The Science and Art of Selling by Alen Majer

How many of us have dreamt of being able to brag about our achievements, openly and honestly, showing off our trophies for all the world to see without the risk of being sidelined for lewd behavior? Well, with selling you absolutely can! If you have it, you get to flaunt it and let people know that you’re as good as you are – it’s important for your reputation. Remember, you’re going to invest an enormous amount of time and effort in your reputation because that is the vehicle that will bring regular customers coming back for more and that will bring new customers running to you for advice. The more you sell and the better salesman you become, the more you get to brag, the greater your reputation, the more you sell, and on it goes….

It’s a process of continuous improvement and the better you are at it the more you’re able to freely admit it. That’s not to say you can get away with being an arrogant braggart. You need to embrace an air of sophistication that spells quality – and still have that charm that ropes the customers in. You can swagger a little, and it definitely helps to flirt, but don’t put your clients off by being a loudmouth who’s too big for his boots. Be aware of setting yourself up for a dive into mediocrity. When you’re too good, and you know it, you may just become too comfortable with your performance and forget to improve on it. That’s when you’ll find yourself slipping and losing sales.

On the other hand, if you’re battling with selling, don’t ever think that it’s appropriate to place yourself at the mercy of the client in order to get a sale. You must always maintain a high standard of self-respect. There is never a need to compromise on your personal values just so that you can get the deal done. It’s also important to earn the client’s respect before he’ll earnestly take note of what you have to say. Throwing yourself at his mercy only creates the impression that you’ll do anything for the sale – that you’re desperate, you’re easy, you’re begging and pleading. He’ll think he can take advantage of you and negotiate a cheaper price without much of a fight from your side. You’ll simply get used, exploited and tossed aside. That’s not selling! Create an image that you can be proud of – put yourself on display, as if you’re a walking, living, breathing advert in your line of expertise.

If you’re passionate about your sales career you will naturally exude a contagious energy, a zeal for what you strive to accomplish each day. This will attract the attention of those who seek your advice and assistance.  You become successful while remaining professional and uncompromising in your values. If you’re more of a risqué type and you don’t mind being adventurous, you could imagine yourself virtually “seducing” the client… toying with him, teasing him, to attract his (or her) attention. To each his own – it’s about personal preference.

When you’re in sales, people don’t mind hearing you brag about what a success you’ve become and how you’ve managed to refine your skill. It’s not like bragging about sex; nobody’s going to roll their eyes. On the contrary, they may just be waiting for you to finish talking to your current customer so they can be next in line to benefit from your skill. How awesome to have clients lining up to spend time with you! Your reputation is out there flying like a flag for all the world to see and they’re watching it! When you’ve achieved a sales status like this, it’s perfectly acceptable to brag and say, “Yes! I’m that good!” and show off proof of that with a massive stack of new orders.

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The secret of being successful in selling is the ability to transmit your energy and your enthusiasm about your product or service. If you fail to do that, you will not sell. If you want to learn how to transfer your energy into sales enthusiasm to improve your career and life, get my book “Selling Is Better Than Sex” today!

www.SellingIsBetter.com

You’re a sales genius. They love you; they trust you; and some of them keep on coming back for more. However, you can very suddenly go from Hero to Zero if you don’t keep your sales figures up to scratch. As a sales genius, you’ll be working hard to have deals lined up for weeks in advance so that you’re not enslaved by what has been referred to as “the Curse of a Sales Job”.

Working month to month, just treading water in the hopes of staying afloat, does not make you a super-sales-hero. You need to plan ahead – take the long-term view and line up those deals to ensure you maintain your status. This is what makes you great – and able to achieve your fullest potential. Again, this is hard work and dedication – but it is fuelled by your passion for selling and your dream to achieve all that you can.

You must realize that customers are available for everyone, at any time and at any age. Not so when it comes to sex, right? No – even with a reputation as a serial womanizer, you can go for weeks or even months at a time without having a beautiful woman to accompany you to social gatherings. That’s the quickest way to dissolve your reputation! But the beauty of sales is that there will always be someone who needs something that you’ve got – you just need to find them and approach the sale in an appropriate way, depending on their needs.

And, with selling, buying leads is also a legitimate way to generate sales – it’s not against the law, either. So when you find that you’re scraping the bottom of the barrel in terms of customers and your pipeline is running dry, you can absolutely purchase a list of leads. However, when your sex life is becoming somewhat dull, or non-existent, paying for a “lead” is not exactly the way you want to go (nor is it legal – in most countries, anyway).

