We all have an inner dialogue, Gallway describes the negative as Self 1 and the positive as Self 2.

As sales people our inner dialogue might sound something like:-

The impact of negative Self 1 thinking on positive Self 2 thinking is called interference and this manifests itself in Self Doubt and Fear which disables people from selling effectively.

One way to improve your performance as a sales person is to identify negative thinking and to question it.

The easiest way to get your Self 1 to “Shut Up” is to challenge it, ask yourself if you really know these thoughts to be true, ask questions, of yourself, your prospects, your marketeers, your clients.

What is the truth?

Assumptions and judgements simply support our Self 2 thinking and act as barriers for action. Use facts against your negative Self 1.

The best way to support your positive Self 2 is to listen to it more, don’t dismiss it, write it down. Positive Self 2 thinking is a fuel for Salespeople and gets many of us through the day.

If we think we can and believe we can, we will.  

My view – Coaching skills are relevant personally, professionally across all industries and roles . Its not about being a coach it’s about using coaching skills to be a better sales person, a better manager, a better leader, a better parent.

Asking questions is at the core of coaching. What a great number of sales people need to learn is to do less telling and ask more questions. Through questions we can better understand the challenge a prospect faces and therefore propose the best solution.

The Coaching model GROW is the most widely know and used, the R represents Reality. It is unlikely that the first problem or issue that a person presents is really the problem. Questions allow you to get under the skin, to get to the reality, often described as peeling layers off an onion.

Uncovering the Reality is hugely important in Sales.

• What is the prospects real challenge
• What is really driving this person to look at your solution
• What are the real reasons they won’t return your call
• What are the real benefits they need to see above all others
• What can they really afford to spend

By training sales people to ask better questions, actively listen, to feel comfortable with their own silence and asking for feedback will improve the quality of a relationship between prospect and salesperson. Ultimately this coaching approach leads to shortened sales cycles as proposals more frequently meet the clients exact needs and ultimately more sales.

If putting yourself or your sales team through coach training is not high up on your priorities, how about trying this out.

 Try this out

With your next prospect meeting try this….

1. Ask questions for the first half of the meeting, don’t talk about your product or solution.
2. Give your prospect space to answer and allow silence to happen, often they will fill the silence for you and tell you more than they would normally.
3. Don’t follow a list of questions like a survey, allow the conversation to take its own course let the prospect drive it, let them talk.
4. Use the second half of the meeting to highlight where your product or solutions meets some of the specific things they have mentioned. Repeat their words back to them show them you have listened and understood. Avoid talking about your solution in too much detail.
5. When  you do tell them something always follow it up with an open question immediately, “What do you think of that”, “How would this solve your problem”, “What can I do to help you make this happen?”
6. Clearly the aim is not to piss them off, if you feel they are becoming irritated by your questions ask them. “would you like to discuss what we can do for you? Or are you happy for me to ask you a few more questions?”.

The aim is to have a free flowing conversation where the prospect feels in control, relaxed and listened to. Building rapport and trust quickly and giving the prospect space to share exactly what they think and need. The closer you get to the Reality the closer you are to winning the business.

When planning an online demonstration, presentation and/or online meeting there is more than the meeting application to consider. When preparing for the meeting take time to think through the following:

1. Keep it Short

Keep it short, 30 minutes – 1hour for a first meeting is about right. They may be able to see you on screen, even so their attention span is shortened by a 2D experience. Do not spend the first 10 minutes explaining who you are and what you do, get straight into asking them questions and showing them the solutions to the problems they share with you. If you have committed to a time make sure you stick to it, it is easy to see impatience face to face, you won’t spot a tapping foot online!

2. Be Yourself

In a face to face presentation your personality and presence can create an impression and leave an impact. Online you loose much of this impact so this is not a time to hold back, be yourself confidently and practice your online demonstration on someone you know first. Ask them for an opinion on how you come across and how this differs when you are face to face, this will give you an idea of where you might need to adapt your communication style to accommodate for online meetings.

