I have said many times that I consider myself extremely fortunate to have the job that I do. I spend most days working with smart people to solve real problems in a creative and collaborative environment. In recent years, I have got into the habit of taking a photo of the whiteboard or  flip-chart at the end of a session. It is my usual practice to ask groups what they think they have learned from their participation in a workshop. Of course, I am interested in what they are going to do in the immediate future as a result of having attended the session. However, I also ask them to summarise the key, underlying  principles that they will take away. Lessons that will be useful again and again in their jobs. These are usually recorded as short statements or aphorisms that we record and share post course.

Below is a de-duplicated list of lessons recorded over several years of working with sales managers (in many different industries) on the topic of managing sales performance. We use it as an aid to coaching sales managers and as a checklist for helping sales managers decide what a great performance really looks like, (hint: it’s more than a great set of results).

1. Learning ≥ Change or we are failing to perform.

Our ability to perform is always affected by external factors, markets change, customers change and competitors change. If the sales team is failing to develop and learn at a speed that is at least equal to the rate of change they are falling behind and performance will suffer.

2. Everyone has the ability and potential  to perform at a high level.

Managers who get the best from their staff share this belief. People tend to live up to our expectations of them. If we believe that staff are incapable of high levels of performance, we begin to act upon that belief and our staff adjust their performance to meet our expectations.

Your starting point should always be to expect a great performance from everyone.

3. No one comes to work to perform badly!

People under perform for a whole range of reasons but in general there is never an intention to perform poorly. Sometimes the best way to get a great performance out of people is simply to remove the things that are holding them back.

4. High performing people tend to adapt the job to suit their strengths.

Sometimes the best way to get a great performance from a team is to devise a plan that allows them to play to their strengths rather than to try and eliminate all weaknesses.

5. High performing people tend to share similar traits.

Attitude plays a huge role in performance management if you can identify those traits that make the biggest difference in your marketplace. Sometimes replicating a few key skills or traits across the sales team can have a huge impact on performance and results.

6. Managing performance is a balancing act between internal and external forces.

In many ways all the key lessons from strategy can be applied to performance management, in so far as the art of performance is the ability to recognise external threats and opportunities and adapting your sales approach to maximise your use of resources and product strengths

7. People generally know how to improve their own performance

A coaching approach to sales is often the most effective means of improving sales performance. Sales people who have the skill and self- awareness to develop their own performance are the most valuable asset on your sales team.

8. Everyone learns and develops in different ways

An obvious but important point. Developing sales performance requires that the sales manager is aware of the different learning types on their team adaptable in their approach to training and coaching.

9. Coaches and mentors need to be experts in performance as well as the product or service

Great coaches have a detailed knowledge of all the factors that drive performance in their field. They have high levels of insight into individual and team performances and are able to pay attention to even the smallest details.

Performance management is the art of producing the results that you need over the longer term. It is everything that you do to produce the result rather than the result itself.

In April 2016, Ocean Learning will be launching a new training company as a joint venture with Software Promotions Ltd www.softwarepromotions.com .

For many years, we have had clients ask for digital marketing courses and we have always declined, not because I don’t recognise the importance of such courses but because the market was always so crowded with self-proclaimed experts. I attended several courses to help build and develop my own Inbound Marketing Strategy and usually I was somewhat disappointed, either because the person running the course was simply talking through the theory (much of which I had read) or worse, was using the course to sell consultancy services (in which case they didn’t really have an interest in teaching us enough to solve our own problems).

Then I met Dave Collins. Dave runs a business called Software Promotions and they are the people who the Software Industry (550 businesses worldwide) trust to manage their SEO.

Dave Collins

I first met Dave a few years ago when I was speaking at the Business of Software Conference in Boston. In fact, I heard about him long before I met him. Several delegates at the conference were talking to me (at different times) about sales and how to convert inbound sales leads into customers. During the course of the conversations, they mentioned Dave and his team as being the only people in the business that they wanted to manage their SEO and their Awards campaigns.

