Is there a Christian approach to sales?

Decades ago, I almost lost my first professional sales position because of my Christian faith.? “Being a Christian sales person is going to be tricky,” I concluded. While that may have been true in my young and immature mindset, over the years, I’ve come to see that not only is there a Christian approach to sales but that in many ways it sets the standard for the best practices of the secular community.

Contention

First, let’s identify the points of contention.? There is, within a large segment of the business community, an idea that sales is about ‘winning’ and manipulating people to buy your product or service whether or not they need or want it.? The focus is on results and the sales person’s ability to ‘close every sale.’? Typically, people who occupy this camp emphasize ‘closing’ and the money that comes to the organization and the people who successfully do so.

The Christian approach is to see sales and organizational sales systems as a means of discovering what the customer wants and providing him/her with that.? The emphasis is on the customer, not the financial results. Instead of ‘closing,’ this approach emphasizes ‘opening’ or understanding the customer as a necessary prelude to recommending a solution.

Sales, by its nature, is a highly measurable, results-driven endeavor.? Whether it is a company or an individual, if you sell a lot, everyone is happy, and if you don’t, all kinds of problems pop up. There is probably no other business endeavor that emphasizes results more than sales.

Yet, one of the fundamentals of Christianity is to attend to the process, and leave the results to God.? Most sales managers are not going to be amenable to the idea that, as a salesperson, you are not responsible for results.

So there is, at least superficially, a fundamental conflict between the common ideas of sales and the Christian ethic.

Reconciled?

Can these be reconciled?? ?Absolutely.

I’ve spent most of my adult career working with sales forces and developing sales systems for B2B businesses.? One of the things that I have learned is a foundational truth that applies to sales:? To sell well, you must do enough of the right things, and you must do them well enough.

That sounds so simple.? Yet it is the fundamental challenge for selling organizations. It’s a simple concept.? The financial transaction which ultimately occurs is a result of the activities of the salesperson and the customer which precede the decision to buy. So, in a typical B2B sales process, if you want to make one sale, you must present a proposal to a certain number of prospects.

In order to present your proposals, you must have identified a certain number of opportunities.? In order to identify those opportunities, you must have created a number of first meetings between the salesperson and the prospect. In order to create a certain number of first meetings between the sales person and the prospect, you must begin with a number of qualified prospects.

The ultimate sale, then, is a result of the sales person completing a certain sequence of activities... CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE