What happened at the end of 2008 and through 2009 was remarkable. It was an historic downturn and the worst economic crisis that any of us have ever experienced. If you worked in sales, you faced the hurricane force headwinds of demand for your product or service declining by an order of magnitude. If you worked in sales you worked much harder to produce results—results that may not have been what you or your company desired. It was the worst of times.

The end of 2008 and all of 2009 was as difficult a sales environment as any of us have ever experienced, and with luck, something we will never have to experience again. But the real trouble with going through periods that cause the kind of deep stress and entrenching that was required to survive the Great Recession is that the mindset that is required to survive sticks. You hang on to the entrenched, survival mindset longer than is necessary and longer than is useful.

At some point, you have to move from keeping your head down and plowing through in darkness to lifting your eyes to capture a new vision of a better and brighter future.

Will You Notice the Light?

I usually save my question for the end of my posts. But this post is really about the questions that you need to ask yourself now. Your sales results are the result of what you believe and how you act on those beliefs. At the halfway point of this year, let’s do some checking in.

Have you shed your entrenched, head down, nose to the grindstone, survivalist mentality for something more useful?

Have you lifted your eyes yet?

Have you traded old fears for new hope?

Have you traded your goal of survival for a new ambition?

Do you still believe that nobody is buying?

Have you made the choice to act?

Have you captured a new vision of what 2010 means to you? Has it changed from what it was in 2009?

A New Vision for 2010

The great danger in retaining the fear and the behaviors of the past few years is that they prevent you from capturing new opportunities. Those that believe there is a better future act on those beliefs and make it their reality. The find opportunity and they make opportunities. The first do so win, and they win big.

There is still time in 2010 to make of it what you will. There is still plenty of time for you to attach a new meaning to 2010, to create a new vision for what it will mean to you and your company (if you haven’t already). And there is still time to take the actions that will produce the results that can and will define 2010 for you.

But to see that vision, to really capture that vision, you have to lift your eyes and look up. Then you have to march forward and act on your new vision. There are lots of people who are counting on you to both provide the vision and to act on it.

Be changed by what you experienced during 2009. But be changed in a positive way. Capture the lessons that allowed you to survive; you may someday need them again. But don’t allow the fear of the darkness to prevent you from going out into the light.

Is it the easiest time in history to make sales? No, it probably isn’t. But there is no reason to believe it is still December 2008, either.

Lift your eyes.

Make your future.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Strange. “Selling is like life which is like selling.” Bold — Yes, I know…. And oh so very exciting… (grinding teeth sound) And so, when the vast editing team here at SalesBloggers.com decided to ask us to write about Sales Metaphors in the grand month of June, I had to resist the urge to throw [...]

Your personal development can and will do more to improve your success in sales than any other single factor. Personal development focuses on the one factor that is common to every sale in which you will ever be involved: you. Developing the foundational attributes of success in any endeavor and the foundational attributes of sales are the key to developing both your confidence and your competence in sales.

The word “simple” means that something is not complicated. It doesn’t mean that something is without difficulty. Selling is difficult. Here are five simple (but not easy) ways you can sell more.

Focus Less on Closing and More on Being Effective at Every Stage

Salespeople place far too much emphasis on closing. The problem with focusing on closing sales is that you are focused on the scoreboard instead of on playing the game well and playing the game to win.

Instead of spending your time on the eventual outcome, spend your time, your effort, and your energy on prospecting effectively to open new relationships, on making effective sales calls that lead to an advance in the sale, on building the consensus necessary to selling your solutions, and on building a compelling presentation.

Spend your time and your energy on ensuring that you are effective at every stage, and the score will take care of itself.

Focus More on Solving Business Problems

Making more sales means solving more business problems. Making bigger sales means solving bigger sales problems. Becoming the lifelong partner and provider of choice means solving the most challenging problems your customers face, and in doing so, helping them build a competitive advantage in their space.

To sell more, spend more time discovering these problems and helping your clients solve them.

Stop Selling to Prospects Who Can’t Buy

Your time is limited. You have to use great discretion in how and where you spend your time. There is no reason to spend time with prospects that cannot buy. The faster you can qualify prospects out, the faster you can move on to prospects and clients where you, your company, and your products and services can be of value and of service.

This means that you cannot pad your activity with sales calls that will result in no sales simply to make the activity goals. In the long run, your time is far better spent doing the heavy lifting and prospecting like crazy to identify prospects that can buy.

