12 Sales Tips To SMASH Your Targets

Welcome to the NEW LinkedIn newsletter for The Daily Sales followers!

Please do give this newsletter a subscribe as we will be sharing the best sales and sales leadership tips and tricks, with an obvious sprinkle of memes and motivation in there as well.

To kick-off the first edition we have been digging deep to find the top 12 sales tips out there that will help you and your sales teams SMASH their sales target this month, this quarter and this year.

(We're also going to sharing a free 140-page eBook at the end as well!)

Let's dig in:

1) Start Asking For MORE (or just ANY) Referrals

Some of the best, and highest converting, opportunities are those that come from referrals. There are companies that report referrals converting up to 70% of the time with 49% of companies saying that referrals have been their most effective tactic during COVID.

With all that being said, SO MANY salespeople are either not asking for ANY or not asking for enough.

One of the main reasons salespeople don't ask for them is fear. They've only just asked for the close which was scary enough, now you want them to ask for MORE?! This is easily solved by highlighting one big truth, people LIKE giving referrals, it makes them feel good.

So when you ask your customers for a referral, they feel good (not bad), giving you some.

2) Know When To Walk AWAY From An Opportunity

Saying no is one of the most powerful things you can do to sell more (as hard as that may be to believe).

So many salespeople are weighed down by prospects and pipeline that will simply never convert, and by walking away from bad or weak opportunities, you're then able to put more time and effort into ones that WILL close.

Do a full pipeline audit each and every month to look at which opportunities are likely to convert, or are not likely to convert. Prioritise your time on those you genuinely feel with close, allowing you to give them the time and effort needed to close them.

There are platforms that can also help with this, Outreach.io is by the far the best, giving you the most accurate insights into what will and won't close and the best forecasting insights as well.

3) Start Generating Your OWN (Good) Leads

Everyone working in any and every sales position should be hungry and out there generating their own leads. Not waiting on marketing, not waiting on their SDR's, but out there looking for their own leads as well.

If you want to sell more then you're going to need more leads and opportunities to do so. The best salespeople don't wait around for others, they're out there always looking for good opportunities.

Whether it's picking up the phone and making more calls, sending more emails, leveraging LinkedIn, sending video messages, the list goes on.

We'd recommend reading "Fanatical Prospecting" by Jeb Blount, "High Profit Prospecting" by Mark Hunter and "The Ultimate LinkedIn Sales Guide" by Daniel Disney for the best lead-generating and prospecting advice.

4) Try Selling OUTSIDE Of Office Working Hours (9-5)

Look, here is the reality, most of your prospects and target decision makers are the busiest during office working hours (Monday - Friday 9-5), yet this is the time most salespeople are hired and told to work.

This is why you'll struggle to reach most of them.

What this does do however is create an opportunity, and top performing salespeople all over the world also prospect and follow up OUTSIDE of office hours.

It might be making calls, sending emails or messages between 07:00 - 09:00 or sending them between 17:00 - 19:00.

Many decision makers will still be at work during those times, but a lot less likely to be in meetings or wrapped up in work tasks and so can often be more responsive, likely to answer calls and more likely to reply to you.

5) Try Overcoming A Few More OBJECTIONS

It can sometimes take just overcoming ONE more objection to win a sale, yet so many salespeople buckle or fall at objections. You want to become an objection master, to never fear them but to be fully prepared for them. You want to be able to overcome any and all objections that come your way.

Our top tip is to create a list of AS MANY of your common objections as possible and then underneath each one, have potential ways to overcome them. Print this list and have it accessible every time you're speaking to your prospects and customers.

Just remember, each objection you overcome gets you closer to the sale, and could be the one objection they have that will then make them feel ready to buy.

6) Ask What Is Holding Deals Back From CLOSING

Most of you reading this will have deals in your pipeline that aren't closing, some of which you'll be struggling to even get a response back from them.

One of the most effective ways to get responses is to just ask them outright what is holding them back. Ask them what is holding them back from moving forward, what concerns or questions do they have.

