At this time of year, there really are two types of salespeople – the ones who can give thanks for a great year, and the ones who ring their bell and beg for dimes.  Which are you?

Ah, yes, the holiday season is upon us. That means that this is the time to spend with friends and family, giving thanks, gifts, and appreciation for all that they give us. It’s also the season for something that is charming at its start, but – if we’re all honest – can get kind of annoying by Christmas – the Salvation Army bell ringers at every supermarket and shopping center. It seems to me that there is a parallel in the sales world.

I’ve always found that in selling, there are essentially two types of salespeople within the last month and a half of the year. Those who have had a successful year are in a very celebratory mood, because they already have a pretty good idea where their year-end numbers will be. They’re not worried about the “holiday objection;” instead, they are thinking about, and lining up, January business to get a good start on the year. The other kind has had a bad year, and spends their time running from customer to customer, ringing their bell and begging for dimes so that the less fortunate (themselves) can have a Christmas. Which are you? More importantly, would you like to be one of the celebrators next year?

If you do, it needs to start NOW. Over the years, I’ve written several articles on dealing with the “holiday objection,” (“talk to me after the holidays”). The reason that salespeople have trouble with this objection is that they don’t contribute value to the discussion. Too many salespeople spend their lives doing what I call the “doughnut call,” where they bring a box of donuts and ask for an order. If you’re one of them, it doesn’t have to be that way. If you’re NOT one of them, you’re still probably wanting to move ahead next year, so let’s talk about that. Here are some ways to redo your game for 2011:

Every call has a purpose. The biggest sales-killer is the purposeless sales call; i.e. a call that begins with no agenda and ends with no result. Stop ‘just dropping by’ to get the weekly order (or beg for an order); instead dedicate yourself to moving the relationship forward on every call. Ask new questions, present new products, get introductions to new contacts, etc. If the relationship is no better at the end of the call than the beginning, you’re wasting your time and your customer’s.

No excuses. Salespeople are great at making excuses and coming up with reasons why they don’t control their own destiny. Quit it. Your company blows? Find another company. Products are outdated? Find new applications or again, find another company. No new business? Get comfortable with prospecting resources like ReferenceUSA and Jigsaw, and build your business. It’s on YOU, champ, and there are more resources available to you than ever before.

Know your numbers and live them. Sales is a process, and like all processes, it has predictable results. While equal quantities of activity may produce differing results in the short term, over the long haul, you can predict your results with a given level of activity. Given that, there’s really no excuse (see above) for poor results – other than an unwillingness to live by the numbers. Know your numbers – how many calls produce an appointment? How many appointments produce a viable proposal? How many viable proposals produce a sale? Then EXECUTE them to achieve what you need. Or – just for giggles – why not go BEYOND the basic formula and overachieve?

Better your game. The basic formula of sales achievement is: (Quantity of activity x Quality of activity = Results). We just talked about the quantitative issue; when was the last time you worked to up the qualitative side of the equation? If you learn a new technique, every call you make is more powerful. The truly great salespeople work consistently to become better week in and week out, year in and year out. Do you want to be one of those people?

There’s no magic to this, of course. It just takes hard work and dedication. Even in this time of 10% unemployment, few salespeople who live these principles are out of work. Start working NOW to make 2011 your best year ever, and this time next year, you can be giving thanks.

I’ve been spending a lot of time recently teaching engineers how to sell.  As it turns out, they’ve been helping me learn something very valuable about selling, too.

For whatever reason, I have spent a lot of my time, particularly within the last three years, working with a lot of companies who have sales engineers – meaning that they hire people with engineering backgrounds to be salespeople. When I tell people about this fact, they give expressions of horror or sympathy, because of what they perceive as the difficulty of training engineers to be salespeople. What’s funny is, I love working with engineers. Want to know why?

It’s simple. Engineers know their numbers, and they understand repeatable processes. Engineering is all about creating repeatable processes, and so is selling. The only difference is that in selling, our processes aren’t 100% repeatable because we sell to human beings who have their own motivations. That said, every new skill learned, every new technique applied, is designed to raise our percentages. If a new skill does not raise our percentages, we ought not use it. There’s a basic formula to calculating your chances of selling success, and it is:

(Quantity of activity) x (Quality of activity) = Results.

