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Raise The Bar

As a professional sales person, you should always be stretching yourself towards continuous improvement. To determine where you stand in relation to the Super Star Salesperson, take the following quiz.

Grade yourself on each category/activity, based on the following:
3= I’m doing this now, consistently.
2= I’m doing this now, occasionally.
1= I don’t do this now, but am willing to start.
0= I’m not interested in doing this.

Even if you are the consummate sales professional, the only hope of staying at the top of your game is ongoing and continuous improvement. As you read through and complete this quiz, look to identify how and where you can take your business actions and performance to an even higher level. As is true so often on tests of this nature, we will identify several things we already know, and in fact were once doing yet are doing them no longer. Use this exercise as the catalyst to reinvent yourself and your business!

GOALS
___Have a written one-year plan.
___Have a tracking and reporting system to monitor performance to plan.
___Incorporate life goals beyond pure business goals.
___Know the daily/weekly/monthly actions necessary to reach key objectives.
___Start off each day with a detailed to-do list.
___Follow a disciplined time management system.
___Have the necessary patience, realizing superstar results come from a process not an event.

MARKETING
___Try new and innovative marketing ideas.
___Understand and implement an effective “perception of value” campaign.
___Have an ongoing “touch system” to stay visibly in front of my market.
___Evaluate my competition to gain and implement new, winning ideas.
___Spend at least 50 percent of my time each week talking with prospects, customers, and clients.
___Seek out and develop niche markets to expand my marketing and business reach.

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT
___Approach new markets and new business sources regularly.
___Identify a “Prospect Basket” of candidates to do new business with, and weekly pursue a specific quantity, inclusive a proactive follow-up.
___Practice “Model the Masters”, by brainstorming with other superstar sales professionals in your business.
___Be actively involved in both trade associations and community groups to ensure visibility.

CUSTOMERS FOR LIFE
___Calculate the lifetime value of your customers.
___Be selective in whom you work with, and manage your time accordingly.
___Maintain a database of standard form letters for typical customer contact points.
___Provide value added suggestions, ideas and tools to help your database be more successful, and enhance your relationships.

REFERRAL BUSINESS
___Create the “Great First Impression”. Make it easy for first time customers to be enthusiastic about referring business opportunities to you.
___Have a formal plan and process for asking for referrals at different stages where appropriate.
___Refer business to your clients whenever possible.

ENTREPRENEUR BEHAVIOR
___Treat your book of business as if it were a business.
___Invest in your business and marketing efforts, don’t wait for the company to do so.
___Stay focused on business creating activities.
___Seek out a mentor to help you reach the next level.
___Master your key products and services.
___Attend industry conferences, seminars, and maintain a regular industry reading program.

CULTURE FOR SUCCESS
___Align oneself with top professionals and a company with a solid reputation.
___Maintain ongoing recognition systems for:

1. Prospects, customers, clients,
2. Fellow sales associates, and
3. Sales support team.

___Focus on key revenue generating activities, delegating as much admin activities
to support personnel/assistants.
___Leverage the company resources as further support to your business.
___Maintain a practice of “under-promise”, “over-deliver” in daily business activities.

SCORING:
Add your total of the above criteria. If you scored 85-105, congratulations on your superstar performance and direction. Ensure you review this key activity indicator and work on your areas where improvement is indicated. A score of 60-85 suggests an acceptable direction towards sales professionalism, however there remain a good number of areas for improvement and opportunity. Pick two-three specific activities to focus on for improvement. Once implemented, return to this indicator and choose additional areas for improvement. A score below 60 is a wake-up call, and suggests an overall relook and rework of your activities and commitment to excellence in the sales profession. Use this quiz as your starting point, and begin to implement more of the activities that are reflective of those in the selling profession we recognize as SUPERSTARS!*

Thursday, October 27th, 2011
“Teams” win championships – not coaches or star players. What are you doing to build each individual into a stronger performer, and a more valuable contributor to the sales team?
Our goal here is to enhance your effectiveness as a builder of strong sales people. You can coach them to success!

“Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.” – Calvin Coolidge

Our job as sales leaders is not to grow sales – our job is to grow salespeople. And then it’s their job to grow sales.

While it is true that our success is ultimately measured on sales levels, we personally aren’t going to make that happen. Our job, then, is to help salespeople be better at what they do. We need to coach them.