Cruising the internet in search of customers is perfectly acceptable too. You won’t find yourself in any moral or ethical dilemma when paying for leads. And you won’t get fired for typing “selling techniques” into a search engine at work. But wait and see what happens when you’re caught surfing the net for tips on “how to please…”

With all the technology that we have available to us today, the act of “cold-calling” is just about becoming a thing of the past. You can access so much information about a client before you even get to the first meeting. As a result, you will be better prepared than if you had just picked up the phone and dialed a random number in the hopes of charming yourself into another sale. With as much “pre-knowledge” of the customer as possible, you’re equipped to ask all of the right questions, and you’re able to listen to the client’s needs with a greater understanding.

If you’ve carried out your research thoroughly, half of the work is done. It can no longer be termed a “cold call” when you’re already warming up to the client and the operations of his business. Rather, you have the upper hand as you begin the call, knowing more about your client than he does about you. This means that you’re better prepared to approach him in an effective manner and better prepared to address the type of business that he has and the problems he might be encountering.

And besides, you don’t have to dial a “900” number to sell over the phone. If you want customers from faraway places, it’s not that difficult and not that expensive either. You just pick up the phone, send an e-mail, and use any modern technology that you have on hand. But try finding your dream woman from some faraway exotic place – you’ll pay a fortune in travelling costs and accommodation, and that’s before you’ve even taken her out to dinner.

Yet again we can prove that selling is better than sex – and far less risky too. Finding new customers won’t get you into trouble either. You can have as many customers as you want, and as many as you can handle!

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The secret of being successful in selling is the ability to transmit your energy and your enthusiasm about your product or service. If you fail to do that, you will not sell. If you want to learn how to transfer your energy into sales enthusiasm to improve your career and life, get my book “Selling Is Better Than Sex” today!

This book will provide you with more than 200 reasons why selling is even better than sex, and what you can do about it in order to improve your career and your life. This is not just another sales book – this is a revelation!

www.SellingIsBetter.com

In sales you’ll always know where you stand. No longer do you have to torment yourself with the question of your performance. At the end of the day, your sales figures will be the yardstick that indicates how well you’ve done in selling. You’ll always know how your performance was for that day, for each and every customer. The proof is in the purchase of the product that you’re selling.

No-one can fake a purchase or lie to you about how great your pitch was. Customers aren’t concerned with stroking your ego just to pacify you so that they can make a quick escape. If you’re great at what you do, they buy your product. It’s as simple as that. And if you’ve really impressed them, they’ll keep coming back for more. And they’ll tell their family and friends about you and refer them to you for your excellent service.

That’s essentially what they talk about – how great you are at performing in the sales arena. They don’t care what kind of physical shape you’re in either. They don’t sit around and chat about your physique or snigger about your six-pack that’s been left abandoned for years. In fact, most of the best sales guys are usually out of shape. You don’t have to concern yourself with sweating it out at the gym.

As a successful sales guru, you’ve got the customers coming in already, in droves. Because you don’t have to be concerned about your fitness in order to be a brilliant salesperson, you don’t have to feel embarrassed by selling with the lights on! In fact, if you turned the lights off, most of your clients might start feeling a little concerned about their own safety and well being. Leave the lights on; forget about the gym; in sales you can be a success regardless of what shape you’re in.

As well, what makes all of this a lot easier is that a new sales job comes with an instruction manual – complete with graphs and pictures and everything that you might need to come to grips with the basics. Imagine how easy some things in life would be if everything came with a manual? Sure, some of us are blessed with a natural charm and an outgoing and vivacious personality (among other things), but there are still things to learn.

There aren’t too many of us that can be really successful without further enhancing our education. It’s not like a few tips from your Dad are all that you need to make a good go of it. No – we start with the manual and we progress from there to more extensive, specialized courses in skill and technique. And then it still takes practice to perfect the technique. At least, with selling, you don’t earn yourself a reputation for being promiscuous when you expose your sales pitch to a wide variety of customers.

Let’s face the facts here – as a salesperson you don’t have to pussy-foot around your clients and question them in subtle, tactful ways to find out if you were any good. If you were good, they bought your product. Your massive sales figures at the end of each day will show the world what a sensation you are, a market leader in your field. You have the magic touch – you know it and you can prove it!