When I finally met Dave. I found that not only was he super knowledgeable about SEO, but that he was passionate about helping businesses grow. I learned more about SEO over an (admittedly long) breakfast at the conference, than I had on all previous courses.

For the last couple of years, I have been trying to persuade Dave to share his knowledge and experience with a wider audience and we finally started to work on the idea  in the summer of 2015.

It is hard to get time in Dave’s diary because his clients demand a great deal of his attention, however, the more we talked, the more we realised just how useful an SEO course could be for business owners and marketers.

• The principles of ‘good’ SEO apply across all industries and markets. Equally, the most common mistakes can impact negatively on any business.

• The best way to learn and understand SEO is to apply the lessons learned immediately to your own business. The theory is useful, but what really matters is making changes to your site that actively drive more traffic (customers) your way.

• The nature of SEO, or rather the way it has been perceived as highly technical, complex means that many businesses are tempted to either ignore it and hope for the best or to farm it out to third party experts and hope that they know what they are doing.

• Organic Search is crucial to all businesses who seek to attract customers on the web.

• We know that people trust organic search more than paid advertising on Google. We also know that most people will not look beyond the first page of the search listings.

• Business Owners must take SEO seriously and whether they do it internally or hire someone to do it for them, they must have an understanding of how Google rank businesses and what they can do to come higher in a search.

In April 2016, we will be launching Smart SEO Training. Our business aim is simple – we want to empower business owners to be able to make better decisions about SEO and to help them get more web traffic.

We also want anyone coming to a Smart SEO Training Event to have the very best learning experience.

Dave and I have worked together to combine his 16 years of SEO experience with my 20+ years of training and development experience to create a workshop that will engage , entertain and educate. Most importantly, it will provide you with real value by;

• Demystifying the SEO process and explaining the most important parts in clear, simple, actionable language.

• Running a workshop rather than a lecture. We encourage you to bring your laptops and to work on your own website strategy throughout the day.

• Showing you the most useful SEO tools available to you and how to use them.

• Helping you to create an SEO action plan for your business.

I want to stress that all our courses (there are a whole range in the pipeline) are aimed at the business owner and marketing professional. We do not train SEO agencies, nor will we ever pitch for your SEO business. Our business is empowering entrepreneurs to grow their own business.

Dave has published a really useful primer, “SEO for the rest of us” that you can download here www.smartseotraining.co.uk/the-seo-book 

You can find our more about our courses here www.smartseotraining.co.uk

Does the world really need more sales people?
One of the many benefits of the internet is that consumers and business buyers now have unlimited access to all the information that they need and easy ways to make purchases. At one click, they can access;

• Hundreds of suppliers
• Blogs and information sites offering advice to potential buyers
• Customer reviews and case studies

In addition, they can order via credit card for instant or next day deliver.
In this world of easy payment and instant access, do we really need sales people?
Some businesses argue that we do not, that effective marketing and a good website are enough to generate sales and in some cases, this is true. However, for the majority of business, good sales people remain an essential part of the business development process.

