Recently I was dispatched to a beautiful countryside hotel in the UK by my company for a weeklong global sales meeting. Hence the lack of new posts. Following that I spent a week in my home country of Bulgaria, which is a recent addition to the European Union. Boy did I learn some lessons from these two vastly different worlds (not only different from the US but different from each other as well).
First things first. I must say that I have never received better service than when I stayed at the Welcombe Menzies Hotel in Stratford-Upon-Avon, UK. So refreshing. Everything from the hotel staff to the restaurant waiters were superb. One thing that caught my attention was particularly the older staff. These guys, many of whom could easily be my father, frequently went out of their way to make my stay easier. One of them was able to arrange a bike delivered to one of my colleagues who enjoyed riding a bike anywhere he went. He didn’t have to do that, but he did it anyway and was promptly and generously tipped. On another note, in the service business in UK most people are not expected to receive tips. I spend about 50 pounds in tips, although all my expenses were covered by the company.
My point here is that as someone who works in any kind of service industry, you are basically a sales person. I think, especially in the US, lots of workers deem it below them to go out of their way and do something for their clients which will eventually pay them dividends in the long run. It is easily done. Something as simple as a follow up call after a successful sales call can be enough to sway your customer to come back again. Another tactic I use is to make my prospects feel special by telling them I am doing something special just for them. It can be a benefit that comes with the product or service you are selling but if you make it seem special, you will make your prospect feel special too. This appeals to the basic human need to feel important and will take you a long way to a successful sales career.
Go and incorporate this in your sales pitch today. Go above and beyond what you are paid for and you will get paid plenty in the long run.
On the second leg of my trip to Europe, I visited my home country of Bulgaria for a week too. Boy what a difference. I’m not even going to go into the lousy service I received while I was there. Suffice to say I didn’t even receive ketchup with my fries even after explicitly asking for it. But I will talk about someone, who is very close to me and who happened to be a heavy construction machinery salesman. If you don’t know, Bulgaria is a developing country in Eastern Europe. While it is still one of the poorest in Europe, it also has one of the highest rates of new construction in the region. The market is basically begging for solid and reliable equipment and while some of the business practices can be dodgy, it is certainly a good market for what my friend is selling.
The problem is that he has been there for over 8 months and hasn’t sold a single machine. The answer to this problem was not too difficult for me to figure out. First of all he looked more like a construction worker on his break than someone who peddles equipment worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. He sported an extremely short haircut that while not bad in itself, made him look too threatening. He had a huge earring on his left year and generally dressed in street clothes. You get the image. This is not someone who you would like to buy anything from. Fair enough. But it didn’t stop there. This so called salesman sported the worse attitude that I have seen in years. He was so cynical and negative that talking to him for more than 10 minutes was completely, excruciatingly painful. You couldn’t hold a normal conversation with him without feeling put down, desperate and negative about just about everything around you. Not the best sales person attitude if you ask me.
This leads me to my point that attitude and physical presentation are so essential. As sales people we need to gain trust from our prospects and that means dressing well and being presentable if meeting in person, and having a pleasant and positive voice when on the phone. There are other things that go into it as well. Like honesty, enthusiasm and going beyond your duty to help the prospect. Be giving. Don’t hoard your sales talents. Prospects want to be sold. They want really hard to be convinced that what they are considering buying is actually worth buying.
Well, that is it for me this time. Happy calling and don’t forget to check my eBook “Cold Call Warrior” for an extensive and effective sales training regimen. Until next time.
Anton B.