Study and Practice the Fundamentals

Sales isn’t about gimmicks, tricks, shortcuts, or secrets. If something sounds to good to be true, it is. You should leave it alone. The only certain way to success in sales, and to selling more, is to study and practice the fundamentals.

Instead of resisting the fundamentals, embrace them. Go to your bookshelf and pull off all of the books on sales whose titles include the word “never” or “secrets” or “closing“ or “shortcuts.” Take these books to your fireplace and burn them. You may as well search your computer for all of the similar PDF’s you have downloaded, as well. You don’t have to burn them, but you sure as Hell need to delete them. Let this purging serve as a clean break from any of this kind of thinking that may have crept into your thinking.

Embrace prospecting. Embrace cold calling. Embracing studying sales. Embrace writing a set of needs analysis questions that demonstrate you understand your business and your client’s business. Embrace learning to be a masterful listener, and masterful presenter. And most of all . . .

Learn to Close and to Obtain Commitments

Closing is not the single event at the end of the sales cycle. Closing is the ability to ask for and obtain the commitments that move a sale forward. These commitments have to be gained from the time you ask for the commitment to meet for an appointment all the way through the execution of the sale when it is eventually closed.

Closing should be natural and easy—if you have created value during each and every sales encounter. Asking for the commitment to move forward together is as simple as saying something like “I believe we have learned enough to be confident that we can move forward from here together. Can we schedule to take this next step together, or is there something you would still need from us?”

Is it perfect? No. Do you have something better? I am certain you do, and I hope you’ll share. But is it a Hell of a lot better than the Ben Franklin close? It’s not even a contest.

Conclusion

To sell more, stop focusing on the scoreboard and play the game. Spend you time solving your clients most pressing business problems, and stop spending time with people who cannot buy. Forget the shortcuts, the tips, the gimmicks, and the tricks and spend your time learning the fundamentals. Following these first four ideas will help you create the value that makes obtaining commitments natural and easy. Now go sell more!

Popularity: 2% [?]

Paying commission wisely is a big challenge for business owners and managers. Commission can either drive sales performance, or turn your sales team into a bowl of oatmeal. Designing a commission plan that drives sales performance isn’t as easy as it sounds. There’s a minefield there, and you have to navigate through it successfully to have a commission plan that works.

Here are nine thoughts about commission plans and compensation:

1. I hate the word “target.” I don’t like the word “plan” when used as a substitute for a job requirement. I even shy away from the word “goal.” These words sound too tentative. I had a target age of retirement at age 40. I planned to have $10,000,000 in the bank before I retired. I had a goal of buying a 10,000 square foot house. Yet, none of those things happened. So much for targets, plans, and goals. Did I mention I want to lose fifty pounds?

Why don’t you simply just say what you mean. How about “minimum acceptable revenue produced,” as in, “Derek, your MARP for 2010 is $1.2 million. Got it?”

2. Most commission plans are based upon a percent of something. But if the something is gray or unclear or inconsistent, the percentage amount will be gray or unclear or inconsistent. How can employees be clear and consistent in revenue production if you’re not clear and consistent in how they’re being paid? Clarity is king.

3. Don’t roll out a new compensation plan only to change it one month later because you had to rethink a bunch of stuff. Do your homework. Accurately predict your losses and other challenges that will arise with the new compensation plan. Plan ahead. Then implement it. No going back, no waffling, no negotiating – it is the new commission structure. If you must, review the plan annually and make whatever small tweaks are required.

4. Compensation plans should do the best job of compensating your best performers. It’s okay if your bottom 10% of sales performers quit every year because they’re not making enough money working within your commission plan. Hire a new group who won’t be in the bottom 10% the next year. Don’t worry about low performers. Do you really want them? Do you really need them? Make sure your structure compensates high performers.

5. No compensation plan will make every employee happy. Some won’t even make any employee happy. Do what you need to do to run your business. Compensation should drive performance. If it does that, you’re a winner.

6. Whenever an employee complains about your compensation plan and has a suggestion for you (“How about if we pay 12% instead of 10 %”), ask “What are you willing to give up to earn 12%?” They won’t have an answer. End of discussion.

7. Pay “super commission.” If your commission rate is, say, 8%, consider paying 9% once the salesperson meets their monthly sales requirement (or some other landmark), and only 7% commission when they don’t. That’s super commission, and better than paying everybody 8%.

8. Pay super-dooper commission. Add a bonus for making 10% over minimum expectations for annual sales production. That’s super-dooper. Use what you’re saving paying the low performers in #7 to pay your high performers (refer to #4).

