| Full database
Admin    New blog | Edit/delete blog | Configure Ublog 
Blog database     FULL  
 
 
Google
Web www.malima.com.br

  OCTOBER 2008  
smtwtfs
1234
5
6
7891011
12131415161718
19202122232425
262728293031

current month



uapplication.com

THE LONGER THEY TAKE, THE LESS THEY BUY  by

 Scott Ginsberg 		10/6/2008 at 11:03
PICTURE THIS: you walk into Borders on a Sunday afternoon. You head over to the business section to pick up the latest book on leadership.

Flipping through, you see nothing remarkable ... yet.

So you keep flipping. And flipping. And flipping. Frustratingly hoping to come across a poignant sentence, a cool graph or an astonishing picture to use in tomorrow’s staff meeting.

But to no avail.

About seven minutes go by. You reach the appendix of the book, having found nothing that stood out.

Well, back on the shelf you go! You think.

And then.

Then something else catches your eye.

"Hmm. What’s this...?" you think.

You grab a different book. You lean up against the shelf and randomly open it to page 147.

And within three seconds, you’re smiling. Nodding and affirming and pointing out a piece of leadership advice that’s SO relevant, you say to yourself, "Wow. That’s goooood! I’m buying this book for my boss!"

So you do.

And it only took ... what? A few seconds?

LESSON LEARNED: the longer they take, the less they buy.

In Doug Hall’s Jumpstart Your Brain, he shares several brilliant observations on this very topic. Based on his extensive work with Proctor & Gamble’s retail division, Doug learned three things:

1. Complexity generates contemplation. You lose when your customer has to contemplate your idea because in the process of contemplating, customers start looking at other options.

2. Get them early. If it takes more than ten seconds to explain or grasp, it’s probably not a wicked good idea.

3. Simple ideas are self-evident. And self-evident products make ...
  read more...


HANDLING THE COLD POTATO  by

 Kelley Robertson 		10/6/2008 at 11:02
Do you have prospects that seem to give you the run-around? They expressed interest in your product or service when you first contacted them but now they don’t return your calls, reply to your emails or seem interested in making a buying decision.

Persistence is an essential trait that successful sales people possess. The ability to stick with a specific task, continue in the face of adversity, or use different strategies to achieve your goal is critical if you want a long-term career in sales and business.

However, there is a distinct difference between this and beating your head against a wall trying to convince a prospect to buy your product or service. Recent conversations with some of my newsletter subscribers reminded me how often people get caught in the trap of thinking they can (or should) close every deal that comes their way. Simply put, there comes a time when you have to let go and give up.

However, if you’re not quite prepared to do that, here are five suggestions that may turn that cold potato into a hot one.

1. Consider creating an email list and adding those people into a monthly email campaign. Some of them will have their situation change and still others are simply very busy with something that is more urgent. Without monthly email follow-up, you can lose the people that were temporarily distracted as well as those whose situation changed.

2. If you have another contact in the company ask them for input or to find out ...
  read more...


3 SIMPLE REASONS THAT WILL HELP YOU SELL MORE  by

 Cheryl Clausen 		10/6/2008 at 11:01
Before you can sell anyone anything they must first have an unfulfilled want. Why do so many salespeople act in defiance of this simple truth? It’s a sure recipe for a lot of hard work with little to show for it. It’s an exercise in frustration, and a waste of time.

Face it a buyer will not buy until they’re ready to buy. And they can’t get ready to buy until they decide they want something. No matter how wonderful whatever you’re selling may or may not be. If they don’t want it they aren’t going to buy it.

Even though most salespeople realize this they waste a lot of time meeting with and chasing after people who aren’t legitimate prospects. While doing so may keep you busy it does nothing positive for your bank account. There are 3 simple reasons a buyer will act to buy.

The first reason is they want to gain a benefit or outcome they don’t have now. These buyers are actively searching for this benefit. However, they may not realize the connection between what you offer and the benefit they want unless you clearly spell it out for them.

