Here is a highly recommended sales education resource: Speedy KAVAINT.COM W3C Software Directory COUNTERDEAL.COM By: Twitter Buttons

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How To Handle The Price Question

I receive emails all week long asking me how to qualify prospects better, how to stay in control when the prospect is blowing you off, how to overcome initial resistance, how to get to the decision maker, etc., etc.. I like to call those reps back that actually leave a phone number, and when we do a little role playing I find out the same thing over and over again – They are all winging it!

Let me tell you right here and right now: If you want to be a Top Sales Producer, YOU MUST script out effective responses to the questions and objections you get every single day. If you think you don’t need to do this, that you’ve been in sales long enough to know what to say, and that you are doing fine without them, then I’ve got a little test for you: What do you say when your prospect asks you about the price of your product or service?

In other words, after you give them the price, what do you do? Do you:

Speedy KAVAINT.COM W3C Software Directory COUNTERDEAL.COM By: Twitter Buttons

Phone training is crucial to a successful business. Although much business is conducted on the internet, allowing people to be as far away as India and The East Coast of the United States, quick connection through the telephone will allow for a personal touch as well as a way of direct communication. Phone training will allow you to communicate with grace and ease. It will allow you to present yourself to others, as well as making them feel comfortable with the conversation at hand. Although this may seem clear, it is important for small businesses to provide telemarketing sales training to in house phone callers and to consider the level of phone skills that exists when outsourcing telemarketing.  The following skills are basic but can make the difference between successful telemarketing and failure. The first skill is to immediately introduce yourself and state why you are calling. Ambiguous introductions in a call can leave the call’s receiver uneasy and not relaxed. They may question your motives. Clearly establish your purpose. If you are calling for a sales pitch, clarify. If there’s a problem, identify it. This is not to say you must be blatant. You can be selective with your words to give a more positive message. Instead of calling it a sales passage, you can relabel this by using positive language to obtain a positive reaction, or for the receiver to keep listening. Use words that ask for the help of the receiver. Also indicate what they can specifically do. Personalizing to fit the individual will help them feel involved as well as a need to act. Aligned with keeping the conversation personal, ask questions that directly relate to the receiver. Ask about his experience with the product or service. People are interested in talking about themselves, and this is in outlet to do so, that allows for relaxation. As the receiver settles in, you are finding a groove with them, which will allow you in for your ultimate pitch. It is important to address any concerns or questions the receiver may have during the call. If the subject is not within your particular jurisdiction, help the receiver by providing information to who can help them. This will also gain trust, and keep the relationship open. Having this information available to the receiver will also improve his opinion of the company and its efficiency. The pitch is a critical part of the phone call. It will determine how it will ultimately end, and if you achieve your objective. When pitching, pitch to the individual. Before the pitch, cultivate knowledge about them. If they like this feature or are looking for something that will help with some aspect, recycle this bit into the pitch. If they want video editing software, and the new product has better features in this department, point this out! Do not waste their time with information that they do not care about. Tailor the information to the individual at hand. This will improve your chances of success with the call. The pitch must also show why it’s important. Show how it will impact them, AND how it can impact others. When the pivotal point is reached where they must now make a decision, be prepared. They may not agree with you. This does not mean that you should give up. Back up your reasoning. It is important to use already established points here. It is more important to make a solid point of a few ideas than to create a weak argument of several varied points that are not consistent. Repeat the value of the editing software; repeat what can be achieved with the receivers help. Then ask again. Do not ask the same way. Try a new approach. If asking for donations, ask for a smaller amount. If selling an elaborate product, try offering a small package, or a free trial. If the receiver still declines, you have one more try. It is important to try three times, to offer alternative solutions, as well as to make sure their no is definite. Try another approach. The key is to always be polite, compassionate and understanding. In this difficult economic time, many people will not be able to afford your services. When they decline, make sure you tell them that you understand how difficult it is. If you align yourself with them, instead of against them, you are more likely to gain their patronage in the future. Being polite is simple, but important. It leaves the customer with a satisfied reaction, even if he is not aware of why. When finishing the conversation, thank the receiver. Even if he has not given you his patronage, he has given you his time. If he has donated or bought a product of yours, make sure to repeat this to him, and thank him once again. Finally ask him if he has any further questions. Leaving the conversation on this note shows that you are working for him and addressing his concerns. It also will leave him with a positive impression of your company. Phone skills are important to selling the process, as well as creating connections all over the world. Even office personal will benefit from phone training, since they are your interface with your prospects and customers and will cast your public image. With phone training, your staff will soon be personable on the phone as well as on the web.

