The more things change … the more you have to change with them. The selling profession is never, ever static—even, perhaps especially, during tough times. Successful selling has become harder—and not just because of the economy.
In the past, people often went into a career in sales when they couldn’t find a job doing anything else. It used to be easy to make this your profession, and, in many cases, if you worked hard enough, you could be quite successful. Today, selling is anything but easy—and it takes much more than just hard work. The price of admission to today’s selling game includes business savvy, product knowledge, people skills, time management talents, technology acumen and an advisor-like mentality. And, yes, it still takes hard work, too!
People don’t want tri-folds. They don’t need talkers—especially generalists. If they want to know more about your product or service, all the buyer has to do is click on the Internet or watch a YouTube video. Chances are they have someone on staff who already knows enough about your services that listening to you talk about them might even be a waste of everyone’s time.
Many salespeople are still using sales models that were formalized in the 1920s. They are still following advice of authors like Edward K. Strong, who, in 1924, wrote The Psychology of Selling Life Insurance. He talked about creating interests, overcoming objections and techniques for closing the sale. Thanks to Strong and others, selling was no longer an art or a knack; if you could read a “how-to” book, you could do it.
Next, there is the infamous “sales funnel.” For years, salespeople have used the idea of a sales funnel with the AIDA acronym created in 1898 by E. St. Elmo Lewis (awareness, interest, desire and action). The idea was (and still is in many cases) to move a prospective buyer through the funnel until you “closed ‘em.”
I, like so many other salespeople, learned the features and benefits model of selling. Here, you talk up the “features” of your product and then discuss the “benefits” of your buyer using your product. Buyers today are way too sophisticated for that approach! As I said before, they probably already know the benefits of a product.
Selling today is more than just qualifying, building rapport, educating and closing.
Today, the professional salesperson must start out as an advisor to the client. Don’t just tell them what your product does, tell them what it does specifically for them. You have to talk about saving them time, increasing their revenue, reducing their down time, lowering their costs, limiting their risks, etc.
Over the next several Points, we are going to review our new selling model, which we call Authentic Selling. This new approach is something we’ve spent the past five years developing.
Our Authentic Selling model is made up of 9 characteristics.
- Advisor
- Undisputed Results
- Trustworthy
- Helpful
- Empathetic
- Natural
- Thought Leader
- Integrity
- Collaborative
The next series of Points will point out exactly how to make this advanced and innovative system work for you.
Corsini’s Point:
The selling profession continues to evolve, and, in order to compete, you need to change, too. I challenge you to adopt a better and more natural method of selling. I believe our Authentic Selling model is exactly that. It is a more effective and more intuitive way to succeed in sales. Next time, we’ll focus on the characteristics of today’s buyers and how our Authentic Selling model will help you reach them.