Notice that I didn’t use variables like “luck” or “economy” in there. Those are factors that might skew your results somewhat in the short term, but over the long haul, your success in selling depends entirely onhow much selling work you do, and how good you are at it. Although that sounds simple, there are a lot of salespeople – and a lot of companies – that do not get it. Salespeople will look forever for a “magic button” to improving their results without measurably improving their quantity or quality of sales activity. Hence, with this in mind, let’s take an engineering-focused approach to a sales improvement plan for 2011.

Step One: Optimize Quantity of activity.

You will notice that I didn’t say “Maximize” quantity of activity. Sometimes, the “maximum” level of activity isn’t desirable; you then find yourself rushing through calls just to put up numbers. You increase your Quantity, but you can actually decrease your Quality of activity enough that your results are worse. Consider this: Most B2B salespeople have about 40 hours of meaningful selling time to work with in any given week. Let’s look at two simple ways to maximize your “Between the lines” time:

Cut the BS. Look, I’m no saint when it comes to sales activity. I have been known to make personal calls, pick up dry cleaning, etc. during that 40 hour window. But whenever I do those things, I first consider the penalty for lost selling time. Too many salespeople don’t. Make a log, in fifteen minute increments, of how you spend your selling time during the week. What can you cut out, and more importantly, what meaningful selling activity can you plug in? Push as much personal junk off to the after-hours, and optimize your selling time.

Delegate. Every task has a value, and every person in a company also has a value. If the value of the task doesn’t match the value of the person, you have an inefficient allocation of resources (gee, that phrase sounds like the engineers are rubbing off on me, too). Essentially, we want tasks delegated to the lowest salaried level that can carry them out well. Hence, if your time is better spent outside making calls than sitting at your desk writing sales letters, perhaps you might work with your manager to find someone to write those letters for you. Can a customer service department or inside salesperson process that order? Give it to them, and get back to what you do best. In doing these things, you will optimize your activity.

Step Two: Improve Quality of Activity.

This step differs from Step One, because in Step One, there’s a limit to how much you can streamline your workday. There’s no limit to how much you can improve your skills – yet I see salespeople who have been selling for 25 years and obviously haven’t learned anything new in the last 20. This is a process ofcontinuous improvement, gang. The selling environment never stops changing. When you stop changing, you are giving up.

Get up to speed with technology. I thought about putting this under step one, but the truth is that technology can improve your quality of activity much more than your quantity. I’ve already made myself clear on social networking (and if you haven’t read those articles, they’re archived on my site in the blog section), but you should be using technological tools like Jigsaw and ReferenceUSA to find new prospects, Google News Alerts to keep up on current customers, and tools like Constant Contact to stay in touch. If you’re not on game with these, all the Tweeting in the world won’t help you. Selling in today’s world is a battle of information, and the salesperson with the most customer information usually wins.

Commit to a program of self improvement. You should be a continuous digester and user of selling information; fortunately today’s technology puts more of this at your fingertips than ever before. Commit to learning one new skill every two weeks. Week one is to research and read about the skill; week two is to practice and adopt it. Repeat the process every two weeks for the rest of your professional life. Sometimes these skills don’t work in your environment; have the professional discipline to toss them out.

No Donut Calls. The “Donut call” is the lowest common denominator of selling activity; it’s “Hi, here are some doughnuts. Can I have an order?” There’s no effort at relationship building here. Don’t be that guy or gal. Instead focus on building the relationship with every customer you have, and developing them to their maximum.

Well, this plan is simple to write, but it’s not simple to execute. However, if you COMMIT yourself to executing these steps on a continuous basis, 2011 will be a lot better than 2010 – even if your 2010 was pretty good. Hopefully that’s a repeatable process we can all get behind.

No, I’m not talking about making sales in December 2010. It’s too late for that.

 Heck, it’s been too late for that for a couple of months. Is it possible to get appointments and sales this month? Sure. But let’s be honest – it’s not likely by now.

There are few things as sure as the “holiday objection.” That objection goes roughly like this: “Sure, Troy, that sounds interesting. Tell you what – call me back after the holidays, will you?” If you’re selling, you’ve heard that objection. There are reasons both legitimate and illegitimate for it, and best of all, there are ways around it. I can’t give you magic words that will automatically make people want to see you, but I can help you win sales in December 2011.