Personality research is not just for those seeking the ideal romantic partner or those trying to resolve emotional difficulties.  Although it can be tremendously helpful in these areas, an area in which it really has taken off is in matching employers and employees. Career assessment tests are valuable for both sides of the equation.  Today there are tests that have been empirically tested for so many different situations.  These tools can facilitate the decision making process for employers who are swamped with resumes and help a candidate who is ideally suited for a job to stand out.  Proper use of career aptitude tests is a win/win for both employers and job seekers. There are many different types of personality tests.  Some are criterion based (e.g. the characteristics that people who are successful in a given category have) and others work off the five factor premise (characteristics that all people share but which come in varying degrees in each person). The Myers-Briggs test with which many people are familiar is a theory based test.  It is an adaptation of the theories of Carl Jung.   The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory is a criterion based test that is used with both normal and abnormal psychological populations.  Five factor tests such as Cattell’s 16 Personality Factor Questionnaire (16PF) and the DISC assessment by Inscape Publishing are just for normal populations and are the ones most commonly used as career assessment tests. The DISC Assessment and the 16PF are particularly interesting tests.  They can be taken on line (although you need to do it through someone who is certified to administer the test) and actuarial interpretations are rendered.  It is fascinating to find out the results. The tests are not difficult and there is no right or wrong answer.  They simply ask test takers their preferences from a group of forced choices (in the case of the DISC assessment) or from a bipolar scale (2 opposite choices and one neutral in the 16PF).  They are entertaining to take.  There is no pressure on the test taker.  But there are some scales that will determine if the test taker is “faking” (e.g. those “trying” to be a fit for a job).  The best thing to do is to encourage testers to just be themselves. Test results will show both the tester and potential employee whether any given job is a perfect fit or if it is only something that the job applicant can do (but would prefer some other type of work).  This is the crucial ingredient for being happy on the job.  It is also a key to keeping employee turnover low. What types of things do these tests reveal?  The DISC assessment excels in identifying characteristics based on four factors: Demand, Influencing, Security, and Conforming. It can tell you whether someone has the characteristics to be a stellar salesperson or would be more suited to work behind a desk crunching the numbers.  It will also tell you the best way to manage the people on your team because you will learn what their communication style is (and your own too) and what it takes to communicate effectively with them.  This will have an extraordinary effect on your business. The 16 PF is based on five global traits and 16 individual personality factors.  It is an incredible test that has been used for more than fifty years (with revised editions) and has been tested extensively.  It too can be taken online with an actuarial interpretation.  The categories include such items as extraversion/introversion, concrete thinker/abstract thinker, dominance/compliant, openness to change/resistant to change, rule consciousness, self-reliance, perfectionism and so forth.  Computerized analysis is extremely helpful because the 16 personality factors will influence the others (depending on the degree to which they exist).  The tests will also match up the occupations for which the test takers are most suited. Thus the test is ideal for employers who are wading through resumes and who want to make the best decision between viable candidates.  The test is also ideal for people who are interested in starting a new career but are uncertain about where they should start.  Career assessment tests are well worth the fee to use them because they will ultimately save money.  Unhappy employees who are not suited for their jobs will find other jobs as soon as possible.  In tough economic times they will stick it out but underperform or add negativity to the work environment.  Those who are considering a career change will save money by making the right decision about which educational option should be pursued for example. There are many, many other tests that are available.  It is important to make sure that the tests used have been empirically tested and have high reliabilities and validities.  Reputable test providers will be able to provide the statistics that substantiate any claims made.  They will also be able to help select the right test for the purpose that you have in mind.

In today’s economic climate, there is certainly no shortage in the number of sales resumes piling up. With so many to choose from, it becomes very time consuming and tricky to make meaningful comparisons. Most often, hiring decisions end up being based just on the work experience and job skills that are listed on the resume. Personal skills are more difficult to assess and very often are not a major consideration. They should be. A person’s “true colors” will often exacerbate difficulties in the work place. They are the reason that many people end up quitting or being fired.

People who are in sales are typically extroverted individuals and therefore know how to confidently discuss the subject they know best: themselves. What can be done to make the difficult task of wading through sales resumes easier? How can you be sure that you are hiring a person who not only has the right job skills but will be an asset to your business? What else needs to be considered besides work experience?

Here are some of the personal skills that you need to consider: personal accountability, self starting, results oriented, ethical, ability to preserve, stability, attention to details and so forth.

Although this can be overwhelming there is a way to make your sales assessments for hiring and training a lot easier. This is done by implementing a nonbiased system that allows you to objectively determine the true soft skills abilities that a sales person really needs.

Today it is not sufficient to use pushy, peddling tactics. The age of interruption marketing and pressure sales tactics is in decline and permission marketing has taken its place. Your sales force needs to have the soft skills for success in your market place. You can perform sales assessments that will first help you choose the individuals who have the strong sales personalities and then use it for your training programs. Individuals who have the right personal abilities will deliver the best results when soft skills are learned.

What is the best way to do a sales assessment? Sales assessment tests can be done online or in a separate room. This is a great way to eliminate any prejudice that the interviewer may have (consciously or unconsciously). The test should assess behaviors that the person displays, personal skills that the person has or lacks and the core values. These last two considerations are often hard to see during an interview because they are beneath the interviewee’s surface. If an interviewer were to directly question a candidate with the hope of further discovery, a candidate might “fake” it by trying to give the answers that appear to be sought. Good sales assessment tests will have built in controls that help prevent manipulation of the test results.

The sales assessment test should be one that is easy to administer and easy for the candidate to take. It should not be more than 20 minutes in duration. Online tests will be scored immediately for the interviewer to review. The behavioral and personality characteristics of the examinee should be delivered in a way that is easy to interpret. A good test system will provide a detailed written analysis as well as some charts that make it easy to see where a candidate’s strengths are.

Who should be tested? Since there is a cost involved with testing, it is wise to sort through the resumes and pick the best. These candidates do not need to be as thoroughly scrutinized as when testing is not being used. The test will help you make the final decision.

Now, here is an interesting consideration. Even if there are only a couple of candidates or you are hiring multiple people, it will pay to have them tested. Why? You will know their behavior profiles and be informed about the best ways to motivate them and manage them. This will increase the productivity of your team enormously.

This is why smart sales managers will make sure that their entire team has taken a valid sales assessment test. Each team member can be trained to understand personality profiles of everyone on the team and best of all understand the types of profiles that exist. Just consider how powerful this is. When a sales person is trained to first know oneself and then understand how to interact with other personality types, sales barriers are removed. Genuine communication is set up. Soft skills and permission marketing will reign. Your business will prosper because your sales team will be productive…even during tough times. Clearly, sales assessment is absolutely vital for hiring and training all your personnel.

In order to get the best results, make sure that the sales assessment tests you use are recognized and highly valued in the human resources industry. You can call a trusted small business consulting firm for recommendations.