Top 5 Sales Tips Today

Dec 13, 2021

I was browsing online to find what sales tips people follow to be successful.  After searching around, here are the best five tips I found:

1.     It’s not what you say; It’s what your customer believes.

2.     Never go into a sales call not knowing how you’re going to close the deal.

3.     Have a dedicated time set aside (either daily or weekly) to do your prospecting.

4.     Believe in yourself and what you’re doing to help your customers.

5.    Show up and show up on time.

Interestingly, these five top quotes are as important today as they were when I started my career in sales now over 35 years ago.

My father was a salesman and one of the greatest gifts he gave me was taking me every summer to work with him, traveling all around Northern California to visit existing clients while he was also trying to secure new business. His belief was one of service, and in my mind today, he over-serviced his clients in ways that one could not imagine.

It was not uncommon for my dad to help a client fix a piece of machinery or help unload a truck, while he was making a sales call. He believed that if you showed that you cared more about the client, then the sale will eventually come.  And he was sure right.

This ties to the first sales tip– It’s not what you say, it’s what your customer believes. My dad’s customers knew he was an honest human being who really cared about them, so as a reward, bought from him.

Tip number two is how to close. So many salespeople get so excited about having an opportunity to sell something, that they give little thought on how and when to ask to close. In commercial real estate, there was an agent that was proud to tell me that he had shown a prospective tenant over 30 buildings– but that they still hadn’t made an offer. Clearly, this an example of someone that should have been taught the skillset of asking for the order a lot sooner.

Tip number three is about time management– the Achilles’ heel for most salespeople.  At Starboard, we give personality profile tests to our new agents and one discipline that typically shows up weak in a sales profile is their organization skills.  This makes sense since salespeople are typically not analytical. They are creative, free-flowing individuals that deal with uncertainty every day, therefore organization often times takes a back seat.  But time management is the key to a successful sales career and without a daily organizational plan, you will constantly be struggling with finding enough time to what you need done. Consequently, you will eventually short shift your client’s needs and lose business.

Tip four is based on your own personal confidence.  If you don’t think you are going to make it, you won’t.  Every day you have to think and know you are going to win to close business transactions. If you don’t feel up to it, you will not succeed.  It’s like completing a put in golf.  You are five feet away from the hole, you line up your shot, but all of sudden your mind wonders and questions whether you can make the shot.  If you question yourself, you lose your confidence, and you will lose.

Tip Five:  This is my personal Achilles’ heel.  I tend to overload my day and because I talk so much, I run over my own time limits. Therefore, I usually run late to my appointments.  I have gotten better thanks to apps like Siri and Alexa that can remind me to leave for a meeting, but not being on time to a meeting, especially with a brand-new client, is a deal killer.

Calendar your day and stick with it. Set up alarms to ensure you give yourself plenty of time to get there. If you are going to run late, make sure to notify the person you’re meeting with as soon as you know so they have a chance to do something else while they wait for you.  Also, always give them the chance to reschedule if you are now inconveniencing them.

There are certainly a lot more tips that could be added to this list. But these five tips create the right building blocks for your success. All you have to do is remember and execute them.  Create a plan for yourself so that you incorporate them into your daily routine and then monitor the results regularly to see if in fact you are following through.

Written by: Hans Hansson

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