9. It’s okay if salespeople make a lot of money…if they earn it. I’m amazed at the number of small and medium-sized businesses that believe, either consciously or unconsciously, that there should be a cap in salespersons’ commission earnings.

Sometimes it takes this form: New compensation plan is implemented > it works like it’s supposed to > the best sales reps make a lot of money > management thinks they made too much so lower how much reps can make the next year> high performers quit performing or leave the company. Let your plan work. It’s okay if salespeople make lots of money. Part of that money goes to you. What you want is lots of salespeople who make lots of money. That’s how you can make even more money.

Popularity: unranked [?]

I know the Sales Bloggers Union topic this month is “How Were Your March 2010 Sales.” Since this is December of 2009, the gist of the topic is that March 2010 sales are already being decided by salespeople’s actions this month (at least for those with a 3 month or so sales cycle).

But I want to take a look at your sales last March (March 2009). What can you gain by looking at your sales from last March? That was six months ago! How can it help your sales this month? Or next March?

Selling is a profession of immediacy. Commission salespeople get paid for what they sell today. The presence of weekly, monthly, and yearly sales goals stresses the need for immediacy. Given all the attention on the “What have you sold for me lately” mentality of sales executives and managers (I don’t disagree with it, I just think it gets out of hand in some organizations to the point that it is no longer healthy for the long term health of the business), it’s not common for salespeople to look backward to analyze performance of a previous month, especially when it is six months prior.

Here are five questions that will help you analyze your March sales from earlier this year, and then use that information to maximize your sales now.

1. Who did you meet with that is still a viable prospect, but who you allowed to drop off your radar screen?

Low-hanging fruit is tasty and accessible, and any salesperson would be a fool for passing it by for more high-maintenance fruit. But once all the low-hanging fruit has been consumed, a salesperson is confronted with either waiting for more low-hanging fruit to appear (thereby ceding control of his career to external forces), or going after fruit that requires more advanced  effort.

Follow up is a weakness of many sales professionals. They may have started with good intentions, but six months later, they’ve forgotten all about the follow-up and are pulling their hair out looking for new sales to meet the monthly target. What’s wrong with that picture?

The nice thing about letting customers drop off your radar screen is that you can quickly recalibrate and pick them up again. Radar is like that.

2. Who did you sell to, and why did they buy?

Salespeople are often just so darned happy to have a sale that they are energized to move on to the next prospect, hoping the magic will continue. But when we do this, we are overlooking the opportunity to identify the real reason each of our customers bought from us.

Were you in the right place at the right time? Was your pricing better than your competition’s? Did they like you or your company better? Did you do a better job of selling? What needs were met by you, your company, and your product or service that your competitor didn’t or couldn’t meet?

Completing an analysis to identify why your customer purchased can provide you with information that will help you over and over again.

3. What did you do to engineer a positive outcome?

Sometimes salespeople amaze themselves with the sales results they’re able to get. But a little constructive analysis can bring subconscious behaviors in to the realm of conscious thought. Conscious thought allows us to examine our behaviors, question them, and connect dots that may have been out of our consciousness previously.

If you can quantify your behaviors, you can repeat them. If you leave behaviors up to chance, they can’t be quantified. Find out what you’re doing that works so you can make it work better for you now and in the future.

4. What can you sell now to those customers that already bought last March?

Over and over again, I’ve seen sales professionals call upon their book of past clients to raise them from a quota deficit or worse. We need to cultivate sales from the fertile fields of our selling past to squeeze the most from our limited resources.

There just may be one or two or fifty customers you served last March who would buy from you again, if you’d only ask.

5. Have you extracted referrals from your March customers?

Have you asked? Did you contact them? Did you make it easy for your March customers to refer their contacts to you?

Maybe you intended to but never got around to it. Now’s a great time to get around to it.

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Here’s to March of 2009, and to all the Marches of the future, too.

Popularity: 2% [?]

ummm…. so March sales?

Please stop telling me about your stupid pipeline.  I know you have all the answers teed up for me.  I don’t give a @#$%…

I’m not your mom or you sales manager so stop pitching me on how amazing your three month selling cycle is.  Frankly I don’t care.

I am sure your pipeline is magical.

By the way, can I go back to that word “pipeline”?  Of all the major “P” words that play into a selling discussion:

…..Presentation

……….Pitch

……………Practice

………………..Process

…………………….”Pain” points

…………………………Professionalism

……………………………..Poise

There is a word that I don’t often hear — people.