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If you want to learn how to transfer the sex energy into sales enthusiasm to improve your career and life, and learn about other 200 reasons why selling is even better than sex, get my book “Selling Is Better Than Sex” today! www.SellingIsBetter.com

The world’s oldest profession involves selling. One might even argue about which came first – the selling or the sex? In fact, selling and sex are so closely related that succeeding at either one of them can be euphoric, addictive, and good fun.
Some people might like to argue that selling is not better than sex. They believe it’s the other way round. In this post (and other following this one) I will give you many different reasons why selling IS better than sex.

For a start, it’s okay to make a sale in public.
In fact, the more people that witness the sale you’re making and the product you’re providing, the better! Also, when they see first-hand the customer’s satisfaction at having had an excellent sales experience, it inspires them to think about making their own purchase. This leads to word-of-mouth referrals where you earn a reputation for being the best at what you do. You become known as the expert in your line of work. But sex in public? Well, that may just get you into a lot of trouble. And let’s face it – a reputation for being promiscuous is perhaps not the way you want to go.

This brings us to the next point: that it is perfectly legal to sell professionally. The Ten Commandments don’t say anything about not selling. Yes, one of the commandments is “Thou shalt not commit adultery”, but Moses did not climb Mount Sinai to receive the instruction “Thou shalt not sell”. On the contrary, selling, bartering and trading were an essential source of income for many families, even in Moses’ time.
Nor is selling listed as one of the seven cardinal sins and the Pope makes no mention about the hazards of selling prior to marriage.

With a humorous twist, my posts will take you through the essentials of successful selling, illustrating that business can be fun and should be fun. Love what you do and do what you love. It’s about passion…it’s about creating the pathway for your own success and doing it with enthusiasm and zeal. Anyone who wakes up in the morning with passion in their heart will bound out of bed ready and eager to face the challenges of the day.

A positive attitude reaps rewards. It was Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company, who said:

“If you think you can do a thing or you think you can’t do a thing, you’re right.”

A positive attitude is the fuel that will drive your ability to achieve the tasks you undertake. Adopting an expectation of excellence and achievement is the first step to being successful at what you do.

You have the freedom to SELL! You can sell as much as you like, to whomever you like, for whatever the acceptable rate is, without exploiting yourself or bringing shame to your family name! Yes, selling IS definitely better than sex. And we’ll examine the reasons why more closely right here on this blog.

If you want to learn how to transfer the sex energy into sales enthusiasm to improve your career and life, and learn about other 200 reasons why selling is even better than sex, get my book “Selling Is Better Than Sex” today! www.SellingIsBetter.com

Today I am honored to have a guest blogger on my blog, his name is Dave Kahle and he is one of the top sales trainers in the world. Here is his article.

Sales Master Best Practices:

Has a systematic set of criteria for classifying customers and prospects into ABC categories

“You’ve got to show it in order to sell it.”

Today’s selling environment is jammed with an unbelievable array of “things to do.” Left without any mechanism to take control, salespeople can easily default to a way of going about their jobs that is characterized by being extremely busy at all the wrong things. We spend all day reacting to the pressures and demands on us. At the end of the day, we have been busy, but we’ve accomplished little of value.

The best salespeople understand that daily temptation to give into the urgent in place of the important. They understand the need to prioritize. And, when it comes to sales, the most important aspect of your job to prioritize is your list of customers and prospects.

The best salespeople spend the most time with the highest potential customers and prospects. In order to consistently do so, they need a system for classifying customers and prospects into categories based on potential – ABC. The “A” customers are the highest potential 20 percent of their account base. The “C” customers are the lowest potential 30 – 50 percent, and the “Bs” are everyone who is left in the middle.

Note that the discriminating characteristic is “potential.” So many salespeople categorize their accounts based on the quantity of their purchases. Thus, the A accounts are those who bought the most last year. But that view is historic – who bought the most last year. In our rapidly changing economy, that historic basis for investing your sales time is misleading. The issue is not who bought the most last year. It is far more effective to determine who could buy the most this year.
The best salespeople understand this, and develop a systematic way of determining the potential in each account. Having a defendable basis for their decisions, they are then free to invest their time where it will get the best results – one of the hallmarks of the high–achieving salesperson.

