The Sales Difference

The Sales Difference is about creating a selling experience that positions a sales person to gain greater trust. The Sales Difference is not about tactical selling skills like prospecting or closing or negotiating, rather it's about how we sell as people. Its how we carry ourselves and deliver us as sales people differently from others.

Companies spend billions of dollars in the United States alone teaching tactical selling strategies such as negotiation skills or objection handling or prospecting just to name a few. What is not done quite frankly is teaching companies and their sales teams how to sell to facilitate a great customer experience. For example, when there is a first appointment and two competitors are vying for the business. Let's take the hypothetical situation of the following. The first sales rep walks in with a empty pad of paper ready to ask the prospective customer great needs based selling questions and certainly possess a dedication to build a strong relationship. On the other hand the second rep walks in with the prospect's website printed out and highlighted along with notations as well as pre-written questions to ask the customer. In addition, each question has circles next to it where the salesperson is going to write the responses positioning them much more readily to paraphrase what the customer's unique set of needs are. Last, the second rep sends the questions ahead of time to the prospective customer preparing them for the conversation in the spirit of time. Before a single word has even been uttered by either of the two sales reps which one has built greater trust and which sales rep has positioned them self to deliver a more worthwhile selling experience? What is the customer thinking in terms of dedication to truly solve their problem and which sales rep have they gravitated toward?

Typically when stuff like this is suggested to sales people they often hide behind "I'm very busy and I don't have a lot of time". This is the very reason each and every sales rep needs to deploy a Sales Difference strategy. Let me share a second example. Years ago our company worked for recreational boating company and they had a large call center that typically took inbound calls from customers. It was the mandate of the company to turn these inbound customer service agents into up-selling and cross-selling sales minded professionals. Needless to say people were terrified. They did not want to be perceived as aggressive or overbearing salespeople. The company sold in this department commodity products such as boat oil. Needless to say as a commodity product what we decided to do was create a unique experience to position our customers to view us not only as helpful but to actually deliver helpful content.

One of the typical objections that our customers had was that they could not talk due to the fact they were getting ready for a boat show at their boat dealership. We trained our staff to ask a series of questions around their boat shows and what they were doing to prepare for it. What we also did was create a library of articles and helpful tips on how to run a successful boat show. We integrated this content into our conversation sharing with our prospective customers that we might have a way to help them and would they mind if we sent them some information via e-mail or an actual physical copy. Customers needless to say were absolutely shocked because they were so used to people just selling them boat oil and talking about promotional specials and early delivery and price discounts. During this 18 month tenure when we provided the strategy the Sales Difference the organization's sales went up 22%, 31%, and 74%! There was very little sales training in the areas of up-selling or cross-selling or closing.

The Sales Difference is about creating an interaction that allows salespeople to deliver an experience where customers say Wow. But here's the unique opportunity. Very few sales people nationally think this way about delivering such an experience. Thus the Sales Difference is the opportunity.

Listen to our podcast on The Sales Difference: https://soundcloud.com/progresscoaching/the-sales-difference

The Sales Difference Webcast:Feb. 22nd at 12:00 noon central time: Register Here: https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_9DQ9gHmNRQeTaKlAqtbWaQ