In case you are not quite sure what I am getting at, take a look at your rolodex.  It’s all those dudes…

Sadly, your sales force automation platform screaming at you in your local web browser doesn’t give a crap either.  Sure there are a nice couple of fields there to put in first and last names and possibly a birth date.  (oooh…. maybe you can even put in a Twitter name)/

<whatever…..>

But your platform (which by the way, I understand your sales manager is stalkerishly addicted to) isn’t the road map to predictably building a kick-ass solution in March right now pre-Christmas.

It’s people…  You. Them. Us.

People relate.  People object.  People buy.

It’s people that we need to focus on.

The mathematics of making sure you maximize your time and attention are givens.  I am guessing that if you have read this far that you have mastered the art of engineering your schedule to predict your sales in March.

If that’s not you, go read some of the content that the other blokes on this blog write about (some of these dudes are pretty witty).

Know the formula of prospects to leads to contacts to buyers to repeat customers…

Know it and then improve it.  That’s your homework to do.

What I want to inspire you about is your focus on the person.

…..The other side of the sales contract.

……….The line item in your CRM with a price tag attached.

……………The entity “cutting the check” to you when you close the deal.

The person you are trying to seduce with your sweet sales love story.

Those persons generally:

1. Want to be appreciated
2. Enjoy funny, witty messaging
3. Hate to feel abused
4. Want to help others
5. Hurt
6. Think about what’s in it for them
7. Will invest in you if you ask them to
8. Want to believe in something bigger than themselves
9. Fear change
10. Worry about paying the bills
11. Want to feel like they make a difference
12. Need money to survive
13. Live pretty stressed out
14. Tend to tell you the truth if you ask the right questions
15. Lie to protect their own best interests
16. Believe in karma
17. Like being appreciated
18. Know when you really care
19. Decide if they like you pretty fast
20. Will give you second chances if you ask

And a bunch of other drama that you learned in Sunday School.

Fall in love with people — the people spending money with you preferably — and watch as you close deals faster than ever.

Forget about  your sales numbers in March.  Hit your quota by February and take the whole damn month of March off…

Popularity: 6% [?]

Everyone wants to differentiate themselves in the eyes of buyers. Yet they often pick the most conventional, beige, bland and predictable ways of demonstrating it. They pick the latest fads or are forced to do something that once worked, 15 years ago, for their manager and is now labelled as a “methodology”.

There are some great suggestions out there, for example sending hand written notes to prospects and clients as a means of standing out in the digital age. Another maybe connecting with all your prospects and clients on LinkedIn. There so many great things one can do, but I think the real differentiator is not what you do, but how consistently you do it.

What happens with a lot of these initiatives, is sales people see an idea or a practice, they say “Wow, I’m gonna do that and make some more money.”  For the next two three weeks or so they stick with it, then the newness fades, it’s another thing to do, it becomes work, and they stop doing it.  What also fades along with the new habit, is the enthusiasm you had, the spark that something new brings, and the way you look at your work, customers, and selling.

So while you try something new every couple of months, your customers see another sales rep who moves from one trend to another, and just as he is getting hand written thank you cards from everyone all of a sudden, they all or most seem to stop at the same time.  The one that gets noticed as being different is the one that sticks with it.

So if you want to be different focus on two things.   The first is to be selective and thoughtful about the things you do that are visible to the buyer or impacts them.  While shock and awe have their place in sales, their impact is temporary, like a sugar high, clients will not remember or take into account at the time of decision.  However something as mundane as a pre-planned call schedule for the year, say a regiment of calling your top 20 clients at least once every six weeks, and then actually sticking with it and not using everyday things that should be anticipated as an excuse as to why it didn’t get done, gets noticed.  The goal is to have buyers say “Now, I don’t see others do it like that”.

Second, once you have selected these things, the real differentiator comes by sticking with it, do it as planned consistently and across the board.  Again, I want to stress, this is not doing things for the sake of doing them, they should add to the sale, but if you focus on the right things and keep doing them, you will be seen as different.  As you may have read in my other postings I have a clearly laid out contact strategy for prospects; a combination of touch-points that include e-mail, calls, voice mail, and now a few other medium for messaging prospects.  Based on predetermined rules and factor, they get a regularly scheduled contact from Renbor in the process of nurturing.  I regularly get feedback that one of the reasons I finally get the appointment and subsequent deal, is that I was consistent, respected the buyers timeline, but did go away like my competitors; not only do clients like that, they want their teams doing that.

