For business owners, your sales strategy is just as important as your marketing strategy. Especially in the online space, the two go hand-in-hand. That’s why it’s important to understand Business Sales 101!
We recently spoke with Sales Expert Meghan Lamle on our podcast, A Little Marketing. She shared with us some of her secrets to sales success.
So if you want to learn more about Business Sales 101 or need tips on how to level up your business’s sales strategy, watch our podcast, “A Little Marketing,” with Meghan Lamle. And, below are 11 tips that every salesperson should use to become a better seller.
Sales expert Meghan Lamle walks Nikki Gillingham and me through her thoughts on Business Sales 101.
1. Sales is Communication
Forget all the old-school ideas around sales, such as “what to say” or “how to close.” The key to sales is communication. When you get better at communicating and executing a point so that a customer understands you, you’ll sell better. So speak in a way that’s interesting and easy to understand.
2. Your Relationship with Your Clients is Everything
As a salesperson, you must build relationships with clients. So often, sellers focus on attracting new customers. But don’t neglect building relationships with current clients! If someone enjoys doing business with you, they will want to do it again and again. Relationships with clients are how you build trust. Your clients need to trust you, which comes from helping them solve problems. Provide your clients with solutions, and you will gain their trust.
3. Tap Into Human Behavior
Sales Principles are rooted in human behaviour: fear and pleasure. Understanding this allows you to see where the client is coming from so that you don’t necessarily have to rely on scripts. Learn how to incorporate either fear or pleasure into your sales – this is how you get your client to close.
4. Know Your Clients
When speaking with a client, don’t be afraid to take notes. Remembering essential details about a client will help you build upon that relationship in the future.
5. Listen
Much selling is listening. Listen intentionally and let your clients feel heard. Listening is much more powerful than any “magic sales phrase” ever could be.
6. Build Your Sales Team Up
If you’re a sales leader, it is so vital that you’re building your sales team up, not breaking them down. As salespeople, rejection is a part of the job, but humans are not designed to hear no over and over. So if you’re not building your team up positively, you will not have a strong sales team.
8. Pay Attention to Detail
Pay attention to detail if you want to start a conversation with a potential client. Either notice what they’re seeing and build upon that or point out something personal about them that will help you create a sales conversation. Likewise, notice what others aren’t, and do your best to make the initial discussion unique.
9. Analyze the Sales Strategies that Work
When something works – explore it more profoundly. Ask: why does this work? Then, take that why and incorporate it further into your strategies.
10. Dollars Aren’t the Only Way to Measure Sales Success
If you want to measure your success as a salesperson or your sales team’s success, don’t just look at the dollar metrics. Success is often measurable by the sales cycle: How long from when an initial client conversation starts to close. You can also gauge sales success by confidence. A good salesperson can confidently explain what they do to anyone.
11. Sales and Marketing Go Hand-in-Hand
Marketing and sales aren’t a hand-off process anymore. With all the information that audiences constantly consume, these processes have evolved to become parallel. Therefore, your marketing team must collaborate with your sales team and vice versa. Because while a customer is gaining marketing information, they’re also entering the sales process. Marketing helps sales, and sales help marketing – it’s a crossover.
We love to talk abut sales! So if you like to discuss business sales 101 with us, do not hesitate to reach out!