Here’s the secret: You win December sales based on the work you do from January through November. You don’t win them in December. As I noted, there are reasons both legitimate and illegitimate for customers not wanting to see you during the holidays, so let’s take a look at them:

Your prospect is closing out the year. If you’re calling on top management – or worse, the financial department – you’re going to get this objection a lot. It’s real, or it can be. Upper managers are worried about closing out their books in December, and they may not want to make time to see a salesperson at that time. Unless you can demonstrate that seeing you is a higher return on investment than working on the books, you’re probably sunk with this one.

They’re out of money. This one can be figurative or literal. Figuratively, they’ve spent their budget. Literally, their own customers are stretching them out financially (trying to make their own year-end) and they’re cash-poor. If this is the real issue, you might be able to work out some creative payment or shipping terms that work with their financial issues.

Of course, there are illegitimate issues. Or at least, there are issues that salespeople like you and I perceive as illegitimate, and all those issues boil down to this one:

They just don’t freakin’ feel like seeing salespeople during the holiday season. Sad but true – however, customers will take whatever excuse they can to NOT see salespeople, and since salespeople accept the “holiday objection” so readily, why not use it?

So what can we do about this objection? Sadly, there’s not much we can do right now. There are the usual combinations of sales words we can try:

“So what will change after the holidays?”
”If you’d like to do business after the holidays, why not get together and start now?”

“How about helping me make a sale, and we can both have a Merry Christmas?”

The truth is that these words will sometimes get you in the door. Sometimes. Well, actually, probably not very much unless you’ve already built a foundation. What we know is that we need to build a sales funnel, and we need to communicate value in order for prospects to want to meet with us. In December, both those skills are raised tenfold. Keep in mind that, in addition to the “holiday objection,” the normal reasons that people won’t appoint us still exist.

To win in December, you have to start in January. You start by understanding customers’ decision and buy cycles, and plan your sales efforts. Most salespeople don’t do this – if the customer in front of them won’t help them make this month’s quota or next month’s quota, they aren’t interested. By doing so, they lose sales opportunities. Don’t be that guy (or gal). When a customer or a prospect indicates a potential buy cycle, note it and use it – plan for the long term.

You can also create a reason to buy in December that doesn’t exist in other months. Most people are thinking of cutting price right now, but you don’t have to do that. What if you offered a heightened level of initial service for December purchasers that only cost your time? By doing this, you might be able to pull some sales forward from January (you’re planning your sales ahead, remember?).

Or, if none of the above options are available, you can simply get more aggressive in December. Step up your letter-mailing efforts at the end of November, and bite the bullet and make more calls, more cold calls, more networking, more whatever in December to hit your numbers. Yes, it’s possible.

See, here’s a cold fact. Whatever you’re selling (with the possible exception of beachwear in Minnesota), it’s being purchased in December. That means someone is making the sale. Shouldn’t it be you? Get cracking. If not now, then when?

Are you really a relationship salesperson – or do you just think you are?  This article will help you decide.

For the past 5 years, I’ve recruited an average of a dozen people per year for my clients. For each of those jobs, I’ve interviewed anywhere between ten and 25 people; that means that I’ve interviewed somewhere in the neighborhood of 600 to 750 people in the last five years. I would bet that every one of them, at some point during the interview, described themselves as a “relationship salesperson.” Unfortunately, “relationship selling,” which should be one of the most meaningful phrases in selling, has become meaningless through overuse.

Over the course of time, some sales skills become more important and some become less important.  In today’s environment, one skill that is becoming more important is the skill of written sales communication.  Unfortunately, based on what I see, one skill that is rapidly going away is – you guessed it – written sales communications.

  Hence, today, we’re going to discuss the rights and wrongs of selling with a keyboard. First, however, I want to make one very important point: The very best sales letter, brochure, or marketing piece is no substitute for even an adequate face to face sales call. Written sales communications should be designed to facilitate the sales process, not replace it.

With that in mind, let’s think about our objective for a sales letter (for brevity’s sake, I’ll refer to all written sales communications as letters). The purpose of a sales letter (or for that matter, any form of sales communication) is to advance the relationship between seller and customer. Period. The litmus test for anything you’re about to send out, therefore, should be: Does this advance the relationship in any way? If it does, you’ve got a good start. (This is true for letters to prospects, as well – if the letter makes it more likely that a prospect will see you, it has advance the relationship.) Following are some ways a good sales letter can advance customer relationships:

Educate the customer. This is perhaps the all-time best way of advancing a customer relationship. If you can impart some piece of knowledge that helps your customer do a better job of running their own business, you win. If you’re selling to end users, think about ways to teach your customers how to better use your products and services; more successful implementations reflect on your knowledge and expertise. If you’re selling wholesale, consider teaching your customers better ways to sell, market, and price your products. If you sell to a vertical market, consider regular communications that help your customers identify industry trends quickly. You get the idea. If you hadn’t already figured it out, “Educating the Customer” is the primary purpose of the HotSheet.