7 reasons that your business needs good Sales People

1. Customers don’t really buy your product, they buy the idea behind your product.  Let’s say 3 customers each buy the same CRM system. One customer may buy it because they fear that competitors will be gaining an advantage over them. Another might do it to be able to find efficiencies in their sales force and another might do it because it is important to them to be seen at the leading edge of technical innovation in their role. Great sales people invest efforts in finding out what the real concerns of customers are and on solving those problems. They focus on finding out what job the client needs the product to do, rather than just pitching features and benefits.
2. Every business needs new business.
   Any business will lose between 10% and 20% of its customers each year due to reasons beyond their control. Customers change jobs, retire, restructure and shift focus. New business is the life -blood of any commercial organisation. Effective sales people know how to find prospects and create new customers.
3. Many customers don’t know they need your product.
   How many products and services exist today that simply did not exist even just a few years ago? We didn’t know that we would need smart phones, tablets, web designs, SEO experts, online movie rentals, but we take them for granted. Often, customers do not know they need a product until they have an opportunity to discuss their business with a sales person. Only then do they begin to see the potential benefits. Great sales people don’t just respond to needs, they help to create the need.
4. Sales Data is confusing and misleading
   Have you ever spent a significant sum of money on an important purchase, only to find that there was a better product or deal available?Many customers need an opportunity to discuss their needs with a knowledgeable sales person so that they can make their minds up confident in the knowledge that they are making the best decision possible.
5. Service Matters
   In many cases, customers buy from one supplier because they feel like they know and trust the sales people that they deal with. The sales service is a key driver for many customers.
6. Complexity and Value
   Not every deal is simple enough for an automatic transaction. Many sales require nurturing over a long period of time because they involve high value deals and multiple decision makers.
7. Urgency
   Sometimes, customers need a gently push in the right direction. They need reasons to act now.
   A customer who has realised that they have a need, but who has not yet decided on a supplier, is a customer liable to be poached by a competitor. Sales people know how to create both the desire and urgency to buy.

I spend a great deal of my time talking with founders and sales managers about the best way to win those all-important first customers.

Getting people to buy a new product can be really tough. There is an inbuilt inertia in every marketplace. To some the word “new” can mean exciting, novel, fresh, easier and more cost-effective and to others it can  mean risky, uncomfortable and unfamiliar.

We all know the product growth lifecycle model, and we all know that even if we get those elusive first 100 clients (early adopters) that there is a chasm (see Geoffrey Moore Crossing the Chasm!) that often swallows up the unsuspecting and over-optimistic business.

We all know the product growth lifecycle model, and we all know that even if we get those elusive first 100 clients (early adopters) that there is a chasm (see Geoffrey Moore Crossing the Chasm!) that often swallows up the unsuspecting and over-optimistic business.

The logic, however attractive, does not always stand up.

If a customer really values something and they get a chance to have a bit more of it for free in return for their loyalty, they feel like they have won.

For example, for many years now, I have been somewhat disappointed with my health insurance. I value having it (I’m a self-employed man with 3 kids) but I resent the year on year increases with no additional value.  I was offered a cheaper solutions with greater flexibility by other suppliers, and I thought about switching but somehow never quite got round to it. I was too busy to see it through (I imagined long boring meetings and piles of paperwork were involved), and worried about the possible hidden restrictions, In short I was just about familiar and comfortable enough with my big brand supplier not to let my irritation at rising prices push me to look elsewhere.

Then a sales representative for another company came to see me.  He understood my reluctance to change, but also took it seriously. He made a good case for switching, did a thorough comparison of my existing supplier’s offering with that of the company that he represented. He then said that he understood how difficult it was to break with an existing supplier so as an incentive he offered me two months free cover if I were to switch. Interestingly he never once used the word “free”. He always talked about “additional cover, 14 months for the price of 12.”

On reflection I realised that I didn’t by health co*ver that day because it was free. I bought it because I believed it was the right product for my family at the time. The offer months free cover just made it easier for me to break my habit.

The key is that I already valued the product and I just needed a push. (The two months free equated easily to the £300 I would have spent over the same period). Free meant something.

Compare this with the “try this for free offers” pitched by so many start ups – there the “free” offer is on something for which I have no real need(as yet). I might try it, I might even like it, but because I have paid nothing for it (and for those of you selling software, I haven’t even had to expend more that a mouse click’s worth of energy to receive it,) I have nothing invested. My commitment levels are low and I associate the value of the product with the price I paid for it.

Now there are exceptions. If your product is a 12 foot multi-uddered seven shades of purple cow (Thanks Seth Godin!), you might get people to invest time and effort in trialling the product, thus realising its value. But if this is the case, why are you giving it away for free?

