We hear all the time about all sorts of methods and techniques for closing a deal in sales situations, as well as other approaches that are designed for us salespeople to gain more business with our customers and prospects. While some of these approaches can be useful, there’s just no substitute for what’s considered one the best sales techniques around.
The technique I speak of is building great rapport with your customers and prospects, and having them feel (or better yet, know) that you’re 100% committed to helping them attain their needs, wants, and desires; But this is not how many salespeople are doing it in their own businesses right now, is it?
Frequently people will get into sales because they see it as a way to make big money, but they then fall into the routine of being forceful in their sales approaches, trying to move the customer in the direction that is best for the salesperson, instead of for the customer/prospect.
The unfortunate reality is these salespeople don’t realize their customers can see what they’re up to. Somehow these salespeople feel they’re not telegraphing what they’re doing in any way that can be detected by the customer or prospect they’re working with.
With this in mind, just once I’d like to be in a clothing store and hear a salesperson say to the customer, “You know, that doesn’t look very good on you at all.” Any salesperson that would tell me this would instantly raise their level of credibility! Yet there are a great many salespeople out there trying to steer their prospects towards doing deals that may not be the best ones for the prospects, but they’re the best ones for the salespeople instead.
Those salespeople who still practicing the “me-first” method must know one thing. Once your customer/prospect picks up on this behavior, your relationship with that person is sunk! Now you’ve become just someone who “sells” to them, but they now know that they can’t trust your judgment and opinion. They have to determine whether or not the product or service will work for them completely independent of anything you now say to them.
Let’s face it, the type of salesperson we all want to work with is someone we like; someone who we feel has as their number one priority the best way to serve our needs. When we both like someone and feel they’re committed to serving our best interests, we naturally just feel ourselves wanting to work with them. The same applies for you, too, in your own business.
As an example, do you think if you were the one looking to buy or lease a product or service that you could sense if the rep you were working with had your best interests in mind above his/her own? If your answer to this is “Yes,” don’t you think the same applies with your own customers and prospects, too? Don’t you think they can sense if you’re serving their best interests or looking out for your own commission?
Sometimes, for whatever reason, some of us don’t feel our customers and prospects share our same intuitive qualities in this arena. And it can cost us big time, too, if we haven’t already become the kind of salesperson who always puts their needs before our own. Make sure you’re adept at developing great rapport with your customers and prospects, and make sure they always understand that serving their best interests is constantly your number one priority. Once you’ve mastered this in your own business, people will sense that you’re the best choice they could ever make when it’s time for them to buy. Best of luck to you out in the field.