Tell them about new stuff. Most companies add products and services from time to time, yet many of those same companies forget to tell their customer base about the new products and services. If you’ve ever had a customer say, “Hey, I didn’t know you did that, too,” you’re probably one of those companies. Remember – our objective with each customer is to sell them as much of our stuff as possible. A letter announcing new products helps advance the relationship by letting them know everything you could be doing for them. Make sure you remember to talk about the BENEFITS of the new products, as well.

“By the way, we also sell:” This is a close relative of the “new stuff” letter. If you sell multiple product categories or lines, your first sale usually will not cover the entire length and breadth of your product line. You still want your customer to know what you do, so after thanking them for their first purchase, send out a letter saying, “You might not be aware, but we can also serve your needs in these ways,” etc.

Personnel change notifications. Although it’s not pleasant, turnover in sales and service can’t be helped. If your outgoing salesperson has a large customer base, it’s probably going to be difficult to call them all (either by phone or face to face) before one calls in asking for Joe, who no longer works for you. Be proactive and let your customers know who will be taking care of them after the current person’s departure. Personnel changes tend to induce fear in customers (that their needs won’t be taken care of), so the more proactive and reassuring you can be, the better the relationship.

Of course, the types of written communications you might want to do encompasses much more than I have space for here, but if you give each letter the litmus test discussed above (does it advance the relationship?), you will be far ahead of those companies that send out communications that do nothing for either the sender or receiver.

I mentioned that I might have more to say on the topic of “Credibility” in the coming weeks.  I do, and here it is.

About a week ago, I was quoted in an article on Fast Company’s Blog site regarding credibility. The article was good, but there were some things that I said that I wish would have made the cut. However, since I do have the power of the keyboard, I’ll rectify those omissions here. The basic thrust of the article was, “How important is credibility in sales?” Here’s my basic reply, as quoted in the article:

“Credibility is the cornerstone of a successful selling career. As salespeople, we place ourselves in the product distribution process between the manufacturer and end user. The only reason for us to be there is that we can add value to the process. This means discovering customers’ needs and matching our products to those needs better than customers could if they were just leafing through a catalog or going to an Internet site.” Let’s take a deeper dive into this topic:

Credibility is the characteristic that causes people to believe what you say – because it’s you who is saying it. “Credibility” has less to do with the words being said, then, than the person who is saying them. Without that credibility, there is no way for salespeople to add the necessary value to become a part of the sales process. Then we are simply middlemen, and in some cases an obstacle to success rather than a help toward success.

Credibility has two basic components: Expertise and Trust. When the customer sees you as credible, they do so because they believe, first, that you know what you’re talking about (you know their needs and the product’s characteristics well enough to make a proper match), and that you are a trustworthy person (you’re not going to lie, fib, exaggerate, embellish, or any other word that means “deceive”). Without this credibility, there’s really no reason for you to be involved in the customer’s buying process at all. So how do we build these two characteristics?

Both characteristics have to be both built and demonstrated. Here are some ways of accomplishing this:

Building Expertise:

• Become a student of your product(s); keep abreast of new developments and applications.
• Know what your own company does well and not so well.
• Become a student of the process of selling; especially know how to ask good questions.
• Become a student of your customers; work to know their objectives, goals, and needs nearly as well as they do themselves.

Demonstrating Expertise:

• Solve problems for your customers live and on-the-spot.
• Write articles for trade publications.
• Blog or send out e-newsletters with helpful tips and techniques to maximize your product.
• Become a “go-to” person for your customers; be interested in solving problems beyond what you sell.
• Make the most out of your face time with your customers.

Building Trust:

• Commit yourself to never telling your customers anything that isn’t true.
• When a problem occurs, accept full responsibility (even if it’s not your fault) and fix it ASAP.
• If you don’t know the answer, take the time to find it rather than guessing or winging it.

Demonstrating Trustworthiness:

• Tell the truth – even when it hurts.
• Don’t sell anything your customer doesn’t need, or that is an inappropriate application.
• Commit yourself to being a problem solver.