The second reason a buyer will act to buy is they want to avoid a loss. When you communicate to these potential buyers in terms of how you can help them avoid what they don’t want they pay attention. Once you have their attention you have the opportunity to learn more about the specifics of what they want to ...
  read more...


INCREASE SALES BY GETTING STRANGERS COMING TO YOU  by

 Cheryl Clausen 		10/6/2008 at 11:01
When you were little weren’t you told, "Don’t talk to strangers?" Of course you were. The adults around you told you this to protect you from harm.

Now that you’re all grown up with far less reason to fear strangers you still don’t like approaching a complete stranger. And you don’t like complete strangers approaching you unless they follow the rules. You expect a stranger to be polite, respectful, and helpful. The instant a stranger asks you for something you’re strongly repelled unless there is obvious peril for the stranger if you don’t come to their rescue.

So here you are in sales and if you don’t get some strangers to buy from you you’re going to starve out of the business. The thought of calling or dropping in on a stranger paralyzes you. Are you done for?

No, there’s hope and an easy solution. Get strangers contacting you. All you have to do is follow the rules and add a couple other elements.

Open the connection by presenting a way to learn more about what you already know they want. You see this done all the time. An ad offers a free report. A letter directs you to a website to get a comparison chart, and many other examples. Even government agencies and hospitals use this easy technique to get strangers to contact them.

And you can too. The key is the information you offer has to specifically address what they’re most concerned about in relation to what they want, what they don’t want, ...
  read more...


SALES STOPS & STARTS  by

 Cheryl Clausen 		10/6/2008 at 11:00
Do you have a costly sales habit? The habit of heavily prospecting until you fill your sales funnel, and then stopping your prospecting efforts. You do it because you get busy meeting with prospects and taking care of clients.

Sounds logical enough. Yet, these starts and stops in your sales funnel cause peaks and valleys in your income. Sometimes those valleys are more than you can take financially.

So what do you do? You have to take care of existing clients. You have to meet with the prospects your prospecting efforts have generated. How do you keep all these balls in the air at once?

The simplest solution is to work from a marketing plan and make everything as automatic as possible. Rather than focusing on prospecting for a while then setting your prospecting efforts aside to take care of current business, and then starting from scratch once you’ve worked through that business. A marketing plan looks at what you’ll do and when over the course of the entire year. No more income peaks and valleys.

No more wondering how you’re going to get your next appointment. No more setting appointments with people who aren’t even good suspects. All because you have an ongoing prospecting system to keep your sales funnel full.

There are a number of ways to make it automatic. When your marketing plan is primarily automatic it will get done. No excuses needed.

Simple and inexpensive options exist to do what you need done. This might include a one page website, an auto-responder, ...
  read more...


FIVE TIPS TO HELP YOU SUCCEED IN DIRECT SALES  by

 Audrey Okaneko 		7/6/2008 at 08:34
I get emails quite often that say something along the lines of "if you could offer just one piece of advice to me what would it be?" Businesses are not built on one secret or on one magical theory. Businesses are built on consistency and hard work. What I’d like to do is share some of my tips that I hope will help you succeed in your own direct sales business:

1. Use whatever materials your company supplies. If your company offers a recruiting flyer, use it. Don’t invest your time reinventing the wheel. Use the company offered flyer instead. If your company offers samples, buy them. As consumers, we all like samples and we all like to try new things. Offer samples to both existing customers and potential customers. If your company offers training, take advantage, whether it’s on the phone, or online. I’ve found company training to be invaluable.

2. Talk to strangers. We all grew up learning never talk to strangers. My two kids will tell you that I’ve always spoken to strangers. I will talk about the weather, a local news story, an item in their grocery cart, a book they are holding, the car they are driving or I’ll even just smile and say hello. Every single person out there either wants what you have to offer or they don’t. They only way to know if they want what you offer is to start a conversation and see where it leads. I am in no way suggesting ...
  read more...