If you start a blog or other interaction with the market, stick with it.  I see a lot of people start a blog, at first posting a couple of times a week, once a month, every six weeks, last May,…  So what ever it is you are going to do, the real difference is are you going to do it consistently and long enough to matter to the buyer.

Popularity: 11% [?]

The challenge with talking about sales presentations is that it immediately invokes an image of a one way conversation. The only thing that can be worse is if it included a PowerPoint presentation read by the presenter. To me selling and presenting are two different things that only on occasion and under specific circumstances go well together.

Selling should be a conversation, a dialogue that leads to a conclusion that makes sense for both participants. The art and science of selling is the ability of the seller to steer the conversation on pre-planned path that involves and challenges the buyer to think.  By thinking you can encourage them to look beyond the status quo, and begin to explore potential solutions or alternative ways to doing things.

The danger with presentations is that they are open to a lot of presupposition on the part of the seller, and can turn into a spray and pray session, or worse.  Now I know some of you are thinking “well but what if I have done my research, and am presenting relevant and viable things to the buyer?”  I think research is good, but should be used to formulate to stimulate discussion, the conversation that sales is.  All too many sales people use research to show how much they know, how smart they are and why the buyer should buy from them for those reasons.  Don’t forget the old truism “knowledge is the biggest barrier to learning.”  This coupled with the fact that buying is very much an emotional event, you know people buy on emotion and then spend time rationalizing their decision.  Hard to get people excited talking at them rather than with them.

I know some say that at one point, when you have uncovered everything it is then time to present the solution, which is a form of presenting.  Maybe?  Why not deliver a “discussion document”, review it with the buyer, and have him make his mark on it, taking pride of creation and ownership.  When I sell the first thing I deliver is a document like this, and what really drives home that this is an interactive process, is that this document has no place for a signature like most conventional proposals presented; but it has all the elements, pricing, terms, date, etc. and it has all the emotional steps leading to a crescendo where no immediate signature is needed to lock them in.  They are so involved, they feel the pride of ownership, they ask for the contract because they can’t wait, they want it, they are like kids on Christmas eve just chomping at the bit to get started.

There are two situations where you may have to present, but even there, I think you can try something different.  One is in an RFP situation, where you have completed a response and now have to present.  The other is similar where a company uses the “swimsuit in a beauty contest” approach to making a decision, (boy there is a whole other post there, ha), the expectation is that you will come in and do your song and dance in 30 minutes and convince them why your dance is better than the other three vendors, because they always call you vendor, not potential partner, or potential trusted advisor, which are all the labels you want to wear, but you’ll never be anything other than vendor 3 of 4.  Unless you change the premise, instead of having dancing PowerPoint, ask them questions.  They haven’t thought it through as much as you think.  The other vendors go in and dance to a pre-selected song, tired and predictable, so you need to stand out, change the tune, and ask them questions.  What are they hoping to achieve, how will the measure success, how will it impact one department vs. another (it’s great when they are both at the table, the sparks just fly), what’s the impact of not doing anything, why now….  Most often you see a change of mood, after sitting through one “polished’ presentation after the other, they actually get to participate.  They usually see that there is more to it then they thought, they see that one vendor is genuine.  Because at the end you intentions not your presentation drive the discussion.

Again I understand and respect the need for proper appearance, stance, language, a little drama, intonation, and all the other things, but if you don’t engage and capture you can be Fred Astaire (or Michael Jackson), you’ll never go as far as a good question between the eyes.

Popularity: 13% [?]

I was fortunate enough to start acting at a fairly early age by participating in school plays. As a senior in high school, I was presented with the “Best Actor” award at a state drama contest. I went on to begin college as a theater minor, and have since appeared in many theatrical productions.

Now, I’m no Anthony Hopkins, but training in acting and theater has definitely enhanced my sales career. With one foot in the world of theater and the other in the realm of business, I offer a dozen suggestions to help you perform effective sales presentations.

1. Speak deliberately.

When an experienced actor first begins to stage rehearsals, they are repeatedly reminded by the director to slow down their pace of speech. Speech carries differently on stage in a theater than it does in normal every day conversation, so it requires a different pace that is suited to the environment.

Although a great sales presentation can be very conversational in style, an effective sales presentation often requires more deliberate speech than does a regular chit-chat around your family’s dinner table or with coworkers at the water cooler. Speak deliberately.