I should tell you that true credibility in the eyes of your customers is not something that comes quickly or easily. But it is worthwhile, and probably the best investment of your time you can make.

One great way to generate selling opportunities is to create a teaching seminar.  Here are some guidelines on putting one together.

In this space, we talk a lot about the conventional selling approach; i.e. data driven prospecting, networking, and other “push” methods of getting to our prospects and selling them. There’s a good reason for that – those methods WORK. They worked 20 years ago, they work today, and I’m pretty comfortable with betting that they’ll work 20 years from now. But there are other ways of creating a selling opportunity, and that’s what we’ll talk about today.

One great way of creating a selling opportunity is to host a seminar for your customers and prospects. A seminar is a program that teaches your attendees something that they can take and use. The idea of the seminar is that, by teaching them something, you add value to their business as well as prove your expertise. Since expertise is one of the ways that people use to determine who they buy from, you become a potential vendor.

The road to hosting successful seminars is filled with pitfalls, though (believe me). I’m a big fan of hosting seminars as part of a successful sales approach, and hopefully in this article, we can avoid some of the pitfalls and give you pointers toward success.

Pitfall #1: Selling instead of teaching. When you announce a seminar, your potential attendees’ biggest fear is that they are in for a 60-minute sales pitch, rather than an educational opportunity. The timeshare industry is notorious for this, but they’re far from the only one. If you want to host successful seminars, you’ll make sure that your program is an educational opportunity for your attendees rather than a sales pitch. In my programs, I typically keep any sales messages (i.e. selling my own stuff) to no more than the last 1-2 minutes. If you do your job and teach them something of value, you’re better off than if you’d spent 30 minutes babbling at your audience about how you’re the best vendor.

Pitfall #2: Bad promotion. To maximize attendance, you should have more than one potential way of getting the message out. You’re best off to include current customers as well as prospects, and have channels for communicating with each. Salespeople can invite people personally, for instance. You can, and should, also promote via e-mail invitations. Web sites like Chamber of Commerce sites, as well as LinkedIn, serve as great ways to get your message out.

Success Point #1: Have a great topic! To drive attendance and enthusiasm at your program, you need a topic that is interesting and valuable to your attendees. For instance, instead of “How to operate the new ZXY-2000 printer,” you might have a workshop on printing with vivid colors and rich paperstock while still minimizing ink and toner expenses. “How-to’s” on your product rarely work; “how-to’s” that most of your customers can use, regardless of product, can be winners. If you’re in doubt about what constitutes a great topic, ask your customers! And remember, they won’t all be winners; I’ve held a few clinkers. Sometimes the topic that sounds great draws little interest, and vice versa. Don’t get discouraged if you don’t succeed at first.

Success Point #2: Have a good environment. Your seminar should be at a location that has a nicely decorated, professional appearing room for the seminar; you should have plenty of parking; drinks and other appropriate refreshments should be available, and most of all – COMFORTABLE CHAIRS are important! If you don’t have such a setting, many hotels, Chambers of Commerce, and other institutions do. Don’t be afraid to move off-site. If it’s a lunch-and-learn, the food should be excellent.

Success Point #3: To charge or not to charge? Early on in my business, when I hosted my own workshops and seminars, I gave much consideration to charging an attendance fee. For my own business, the right decision was in fact to charge, and I do so now. When I charge a fee, I get a much higher show-up ratio, and the people showing up are usually more qualified. That said, this is your decision, and has much to do with the quality and value of the information delivered. Whatever you charge should be a fraction of the value realized, though.

Success Point #4: Interactivity is better. The more you can involve your audience, the better; people stay more attentive if they know to expect someone else at some point. You should also build in some time – 15 to 30 minutes is plenty – for attendees to network together.

There’s a lot more to be said about having a seminar for lead generation and selling purposes (as a matter of fact, this could be a topic for one of my own seminars), but these guidelines will get you started. The key question to ask yourself is this: What can I teach my customers that is topically related to what I sell them, and that will generate value and interest for them? Answer that one, and you have a topic. Then give it a shot. Don’t feel bad if it takes you a few tries to get it right.  It’s another tool in the successful salesperson’s toolbox.

Can a poker tournament teach us something about selling?  Maybe.  I think it can.  Read and see why.