By “Coaching” we are talking about field coaching – hands-on and in competitive situations. Think about the impact a basketball coach has during the game, compared to after the contest.
While the “after the game” sales meeting is important, it’s working in the field with salespeople that holds forth our greatest opportunity. We see a sales leader working with salespeople on three types of calls:

1) Training call – Here the sales manager takes the lead during the call to show how it should be done. Other than being introduced to the prospect or client, the salesman is essentially a silent observer.After demonstrating “how-to”, the sales leader debriefs after each call. “What went right” and “What went wrong” are thoroughly discussed, so that the salesman can see the dynamics involved.

2) Joint call – A sales manager and salesman both participate in these calls. Each person contributes appropriately; and often these calls are used in re-establishing a relationship or introducing the sales leader to customers.
Joint calls also are effective for gathering information about market activity, the competition, and individual customer wants and needs. How well your company is meeting those needs can be ascertained on a joint call.

3) Coaching call – In these instances the sales leader plays the role of an observer, and the salesman conducts the call. The introduction of the manager usually should be done in a low-key manner. If he or she is unknown to the prospect, simply introduce the manager as an associate of the salesman.

On coaching calls the sales manager learns the most about how a sales person performs on his or her day-to-day calls. As a result, it is where the sales leader can offer the most. But that is true only if the coaching call is conducted properly – and often that is tough for the sales leader to do. Even if the sales person is “blowing it”, it is critical that the call be conducted solely by the sales person. After the first coaching call, the salesperson will usually want to know how he or she did. But sales managers must resist doing a debriefing at this time. Instead, suggest that 5 or 6 more calls be made. Once they are all completed, the sales leader should sit with the salesperson and debrief.

Identify those things that went well, and share them with the salesperson. Also identify what could be done better.

Rather than weighing down the sales person with too many suggestions, pick one or two that hold the greatest opportunity to increase his or her success. Discuss these two items thoroughly, suggesting specific actions for improvement. You can’t be helpful if you don’t know what’s going on in the field. It’s not a control issue – it’s an information issue. Get in the practice of taking notes on each account executive you work with.

Start accumulating information about the account executive and his or her customers and prospects. Let each salesperson know your purpose – to help them grow professionally, and to grow their production.
Before You Start-Two basic points are important to make before going on sales calls with salespeople:
Fundamental One-Give plenty of advance notice. Surprise visits to the field are not appreciated by your sales team, as that implies a lack of trust. Set up your schedule at least a week in advance.
Fundamental Two-Go with a plan. Don’t say to the salesperson, “Well, what should we work on this time out?” Instead, review your prior notes, current production, and call report- and then state where you think it best to focus. Always solicit feedback and agreement from the salesperson. Remember that if you demonstrate that you are doing your homework; salespeople will be more prone to do theirs.

Let’s build on those fundamentals by establishing some guidelines to help keep your calls focused:
1) Begin by reiterating the objective of the day’s calls. Be sure to show how your current objectives will fulfill the salesperson’s overall game plan.

2) Build on the last coaching session. Review with the salesperson what you each agreed upon, and what got completed during the previous call. See if anything needs to be changed or discussed before setting out.

3) Let the account executive do the scheduling. If you are being “set up” with calls only to his or her best customers, you will know soon enough- and can correct accordingly.

4) Agree on the type of calls. Will they be training? Joint? Coaching?

5) Make the first call as positive as possible. Your presence increases the tension, so make this as easy as you can for the salesperson.

6) Before each call, ask about the purpose. There should be a specific goal on every call, and a specific approach for each one. Know it before hand, so you can better asses the call later.

7) Practice being a keen observer. Develop a mental checklist of what you are looking for, so you can avoid taking notes during calls. Make quick bullet notes in the car between calls. Focus on the primary changes to be suggested.

The list could include:

• Greeting
• Questions salesperson asked
• Questions prospect asked
• Percent of time talking versus listening
• Use of benefit statements
• Ask for business

Remember your purpose, and never take over a call. If you do that, your relationship with the salesperson is on the way to destruction. Your primary reason for being there is training; not seeing how much can be sold.

8) At the appropriate time, depending on the type of call, describe what you observed. But remember-

• Focus on one or two specific items
• Let the account executive talk
• Agree on what can be done differently

9) At the end of the day, get overall agreement on what the account executive is to do and what you will do to help. Write it down. When giving feedback to the salesperson, ask yourself: What do I want to communicate? Where do I want to focus suggested changes? How can I communicate this information so that the salesperson will be receptive to it? What specific solution or goal may I offer, and how may I assist the recipient to achieve his or her goal.