That’s not to say that free offers don’t work, they do, but they work best when the client understands that they are getting something of value for which they don’t have to pay, rather than just getting something for free.

So if you want to get traction, think carefully about what you mean by the term. If you just want to find a few individual people to try your product, that’s one thing. If you want to recruit members of your tribe who will genuinely appreciate your product and who will recommend it to all and sundry, then you need a strategy.

1. Only offer free trials to those who will really benefit from your product right now. People who may have a use or need for your product at some unspecified time in the future will not value it, nor will they blog or tweet anything meaningful about it – make sure they have a problem – now.
2. Make sure that the person trialling the product or having it for free is someone who has the power to buy (or is a significant recommender).
3. Enter into an agreement. If someone gets something for free, it is without value. If someone trades their time and input to receive a product they need for free, it is worth at least the value that they put on their time and effort. If you want to give someone a product for free think about……..
   • Talking to them beforehand about why they may want the product. Make sure that they have a problem that needs solving right now.
   • Ask them to agree to a number of conversations to assess their impressions of the product (allowing you to pick up valuable feedback and PR quotes)
   • Ask them to recommend the product (so long as they are happy with it) to colleagues and peers.
   • Ask them to be the basis of a case study (you can arrange for it to be written).
   • Ask them to provide insight as to the best way to ? the benefits of the product. 100 new tribe members may be worth 100 free licenses. In fact we need a new word for no cost, but traded against other?

Common Complain
While preparing some new sales courses recently, I spent several hours trawling the internet to find out what the most common complaints about salespeople and the experience of being sold to are. I spent time on general sales blogs, consumer group sites and industry sites for businesses that rely heavily on direct sales operations (financial services, household improvements, advertising, enterprise, software etc). Not surprisingly, lots of people have lots of opinions about the things that salespeople do wrong. The big list is very long and varied, however there are a number of themes that emerge and after some “chunking” and de-duplicating, here are the most common complaints that we have found reported about salespeople.

False Sincerity

This is the practice of acting as if there is already some connection between the salesperson and the customer. It can happen in a number of ways;
Asking how people are and what kind of day they are having. On a superficial level this is polite, but in reality the customer knows you are just filling in time until you can pitch your product. If there is no relationship, don’t ask questions that suggest there is, it feels wrong for everyone. Obviously, once a relationship exists (a second call or a follow-up meeting) then it becomes more appropriate to make such enquiries.

Lack of Research

“Salespeople who haven’t bothered to find out at least the basic details about the company really are signalling that they don’t care about me at all, they only care about how much I might be worth to them”. This comment from a technology buyer says it all.
Misleading reasons for calling

This takes many forms. At it’s worst; people who call claiming tobe representing another organisation are starting the call with a lie. Examples;

The software company that claims to be calling on behalf of Microsoft or other major suppliers
White-goods insurance companies that claims to be calling on behalf of the manufacturer
The alarm company that claims to be calling on behalf of the Police or Local Council

In addition, some salespeople claim they have been asked to call by a customer’s colleague, or claim that they have had prior dealings with the customer’s company. If the first thing a salesperson does is seek to mislead the customer, it does not bode well for the rest of the call.

Cheesy/Clichéd Offers

We all know the kind of thing – “Mr Jones, I am just calling to let you know about this limited offer, it must end on Sunday”.
“We have salespeople in your area next week and they are able to offer incredible discounts only this week”.

This is a scattergun approach. No effort is made to sell the value or to establish whether the product may actually be useful.

These kinds of lines may have worked in the 1960’s, but by now, everyone has heard them a million times.

Like the “closing down” offers from furniture stores that never close down, this approach treats the customers as though they are stupid. Not a great way to start a business relationship.

Scripted Pitches

Sometimes, salespeople actually do have a pitch scrolling down on their computer (or stuck on a wall in front of them). Sometimes, the script is just a well rehearsed sales pitch from which the salesperson dare not deviate.