3. Ask Questions

You don’t have the body language and facial expressions of your audience to guage the impact of what you are discussing with them. To account for this ask MORE QUESTIONS. Before the meeting prepare a list of all the things you need to know about the prospect / client / delegate. Here is a prompt list to get you started:-

• How did they hear about you
• Why are they looking at your organisation
• What is the reason for looking at your product or service
• What problem will it solve for them / the business
• What must your solution do
• Which other solutions have they looked at
• What would stop them from buying your product or service
• Who is not in the meeting that is involved in the purchasing process
• What are their timescales and budgets

Online meetings are often shorter, you can’t expect to front or back end load the meeting with your questions. So you will need to spread the questions out throughout the demonstration. Try asking them at points when there is a natural stop or break in the demonstration. E.g., when you are launching a new application, running a report, opening a document or file. It will also seem more natural. Having a list at your hand will really help.

4. Don’t over do the detail

To keep an online meeting audience engaged they need to be involved in the meeting, so talking at them for more than 5 minutes is sure to switch them off. If you need to use a presentation stick to a very small number of slides 3-5 at most. Things to include – Clients, reasons why clients choose your solution, awards / accreditations, pricing. Avoid – lengthly feature lists, too many words and diagrams, company histories, detailed product roadmaps.

When demonstrating the application / service stick to showing the features that the client wants to see. The most important questions at the start of the meeting should be “what are you hoping this solution can do for you”, “what would you like to see it do?”. Once they are satisfied it can do what they need it to do then move onto the features which will add value and differentiate you from the competition. Don’t over do it. Remeber Paretos Law – 80% of people only use 20% off an application. You may be excited by all the great new features, don’t assume they are.

Finally, online meetings do create additional challenges and they will not replace face to face meetings entirely. However the benefits cannot be disputed. For both vendor and client it; saves time and money, speeds up the buying process and enables more people to be involved where ever they are based in the world. Whilst online meetings process miss valuable human interaction they certainly make up for this in their ability to involve more people, any time, any where.

LinkedIn’s effectiveness as a tool for contacting potential sales prospects will depend on your ability to write a compelling message that expresses clear benefit for the person you want to reach. If the end recipient is two or three links away, your message also has to convince each intermediary. This is no easy task.

In my view, LinkedIn provides an exciting method for contacting sales prospects who are difficult to reach. It makes networking a viable alternative to making a cold telephone call however; it is no magic short cut. If you are serious about using LinkedIn for referrals invest in training to help you get the most from it.

 There are lots of companies who offer LinkedIn training one company I highly regard is Linked2Success.

As someone with a good level of LinkedIn experience here is a checklist of things I believe you need to have in place before even considering asking for referrals:

 
1 – Get your profile right. If someone refers you through LinkedIn your profile is the first place they will look. If they are not impressed, they are likely not to respond.

2 – Build your network. Seek to connect with the people you know, like and trust. People who would be happy to refer you and whom you would be happy to refer. Family and friends included.

3 – Get endorsed. An objective view of you is immensely powerful when trying to persuade people to buy from you. Don’t just trade testimonials from your networking buddies! Ask for genuine referrals from people whose business or life you have had a positive impact on and who have a story to share.

4 – Ask for connections. If you don’t ask, you don’t get. Based on Six Degrees of Separation, LinkedIn allows you to find out how you are connected to your prospects and then ask for the introduction.

LinkedIn is great for opening doors however nothing beats a personal call and a face to face meeting over a coffee. Even if the trust bond (see Sales Referrals Part 1) exists between the referral source and the prospect the onus is on you to make a great first impression.

LinkedIn is a tool in the process and not the whole process! Referrals are all about relationships and trust between people, the key is to use LinkedIn as a way of getting yourself in front of people. Don’t hide behind e-mail and social media, pick up the phone!

Timeliness is important because the referral source often tells the referral that his/her name has been passed along to us. The more time that passes between that communication and our follow up, the colder that opportunity can become. A long time between the two events might be interpreted as us not caring much about this new business opportunity or as our own lack of organisation, both of which can be detrimental to our chances with the referral.

First impressions are lasting, so we need to follow up quickly and professionally to make the most of the referral opportunity. Initial Contact is equally as important as timing. Often we’re unsure of the level of relationship between our referral source and the referral, even if we know how they are connected.

To compensate for this lack of information we need to make our approach as strong and effective as possible. As an example, with very little planning or forethought, we might say, “Jo Bloggs said I should call/contact you.” This puts the burden of detective work on the referral. In fact, the referral is likely to start asking us questions, which is exactly the opposite of how we want this conversation to begin.

Try this approach: “Jo Bloggs asked me to call/contact you and I promised I would.” As a result, we put a much more positive light on the conversation and dialogue to follow. This allows us to move directly into setting an appointment, qualifying or asking good questions to get key information on the prospect’s situation or needs. The point here is to take time considering what you are going to say and how you are going to say it whether written, on the phone or face to face. No standard e-mails. No LinkedIn templates.

