Introduction
The power of reflective selling is primarily in the hands of the sales representative. Those who can sell successfully tend to be fired up and fueled by challenges and adversity. A level playing field holds little interest for them. However, the most successful salespeople know when to lean back and listen as well as leaning forward to promote and instruct.
Selling as Servant: FUBU=For Us, By Us
Daymond John started out with a sewing machine, some money from his mom and an unstoppable fire. He promotes choosing a product or field that you are so fired up about that you would do the work for nothing. Luckily, Mr. John was open to feedback, because when he started selling his handmade hats on the streets of New York, he got plenty of comments. He took that feedback home, sat back down at his sewing machine and made improvements. With some additional marketing from old neighbor and friend LL Cool J, Mr. John’s product line took off. Constant striving for improvement and a desire to put feedback to use quickly so you can return to market testing have made it possible for Daymond John to build an empire. While the clothing business has a high rate of redundancy, John promotes the idea of creating a unique vision for his products.
Active Listening Can Be Improved With Technology
Salespeople are driven by challenge. However, comments from your potential customer can’t be viewed as something that must be overcome. Instead, use your sales calls to develop a rapport that includes supportive listening. Technology can help. Record and study your sales calls for factors including pace and talk time vs. listening time. If your potential client is listening more than talking, you’re losing an excellent chance to learn what they need and why. As you review your recordings, take physical notes of what went well, what didn’t work and what your client is really looking for. The act of taking notes with pen and paper will help you capture the items you really want to remember for the long term. A quality recording means you can truly listen during the conversation and learn from the recording.
Sincerity as Blank Slate: I Feel Your Pain
Kimra Luna is all about helping others feed their own fire. No matter how you want to expand your online brand or who you want to sell to, she can help. The “what” of your business is completely up to you. Luna is also big on delegating. By hiring staff to make her busy life easier, including a chef, she is able to commit her working energy to what she’s truly passionate about: helping others find and promote their passion. Kimra understands struggle and suffering. After moving off of public assistance and having to live apart from her spouse while he moved around the country to find work, Luna is excited to help would-be online entrepreneurs find their niche and explore their passions. She can’t help you find a sales or promotional field that fuels your fire. Once you’ve got a fire started, she can help you feed your flame.
Document Clearly
Sales and service are about tracking. If you sell a perfect product that will never fail or fall apart, you’re a fabulously lucky rep. However, if you live in the real world, you’ll need to be able to successfully service or replace some of the products you sell. As you get better at selling and providing reliable service, you may wind up leading new salespeople in this challenging industry. Your ability to track and document what they sell and to whom is key during their early stages, but once they’re ready to fly from the nest on their own, your sales and service tracking process needs to be easily managed by all sales staff. You need to demonstrate your trust in them, and they need to be able to do their jobs using a tracking system that makes sense. In addition, all sales support staff need access to the tracking software, pricing data and pay plan options. Salespeople have the skills and the smarts to work independently. A quality and easy to use tracking plan keeps an independent rep from becoming a loose cannon.
Service: From Door to Bed to Door
John Paul DeJoria learned sales as a child. He sold newspapers and Christmas cards door to door, on foot, before he was 10 years old. Life for this first generation American got harder as he got older. A poor environment led him into gang activity and put him at terrible risk for a future of failure. But DeJoria had a passion and wasn’t about to give in. By putting a $700 loan to use for product and packaging, he cut all his expenses to the bone and lived out of his car. From his rolling bedroom, he was able to deliver his product directly to his customers. John Paul Mitchell shampoo had a creator and delivery driver, all in one. While he now has a Tesla to drive and a separate place to sleep, he still works from a lean, simple palette. He limits the amount of brainpower he needs to commit to choices such as wardrobe by wearing all black. He doesn’t do email. If he can’t talk to you on his flip-phone, communication may be impossible. Best of all, DeJoria doesn’t suffer people who just want to agree with him. If you are in need of honest advice, he recommends seeking out the opinions of those who aren’t afraid to argue with you. From his kids to his employees, he strives to get the opinions of those close to him and celebrates honest feedback.
Surveys
Surveys can be a challenge to put together and frustrating to send out and track. However, your goal with collecting surveys needs to be to collect the gold. Yes, you will get some negative feedback. There are always folks who have their red pen out, looking for problems. However, your ability to sell should be rewarded as well as improved. Positive feedback results should be posted and celebrated. If you need to print off a copy of a positive survey to take to your boss, you can start the celebration trend!
Final Thoughts-Reflection
Salespeople spend their working day on a narrow balance beam. You have to listen to get the right product to the customer. Listening is said to be an act of love, so a sincere listener will hear more pain points than someone who’s obviously not focused. A sincere listener is also more apt to reflect well. You will need to follow up with your customer to provide positive service if anything with the product or process has gone wrong. Salespeople are on the hook for problems from raw goods to manufacturing to packaging to the shipping department. However, with a passionate salesperson and a great team to back them up, a quality product can quickly move from the stocking shelf to the truck and out to the client.