HARD SELLING IN TODAY’S WORLD  by

 Bruce King 		7/6/2008 at 08:33
A few ago I spoke at my one day conference at The Institute of Directors. Feedback was generally excellent although there were a few comments on the delegate’s feedback forms complaining that what I was promoting appeared to be ’Hard Selling’. That was quite a surprise to me as I had qualified precisely why my approach to sales is the way it is. See what you think...

Firstly I explain to the audience that consultative selling is of course the professional way to sell. But it has it’s downsides, particularly because a number of sales people given the title ’Sales Consultant’ think they have become Consultants, feel more comfortable being consultants, do a lot of unpaid consulting and don’t sell very much. That’s why I much prefer the term Sales Executive

I also emphasised that:

Yes - we are customer focused

Yes - we act with total honesty and integrity - possibly a great deal more than many of our potential customers who often seem to think it’s fine to lie to salespeople, expect free consulting and don’t return calls but do give us unlimited access to their voicemail.

Yes - we go out of our way to build relationships

BUT - we are still SELLING. That’s how we earn our money and in my opinion, if asking for the business and using techniques to avoid ’I’ll think it over’ is hard selling then I’m all in favour of it as long as it’s done subtly.

To illustrate my point I also told the story of a ...
  read more...


ARE YOU PARTICIPATING IN THE RECESSION?  by

 Maurice Friedman 		7/6/2008 at 08:33
I just finished a call with one of my friends who works as loan officer, I started the conversation with the question, "How is business?" He responded, "not good, but listen, what can you expect the housing market is down." So I asked him, "Why did you decide to participate in the recession?"

There was a long pause, and then I told him the following story:

Once upon a time there was a guy who had a sandwich stand off a major highway. There were big signs on the road pointing to his place, the food was delicious, he employed lots of workers to serve people really fast and get them on their way, and business was booming. One day his big brother, who worked in Wall Street, came to visit. He took one look on what was going on, and looked his younger brother straight in the eye and said, "Don’t you know that there is a big recession going on in the city?"

The naive younger guy, who lived at a nearby farm, had no idea what was going on in the city, but he knew that a recession was a very bad thing. He was happy that his smart big brother was there to help. "So what do you think we can do?" he asked for advice. "Everyone is downsizing," the Wall Street expert said scratching his bald head. "You cannot keep up your payroll and keep on ordering so much inventory when there is a recession going on." "You ...
  read more...


PEOPLE BUY FROM PEOPLE  by

 Mark Tewart 		7/6/2008 at 08:30
As a sales professional, it can be an eye-opening experience when you go shopping for yourself. Weaknesses in other’s presentations can teach us lessons about how to strengthen our own. One common theme you might notice is that many people don’t seem to recognize that people don’t buy products or services. People buy from people.

People buy solutions to perceived or real problems. Good sales people assist buyers in solving their problems through emotions, visual imagery, and proper logic and people skills. The one component of sales that makes everything come together is people skills. You may be great at product knowledge, presentation, demonstrations or closing skills, but none of those things will matter if you don’t create a relationship with your customer.

A catalyst is an agent of change. There is not a better way to describe sales people. When your customer begins to shop, they are beginning a process of change. If you are the sales person who makes the sale, it will usually be because you were better at assisting the customer to make that change. Let’s look at some ways to make those changes happen in a positive way that allows your customer to buy. Take notice of the phrase "allows your customer to buy," rather than "you selling the customer."

Imagine, for example, going to shop for a hot tub. You go to a nationally known store that has obviously conducted sales training for their sales representatives. The sales person has a very specific sales presentation. He also ...
  read more...


HOW TO SELL LIKE A PRO  by

 Mikhail Hutton 		7/6/2008 at 08:30
Imagine that you were on a driving range working on your golf swing. Would you be working on your cuts and slices? Would you be working on your shanks? Or would you be working on a proper swing? The obvious answer of course is that everyone wants to work on their swing so that they can perform better on the golf course. The reality is that about 90% of us work on our cuts and slices and an unfortunate 5% of us work on our shanks. Isn’t that true?