THE IMPORTANCE OF A GOOD CORPORATE CULTURE
Wednesday, October 26th, 2011

This is just a thought that I’d like to pass on to my fellow business entrepreneur and owners of businesses. I often talk about the importance of culture in our company. Creating an environment in our business where the people who work in our business don’t get up in the morning and say oh gosh I gotta go to work, but rather they get up in the morning and say hot damn I get to go to work at that company.

If we as business owners could create that kind of an environment, we’d have a competitive, sustainable advantage. Now if you’re looking at this message here today, you start to think of it in a corporate fashion. I wanna challenge you in a different way to think of it in a local fashion. You can go from one fast food restaurant to another fast food restaurant to another fast food restaurant. You can do that in the same community, and they can have the same company. And each one of those three locations your experience would be entirely different from place to place.

I’ve gone in, and the people have greeted me enthusiastically. I’ve gone in and they pretend like I don’t exist. I have seen all different types, and so what are we doing inside our organizations to make sure that we have consistency amongst our culture? And I use the fast food restaurant, because it’s an easy one as an example, but now I wanna drill it even further down and say I wanna have a consistent culture amongst my sales people such that the people are customers. It’s irrelevant almost who they deal with, because whoever they deal with it is exceptional in terms of the way they’re treated.

Because if you treat your prospects and customers in an exceptional experience fashion, referral business, repeat business comes to you in droves. Now I have a difficult time distinguishing between customer service and sales, because I think that if you do a good job on one, the other one’s gotta be good as well. And so great customer service, probably great sales. Great sales, probably great customer service.

What’s yours like in your company, and what are you doing to make it great, memorable, and a great experience for repeat and referral business? This is Jack Daly with another thought shooting at you today.

ENERGIZE TO OPTIMIZE
Tuesday, October 25th, 2011

We can’t expect different behavior than what we offer as an example. “We are the message” in our companies.

Business leaders today must develop ways to thrive during times of constant change. Below are ten specific actions designed to gain peak performances from our most important resource- our employees.
Never before have we seen companies put so much pressure on their employees to work long and hard. John Hinrichs, president of the consulting firm Management Decision Systems, observes that “10 or 15 years ago we used to talk about job enrichment. Now we talk about job engorgement.”

Reasons for this stress-inducing tendency include:

• Corporate restructurings which have wiped out layers of managers without reducing the amount of work they used to do;
• New technologies – which eventually will lessen the need for supervision – currently are causing tough transitions for managers and employees;
• Increased competition coming from both large, efficient players and niche opportunists.

Our challenge as leader/mentors is two-fold. First we must energize our associates so they can optimize their performance now. Secondly, we need to maintain balance and perspective in our own lives in order to have a proper working relationship with our associates.

YOU ARE THE MESSAGE

Communication is based more on action than on words. If we come in Monday morning out of sorts, walk straight to our office without saying “hello” to anyone, and then shut the door – in what manner will our associates answer the phone that morning? We can’t expect different behavior than what we offer as an example. “We are the message” in our companies.

Here are the ten things to think about, and then proactively implement. If you think some of these ten “energizers” need to come from the top of your organization to be successful, we remind you that leaders start where they are. Do these on your own, and then see what happens around you.

1 – Energizers set direction for their units by writing quarterly mission statements. As part of this process, the team commits to established values. Enthusiasm is generated within departments as they formulate their shared missions. Revising those statements quarterly rekindles that energy and commitment, while also providing an opportunity for each person to develop appropriate short-term goals.

Planning is value is in the process, more than in the plan itself. Once your associates have “bought in” to your shared mission, you’re on your way to success!

2 – Energizers truly listen and thus are plugged in to reality. They are both open and inquisitive, and their search for ideas is never-ending and boundless. Useful suggestions come from competitors, suppliers, customers, front-line associates, trade groups, and your own mentors.

Don’t assume that listening is one of the things you do best. Our booked calendars, busy travel schedules and constant phone calls don’t help us become better listeners. And as an opportune occasion for listening occurs, too often we are talking. So ask yourself, “How much time did I spend truly listening?” Good listeners practice “zero-based thinking,” which requires that we forget the way we’ve always done things, and instead look at situations in new light.