About the author:
Dave Kahle is one of the world’s premier sales training educators.  Since 1988, Dave has worked with over 400 companies, helping them to increase their sales and develop their sales people. Learn more at his website at http://www.davekahle.com

Learning multiplies with fun, Alen’s book proves it. It is simply unputdownable and highly recommended! Book is available at Amazon.”

Reviewed by Ashraf Chaudhry
Sales Trainer & Author of The Craft of Selling “YOURSELF”

Social media is changing hundreds of industries and professions, and sales is no exception. To recognize those members of the sales industry who in their use of social media are bringing together important news, intelligence and theory, InsideView has announced the full list of the ‘InsideView 20.’

This list of sales industry leaders is composed of sales executives, writers, trainers, analysts and more, all of whom are making savvy use of many of the social media tools available today and helping usher in the renaissance they like to call ‘Sales 2.0.’

Guess who is on the list too? Yes, you guessed right! Number 7  - yours truly!

See the whole list here.

It is perfectly socially and morally acceptable to sell to both men and women. No-one is going to question your taste or your moral fiber. You get to spend time with both men and women alike without even questioning your own integrity. You don’t have to choose whether you want to sell to either men or to women – based on your own personal preferences. It’s just part of the job and it’s absolutely, unquestionably appropriate to sell to both sexes.

Besides, selling is legal and widely practiced in every corner of the globe. There are few rules that affect your performance or your ability to sell. Selling is a lifestyle, one that can bring you immense pleasure. And it’s something you can do wherever you are, however you’re feeling, and no matter how old you become. It’s an ageless occupation that doesn’t rely on physical performance and won’t adversely affect your blood pressure due to over-exertion. Stress is only induced in sales when you UNDER-perform, not when you do it too much. They say that too much of a good thing is bad. But whoever heard of making too many sales? No, it’s a calling, a vocation, a livelihood that becomes part of who you are and what you do and how you do it.

And you get to do it with people of the same sex. In fact, you can sell to anyone regardless of race, sex or marital status! You don’t have to worry about what your friends or folks will say when they see you with your clients. You don’t have to sneak around for fear of their disapproval of your client’s appearance or personal preference about anything. You don’t have to check for a wedding band or make sure that the person you’re chatting with is, in fact, a real woman or man. It matters not. You’re a salesperson and you have no qualms when it comes to creed, gender or color. It also doesn’t matter what line of work the customer is in.

Selling is such a widely accepted form of doing business that it’s acceptable for you to even offer your product to a nun. That’s right. You can just swagger right on up to her and show her your product without offending her or causing her to run away. Even the clergy aren’t forbidden from spending time with you. Your priest won’t get into trouble for having a meeting with you after church. A little sales rendezvous. It’s a fact! Priests aren’t sworn to give up selling!

Another great aspect of selling (regardless of whether it’s to a man or a woman) is that you don’t even have to spend time getting to know the client personally. You’re not obliged to wine and dine your customer in a bid to get to know them better. There’s really no need to hear about their past history, where they grew up, where they went to school, what they do for a living, or what their medical history is. You don’t have to ask those questions.

It is perfectly acceptable to sell something to a complete stranger. You can safely walk up to someone previously unknown to you and simply say,

“Hi! I have something really special that I’d like to show you.”

In a different context this could earn you a slap in the face. But in the context of selling, you’re pretty safe, unless you can see that the potential customer has absolutely no interest in buying whatsoever.

What’s more, you’re able to proclaim your love for selling freely. You can shout it from the mountain tops and not fear any retribution. You can proclaim your passion and ability to sell successfully to both men and women, black and white, young and old, and not fear getting dragged out into the street and publicly flogged.

Managing large numbers of sales or co-coordinating a group of salespeople makes you neither a pimp nor a prostitute. Sitting around the family dinner table discussing the antics of your various clients will also not be met with uncomfortable silences or disapproving glares. In fact, in this culturally rich and diverse world that we live in, it is expected that you would have an array of clients from many different backgrounds, and you might even serve them on a regular basis. You cannot be branded as being bi-sexual for selling to both men and women and you can’t even boast about it. It’s pretty much the accepted norm that you’ll flaunt your product to whoever comes your way, regardless of gender or who they are or what they do. You bat for both teams and that is perfectly okay, by everyone’s standards!