2. Know your script.

Maybe your “script” hasn’t been created word-for-word (although in some cases it probably should be!), but you still have to know your backwards and forwards the essence of what you are going to say. Actors, above and beyond all else, are a purposeful lot. Whereas many salespeople fly by the seats of their pants, actors prepare, prepare, and prepare some more to create the desired performance. Know what you are going to say and how you’re going to say it.

3. Edit when necessary.

Playwrights are likely frustrated by this, but directors may edit scripts to meet needs of a particular time, place, audience, or actor, or may unilaterally and subjectively attempt to improve a script. Salespeople need to do that editing work, too. Just because words automatically come out of your mouth doesn’t mean they’re the best words for that particular situation. Select the words that will create the results you want.

And if your words don’t have a clear purpose in your sales presentation, leave them out. Wasted words create distraction.

4. Know your character.

Is it important to be yourself during a sales presentation?

Yes (see #12). But it is also important to become the character that can achieve the desired sales result. The “self” has so many facets in everyday life that we all play many different roles anyway. Depending upon many factors, we choose roles to play throughout our lives. Don’t be a one character salesperson. Be the right character at the right time.

Understand the role you’re playing in each and every sales presentation. At times, this role will change slightly or greatly depending upon who you’re presenting to, or depending upon what product you’re presenting, or even depending upon external factors (a sales presentation in much of the world the day after 9/11 would probably be much different than one the day after New Year’s Day).

5. Make eye contact work for you.

Draw prospects into your presentation with your eyes. Look at all participants, and time your direct eye contact appropriately to achieve the desired effect. One difference between movie acting and theatrical acting is that on-stage performers can more easily utilize effective eye contact. Even with hundreds or thousands of people in an audience, a skilled stage actor can use eye contact to create a memorable performance.

6. Position your body where it will have the most impact.

Stage actors spend hours working with directors to determine appropriate placement on stage for any given scene or portion of a scene. Salespeople should also create proper placement during a sales presentation.

You’re at the kitchen table with your husband and wife prospects? Sit or stand where it will have the most impact. You’re in a retail store at your widget display? Do the same thing. Meeting someone for a consultation in their office? The same applies.

7. Use appropriate body movements

Body movement can capture the attention of your prospects. Just as a struggling actor might work with a movement coach to refine on-stage motions, salespeople should create motions that are effective and seamless. Our body is really the only thing we have control over, so take control and create movements that will enhance your presentation.

8. Don’t just speak. Tell a story.

Don’t just present information, facts, figures, details, terms, product information, technical specifications and the like, but morph this information into a story-like journey. Create a theatrical presentation that leaves them wanting more. A closed deal is the salesperson’s standing ovation.

9. Create some drama.

What creates drama in a sales presentation? Pauses. Unexpected verbiage. Contrast. Twists and turns. Gestures. Stories. Anticipation. Tension. Intrigue. Humor. Suspense.

10. Know when to give the spotlight to someone else.

Most often, this would be to your prospect, but it could be a team seller, the prospect’s infant crying in the stroller, or the soup boiling over on the stove. Rarely do actors get to have the spotlight throughout an entire performance. Although the presentation phase of the selling process is the seller’s time to be “on stage,” sellers must understand that they sometimes have to share the stage with others.

11. Engineer an emotional response

Theatrical presentations can be merely entertaining, and that’s not a bad thing, but the best productions I’ve seen have touched my emotions in some way. The range of emotions residing in human beings is endless, and we can tap into those emotions to help our sales presentations have tremendous impact.

It’s not that we want our prospects to break down in tears in mid-presentation (or maybe we do!), but subtle presentation nuances can spark emotions which serve to engage prospects in our presentation, and therefore help us to more effectively position our product to meet stated and unstated customer needs.

12. Let the uniqueness of you show through.

Different actors play different roles differently. It’s fascinating to see two different actors play the same character in different productions. Each actor brings to their stage a distinct blend of personal traits and a unique point-of-view which shapes their performance. When presenting, don’t forget to let you show through.

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Actors act and we buy their act. Some salespeople may feel that acting is artificial, or perhaps manipulative. I disagree. As consumers, we gladly pay money to watch actors act on stage and screen, and we don’t care that they might be different than the character they’re playing. In fact, we embrace it. I think salespeople should embrace the premise that presenting is partially acting, and utilizing some of the principles of acting can help create convincing and compelling experiences for their prospects, and in doing so, create improved sales performance.

Popularity: 10% [?]