One way to judge how much we value input is to figure the amount of time we spend in our offices, sitting safely behind our own desks. But energy new ideas emanate from where things are happening. Most of us thus need to spend more time in the field. You can start this process by talking with your customers, and then acting on their suggestions.

3 – Philosopher John Gardner refers to what he terms “tough-minded optimism.” Energizers possess such a spirit, which combines hope and realism as the driving forces in building a business. Again, focusing on customer needs helps make this happen. A leader is more interested in serving his customer than in worrying about what the board of directors will think.

“If it’s meant to be, it’s up to me” is the rallying cry for energizers who nevertheless remain prudent and balanced. They are neither foolish dreamers nor impassioned extremists. Instead, leaders are positive cheerleaders who each day provides a message of optimism for those they work with.

4 – Energizers are forever thinking about and articulating their company mission and values. At least once a year give a speech reinforcing what you and the company stands for. Nearly every successful leader relates the concern of repeating the same message too often. Yet his or her supporting team usually feels they can’t hear such a message often enough. Providing an over-all mission statement helps each unit to construct its own specific mission.

Studies have shown that 74 percent of employees rank information sharing as very important, whereas only half of all executives felt this was what their associates wanted.

5 – Where procedure manuals give rules, company stories offer morals. “Storytelling’s power is timeless,” says author Tom Peters. “The marketplace is demanding that we burn the policy manuals and knock off the incessant memo writing; there’s just no time. It also demands we empower everyone to constantly take initiatives. It turns out stories are a – if not, the – leadership answer to both issues.”

Stories which in a simple manner describe “who we are and what we do” influence thinking and action more than procedure manuals do Storytelling is one of the oldest forms of communication, and the energizer turns it into a powerhouse management tool which works in both large and small companies.

6 – Energizers are bureaucracy busters. “It’s no wonder we manage our way to economic decline,” says Stanley Davis. “Our managerial modes don’t suit today’s business. We are still using the model GM founder Alfred Sloan developed for organizing corporate America back in the Twenties. As a result we have industrially-modeled organizations running post-industrial businesses.”

Energizers know the value of the motto, “If it’s not broke, break it.” They work outside normal rules, and thus stand out in the eyes of customers and their own associates. By unleashing your creativity, you can spark the energy within your organization. Even simple changes can mean a great deal to your unit or company.

7- Great benefits can be found in delegating without abdicating. Remain accountable for your group, but don’t allow a decision to be made at a higher level in the organization than it needs to be. Your associates know the daily specifics of their jobs better than you do. Foster an environment in which they design their function in a framework consistent with the company mission and values.

8 – Energizers understand the Pygmalion Effect. People usually accomplish what they believe they are expected to do. If we have high expectations as leader / mentors, our associates probably will show excellent productivity.

Ambitious expectations are built by energizers who believe in their own abilities to train and motivate their associates. Simply being demanding is insufficient. Your associates actually will rise to the level of your trust, or fall to the level of your mistrust.

9 – Energizing and leading people are more powerful than managing a process. By building trust with associates and customers, a leader / mentor puts together the team described in his or her mission statement.

Effective leaders usually are appreciated for their interpersonal skills, rather than for their managerial abilities. People care more about what’s in a manger’s heart than about what is in his or her head.

10- An energizer surrounds himself with associates who are positive and realistic, rather than negative.
A “can-do” attitude characterizes the energized leader / mentor it is seen in the unwillingness to take “no” or “it’s never been done before” for an answer.

To make this possible, an energizer’s mission statement should include minimum production standards and continual training of staff. You also should spend most of your time assisting your best producers, rather than motivating and supervising marginal performers. Good recruiting practices are the basis of a productive office.

In addition, consider hiring an administrator to handle your routine paperwork, so that most of your efforts can be given to increasing production.

The characteristic of energizers which moves organizations to their highest levels of performance is that of a dreamer. Fred Smith’s college term paper was graded “impractical” – but he used it as the basis for building Federal Express. Steven Jobs acted on his dream of having personal computers in every home and classroom.

Energizers mange their dreams; and each of us has a like capacity with regard to our business. If we resist change, we will only fall further behind. If we merely go along with change, then we will just keep pace with it. But if we create change, we will be the ones who lead it.

