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Your prospect has to buy you before he can buy from you. Likability helps, but isn’t key. Sure, if you’re a nice guy I’m more likely to buy my cup of coffee from you in the morning, but if I have to make a significant investment likability isn’t enough. I have to trust you. I [...]

A good sales person is prepared for every call. A good sales person is prepared for anything. Sales  is all about sharing information, and you have to have the right information, because being without it is like being blind. It’s like driving a car at night without your lights on. You are doomed to fail.

Sales training is great. It teaches skills and produces immediate results. But, unfortunately sales training only truly changes behavior long-term if there is accountability.  The ASTD (American Society for Training & Development) says that only 19% of people who receive one-time sales training see any kind of sustained performance improvement.

I work because I have to, but I work in sales because I choose to. To me it is the most enjoyable field to work in. Why? I’m a people’s person. I love dealing with people and I much prefer it to analysing spread sheets all day for instance.  I’m also a very competitive person. [...]

The Duke of Wellington close in sales, is named after the first duke of Wellington, who was the English commander in chief who defeated Napoleon in the battle of Waterloo. The Duke was known for being a great leader and a great strategist. He rarely showed emotion in public, he was a man of logic. [...]

Someone walked into my office the other day and tried to sell me a charity subscription. It was one of those donation plans that automatically take money from your account every month. The moment I saw the salesman I got excited. It’s been a while since someone tried to sell me something and I always [...]

In the end, sales is about closing deals. Just like football is about scoring. But just like in football, sales is not just about scoring, you have to have a good strategy and you have to understand you opponent or prospect. But when it comes to scoring, there are some incredibly nifty techniques that help [...]

Selling to consumers is fun. There is not as much pressure, you usually don’t have to work late and closing a deal usually doesn’t require as much effort. B2B is where the pressure is at. Long days, high targets and a lot of hard work to get the deal in are part of the job [...]

I once made a big upsell while I was training one of my sales reps. The rep had been with us for a few months, but I would still accompany him on appointments every now and then, because he was struggling to hit his targets. Why was he struggling? Because he didn’t understand the importance [...]

Retail is different to most other type of sales. In some ways it’s easier because people are actively looking for something and they’re already in the buying mood. All you have to do is wait for people to walk through the door. Some people who work in retail don’t really see it that way. Maybe [...]