Take 5 – 10 minutes before contacting each referral and think through what you need to say to make an impact. Don’t forget the referral source

Consider this bit of wisdom, “The more you give thanks for, the more you have to give thanks for.”

This especially holds true for those who provide referrals to us. To show our appreciation and to keep the pipeline full of future referrals, we should always follow up with those who refer us business. 

A handwritten thank you note, periodic reports of how the new relationship is proceeding and similar contacts all provide positive reinforcement to those who refer business to us.

Referrals will get you 10 times the profitability at less than 1/5 the cost of other methods of selling. None of us does it as well as we should. What’s stopping you from increasing your referral business?

Here are a few places to look:

1. Clients – This is obvious in the sense that most referrals come from delighted clients. We often fail to ask long-standing clients or customers on a regular basis, such as monthly. When they love us enough to continue doing business with us, it’s very likely that they can and will continue to send us new referrals for additional business. When these clients mention to the referral how beneficial we’ve been to them, the referral is much more strongly predisposed to do business with us as well.
2. Friends – Our circle of friends can be a tremendous source of referral business. Because of this, it’s important that our close friends know what we do and how we add value to our existing customers. When our friends also understand our ideal customer or client profile, they’re better able to look around for prospective referrals for us.
3. Suppliers – Strong relationships with suppliers can result in great referral business. This is particularly true when a supplier offers unrelated services to the same types of organizations as we do. For example, you would want to ask your accountant, web designer, executive coach, business advisor for referrals when especially when looking for B2B referrals.
4. Family members – This is a red flag for many of us who have sworn not to mix business with family. Nonetheless, those of us who have benefited from referrals through family know the value of asking politely and following up promptly.
5. Competitors – Bare with me on this, if you know who your competitors are and what niches they specialise in then a conversation about how you can support one another with appropriate business referrals is worth having. This may not work for all organisation however for many SMEs and consultants a partnership / associate model can provide a rich source of new opportunities. One way to start this dialogue is to develop an industry group, where you and your competitors can start a dialogue, e.g. Finanical Leeds. Or set up a LinkedIn Group.

How to ask for the referral

As mentioned above, people we already know, both inside and outside of our business relationships, can provide us valuable referrals. These people aren’t likely, however, to be seeking us out daily to give us the names and phone numbers of qualified prospects. So how do we get them?

We need to ask for them! Oversimplified?……….Yes, and yet there are certain approaches proven to be very effective in asking for the referral.

How we ask for referrals is a key point in the process. Consider this approach:

“Do you know anyone who can benefit from…….?”

In this situation, we give the referral source a choice between yes and no. This gives us approximately a 50/50 chance that the answer will be no.

Let’s increase the odds in our favor.

First, we need to help our referral source by starting the thought process on his/her behalf. Next, we need to move from the yes/no choice to a choice between yeses. Compare this more specific approach:

 ”Which businesses in your organisation would benefit from…..?”  Or,

 ”Who among your friends might benefit from…..?”

By being more specific, we’ve both helped the referral source focus on a single area and increased our chances of getting a name or two.

In working with delighted clients, try this approach:

“Much of our new business comes from people such as you who are already in [insert as appropriate]. Who among your friends elsewhere in the industry could benefit from the results you are seeing?”

This reinforces the value we add to our current customer and opens the door for referral opportunities with non-competing organizations. This can be particularly valuable when our customer or client views our work with him/her as a competitive advantage

Keep an eye out for part 3 where the focus is on how to contact referrals and a process for managing them.

There is no faster, stronger or better way to build a business than through referral. With the rise of social media the referral process is now easier and faster. Yes we are all being encouraged to join the social media band wagon and as we all struggle to keep up with Twitter, LinkedIn and Blogging etc, many of us are investing our time without focus.

Social media needs focus in order for you to see results for the time you invest and as a sales person seeking referrals is one of the best ways to focus your time and energy. LinkedIn is the godfather of applications in the cloud to do this – a later blog on this!
So to start this referral series I would like to look at the benefits of investing time in referrals.

So why referrals?

1. Referrals come from people we already know – We shorten the cycle of familiarity by simply working with someone who knows someone we know. Common ground already exists through a friendship, acquaintance or business relationship. This eases the pressure on the initial getting-to-know steps of selling. A trust bond exists (see below) between you and your contact which is extended via referral.

