Problem Solving Sales

This is where we are now. Selling is about buying, and the solution is about the problem. A solid sales approach is about more than matching the customer to the product. We now look at sales process, implementation, delivery, use and all touch points as part of the problem solving. A Subtle Change What is…

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Are Objections Harming My Business? Part 2

Yesterday we examined a couple of situations in which a business owner believes he or she is not encountering objections in their business. Today, let’s look at a few more situations, where said business owner is aware of a sales problem, though perhaps not the specific role objections can play. I have dozens of sales…

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Are Objections Harming My Business? Part 1

Are you using prospect objections as a force for good, or for evil? A prospect is not likely to begin a sentence with “Allow me to raise this objection…”, but that is still what they are doing. No business has every client agreeing with its proposals every single time. Following are just some of the…

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Good things happen when people Object

Objections in a sales or business conversation are a good thing. You read that correctly. Too often I have seen business owners, business developers and trades people of various sorts bow out in the face of objection. And yet when your prospects are raising objections they are not saying “No, thank you”. They are actually…

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Buying Triggers

Have you every asked yourself why your new clients buy from you? I don’t mean from you specifically, I mean what has prompted them to buy at all? In almost all cases, buying something is a burden. It is an interruption of one’s productivity, work or leisure time. Before a prospect even has a chance…

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Train Like You Are in Second

I have seen this expression altered slightly to “Train like you’re sponsored by Nike”. Both are good bits of advice. Always Be Learning An Athlete will benefit from continuous training, and a business leader is no different. The first part of this quote is “play like you are in first”. Whether or not you are…

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Nobody Wants Your Product

What they want is the outcome you will produce. People do not buy a B2B product or service for fun, or to do their vendors a favor. They buy solutions to problems, they buy improvements to processes… in other words: they buy the effect a product or service produces for them. Regular readers of this…

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Telling your Story

When to use your Mission Statement. There are three core audience categories for a mission statement – other than the business owner him- or herself: Employees Clients Investors and Executives Find out how using your Mission Statement to serve these three audiences will enhance your business success. I have introduced the concept of Mission Statements:…

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It’s Not Me, It’s You

You have heard me say this before, it’s a bit of a business mantra with me. Not my mantra: yours. Your business success will be determined by the people buying your product or service (buying is more important than selling, more on this in a future post), so make your decisions all about them: the…

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