The problem is that most customers can spot a script a mile off and script says that you think so little of the customer that the salesperson will just say what they are paid to say, regardless of their level of interest.

False Urgency

This is the habit of talking too quickly and responding before the customer has finished talking, or racing into the pitch. It often occurs because the salesperson is nervous or under pressure to hit a target by a given deadline.

The problem is that the urgency is the salesperson’s issue, not the customer’s. Customers who feel rushed often raise more doubts and create delays to give themselves time to think. If the salesperson sounds too desperate, then the customer’s instinct is to back off.

Not Listening

In many ways, this is part of the problem all the above complaints have, but not listening tells the client that their views (and therefore their needs) are less important than the sales pitch.

Customers don’t feel listened to when;

They get asked a standard bunch of questions, regardless of the answers they give.

There is a disconnect between the issues they have raised and the issues addressed by the sales pitch.

The salesperson talks over them, or attempts to anticipate what they are going to say.

The salesperson fails to (naturally) mirror the pace and tone of the conversation.

Scare Tactics and Criticism

These are tactics often employed by salespeople, over emphasising the downside of not buying or implying (and sometimes stating directly) that the customer is failing to do their job properly by not purchasing the product offered.

What do all these complaints have in common?

They are all avoidable through the selection of capable salespeople, by training them effectively and by building a culture that puts the customer first.

They are often the result of salespeople being put under too much pressure to hit a number and too little focus on the long-term customer experience.

They all destroy “perceptions of value” in the long term.

As entrepreneurs and sales people we have a choice as to how we interact with customers we can either focus on the short term fear driven game or on the longer term value driven experience. The behaviour of your sales people will say an awful lot about your company make sure it is not the cause of common complaint.

I get between 10 and 30 sales calls every week. Of these, I take 5-10. I would take more, but my time is precious and the calls are not always at a convenient time. It is one of the problems of being both chief cook and bottle washer in my business.

Recently, I had to review our home broadband package. I was out of contract with AOL(UK) and I had some concerns about the speed of the service.

Now let me say from the outset that generally speaking, I quite like dealing with salespeople and I have great empathy with them, particularly those learning the job for the first time. I try to be pleasant and helpful where possible and even if I am saying no I try to do so politely and to provide some reasons for my decision. In short I have a higher tolerance than many to sales people and sales practice.

AOL has been calling me for some time now, eager to persuade me to renew the contract. This is what the experience is like.

I answer the phone and there is a two to three second delay before I hear an echoey voice

“Hello……. Is that Mr Paul Kenny?”(Many times my name is pronounced very slowly as if being read for the first time)

So, first impressions are not great. I feel somewhat disengaged and I know that I am simply the next person on the CRM list.

When I acknowledge that they have the right person, they introduce themselves, but I can’t quite catch their name. This is followed by a rather exaggerated “How are you Mr Kenny?”

Now I am all for politeness, but this person, whose name I didn’t catch and who I don’t know, is enquiring after my wellbeing. Before I have a chance to finish my (somewhat guarded) reply, they say “That’s great Mr Kenny” and I am not feeling the sincerity.

I now feel that I have just done a bit of an awkward verbal dance with someone who patently sees me as nothing more than the next number on their list and who I care little about. There follows a couple of seconds of awkward silence, I disengage further and start to think about tonight’s dinner that I can smell cooking in the kitchen.

My ‘no name’ contact now proceeds to tell me that he has some fantastic news for me. “I’ll be the judge of that” I think. The forced friendliness and enthusiasm is already starting to wear thin.

“Mr Kenny” they say for the fourth or fifth time (no-one really calls me Mr Kenny – only tax inspectors, so no great warmth is being generated by this overly-formal address). “Mr Kenny, we want to thank you for being such a loyal customer and to offer you 3 months free (I think it was 3 months, I don’t recall the detail) broadband followed by a new monthly rate of £xx”.