A couple of weeks ago, I played in a Texas Hold ‘Em Poker tournament hosted by a club that I belong to. It’s a fun event, and not at all a high-stakes event (the buy in is $20, with an option for one re-buy if you’re busted after an hour). The total pot is then split up and the top four players get varying payoffs. It’s a fun evening of cards and friendship.

Well, something unusual happened this time. I won. Now, I’m not a great poker player; I only play half a dozen times a year or so. Hold ‘Em isn’t my favorite form of the game. And, there are some VERY good poker players in my club; the kind of guys that go to the casinos and win regularly. One of the players (who came in second) basically makes his living that way nowadays. So, after the thrill of winning wore off, I took some time to think about HOW I beat this guy, because I wasn’t “supposed” to. Turns out that I beat him with a lot of the same characteristics that have made me successful in selling.

See, I tend to irritate some players when I play. Not because I’m obnoxious or anything, but more because I don’t play the “accepted” way of playing Hold ‘Em. I’m not going to take a deep dive into the game here – there are plenty of websites that do, if you don’t know much about it – but here are the basics. The game starts with each player being dealt two cards. These are the “pocket” cards, and they are the only cards that are individual to the players. Everyone bets or folds. Then the “flop” happens. That is when three “community” cards are dealt, face up, in the middle of the table. Bet or fold. Then is “Fourth Street,” another community card face up. Bet or fold. The “River” is the final card, bet or fold, then show the cards.

The default position of many players, including some very good players, is to fold. What I mean by “default position” is that they start the game thinking of folding as the first option if the cards don’t come up to snuff, and are persuaded to play based on the cards. Hence, experienced hold ‘em players fold early and often, many times based only on the pocket cards. Here’s where I differ, and here’s where the selling analogy comes into play:

I play to win. My default position is “play,” and I’m persuaded to fold by the lousiness of the cards. HOWEVER – I don’t fold often after the pocket cards; I see the flop cards on about 75% of the hands that I play. The reason is simple – you can’t win unless you play. Folding early is a defensive position, playing not to lose. As you know from my work, I dislike defensive selling, the prevent defense – and playing not to lose. Hence, my default position is “play.”

I like information. One of the reasons I don’t fold before the flop is simple. If I do, I’m giving up only knowing 29% of the possible information (2 out of 7 total cards). To me, that’s not enough, and unless someone is getting really froggy with their early bets, it’s cheap to stay in and see the flop. Hence, I’m in most hands through the flop, and then I can make a decision using 71% of the available information. In selling, I often see salespeople making bad decisions with too little information. The impact can range from giving up too early to losing the sale because you proposed before asking enough questions. Work with good information.

Being different than my competitors.   Here’s another issue: If I tried to play the game the “conventional” way, I’d get killed. I know this because in too many past tournaments, I’ve tried the conventional way and lost ugly. That’s because some of the other guys at the table REALLY know the conventional game – all the odds and permutations – and I know a little bit of the conventional game. Since knowledge is key, I’m their chump if I go that way. Instead, I go my way, which means that the low cards that the other guys fold, I’ll play – at least through the flop (see above). My 6-2 off suit pocket cards look lousy after the first deal, but when two sixes come up on the flop, I’m gold because it’s a pretty sure bet that anyone else at the table has folded with a 6 in their hand. I won several hands this way. In selling? If you’re doing “me too” selling with the same lame questions, the same “me too” benefit statements, you’re at the mercy of price and brand. Be different and effective.

Consistent activity is key. You’ve seen me preach multiple times that consistent activity is the key to successful selling. It is in these tournaments, too. The “blinds” (mandatory minimum bets) double every 15 minutes. If you’re not winning at least one hand every 15 minutes (and folding most of the time), the game quickly gets away from you, in terms of your ability to bet. I watched several players bust out exactly this way, by not playing until it was too late. Once again, my “play lots of hands” philosophy worked.