About the Book:

In Selling is Better than Sex, Alen Majer takes you through the essentials of successful selling with a humorous twist; illustrating that business can be fun and should be fun. It will help you realize that selling is more than just a 9 to 5 job. This book will provide you with more than 200 reasons why selling is even better than sex, and what you can do about it in order to improve your career and your life. This is not just another sales book – this is a revelation!

Read the reviews here and/or download a first chapter from the book Selling Is Better Than Sex - www.sellingisbetter.com

You can’t expect to get the sale 100% of the time. Sometimes the sale is lost to conditions beyond your control. But it does help to understand more about those deals that slip through your fingers when they just may have been saved by foresight and a little more training.

In order to understand the cause of a lost sale and to find ways of overcoming these in the future, it is necessary to make a careful analysis of the factors that come into a potential sale:

1. The Salesperson
2. The Product or Service
3. The Prospect

The Salesperson

-    I didn’t pay enough attention to my service delivery

As the salesperson, top-notch service and attentiveness is par for the course. You cannot expect to woo a prospect and then obtain his business if you pay no attention to the details of your dealings with him. Even the finer points make a difference, such as keeping your appointments and being on time, EVERY time! If your service delivery is poor before you’ve even met with the prospect he probably expects it to become even worse once he’s purchased your product. Your prospect will be inclined to head for the hills before he’ll commit to a contract with you.

-    I couldn’t control my frustration when the prospect kept me waiting

Patience and self-control are admirable and indispensable tools that you will need in order to maintain high levels of service. The business that you don’t get today might just come through to you tomorrow, as long as your prospect has been impressed by your knowledge, dedication and professionalism.

-    I didn’t have a good understanding of the prospect’s business or his needs

When it comes to success in selling, first-class service is an absolutely essential part of the deal. This includes being prepared for your prospect in every possible way by understanding his business and his potential needs, before you even meet with him. It will prove to be a great asset to your selling pitch if you can demonstrate a high level of understanding surrounding your prospect’s particular requirements. This will ensure that your approach is appropriate and that the talking points are pertinent to his business.

-    I was not well-prepared for the meeting

Conduct yourself properly at all times, demonstrating the fact that you are well-prepared for your meeting. When you’re unprepared, you may tend to ramble and talk about points that are not at all applicable to the prospect’s situation. He will lose interest and he may also wonder as to your level of expertise, if you have not managed to understand his business sufficiently.

-    I dropped my professional guard and tried to be too friendly with the prospect

Each of us is different and will tolerate familiarity in varying degrees. It is only appropriate to enjoy a professional relationship where you conduct yourself respectfully and from a polite distance, at all times. Unless there is an invitation from your prospect on a social basis, it’s never wise to become his friend when you’re dealing with a business situation.

-    I’m not particularly enthusiastic about the product that I sell

You MUST be enthusiastic about your product. If you are not enthused, how can you expect others to be? Also, if you’re not interested in the product yourself, you’ll have no desire to learn more about it and will be ineffective at sharing that information with potential buyers.

-    I couldn’t answer the prospect’s questions

If you are unprepared and do not know your product well enough, you will be unable to answer your prospect’s questions or even understand his needs. In order to sell a product effectively, you need to understand it thoroughly and believe in its value.

- I bullied the prospect into listening to my sales pitch

It’s your duty to educate the prospect on the finer details of your product and all its features and benefits. You also need to LISTEN to his concerns so that you may address them effectively and be an asset to the process of discovering his ultimate business solution, as opposed to “just another salesperson”.

-    I frequently repeated my statements

Repetition is sometimes necessary and can be of great value, when properly used. But to do so too frequently only displays a lack of training and an indefinite plan of presentation. It can also indicate a loss of self-control. If you’re well-prepared, you will use repetition as a tool to highlight noteworthy points, instead of rambling while you try to find your place.

-    I couldn’t identify the appropriate time to close the deal

You need to constantly keep your finger on the pulse of the deal and be ready to close the deal at the critical moment. Always be aware of where the meeting is heading and take control of how the discussions pan out. If you’re a step ahead at all times, you will be prepared to seal the deal when the critical moment occurs.

As the salesperson, you are the driving factor of the sale. Your strength and determination in closing the deal will ensure its success or failure. Being properly prepared to meet your client’s needs gives you the strength that you need to address the deal successfully.

Don’t simply be the force behind the sale. Be an EFFECTIVE and EFFICIENT force – and ensure your success. Most importantly, CONNECT with your client. Nothing can work on a broken connection.