BENEFITS, NOT FEATURES.
Monday, October 24th, 2011

I’m just back from a visit with a client of mine where I just finished making a presentation, and I just had to share this with one with you. One of the points that I was trying to make about good selling was ask questions and listen. Another way of putting that, when you care more about your customer than you do about the sale, you’ll tend to sell more than anyone else out there. So it’s all about discovering needs, opportunities, and problems with our clients so that we can help them in their businesses in some better way. And therein we will end up getting more of their business.

In effect when we’re providing a solution to those needs, opportunities, and problems, it isn’t all about this is what we can do for you but rather how it’s going to benefit the customer. The customer doesn’t care about how you do what you do. What we really care about as customers is how we’re going to benefit. And so that was the essence of the presentation. After I was finished, my client then got up in front of all their prospects and then proceeded to show up and throw up with a bunch of PowerPoint slides on all of the things that they do and how they go about doing it and not enough about the benefits.

Ask yourself this question. Are you in the field talking about how the customer will benefit as a result of your relationship, or are you just telling them everything that you do? Thought for the day.

DEFINE SUCCESS BEFORE YOU DESIGN IT
Friday, October 21st, 2011

GOAL SETTING TACTICS

1. Identify “where you are”, your baseline. One can’t begin moving in the right direction until one knows where one is at the present. An effective analogy is to imagine wanting to travel coast to coast. If you didn’t know which coast you were starting from, the journey could be a long and wet one as you started out with just a destination in mind. As well, knowing where you are helps you determine what will be necessary for you to get to the destination.

2. Identify “where you want to be”, your end state goal. Putting this in writing is a must, otherwise we call this dreaming, not goals. Dreams don’t often come true, but goals in writing do. We call this “backward thinking”, determining the end zone and charting back to the present. It’s how you organize your view of the future that determines what the future is.

3. I’ve heard a number of folks employ the acronym SMART effectively here. The “S” is for Specific. The key is to break down each of our goals into bite size chunks that will lead to getting the goal accomplished. One of my goals is to run a marathon (yea, 26.2 miles) in each of the 50 states. I have further broken this down to 4 per year, and went on to identify the specific 4 for each year. Specificity!

4. Next is “M”easureable. Inspect what you expect, with a minimum of a monthly review of results compared to plan. Some of the key candidates here for a sales professional include: phone calls (inbound/outbound), personal visits, presentations, proposals, orders taken, etc.

5. “A”ttainable is next on the list. Challenging, yes, but reachable, otherwise we risk the goals being de-motivating. This I call the reality test. If you are the #10 ranked salesperson in the company, probably not attainable to be #1, at least in a one year timeframe!

6. “R” is for Realistic, and often this comes down to timeframes. Time blocking and scheduling are the keys to effective implementation. Scheduling your activities is essential to goal attainment.

7. “T” is for Trackable, which underscores the necessity for the activities necessary to accomplishing the goal be something which can be tracked and reported on. For many years I have effectively used the simple calendar, in which I record daily activities related to each of my goal action items, then summarize monthly and compare month-to-month results, as well as year-to-year performance on applicable items.

8. Too many in business think of goals in terms of only business. Broaden your thinking to personal/life quality goals. I once heard Dennis Waitley put this so well: “Most people spend more time planning Christmas and holidays than they do planning their life”. Make your goals multi-dimensionable.

9. Accountability. This is where one turns the heat up on oneself. Share your goals with people you respect and care about, and establish a system to review your performance with them and garner feedback. This review process should be minimally quarterly. I make it a regular practice of giving my goals to my 2 adult children, my wife, and my 2 business partners, for each to review my progress quarterly. Talk about pressure!

10. Once the goals are in writing and a system in place to help get the results, identify a few goals that are 1) non-negotiable, 2) most difficult and 3) most important. This will further emphasize the focus, and Focus Precedes Success.

IF YOU STUMBLE, GET BACK UP.
Thursday, October 20th, 2011

I’m in another portion of my workout room. And I was just reflecting as I was working out on this gear that’s hanging up here, particularly this cast. Very reminiscent of a couple years ago when I fell off my bike and injured myself in a substantial way. Concussion, broken collarbone. I’ve got six pins up here in a metal plate and 17 stitches in my head, some broken ribs. And the very next day after the accident, I found myself in this workout center here in my home on my stationary bike over here making sure I didn’t lose my fitness, because I was in the throws of preparing for an Ironman race. And disappointingly, I wasn’t able to get into the next Ironman race, because my doctor benched me because the arm wasn’t able to stretch and pull the water through. But the very next Ironman that was available I was in and successfully completed it. So here’s the question from a business standpoint. When you get knocked down, when you get that objection as a sales person, when you get thrown under the bus and lose a big client, you’re one of three people bidding on a job and you don’t succeed, what do you do next day? What do you do in the next hour? Do you get back on the stationary bike?

