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Old Selling Secret Improves Sales

Are you looking for a way to really impress your prospect? Here’s one of the simplest. Send a handwritten thank you note after your meeting.

In the day when technology often makes us feel isolated, a handwritten note helps make or reinforce the connection. This technique is ideally suited to heart-centered, soft sell salespeople. Few things tell your “prospectors” (prospects who are looking to buy a solution to their wants and needs) that you actually care about [...]

Using "Yes But" for Objections Can Harm Your Relationships

This habit of speech is one of the hardest I can think of to break. It’s natural when we feel attacked to defend ourselves. The problem is that we can harm a relationship we’ve worked hard to build. There’s something about saying “yes, but …” that undermines trust and liking someone.

Years ago I learned to never give a compliment then follow it with “but ….” In the mind of the person receiving the compliment, the “but” cancels out everything positive you said before it. In sales and marketing, whether heart-centered, soft sell sales or hard sell, you can do the same thing, particularly when handling objections.

It’s common to take them personally, to become defensive. As a result, we try a little empathy. We get in trouble when we follow our statement of understanding with a ”but …” to show our prospects or customers that while they made a good point, they are still wrong.
This is when you can win the battle but lose the war. So what’s the answer? Train yourself not to react. Avoid the battle. Develop your natural curiosity about what is really being said. Use heart-centered, soft sell sales by focusing on them. Start a dialogue. Ask [...]

Soft Sell Is Tougher Than It Sounds

Strange as it sounds, soft sell sales and marketing are, in some ways, tougher to do than hard sell because they require the self-discipline to focus on the concerns of others, and they require caring enough about others to delay your gratification of “closing” the sale. You must wait to describe how wonderful your products and services are until the customers are satisfied that you know and understand what their problems and/or desires are. When you have earned their trust by listening and by asking meaningful questions showing you want to understand better, they will be open and receptive to your advice. This is natural because now they feel you care about them, not just their wallets. Then, when they are ready, you can help your customers buy. [...]

Build Trust by Digging Deeper to Understand What Your Customer Wants

Once you understand your best customers’ problems or desires, you next need to ask questions to get a deeper understanding. What do these problems or desires mean to them? What would their situation look like if they solved these challenges or achieved these dreams? What would their ideal situation look like? In other words, how will you know when you have gotten to their goal to either eliminate or minimize the problems from happening or to gain their wishes?

You must build a relationship of trust. Sometimes this can be done in a manner of minutes. Because you made an effort to understand their problems or goal, you can ask questions to see if what you think might be true applies to them. Next you listen to their answers. It’s in the listening that soft sell sales differs from hard sell. Hard sell people can hardly wait for the prospect to shut up so they can close. Soft sell listens to find out what is really important. Dig deeper until you understand what is really important to your prospect, then, provided you have a solution that really works, help customers buy. You’ll find you both enjoy the experience when the purchase is mutually beneficial. As one client said, “It’s a [...]

Trust by Your Customer Begins with Your Understanding

One of my favorite American Humorists is Will Rogers. Although he died in a plane crash in 1935, he is long remembered for his famous line, “I never met a man I didn’t like.” Actually, the full line was “I never met a man I didn’t like once I got to know him.” It’s the getting to know him that makes all the difference in the world, especially in sales situations.

For me, caring becomes immensely easier when I understand something about what my prospect is dealing with. It makes them human, not numbers, people with problems I can relate to. This is why I stress the importance of defining your ideal customer. Why did they buy from you. What were the problems they needed a solution for that you provided?

Success in soft sell marketing and soft sell sales requires developing relationships. Crucial to doing this is building trust that you sincerely care about their needs. This happens naturally when you show you care by understanding their challenges and problems then showing up to work with them on developing a solution that’s best for them. Caring can’t be faked for long in a complex [...]

Soft Sell Marketing Resembles Farming More Than War

If your expressions about selling sound like a military commander planning for a battle, you probably learned from someone who taught traditional sales and marketing techniques. Their terms sound like a military engagement: overcome objections, take control of the prospect, and conduct a marketing campaign (which I still use to describe the multiple aspects of a coordinated program to find and sell to customers). Internet marketers have added a new one, squeeze pages. What a controlling sound for something as simple as inviting you to sign up for an ezine (electronic newsletter), usually in exchange for a gift. It’s no wonder business people call “old school” sales and marketing tactics hard sell.

People who believe, like I do, that selling is a spiritual service prefer farming analogies to war and fighting because, like farming, soft sell marketing sales and marketing nurture and cultivate relationships with perspective customers. Like farmers who care about their crops, soft sell marketers care about taking care of their customers.

So stop waging war with prospects. Start farming instead. Prepare the ground, plant your seeds, nurture and water them with helpful information, suggestions, and ideas. Weed out the misinformation. And prepare for a thanksgiving celebration of gratitude for an abundant [...]

Freakonomics Provides Huge Lesson for Sales Managers

At first glance, Freakonomics: A Rouge Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything, seems like a strange book for sales managers. It was a book with no unifying theme. However, these stories did indeed have a theme: motivation. The key point is that motivation is a complex issue.

This is especially true in sales management. The predominant motivator in hard sell organizations is money, lots of money. They also use recognition and other material rewards, like rings, watches, cars, and trips to exotic places. But these don’t always work because money alone does not make those of us who are soft sell marketer at heart sell out our values of caring about our customers. Serving them comes first, money second. We also have different goals so develop your programs to appeal to different [...]

If You Don’t Like Selling, It May Be Due to Forcing Yourself to Do Hard Sell Sales

When You Sell as a Service, You’ll Be Unhappy in a Hard Sell Company
Have you ever felt out of place? I have. I find it happens most often when I seem to share nothing in common with the group where I am. Despite having been in sales and marketing since 1979, I feel uncomfortable in a company or a conference where the sales style is hard sell. I have friends who excel at it. They like the game of jockeying for control. My orientation instead is a service one. I like affirming the client and working with him rather seizing control and dictating. It was really challenging working in a company where I was expected to take control of the client and to prescribe what he would do. One executive told me that I’m the doctor. It’s my job to tell clients what to do.

Had to Find a Way to Satisfy My Boss While Acting Consistent with My Values
I spent 40 months dreading talking to my office because I had to find a way to take their orders and attempt to carry them out using my style of working in partnership with the client. I believe that lasting change comes from buy-in, which comes from agreeing with the objective and contributing to the solution. That’s hard to do when you are ordering instead of proposing a course of action and discussing.

Judith and Jim Seek to Make a Space for Soft Sell Sales and Marketing People
There is now an association for people in sales and marketing who believe in selling and marketing as a service. It’s very reaffirming to have a support group who share your [...]

“These 9 Steps to Finding Prospects Who Want What You Provide are exactly what I need at this point in the startup & growth of my business. Keep them coming. “I now see that the Sales Consultant website I suggested you look at was slanted too much toward "what he can do", even though he claims to be a Sales guru. Last time I looked at it there was "too much to read" as well.” Dave (last name withheld at client’s request) Business Coach & Consultant

Help Customers Buy

Old Selling Secret Improves Sales

Using "Yes But" for Objections Can Harm Your Relationships

Soft Sell Is Tougher Than It Sounds

Build Trust by Digging Deeper to Understand What Your Customer Wants

Trust by Your Customer Begins with Your Understanding

Soft Sell Marketing Resembles Farming More Than War

Freakonomics Provides Huge Lesson for Sales Managers

If You Don’t Like Selling, It May Be Due to Forcing Yourself to Do Hard Sell Sales

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