Now this might normally be seen as good news, but I suspect that there might be a catch, so being a bit hungry (dinner is now smelling great) I ask outright “what’s the catch?”. “No catch Mr Kenny, we want to say thank you for being such a loyal customer”.

Now I am getting the feeling that this person is reverting to their script and they do not want to tell me about the conditions. I decide to let things run on, though now my son is doing keepie- uppies with his new football in my office, my attention is waning.

No name now proceeds to go through a script telling me what a wonderful package they are offering me, their most loyal customer. And guess what? All I have to do to get this loyalty reward is to sign a new contract for another 12 months.

“Aha” I say, so there was a condition. No name insists that the offer is for loyalty. I guess they mean for future loyalty, but now I am a bit disgruntled. We could have saved a lot of time by getting to the point –“we have some great discounts if you commit” would have done nicely.

But now the wheels start to come off. No name is clearly expecting a straight “yes” or “no”, but I have a few issues to discuss first. I explain that I don’t want to re-sign a contract for another year because I have been experiencing very slow connection speeds and attempts to address the problem through the help lines have been frustrating and unproductive.

No name says “I am very sorry to hear that you are experiencing difficulties with your service Mr Kenny” Strangely, he says it in exactly the same way (words, tone, pace, everything as the technical support people who had patently failed to  give any technical support). I start to think that AOL script writers are using copy and paste a little too freely!

No name tells me that AOL are working on the problem and that all will be well soon. I’m expected to believe this on trust because no explanation or evidence was given. He then goes on to remind me that this is a big discount and a great deal!

We do a couple more rounds of this dance before I realise that no name has no intention or deviating from the approved script. He continues to sell a discount even though I thought the package was fairly priced (at least when it worked!) and that my only real concern was reliability of service.

No name made no attempt to explore or clarify my issues, so now I feel that I have been processed rather than sold to. It’s not going well and to give him some credit, no name is also feeling the pain. In spite of me being a loyal and valued customer, we are just not getting on. Dinner is almost ready and my son is desperate to practice a few penalty shots before Mum calls us in to eat. I politely decline the offer and no name mumbles through an exit script- something about calling back again soon, but he and I have lost all heart and he can’t get off the phone fast enough.

So how do I feel about AOL? Well, before the calls (there were 3 or 4 attempts by AOL to repeat the process) I was a loyal customer  (more than 10 years) who paid by direct debit and rarely gave a moment’s thought to broadband supply. For 9 of the 10 years I have been a customer, I have been satisfied. I had a few issues recently, which I would have discussed in detail, had anyone asked. Broadly speaking, I was indifferent. Home broadband is not a big deal for me – some detailed assurances and guarantees of service may well have been enough to ensure my continued custom . On this occasion I am very much an ease and convenience buyer.

The experience of being sold to by AOL left me determined to change suppliers. The calls politicised me, they made me actively seek an alternative. They were, in every way, the opposite of what a salesperson should do.

• Garbled openings and overly-formalised scripts make the customer feel disengaged from the start.
• The sales promotion was based on a strategy of deciet (“our most loyal customers get a special offer) instead of honesty (“we’d like your continued custom and are prepared to reward you for it”).

• An utter failure to question or to listen and an over-reliance on scripted responses left the customer feeling completely disengaged.

• Price incentives were offered without any reference to how happy I was with the service. They were thrown into the conversation so casually that I was left wondering whether I had been overpaying for the service all along.

• Ignoring objections about quality issues or glossing over them leaves the customer feeling dissatisfied and doubtful.

• Dropping all pretence of interest once the call is going badly simply re-confirms all the worries, doubts and fears that the customer has.

• Dropping all pretence of interest once the call is going badly simply re-confirms all the worries, doubts and fears that the customer has.

AOL, you could do so much better. Your current sales processes are damaging, not enhancing your customer experience.