A lot of prospects aren't going to just come to you with their problems or challenges, YOU need to ask them.

Try it on a phone call, through an email or through a LinkedIn message.

7) Use Your CRM To Its Full Potential To Sell More

I know, I know, using your CRM is NOT a fun (this might be because you don't actually have a good CRM at the moment). BUT, when you use your CRM properly it can help you sell more effectively and sell more full stop.

Some CRM's boast increasing new accounts by double digits, some seeing revenue soar by 40%+. (these numbers were achieved by sales teams using Pipedrive CRM).

Use your CRM (or start using a better one) properly, start storing better information, use it to manage your pipeline better, but more importantly use it to serve your customers better.

8) Find (& Shadow) The BEST Salespeople In Your Company

This is quite possibly the BEST tip out of this entire list. Find and shadow the top performing salespeople in your company. Learn what they do, see what they do differently to you, ask them questions, listen, watch and learn.

No one is more valuable for you to learn from than the people succeeding right now selling what you sell to the same customers that you sell too.

Another way you can do this is to follow the best salespeople on platforms like LinkedIn, read their content, listen to podcasts, watch videos on YouTube. There is content all around you full of great sales tips.

9) Stop Selling And Start Helping Your CUSTOMERS Win

If you want to sell more, you have to stop selling and start helping. Don't focus on selling a product, focus on solving a problem.

Whether you're writing a sales email or a sales message, start making the content about how THEY will benefit, how THEY will win. People don't care about what you're selling, unless you can show them how they will benefit from buying it.

10) Remember Your ABC And Your ABP...

A lot of you will know what ABC means in sales

Always Be Closing, but there is an equally important 2nd version, ABP, Always Be PROSPECTING.

Every day, every single minute that you are working, you need to be focused on prospecting new opportunities and closing existing ones. Every activity, every conversation, every task, your focus is on those 2 core outcomes. Closing sales and creating new ones.

The best salespeople are constantly feeding their pipeline and constantly closing as well.

11) Know Who Your QUICK Wins Are

Every salesperson has them, a type of customer that is easier to create and close compared to others. It could be a specific industry, or job title, but look for the patterns and find the customers that are easier and quicker to win.

If you're unsure, find more experienced people within your team and ask them. Most top performers will have a clear understanding of who their quick wins are.

12) Start Building Your Personal Brand To Generate INBOUND Leads

Every salesperson has the opportunity to build their personal brands on platforms like LinkedIn, which if they do successfully, can create a consistent stream of highly qualified inbound leads.

People buy from people, and your personal brand is your chance to show your prospects that you are not just ANOTHER salesperson trying to sell them something, but you are a real human being who wants to help them.

To build a personal brand you need to be consistently active on LinkedIn, sharing and engaging at least 2-3 times per week and making sure you give value.

The Daily Sales Founder, Daniel Disney, is currently offering a 140-page eBook completely free which is full of LinkedIn, Social Selling & Personal Branding tips which you can access right here

Right, we hope you've enjoyed this first edition of The Daily Sales Tips & Tricks Newsletter here on LinkedIn!

Please do make sure you click subscribe so you get notified when we share the next one.

If you're looking for tools to help you and your teams sell more we'd highly recommend checking out our amazing partners here at The Daily Sales (if you'd like to become a Daily Sales partner please email [email protected]):

Pipedrive CRM - The best CRM out there, you can try for free for 30-days and if you follow this link you'll get 20% discount on your first year. Find out more

Outreach - The best sales engagement and intelligence platform helping your sales teams sell better and sell more. Find out more

Gong - The number one platform for revenue teams giving you real-time insights into sales conversations. Find out more

Dooly - Automate note taking and helps guide your sales teams to more closed deals. Find out more

RepVue - The place where salespeople can RATE their companies and find out how companies are rated by the salespeople working there. Find out more

Bigtincan - The smartest sales enablement tool helping take your buyers experience to a whole new level. Find out more

Reachdesk - Send personalised gifts to your prospects and customers to help win more deals and stand out from the crowd. Find out more