Profit from Ties

THERE are two very different generic perspectives on sales — either salesmen are heroes who make sure the business survives, or they are rather sad figures who expose the fallacy of “capitalism”.

In Philip Broughton’s book Life’s A Pitch, he argues that “we are all selling all the time” — not just in business, but in our relationships with others, when building friendships, buying and selling goods every day. In almost everything we do, there is an element of “selling”.

Whether we like it or not, selling is as old as trade itself, and trade is as old as mankind. As soon as our forefathers started trading with each other, selling was essentially born.

The same goes for relationships. When our very early ancestors began to realise that their survival rate increased when they organised themselves and began to live in small communities built around relationships that would help everyone to survive better, the idea of social relationships were essentially born too.

It is, however, important to note that these early relationships were mutually interdependent and were essentially about survival.

In modern times, some of these social relationships seem to have moved to Facebook and other social networking sites, but these relationships are not necessarily interdependent, and therefore the more traditional values around friendship and relationships are not necessarily the same either.

It is thought that since people started to live in communities, evolution helped to develop our brains to build strong relations with up to a few hundred people at maximum, with whom we could relate to personally and about whom we could remember lots of details.

However, as sophisticated as we have become since, evolution is not that fast and we can still only hold enough data for a certain number of close friends and family.

Research has shown that among the top five happiness factors, “family relationships” comes up top, followed by “financial situation” and “work”, followed by “community and friends”.

The work factor is not so much about salary as it is about providing meaning and the relationships we build at work, and making friends is generally very important to most people too. In essence, we need other people, and we need to be needed. We build relationships with people around us to fulfil that need, and these relationships are generally positive.

With regard to the connection between sales and relationships, we may not like the idea that relationships can be profitable, but in business, things that don’t make a profit don’t survive — it is as simple as that!

During the 1990s, marketing people came up with the idea of building lasting relationships with customers, and today we refer to it as “customer relationship management” or CRM.

CRM is basically a marketing, database and relationship-building tool, which hopes to build relationships that help the business to launch products that the customer actually wants, improve its service system, build customer loyalty and, therefore, gain more sales and opportunities for cross-selling too.

The database element is essentially managing all the data and knowledge, which gets accumulated for potentially up to millions of customers. The knowledge we as individuals store in our brains for our personal relationships now gets data-mined and stored on computers for customers. CRM is big business and many companies are pondering about how to manage their customer relationships.

The Chinese term “Guanxi” is often claimed to be the lifeblood of how Chinese business is conducted, and the equivalent in the West would probably be referred to as “personal relationships” or “connections”.

It is widely recognised that relationships in general are important for conducting business — whether in the West or in the East. However, the importance and expectations of the personal relationship may vary greatly.

There is no doubt that relationships are important for us as individuals as well as for business, and in business the aim is to provide profits through sales. If sales are built on relationships with customers, then these are essentially profitable relationships.

It is therefore fitting to conclude that if all businesses are built on sales, then sustainable sales are built on profitable relationships.

Article by Niels Kemp Rasmussen, senior consultant, Training Edge International. He specialises in helping clients uncover hidden potential and increasing performance in their organisations. 

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Win You Customers' Trust

Some 96 per cent of all sales professionals agree that trust is critical to their sales success.

However, few know exactly what customers need to trust them for, and how to build the dimensions that are critical to trust. This means that sales professionals lack the ability to maximise the trust factor and are therefore unable to provide customers with what they value most.

A recent global survey conducted by Huthwaite International showed that sales professionals had a clear understanding of the importance of trust.

Findings of studies across Asia-Pacific, conducted by Mext & Duxton Consulting, show that if customers trust a brand or product, 83 per cent will recommend it to others; 82 per cent buy it more frequently; 78 per cent turn to it first for things they want; and almost half are willing to pay a premium for it.

Further studies show that just a 20 per cent improvement in trust can improve buyer behaviour by a whopping 400 per cent.

Building trust

It is critical for sales professionals to understand exactly how to build trust for their specific company, for their product and for themselves.

A very simple example: human beings go through various “tensions” when it comes to decision-making about whether or not to trust a person.

For those who are married, think back to when you were looking for a spouse. On the one hand, you wanted a person who was stable, gave you comfort and made you feel prepared for all the future. On the other, you also wanted someone exciting, someone who made you laugh, motivated you and maybe even introduced you to something new, exciting and unknown.

Depending on your needs, you would have trusted someone either very exciting, or very comforting or someone who could combine both in a unique way.

This is just one of the three tensions people go through when making a decision whether to trust someone (or something).

However, think about how powerful it would have been for any of your past romantic dates to actually know what you were looking for. This would have given your date a very good chance to make you fall on your knees and pop the question.