In Part 2, I will tell you how 2 sales people and BT made their business stand out from the competition and how it was the sales person that swung the deal.

A question I often get asked is “what do you do when the client goes quiet ?”, that is you have made an initial contact generated some interest and the client has gone away to think about it. If you call too soon you are being pushy, if you leave it you run the risk of losing the business.
So some rules to help with this.

Always suggest a time when you will call the client. (preferably before they say I’ll get back to you..). This leaves you in control and feeling confident about calling them. (you are after all just keeping a promise).

If the client says “I’ll think about it” ask “when should I schedule our next call?” The language is inclusive, never pushy and leaves the client with a choice.

Give the client a reason for calling them back at your suggested time for example “we have some new user feedback being published on Friday I will give you a call then.

If a client insists that they will call you and that you shouldn’t call them take this as a signal that they are either not convinced or they do not have enough purchasing power to buy. Try and push your questioning a little further “at this stage what issues are concerning you” or “may I ask for your initial impressions.” You may be able to tease out any concerns and send them away in a more positive frame of mind. However still leave the call saying that you will near death experience ambien keep Ambien them posted of any developments in the mean time.

If the client fails to take your call and then goes quiet you have a few options.

The upfront approach, “When we last spoke you asked me to keep in touch, but I haven’t heard back from you I am just a little concerned that I may be emailing you unnecessarily. Can you suggest a time to speak.”

The indirect approach, call their PA or assistant (assuming they have one ) and explain the situation and because you don’t want to leave things unresolved could they suggest an appropriate time for you to call.

In truth clients go quiet for all sorts of reasons, they get distracted, other priorities arise, or they simply need time to think. Gentle polite persistence is the right and the assertive thing to do. Clients who get angry when you call at an agreed time or keep them updated with new developments, are often just masquerading as decision makers don’t let their reaction colour your wider thinking.

So much business is won simply by being front of mind at the time the client decides to buy. If you fade into the background you run the risk of the client finding another solution while you wait for them to call.

So keep the initiative, dont worry about the really grumpy client , they are not typical of the wider population and always remember it is better to be seen to be too keen than not to give a damn.

Have you ever been with someone when they were not really there?

Have you ever been with someone when you were not really there?

If you reflect a while on these questions and you have had either experience you already know why listening to other people is a really tough thing to do.

Day one of any sales training programme will include a section on the importance of listening to the customers. When customers are talking they tell you about their needs and their preferences, if you are really listening you will be able to craft a a persuasive case for your product or service. Why then do so many people find it so hard to really listen to their customers.

Well here are some of the reasons that you are probably not really listening to your customers.

1 Warm Up, when we switch our attention from one thing to another the brain takes a few seconds to fully direct all it’s faculties on a new situation. This is why remembering names at parties is so tough. You are chatting to one person and your well meaning host introduces you to another. By the time that you have switched your focus to the new person they have said their name and you weren’t really listening. If you have ever experienced that twinge of embarrassment when you have to ask again for someones name (or worse tried to conduct a conversation without using their name) then you are experiencing a warm up failure. The same happens with the first calls of the day, (your brain is still processing all the baggage of your your journey into work) the first call after a meeting (still running over the details of the meeting) and when you pull your self away from a detailed piece of work.

2 Flare Up Have you ever been in a group discussion where the topic of the conversation ebbs, flows and shifts quickly. You wanted to make a point, a good point an important point, but just as you were about to open your mouth and deliver your opinion someone else jumps in with their own. What happens next is what we call flare up, your point flares up in your own mind, it is all you can think about, you are desperate to make your point and you don’t want to forget it. So your brain, obedient thing that it is, starts to ignore other stimuli so that you can focus your efforts on remembering your important point. When eventually you do blurt out your point there is an embarrassed silence, the conversation has moved on and you didn’t know it you weren’t there you were lost in your own thoughts.