Don’t let yourself be intimidated. When the final table got down to the final four, the “pro” player (who had about 2/3 of the chips on the table) magnanimously offered to stop the game, the three of us that were below him could evenly split the money from 2-4, and he could have the #1 share. I don’t know if the other two guys would have gone for it, but I simply said, “No, I think I’ll make you beat me.” It’s easy to give up in the face of a strong competitor, or not to even try to get certain customers based on your perceptions. Don’t be that guy. Take every shot you can, and you’ll get more than you think to pay off. In this case, the “pro’s” chip lead quickly evaporated and he busted out against me on the final hand. He was most displeased, and even commented that he “hated to lose that way to a bad player.” Bad form, I thought, but I was too busy counting my money to worry about it. Which leads to my final thought:

Whatever you do, make sure it’s well thought out, have a reason for what you do, and make sure it works. My own poker playing style is anything but conventional, but I have a reason for every move I make. I’ve played in about a dozen tournaments.  Most of the time I’ve tried to do it “by the book.” I’ve failed badly. The two times that I’ve played 100% my way, I won a tournament and made it to the final table of a 100-person tourney in Vegas. Does that mean I’m a great poker player? Probably not. I’d get chewed up by the real pros. But in poker, or in sales, I have a reason for every move that I make, and that reasoning is backed up by the percentages of success. If you do things the same way, you’ll succeed more often than not.

There’s one thing that should be in every salesperson’s briefcase before he or she makes their first call.  Want to know what it is?

From time to time, I enjoy engaging practiced salespeople and sales managers in conversation about selling on a deeper level. One such conversation that happened this week centered around the question, “what is the most valuable quality salespeople can bring to the table?” Answers ranged from “product knowledge” to “likeability” to “good communication,” and on into “expert questioning” before one of the salespeople hit the correct answer – the answer that trumps all of the above.

That answer is trustworthiness. The reason it is the trump card is simple; if the customer doesn’t believe what you say, it doesn’t matter how well you know your subject matter, and if the customer doesn’t trust you, they won’t answer questions honestly. Trust, then, is a prerequisite for all activities that center on communication – selling in particular. In that spirit, this week I’ll share a few methods for building trust with customers, but first I have to share one of the most outrageous stories of a salesperson ruining his customer’s trust in him. It’s too good a story not to share.

It seems that this salesperson was employed by a cleaning company that was providing janitorial services to a group of hospitals. The hospital management liked him a lot, and liked the service provided. They believed in him and the quality and integrity of his company. Then came a charity golf tournament.

As a friend of mine (who happened to be in the same fivesome as this salesperson) explained, “It was a typical five-man scramble; one guy would hit into the sand, one into the woods, one way into the rough, one guy would dunk a ball and one would get stuck in a tree somewhere (sounds like my own lack of a golf game wouldn’t have been out of place – but I digress). The salesman would hit first on each hole, then drive the cart down the fairway to ‘spot’ for the team. When the rest of the group had hit and went down the fairway, a ball would have magically appeared in the middle of the fairway with the salesman explaining that one of the shots ‘kicked’ into the fairway.” Yep – he was cheating in a charity golf tournament. But wait – it gets better.

It seems that the key decision maker for the hospital account was also in this same fivesome, and what was happening wasn’t escaping him. In fact, immediately after the 18^th hole, the manager left in disgust, skipping the post-tournament party. Slick Salesman wasn’t done, however. He did the same thing a month later – at a tournamentsponsored by the hospital. After getting a feel for this guy’s character, the hospital management began watching everything that the janitorial company did, and lo and behold, they found bad billing, cleaning that was supposed to be done that wasn’t, and other problems. Long story short, the salesman is no longer employed by the company, and the company no longer has the account. The moral of the story? Some salespeople believe that trust is solely generated by work habits and activities; the truth is that anything you do that shows a lack of integrity can ruin your trust. In that spirit, here are some ways that you can build trust with your customers:

Do what you say, and say what you will do: This is so painfully obvious that I hate to even say it, but I encounter salespeople on a daily basis who think nothing of not fulfilling promises in a timely fashion. When you make a promise to a customer, they remember it. When you fail to fulfill that promise, they remember it FOREVER. It’s not that tough; only promise what you can actually do, then DO IT.

Do the right thing, even when you think no one is looking: Someone once said that this was the very definition of integrity. Sometimes, you’ll be tempted to behave in ways that you would never think of doing if you knew a customer was watching; guess what? They might be. Several years ago, I was in Minneapolis making calls with a salesperson as a favor to a branch manager of the company I worked for. On our second call, the customer got a look at my salesman and immediately threw us out. It turns out that, the night before, the salesman had been out at a bar, got a few drinks in him, and started a conflict with another patron over a particular seat at the bar. Huge stuff, right? Well, it turned out to be. The other patron turned out to be the person he wanted to sell to the next morning. Behave like a jackass in public at your own peril; you never know who is watching.