Sales is much the same way. Sales, like golf, requires exquisite attention to detail. Many times people overlook the two most important facets of success in the sales world. The first being an absolutely proven, simple, effective system and the second being an absolutely simple, TRAINED, effective salesman. This idea is so simple that people often get it wrong (imagine that). So let’s evaluate these claims.

Any company that plans on being around for a while needs to sell some kind of product or service. In today’s economy it should provide an avenue for the most driven people who are looking for a change in their lives to jump on board and have a strong likelihood of success. The system then must be easy to understand and easy to execute.

Many facets of a good system will have clear and concise language where each statement is made for a purpose. The statements should be upfront and honest so that people will see your company ...
  read more...


ARE YOU SUFFERING FROM SALES RAGE?  by

 Leanne Hoagland-Smith 		7/6/2008 at 08:29
Road rage is pretty common to most people. The folks behind the steering wheels of their vehicles honk their horns, cut people off, speed, weave in and out of traffic all with the goal of getting somewhere faster and quicker before someone else without any consideration to anyone else. We have all witnessed these behaviors. Our impressions for the most part are these types of drivers are ego driven and self centered idiots who are accident creators.

The other day while watching one of these road rage drivers I realized that some professional sales people are continually engaged in their own version of road rage - sales rage. These folks demonstrate comparable behaviors and create similar emotions among those watching their sales behaviors.

Sales professionals who engaged in sales rage are constantly speeding and changing lanes. For example, have you ever been at a business networking event and watched someone run from one person to another, busily collecting business cards? Much like the road rage driver, they weave in and out of conversations passing out business cards without caring about if they interrupted anyone else.

If and when these sales rage individuals are engaged in conversations, they cut people off by spewing (honking) what I call the 3 Ps virus of Product, Price or Proposal. Everything is about them and very little is about the suspect to the prospect. Sometimes, you might even hear a raised voice (horn honking again) because the sales rage person is in a hurry and wants attention right ...
  read more...


LOSE THE STAPLES AND INCREASE SALES  by

 Leanne Hoagland-Smith 		7/6/2008 at 08:28
Being in sales means that you must continually meet new individuals. As you separate the wheat from the shaft (qualified prospects from the suspects) and then build those critical relationships, you may eventually have to deliver a proposal or what I prefer to call a statement of work.

Proposals are common especially for products so that buyers can do the price and feature comparisons. Within the service industry, proposals are often the accepted norm to ensure that there are not cost overruns as well as the scope of work stays within the agreed terms.

Imagine for a moment that the day has arrived to deliver your sales proposal. Fortunately, you have avoided the often used request of send me your proposal via email. This request unless it is a formal Request for Proposal (RFP) is a sure way not to increase sales.

As you sit down with your future customer (always think positive) be it a small business owner or C Level executive, you hand her your stapled 3 to 5-page proposal. And what does the prospect do? Usually, she immediately turns to the last page to find the price. Years of conditioning have created a belief system in that the price is on the last page. This belief drives the action of turning to that page and delivers the
results that she wants and not necessarily the results that you want.

What would happen if you lost the staple? Instead of stapling the pages, you hand each page, one page at a time to ...
  read more...


DIRECT SALES SECRETS - THE STUFF THEY "FAIL TO MENTION"  by

 Joe Crawford 		3/23/2008 at 12:14
Top direct sales companies offer some of the most robust compensation to their direct sales reps. What Does it really take to earn a six figure or multiple six figure income from the comfort of your own home office? How is it done, and are you a person that can do it?

First off earning six figure or CEO level income in direct sales, as you have seen it advertised, is possible, for the right individual. Earning a six figure income fast from home while building a residual walk away income in the next few years is made possible by a direct sales business model or system designed intentionally to do just that. I know, you have heard all about the "systems", a system in the direct sales/ Network marketing industry will do the following things:

It will generate leads.