The same happens in sales calls when we suddenly think of an important or relevant point that we want to make, but the customer is still talking, we stop listening for a while, all we can think of is our own point.

3 Assumptions We talk at a rate some where between 90 to 120 words per minute, but we think much faster, so when a customer is talking to us our brain is generally working faster than their mouth. We start to imagine how they will finish the sentence we start to make assumptions about what they are going to say and at our worse we put words in their mouth by finishing their sentances for them.

At school I remember an exercise that our teacher once did to demonstrate the point. She asked us a question, “The old testatment tells the story of how God became angry with man and sent a great flood to punish him for his sins, however God wanted to save the animals, so how many of each species of animal did Moses take on to the ark?

Of course the hands would fly up in the air, we knew the answer. Everyone, even the kids from other faith groups knew the answer, everyone knew that Noah lined the animals up two by two. But of course the answer was none because the question was about Moses (who didn’t build an ark or save any animals as far as we know). Every kid who said two was wrong, not because they didn’t know the story of Noah but because they didn’t listen to the question about Moses.

How often do you stop listening to customers because you “know” what what they are going to say?

4 Wandering Mind: The attention span of the average human being is woefully short, after only a few minutes the sub conscious part of our brain starts to get bored and entertains itself by playing videos from the past or creating possible scenes from the future. It does this all the time, the ability to remember and to imagine in vivid detail is one of the skills that sets us apart from the rest of the animal kingdom but sometimes it gets in the way of us really focusing on the people around us. When someone is described as being lost in their own world they are focusing their attention inwardly rather than externally. We start to do this the moment that we get bored, confused or distracted. If your attention switches from the the external world (your customer) to the internal world ( your personal youtube channel) you are failing to listen.

5 Prejudice: We all hold opinions about other people, we like some people more than we like others,we have views on their jobs, their working methodologies and their capabilities. If you find yourself having an internal conversation about a customer during your sales call you are simply not listening to them.

If you ever wondered what gives someone real presence on a call or in a meeting, what makes them memorable and engaging, well the secret to having presence is simply this; Be Present. Don’t go anywhere else in your mind catch your self before you drift into an internal dialogue, and you will notice that your customers will talk more and share more just because you are present. This is one of those sales hacks that is simple in theory but needs a practice and discipline to master. It’s important because you may only get one chance to listen to a customers needs.

I have just listened to 35 sales calls from a team of recruitment advertising executives.

Selling recruitment advertising is a tough gig. The market is hugely competitive and the products have increasingly become commoditized. There are relatively few points of differentiation between the products, the client base is constantly shifting and every recruiter is suffering from a serious bout of sales fatigue. When a recruitment sales person calls they are often just part of the daily static. Like I say it can be a tough gig for even the most resilient of the species.
However I noticed that there was one simple thing, that more than half the sales people in my sample group just failed to do when they initiated the call. (so simple in fact that it is easily/often forgotten by even experienced sales people).
Calls would begin something like this;
Client: Hello David Jones speaking
Sales Person: Oh hello my name is Joe Smith and I’m calling from ACMEsoft………
Did you spot it?
More than half the people in my sample group failed to use the prospects name, even though they have provided it in their opening .
Our names have one simple function, they allow allow others to draw our attention. We cannot help but pay attention when someone uses our name. (Ever heard your name uttered at the other side of the office? You cannot help but take notice!) Not using the clients name (especially when they have tacitly given you permission to do so in their salutation) is just dumb.
Using a customers name gets their attention for a few precious seconds, failure to do so means you are already on the back foot.
Oh and we live in the 21st century now, people are more likely to be suspicious if you overly formal in your salutation, so unless your customer is over 60 and working in an arcane civil service department there is really no need for Mr Jones. The only people who call me Mr Kenny are the AOL call centre and the Police neither of whom I want to have much to do with)
I know that this is a simple hack and an obvious one but it is so obvious that only about 50% of people remember to do it.