2. Referrals extend the network – We widen the circle of relationships with each new referral, thereby increasing our ability to approach that network for additional business, new business and additional referrals.

3. Referrals reduce sales expense – We reduce not only time but expense by asking for and following up with referrals. It costs 6 times more to sell a new prospect than it does to sell a referral.

4. Referrals add value to the source of the referral – When we follow up on the referral, get the business and create a delighted customer, value is delivered to the party who gave the referral. The referral source is credited and often thanked by our new customer. Many industries emphasize value by offering discounts for those who refer new business.

5. Referrals help you use your best sales force – Happy customers constitute our strongest sales force because word of mouth is the single most effective form of advertising. Product or service claims we make often require proof sources for credibility in the eyes of a prospect. Claims from existing customers carry instant credibility and seldom require additional information. (This is why unhappy customers can be such a detriment, because their claims of poor product or service performance are likewise seldom questioned.)

We know that trust is a strong basis for the buying decision. In typical selling situations, trust is the first and foremost issue in the mind of our prospects. “How do I know I can trust this person and this company,” the prospect asks himself/herself. We work hard and invest in the proper look of printed materials, show the right testimonials, ask good questions and listen closely to the answers, all for the sake of trust.

Brian Tracy, one of the top sales training professionals in the world, cites building the trust bond as the critical first step in the selling process. He says building trust with customers is 40 percent of the process, followed by uncovering needs, presenting solutions and asking for the decision. The value of the referral in this sense is simple, as illustrated below:

Trust bonds already exist between you and the customer and between the customer and the referral. The referral process instantly creates a level of trust between you and the referral, a great advantage for starting the selling process.

Why not start creating a list of people you feel you can ask for a referral from and its not just your clients and professional network. Suppliers, partners, competitors, friends and family are great sources.

Salescake is supporting a number of organisatons with business events throughout 2011.

For further information please download our events brochure here salescake_events2011

Event Calendar

8th February - European Mentoring and Coaching Council
How to sell and market your coaching business – Zandra Moore, Jennifer Holloway
3 Albion Place, Leeds – 5.30pm

22nd February – Leeds University Business School
Leading yourself and others through changing business landcapes – Havana Abid
YorkshireBank Lecture Theatre, Leeds University Business School – 6pm

7th March – CoachCloud
Running a successful coaching business – Zandra Moore, Jennifer Holloway, Zulfi Hussain MBE
Regus, City West Business Park, Leeds – 9am – 11.30am

29th March - Institute of Directors
Turning around Turnaround – Christine Elliott
3 Albion Place, Leeds – 8am – 10.30am

It got me thinking to last year when someone very close to me was made redundant just before Christmas. With a young family to support it was a challenging time. Like many who are faced with the prospect of losing their job they were not sure what their next step would be.   Should they try and get a similar job? Use it as an opportunity to do something different? Re-train? Become self-employed?  In darker moments, Could they get another job?  It is an emotional and difficult time for those effected and their families, but it can also be a great opportunity to change things for the better.

The problem this person encountered was confusion. Not only of what they should do, but also of what they wanted to do. Most people don’t have their careers planned out in infinite detail. They turn up for work from one day to the next doing their best until an opportunity, such as promotion, presents itself and then they plan the next step. To suddenly have your career path removed from under your feet through something like redundancy can send people spinning out of career control. Worries about money, responsibility, social stigma, even self worth can lead people to make desperate or poor career decisions. The good news is that for my friend it didn’t end like this.

Fortunately they were offered an opportunity to go on a two day self coaching course called RIDFEAR. RIDFEAR helps people in situations of change to develop the necessary skills to assess where they are, what they want and how they can achieve it. On the course they were able to meet with people in a similar situation from different sectors, get focused on what was important to them and what they wanted to do. Most importantly it helped them to re-build their self-confidence to make it happen. With a new found direction and determination I’m happy to say that my friend had several interviews and job offers within the month.

What struck me about the process they went through was that the focus was on helping the person coach themselves through the change, giving them tools to work through it and ultimately building their resilience to cope with any more changes life throws at them.

I (and my friend) would whole heartedly recommend any one either at risk of redundancy or responsible for managing the process of redundancy for their organisation, to look at this as an effective way to help people deal with a difficult time.

 For further info go to http://ridfear.co.uk/2.html