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By Percy Chong, 16th December 2014
Between learning sales knowledge and developing selling skills, the latter is definitely the more challenging one. Not just because there is a lot of practical work and physical coordination (of sight, hearing, speech and sometimes limbs) involve in skills enhancement, but more because there is the calibration of judgment that requires hours of tuning and refinement.
How much to say or do before it becomes enough? Does the prospect already “buys me” or like me enough to broach the topic of sales? How do I know that the prospect is already to buy and what do I do to respond to it?
Judgment is so hard to teach in selling. With so many variables and possibilities involve, not mentioning the myriad of abstract human expressions that goes on during the sales interface. The sales novice would be at a lost trying to pick up or even decipher the little nuances that the prospect is sending out during the meeting. And even if they have read the situation correctly, there is still the ability of responding appropriately. That judgment of knowing how much and what to do is even more challenging to deliver.
So the first thing about calibrating judgment is not to play up too much about personal views or opinion. The overarching principle of judgment focuses only on doing things “Right” in order to secure the right results! Sales champions don’t get sales by being nice or popular, or simply working hard, they get it by being right and doing the right thing.
Many sales novices have been observed to take a one-track approach with the handling of every selling situation. They are simply applying “themselves” to every situation. They are a one trick pony playing in a field full of different challenges and entrapment. The solution is for them to throw out all their old ways that are either not right or ineffective, and embrace the new. Example, they do not need to be overtly “nice” unless the situation warrants them to do so. If a strong firm demeanor is required to move the business case that is what they should be delivering to.
However, many of them refuse to change claiming they don’t wish to lose themselves or their style and become untrue…or worse not authentic with themselves. So in their belief, they hang on to their precious identity and self-worth, and they usually end up as authentic “nobody” in the sea of regretful sales person. With respect to selling, personal styles got little or no meaning, it is about picking up the right and successful style to making the sale happen that matters.
Let’s move on and assume that the sales novice is ready to change and adopt what is right to be successful. The next step is for him to start reflecting on every sales situation encountered; and question all possibilities of how each situation could have been better handled or managed in order to secure favourable results. With every real business case reflection, comes greater clarity and calibration of judgment and experience. It is no different from learning through multiple case studies in schools. There is also great merit in consulting with mentors or seniors to seek their guidance in your business case reviews. Do plenty of that and tap on their years of experience and unique judgment, and cut short your own learning curve.
With enough reflection and reviews done, all that is required is the exercise of these new judgments. Application will not be easy, and sometimes it gets cumbersome and even downright demoralising, but over time, your judgment will be sharpen to reflect greater depth and dimension in both reading as well as the handling of any selling situation. Do what is right today and be right for success!
Article contributed by Percy Chong (through Asian Sales Guru) |