfecting every aspect of the sales phone call, my clients slaughtered companies four tines their size!

3. The actual pitch for the product or service.

What’s your pre-emptive strategy to block competitors? What’s going to motivate your prospects to buy right now? Pretend you had to present to all your prospects all at once, what kind of experience would that be? Are you ready right now? If not, your sales process is sloppy.

Sorry, but it’s true. I plan out the sales opportunities to the letter. I know exactly what I’d say if you put all my prospects in a room all at once. Figure it out, then role-play it.

4. The offer.

Creating a compelling offer is an art form. Can you offer something for free that gets you deep into your clients’ world? Can you offer a free audit related to your type of product or service? Can you sweeten the inducement to buy with a bonus or free gift?

I have a client who recently added an MP3 Player to the offer and it increased his sales by 22% overnight. As a bonus, I give away spectacular additional training programs as an inducement to buy my primary offers.

Role-play your offer again and again until the reps do it with ease and complete comfort.

5. The follow up.

Now it’s time to continue the bonding process. In this stage you must recognize and plan your objectives after a sales interaction? Do you want to get referrals? Do you want to keep the client coming back again and again?

How are you going to build a bond? Did you get emails addresses? Can you open a relationship that is so worth having they can’t say no? What’s follow up step one, step two, step three and so on?

Train Your Sales Reps to Act More Like Top Producers

That said, the procedures, role-playing, constant training and working on your sales process and not just in it, can help even regular salespeople perform like top producers. If you’re not leading, you can’t close. There’s a war in today’s business world. It’s called sales. Ad, if you want to win the war and get more market share you must get yourself some true warriors. You need top producers.

Top producers respond perfectly to rejection by becoming more effective. They become more aggressive when someone is brushing them off. They’re more persuasive if someone isn’t buying.

Top Performers know that the sales process is a science. They understand that they must operate like scientists, constantly moving toward the sale. So start drilling down like a scientist each and every aspect of your sales process.

Sales trainer and business growth expert, Chet Holmes is the only trainer to have personally picked up the telephone and cold-called his way into 60 Fortune 500 and got all 60 as clients. To learn his top four incredible concepts that will double your sales in the next twelve months, watch his live videos for free at: http://www.howtodoublesales.com. It will only take five minutes to learn.

Only, doing sales, you burn out much more quickly than in other fields. That’s why it wouldn’t even make sense to do professional sales training as you’re starting out – how do you know you’ll even be in it for more than a year or two.

There are many seminars, services, books, and other such like that offer you so called professional sales training, but take it from me, a professional. That is not where you want to start.

Of course, once you’ve made it past what we call the “two year hump”, you’re probably in it for good, and can do professional sales training. You’ll know who the players are, who use approaches compatible with your personality, and who you can avoid because they’ve got nothing to offer you.

Some professional sales training courses are really offered by the best people in the industry, people with such a nack for sales that they can charge hundreds of dollars for seminars to teach others how to do what they do.

But other times, professional sales training is just offered by two bit huksters, who don’t know jack about sales, people who are good enough maybe to teach a beginner some tricks, but who aren’t really worth the money you’ve got to pay to see them.

You see, professional sales training events involve salesmanship themselves, only they have to be sold to salesmen. You can tell good professional sales training, because there will be a lot of veterans there as well as newcomers.

Most sales companies offer professional sales training on the job, because, lets face it, you’ve either got it or you don’t. Now, once you get into the game a little bit, you can sometimes benefit from further professional sales training seminars, classes and the like, but until then it’s a bad idea to try that approach.

Until you’ve been in the industry a year or two, you won’t have a nose for it, and won’t be able to tell what professional sales training courses are likely to be good and which ones are just a money making scheme to exloit new comers.

Read all about professional sales training.

Here are a couple of tips that you can follow to enhance the curb appeal of your home:

• Spruce up your yard, by regularly mowing and cutting edge of tress and shrubs. If you add some mulch to your flower beds it will keep way weeds.

• Remove bushes that block the view of your home. You want to show case how beautiful that homes exterior is and having to many bushes blocking the view can lead to suspicions.

• Paint your homes exterior using good quality paint. You can try to spray on the paint yourself by renting a paint sprayer for about $60 a day. But if you want a guarantee that the paint job will turn out perfect you may want to hire a professional to do this work for you. You can hire a professional for about $1000 a job.

• Look at your mailbox. A minor change like buying a new mailbox can make a major difference.

• Clean your windows thoroughly. There is nothing more appealing than a home with beautiful, polished windows that sparkle in the light. You may also want to touch up paint the trip of your windows to achieve that extra shine.

• Having the outside of your home well light at night will bring some warmth and welcome to people visiting. This will also give a sense of security to the potential buyers.

• You can make your front yard more colorful, by placing some beautiful and colorful flowers in the newly mulched flower bed.

• You can do some landscaping on your front yard either by yourself or by hiring landscaping professionals to do it for you, however this will be expensive

One of the main reasons, why there is an emphasis to enhance a home’s curb appeal is that it gets people to notice the house. You may have a home that’s really beautiful on the inside, but people get attracted through external appearances first before even setting foot inside. A home with a well-maintained exterior and front yard shows that the homeowner is a careful and diligent person who looks into such things and such impressions matter when you are getting your home ready for a sale.

