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Keeping Sales Moving Forward

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Selling can be a tough profession. Keeping sales moving forward can feel like you’re slogging through mud.

Even though every living human being is selling himself or herself every day that they interact with others, you have chosen to sell in order to house and feed yourself and your loved ones. You face rejection on a daily basis, and the level of success you achieve is really all about the no’s.

You may very well hear something like this on an average day:

“Well, Jim, that new equipment you showed me sure is nice, but unfortunately I’m just going to have to say, ‘no.’”

“We appreciate all the information you’ve shared with us, Mary, but we’re not going to do this right now.”

How you respond when you hear things like that is what makes the difference between eating peanut butter sandwiches at home and being served your meal at a nice restaurant.

So, how do you respond when you hear the word “no?” Does your gut react by wrenching a bit? Do your shoulders sink in defeat? Does it show in your eyes that you’ve given up and are mentally moving on? If so, you’re probably only earning an average income, if that.

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About the Authors

Tom Hopkins is the founder and president of the renowned sales training service Tom Hopkins International. He is a member of the National Speakers Bureau and is the author of the national bestseller How to Master the Art of Selling. Today, more than 35,000 corporations and millions of professional salespeople throughout the world utilize his professional sales training materials.

Ben Katt is a multi-million dollar producer in corporate sales, and has a long track record when it comes to ‘sealing the deal.’ He has been instrumental in turning around several top companies and their sales records.

Getting closer to the customer is the key issue for Marketing Execs

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What are the most important topics for marketers?

Last month, in an online vote with Incite Marketing and Communications, 579 marketers ranked the following as their top five topics:

1. Data-driven creativity: An oxymoron? Use what you learn to drive better marketing campaigns
2. Think Fast, Act Faster: Real-time insight for quick decision-making and responsive marketing
3. Hit them when they’re listening: Choose the right channels, and use them at the right time for better engagement
4. Keeping it super-relevant – Personalized Marketing: Granular customer understanding to ensure every message is relevant
5. Define your impact on the bottom line: How new data sources give you more detail on your marketing’s effectiveness

So, what does the above tell us about the state of mind of executive marketers in June 2013?

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About the Author

Nick Johnson is the founder of Useful Social Media and Incite Marketing and Communications. Johnson runs a business devoted to facilitating conversation between, and asking challenging questions of, the marketing and communications community. Moving beyond standard business intelligence models, he leads a team devoted to building a customer-centric business delivering real value through the creation of an exclusive, dynamic community of senior strategists.

Forget Brand Preference – Win the Brand Relevance War

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There are two ways to compete in existing markets – gaining brand preference and making competitors irrelevant.

Brand Relevance

The first and most commonly used route to winning customers and sales focuses on generating brand preference among the brand choices considered by customers, on beating the competition. Most marketing strategists perceive themselves to be engaged in a brand preference battle. A consumer decides to buy an established product category or subcategory, such as SUVs. Several brands have the visibility and credibility to be considered – perhaps Lexus, BMW, and Cadillac. A brand, perhaps Cadillac, is then selected. Winning involves making sure the customer prefers Cadillac to Lexus and BMW. This means that Cadillac has to be more visible, credible, and attractive in the SUV space than are Lexus and BMW.

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About the Author

David Aaker, author of Brand Relevance: Making Competitors Irrelevant, is Vice-Chairman of Prophet, a marketing consultancy that helps senior executives balance their organization’s short-term business needs against their long-term growth goals, and Professor Emeritus of Marketing Strategy at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business. One of the world’s leading experts on branding and the winner of three awards for lifetime contributions to the science of marketing, David has published over 100 articles and fourteen books; including Strategic Market Management that has been translated into eighteen languages. To read David’s complete biography, click here.

How to Genuinely Enjoy Cold Calling

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Five perspectives that will (honestly!) create enjoyment in your cold calling

Most of us dread our days of making cold calls. We take a deep breath, pump ourselves up, and prepare to talk with a perfect stranger. Is there any wonder a gray cloud sometimes hangs over our desk?

It really doesn’t have to be this way. Cold calling can be an interesting, intriguing, fulfilling adventure.

Here are five perspectives that will give you an entirely new outlook on cold calling. When you apply these new perspectives, cold calling can actually be enjoyable. It can become personally fulfilling as well as financially rewarding.

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About the Author

Ari Galper is the World’s #1 Trust-Based Sales Expert and the Creator of Unlock The Game®, a new sales mindset and approach that has revolutionized the world of selling. His profound discovery of shifting one’s mindset to a place of complete integrity, based on new words and phrases grounded in sincerity, has earned him distinction as the world’s leading authority on how to build trust in the world of selling. Ari has been featured in a multitude of leading sales and business books for his unique and special trust-based sales approach and interviewed on networks such as CNN Money and Sky News. To read Ari’s complete biography, click here.

Are You A Strategy Driven Storyteller?

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Marketing professionals refer to strategy as your unique selling proposition while sales folk use the term ‘positioning.’ However you view it, the implementation and outcome need to be taken very seriously. Whether you are a sales professional, entrepreneur or candidate for a new job, the same techniques come into play.

I have learned that there is no true competition in business because we each have our unique ways of delivering service. How are those in your field servicing their clientele and what are they saying to attract attention? Is what they are saying truthful? How can you differentiate yourself yet move with integrity to make you the preferred choice?

To be on top of your game, you need to know what is most important to your prospects and clients. In fact you need to be familiar with their challenges, needs and deep down desires or wish list.

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About the Author

Elinor Stutz, CEO of Smooth Sale, LLC believes building relationships before the sale and continuing long after is the only way to sell and build a dynamic business. Elinor’s book, Nice Girls DO Get The Sale, is an International Best Seller. Her new book, Hired!: How to Use Sales Techniques to Sell Yourself On Interviews (Career Press), is based upon her own experience and years of community service. To read Elinor’s complete biography, click here.