Take the same tension (stability/comfort versus excitement/progress) and think about Google ad sales professionals versus Yellow Pages ad sales people.

By default, Google sales professionals have to emphasise much more on stability as they already sell a very exciting and progressive product or brand. There is a good reason for Google to heavily promote their founders in public relations to gain the “stability” that most old school brick and mortar companies have by default.

Yellow Pages, on the other hand, is a long established company or brand with a very physical product. The company would need to emphasise much more on the progressiveness of their product and its salesmen to gain the trust of their customers.

For example, they need to understand their customers’ business much better than anybody else and be able to support their customer with progressive ideas to improve their business.

The other two tensions work similarly but with different trust dimensions. Once all three tensions and six dimensions are worked out, you will get a very clear picture about where you stand, and what you need to develop to increase the level of trust in your company and products.

There is a clear guideline on how to train your sales staff, adapt your message and even analyse your product portfolio. This approach to trust has been used with clients widely across countries and in various industries.

It works in any industry, any country and any context. After all, understanding your customers or business partners and building a trusted relationship is the golden key for trust and business success.

Article by Laurenz Koehler, international consultant with Training Edge International and managing partner of Duxton Consulting. E-mail him at Laurenz@trainingedgeasia.com or visit www.trainingedgeasia.com 

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Connect with Your Buyer's Mind

THE role of the sales professional is undergoing a revolution.

Today’s buyers are savvy and well-informed about products, services and prices. Can you compete for their business with other sales professionals successfully, confidently and with ease?

Across the board in today’s market, the role of the sales professional needs to drastically evolve into one that is more tightly aligned with how a buyer makes decisions.

As a sales professional, you need to focus on the reality that customers will buy at their own pace, on their own criteria and for their own reasons, no matter how badly you want the deal or how attractive your offerings look.

Even if you have been fairly successful so far, the likely scenario is that you will be assigned a higher quota in a shrinking territory with cheaper and hungrier competitors.

Empower your customers

Buyers are more knowledgeable than ever, with the prevalence of social media and the Internet facilitating peer-to-peer information sharing and e-marketing campaigns.

The traditional sales pitch that used the “I know just what you need” approach may be off-putting to potential buyers.

While they may grant you a few meetings, you are no more than a source of quick tactical information — an “outsider” at best.

If you don’t like to be “sold to”, neither do your customers, who like to feel that they are in control.

Your role is to help the buyer discover the reasons he needs or wants a product, and then work with him to match those needs and wants to your product’s capabilities.

There is no deal until the buyer expressly states his interest to you. The connection must happen in the mind of the buyer.

Engage in value-based conversations

The common approach for a sales meeting anchors on doing presentations.

Sales professionals are prone to believing that a stack of well-formatted presentation slides and graphics will impress the buyer.

While it is important to give a good overview of your company, 90 per cent of the precious time you have with your customer should be spent on a meaningful, value-based two-way discussion.

This requires a deliberate effort from you to research and compile a stock of relevant success stories about satisfied customers who have used your products to enhance their business or personal lives.

Next, prepare a list of questions based on these success stories to frame the discussion with your prospective customer.

The idea is to ask questions that will invite the potential buyer to open up to you about his unique needs and problems.

A plan of action, to be agreed upon by both parties, can then be drawn up, and a more thorough evaluation can take place later.

Negotiate from a strong position

Being able to negotiate from a strong position hinges on the fact that you have taken the necessary steps to uncover value and that you have met with the real decision makers.

Value is defined as the expressed agreement that your product can address a customer’s business issues in the best way.

Most importantly, you have earned the customer’s trust and respect along the way.

Being customer-centric does not mean giving in to everything the buyer asks for.

It means managing a balanced, give-and-take relationship.

It also means saying a polite “No” at times when a request is unjustified, or when a buyer is not prepared to give anything in return.

Develop a closing plan early and stick to it.

Before agreeing to any discounts, you should confirm that you are the only preferred vendor, that price is the only remaining issue, and the date of issuing the purchase order.

These are fair questions, which the decision maker — if he also cares for your success — should be able to support you in.

Being a sales professional is an exciting career, but you need to see the game differently.

You can add most value to your customers’ organisations and their careers when you demonstrate strong empathy and focus on how they actually go about solving their business problems.

You are accountable for building relationships, which are based on your ability to offer solutions for your customer’s needs. This will ensure a long-term, satisfying and lucrative career.

Article by Julian Cheong, a senior consultant at Training Edge International, multiple winner of top sales awards and high-performing direct sales and account management professional for the past 17 years. 

E-mail:julian.cheong@trainingedgeasia.com or visit www.trainingedgeasia.com

For more information on our training programmes , please  contact us at 63365804