Paul is a principal of NewHomesSection.com. Search new homes Victorville , new homes California and new homes San Diego today!

Prepare Yourself

1. Your attitude has to always be, “Get to the leaders.” A prospect’s interest doesn’t mean much if you haven’t talked to the leader. Subordinates can be helpful, but don’t expect them to sell your offering to their bosses. It requires effort and risk for a questionable reward for them.

2. Whenever you approach an opportunity or prospect, ask (in your own words), “Who else will be involved and who do those people report to?” You can’t depend on your contact to generate interest in all the other people who will have a say in the purchase. If your contact is interested, get him or her to introduce you to the other people.

3. Always think and always say in your own words, “It’s important that I know who the leaders are and I get to them.” It’s important that you do. Believe it and think it. If you do, you’ll ask those contacts to introduce you because you want to make the sale. You can not be reluctant to ask. What’s the worse that can happen? If they say, “No,” ask, “How come?”

4. Believe that you can and believe that you will get to the leaders. Then it will happen and you’ll have the opportunity to interview the ultimate decision makers. You know you can get to the top. Consider when you were losing a sale and you got to the leader person to plead your case. Well, get there early and you’ll become the winner, and no one will be able to change that.

Tak’n It to the Streets

5. When the prospect shows signs of interest, ask immediately, “Who else would also have to be interested?” You want him to divulge info while he’s still anxious for more of your presentation, and before he shuts you out with, “I’ll get back to you.” If he refuses to tell, ask him what his concerns are. Obviously he’s not sold yet and wants to keep you back until he is. His answer to the concerns question will tell you what else you’ve got to do to win him over.

6. When the prospect wants the pricing or a presentation, always say to yourself or your associates, “This decision will be made at a higher level and if I give all the information to this subordinate, I’ll never get a chance to make a case to the real decision makers.”

7. Now practice with a real person. Practice is what makes people great. What will you say when s/he shows interest? What will you’ll say to that contact to side step giving the price? “Before I quote or present, I’d like to talk with these people to understand their expectations to make sure I’ve got everything included.” For a presentation say, “Before I present, I’d like to talk with these people so I can be sure to cover what they’re interested in.” And after either say, “Will you arrange that?”

Practice these before every sales call so that you’re conditioned and ready to respond when they come up.

Sam Manfer is the leading expert one selling to C-Levels and powerful people. Sam is a sales strategist, entertaining key note speaker and author of TAKE ME TO YOUR LEADER$, The Complete Guide to C-Level Selling – getting to and influencing top level decision-makers. Sam makes it easy for any sales person to generate quality leads, and become a 70% closer. Grab your FREE E-Books, Articles and other Advanced Sales Training Tips at http://www.sammanfer.com

And now I invite you to learn how to handle 50 tough selling situations and difficult closing problems PLUS this Bonus FREE E-Book “Getting Past Gatekeepers and Handling Blockers” .

A child does not stop repeating bad behaviors and adopt new ones because her mother is disappointed in her. She stops because she quickly learns that there are repercussions for her actions. In sales training, an effective tool that is often downplayed is the idea of consequences. You can effectively communicate the sales training techniques, share this effectively communicated sales training softly or loudly, repeatedly in memos and meetings and trainings, but still not have the desired outcome.

The problem comes in when you don’t follow through. For example, you have spent a great deal of time encouraging them to learn the sales training techniques that you’ve designed because, ultimately, it will make their jobs easier and more fluid. However, learning these new techniques may be more difficult or time consuming than they may have thought and, for them, their job is not made easier with this new responsibility. You may have communicated quite efficiently to your employees that you would suspend anyone who wasn’t implementing the new sales techniques by a certain date, but that date came and passed without suspensions despite the fact that many were still using the old ways. This may be due to an overwhelming work load or an inability to do the actually suspending, but whatever the reason, your lack of follow through communicates to your employees that you probably won’t follow through with these new sales training techniques either, so why bother?

Along with working out how you will communicate your new sales training, decide what consequences, or incentives, you will put into place. When an employee successfully learns and implements the new training, there should be a benefit or reward. When an employee does not learn the new training or does not put it to use, then, too, should there be a consequence.

These consequences should be very personal to your employee they should not be benefits or drawbacks for the company. For example, the benefit should be a monetary bonus for the individual employee instead of the airy concept that profits will soar for the company and that this will trickle down into raises for everyone. The drawback should be a suspension for the individual employee or a cut in hours rather than the general threat of bankruptcy for the company – or even the threat of layoffs in general. Just like sales to the customers, the way to sell your new sales training techniques to your employees is to make it personal.

Simply put, repetition or angry tirades do not back up effectively communicated sales training strategies. Instead, put your time and energy into creating and backing up consequences for jobs well done (or not done). Plan casual meetings during the work day to get input on how things are going, to see if anyone has questions, concerns, or needs help. In this way, you will create an environment of trust and a foundation of follow through that will not only help you implement your current new sales training ideas but future ones as well.

Jeff Blackwell is the founder of SalesPractice.com an online sales training community offering sales practitioners free access to quality sales training resources.