People like you. People who have reached a point where they accept traditional options will not give them what they want. People who want real wealth.

Time and Money Freedom.

It will present the business.

It will present an appealing informative inside view of the business to you. It will explain the compensation plan, products, and the marketing system.

It will answer questions and Clarify information.

People take in information differently. A good system will provide it in different mediums. Video, audio, and visual. Using the internet, telephone and sometimes in person.

It will ensure that someone has a vested interest in your success.

This is usually done by a component in the compensation plan. There should be someone ...
  read more...


GROW YOUR BUSINESS IN HARD TIMES  by

 Sylvia Bronstein 		3/23/2008 at 12:11
We are all aware dark economic clouds are gathering and potentially building into the perfect storm. Many small businesses are either in denial of the new coming business realities or hunkering down to weather the storm. For most the changing economics can mean trouble. For a small minority this can be an opportunity to gain market share and grow your business.

It is often said that 10 percent of the fisherman catch 90 percent of the fish. What kind of fisherman are you? Most people make excuses to justify hard economic times for their own short comings, failures and inability to move forward. Often these self inflected wounds are caused by the way you see and understand reality. Everything in the world that you are aware of is interpreted in your brain, and those thoughts determine the way you perceive reality. With self awareness of the way you think, honest deep thought and planning you can become one of those 10 percent fishermen and actually take advantage and thrive in difficult waters.

If you own a business or work for yourself in a small or medium size business, you and you alone are responsible for the success or failure of that business. There are always negative outside influences. You need to take control and make necessary course changes to achieve your goals. You take the hits and deserve the rewards for the way you pilot your ship. It is ultimately your decision-making process that determines the kind of business you have.

Now may ...
  read more...




page 1 of 41 2 3 4


Blogs

The Longer They Take, the Less They Buy

 Handling the Cold Potato

 3 Simple Reasons That Will Help You Sell More

 Increase Sales by Getting Strangers Coming to You

 Sales Stops & Starts

 Five Tips to Help You Succeed in Direct Sales

 Hard Selling in Today’s World

 Are You Participating in the Recession?

 People Buy From People

 How to Sell Like a Pro

 Are You Suffering From Sales Rage?

 Lose the Staples and Increase Sales

 Direct Sales Secrets - The Stuff They "Fail To Mention"

 Grow Your Business In Hard Times

 How to Sell your Products and Make Money

 Focus On What You Can Control

 When Speaking, Leave Your Pitch at the Door

 7 Steps to Increasing Your Sales Power

 Avoiding the Procrastination Objections

 Here’s How To Stop Giving Profits Away

 Just Be a Little Bit Better

 Ten Key Factors That Maximize Sales

 Making The Most Of Internet Inquiries

 Ideas Sell

 Free Trial Offers

 How To Set A Selling Price For Your Product Or Service

 Your Business Card - Memorable or Mediocre?

 Ready Set Go, 7 Seconds and Counting to Lose a Prospect

 The Selling Strength of Influence

 To Increase Sales, Are You a Lion or a Gazelle?

 Selling Has Evolved

 Managing Gatekeepers During Lead Generation

 Become A Sales Professional

Unfair Sales Technique

 Self-esteem And Your Sales Success

 How To Overcome Sales Objections

 Sales Process - Increase Your Sales by Going for the "NO"

 Sales Advice - WARNING This Popular Opening May be Hazardous to Your Sales

 The Sales Burnout Factor

 Customers Are All Around You

 Where Sales Meets Service: Up-Selling and Cross-Selling Made Fun & Easy!

 Stop Justifying Your Price and Start Touting Your Benefits

 Is This a Trend? Three Horrible Calls Reviewed

 Sell Your Home By Yourself

 Trust, The Power Word in Sales

 Build even more trust into your existing performing sales copy pages

 10 Killer Ways to Multiply Your Sales

 Building A Financial Services Sales Culture

 B2B Sales leads success checklist

 NLP Selling and Communication Secrets!