Keep your big yap shut when it needs to be: These days, customer confidentiality is huge. Salespeople are regularly trusted with company secrets of their customers. Unfortunately, many salespeople are “Instant babbler, just add beer.” I’ve seen salespeople who think nothing of telling me incredibly confidential details about their customers – stuff that their customers would probably have a heart attack if they knew the salesperson was repeating indiscriminately. If you want to continue to have your customers confide in you, you must respect and value that confidence by keeping it.

Respect your customer’s boundaries: Sometimes, there are pieces of information that your customer doesn’t want to give, or places they are unwilling to take you. If that’s the case, consider it a measure of the increasing bond of trust when your customer eventually gives you those pieces of information or takes you those places. Continue pressing immediately for them and your customer will back off.

Of course, because trust is such a huge subject, there are many more ways to build it. However, this has hopefully given you some things to look for in conducting yourself and building trust in your customer base.

Are you planning for a long career?  There are things you should know.

 As you probably know, I worked in the car business for three years at the start of my career. In that time, I worked for three different dealerships (one long engagement, two short ones) before pointing myself in another direction. Since then, I’ve rarely crossed paths with people from back then; the car business tends to be a bit insular.

However, this morning, I received a resume’ from the owner of one of those dealerships. I doubt that he remembers me; I only worked for him for a few months (his dealership was the one that convinced me that the car business wasn’t my long term gig). This guy had, at the time, a pretty profitable business. He had a great house, a ’58 Corvette, and was making money hand over fist – which is why the tenure and tone of the resume’ was so shocking. Since selling out over 10 years ago, he’s bounced from job to job, mostly in one year or shorter engagements, and in a downwards direction. His “job objective,” as stated on the resume’? “A stable living for my family and some means for retirement.” I have to be honest – it’s sad. But here’s the kicker; his is far from the only resume’ I receive like this, which started me thinking about the career trajectory of entirely too many salespeople.

When I work with business owners on hiring, I always advise them that it’s better to hire salespeople with less experience, but who are on their way up, than it is to catch a salesperson after their career has peaked and they are on the way down. The reason is simple – entirely too many salespeople peak many years before they retire, and then they ride a spiral of unsuccessful short engagements to – where? I honestly don’t know. Yes, this is the pattern of the dealer I’m referring to, but it’s also the pattern of probably 20-25% of the resume’s I see. Many salespeople tend to peak, in terms of performance, about 15-20 years into their selling career. Then they hit the wrong side of the bell curve, and go downward faster than they went up.

My question is, “why?” I still sell, after 22 years, and to be honest, it’s more fun for me now than it ever was. Part of that is because I’m self employed and doing something that I truly love, but part of it is that the zest for the sales call has never left me. I’ve interviewed enough of the previous types of salespeople to know that this is the key issue. For nearly all of the salespeople that are on a downward spiral, something happened – some event or turmoil – that knocked the pins out from under them. Psychologically, they’ve never been able to recover. Let’s talk about how to make you NOT be one of those people.

What I find, in talking to them, is that they literally can’t remember what they loved about selling; they have too easy a time focusing on the negative things that have happened. This typically leads to call reluctance (low quantity of activity) and poor call performance (low quality of activity), which leads to repeated failures. Since selling success is so mindset-dependent (I can’t think of any other discipline in business where enthusiasm is so critical to performance), a poor mindset equals a declining career. Worse, motivation is so individually based, it’s extremely difficult for others to re-energize a salesperson who has lost their zest for the job. So, maybe you should start building some “Career insurance,” on the idea that you’re going to be in the sales world for 30 years or so, and you don’t want to be like this guy.

One common thread of most of the people I’m describing is that they can’t remember details of past successes very well; they are able to focus on recent failures. So, here’s my advice to you: start keeping reminders of your success NOW. Keep a journal, and make sure to put in plenty of details about WHY, and HOW, you are successful. Basically it will be your own training and motivation manual, and it will help you get back on track.

And finally, if you truly lose your zest for selling and can’t get it back, find another way to make a living. It’s a big old business world out there, and there are spots for people other than salespeople. There’s no shame in leaving the profession; there are other ways to have success.

Don’t get me wrong.I’m not arguing against hiring senior salespeople.  I’ve made some great hires of people who were in their late careers; having a long career doesn’t mean that you have to have a declining period. But it’s worth taking a side trip from our normal discussion of sales techniques to talk a little bit about the long term implications of our business, and give a cautionary tale of what may lie ahead – IF you don’t make the right moves now.