Do you get back on the apparatus of success and sales or do you moan, groan, and take you forever to get back into the game? What I’ve learned about top producers in sales is they get right back at it, and they’re even looking to improve over the prospect or client that they may have lost in the battle at that moment in time. So here’s the deal. Get back on the bus. Go look for new business regardless of how many times or the pain of rejection. I wish you good selling.

CULTURE IS KEY
Wednesday, October 19th, 2011

Quick, but important update today. Any time you think that culture doesn’t make a difference in your business, I got news for you. The littlest things really do add up. Recently my wife and I and my sister were in Austin, Texas, and we were headed into a Denny’s to grab a quick breakfast, and it was just down the stadium from where the Longhorns play. And as we walked into the door, all of the people that were waiting on people at tables yelled out good morning! And all throughout our breakfast that took place with every person that came into the place.

Well there was a decent line for breakfast waiting, and I gotta tell you something. No matter when I’m back in Austin, I’m going to make a point to go out of my way just to have those folks scream out good morning, and that attitude conveyed all the way through our entire visit. What a difference a great culture makes for your business. How’s yours in your business?

THE HIGHEST PAYOFF ACTIVITIES
Tuesday, October 18th, 2011

I’ve got something that I’d like to consider, and that is are you working on the highest pay-off activities that you could be working on. Now, here’s a system that I’ve put into place that’s really simple. About three times a day, call it 10:00 in the morning, 1:30 in the afternoon, 4:00 in the afternoon, I’ll stop for a moment, look at what I’m working on, and ask that question… “Is this the highest pay-off activity that I could be working on right now?”

You see what happens to us with all of the noise that’s out there whether it’s e-mails or snail mail or voicemails or live phone calls or any number of people dropping in on you and your business. When you started in the morning, you probably had a list of all the things that you wanted to do that day that were probably high pay-off activities in garnering new business. And then the crises of the day come in and get in the way.

So about three times a day get in the habit of asking yourself is what I’m working on the highest pay-off activity that I could be working on. I will tell you this. The top ten percenters in sales are laser-focused on the activities that are gonna generate them new business, big business from their existing customers, and winning new customers. We need to get a little bit of that going for us.

SALES SUCCESS SUMARY
Monday, October 17th, 2011

FOR AN INCREASE IN SALES READ THIS!
1. Each sales person should list their top 30 prospects in the order of priority. In the next column, indicate the status of the account and what has been the sales prospecting activity over the prior 90 days. In the next column, list the top hurdles in the way of winning over the account, and some possible cures to leap the hurdles. Next comes a column of targeted timeline for the win. The last column on this analysis should indicate next action steps-the who will do what, by when column.

2. For those that really want to see business jump up, take the above approach with existing customers and clients, making sure to look at other locations and product lines that can be won over with those all important “inside referrals”.

3. Role practice. Now that you have the activities identified as to what’s needed, we suggest role practicing each scenario as if the desired appointment is indeed obtained. One person in the role practice will be the sales person, one will be prospect, and one will be observer. Suggest doing each scenario three times, with each individual wearing a different hat. This should cut down on the surprises and add to the confidence level on the real calls. On the pro golf tour, the pros try to draw on as many shots as possible from their practice and memory stores, such as “I’ve been here before, this is how I hit this one”. To get top results, they certainly aren’t “winging it”.

4. To top things off, how about a short term contest? If you are the CEO/business owner/Sales Manager, step up with a 60 days duration contest with a couple solid prizes tied to results. If you are doing this on an individual salesperson level, set a special reward for yourself upon accomplishment of some predetermined result.

Tips to Increase Sales and Profits

• Be unique – from reception to voice mail.
• Never make a call without a purpose.
• Ask questions and listen.
• Selling is the transfer or trust.
• Never quote price until you establish value.
• Goals not in writing are dreams.
• People like to buy, not be sold. Help them buy.
• Trust trumps price all day long.
• Things that get measured get done.
• The best sales people are canned. Don’t wing it.
• Model the masters. Learn from the best.
• People are different. Sell accordingly.
• We are what we think we are. Raise the bar!